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LPC Law Notes Criminal Litigation Notes

Sentencing Appeals Notes

Updated Sentencing Appeals Notes

Criminal Litigation Notes

Criminal Litigation

Approximately 143 pages

A collection of the best LPC Criminal Litigation notes the director of Oxbridge Notes (an Oxford law graduate) could find after combing through dozens of LPC samples from outstanding students with the highest results in England and carefully evaluating each on accuracy, formatting, logical structure, spelling/grammar, conciseness and "wow-factor".

In short these are what we believe to be the strongest set of Criminal Lit notes available in the UK this year. This collection of notes is fully up...

The following is a more accessible plain text extract of the PDF sample above, taken from our Criminal Litigation Notes. Due to the challenges of extracting text from PDFs, it will have odd formatting:

Sentencing & Appeals

Sentencing

Which Court?
Magistrates Court or Crown Court (depending on offence)
Find Offence?
What did the defendant plead to? What was the defendant found guilty of?
Statutory Aggravating Factors?
s.143(1) CJA 2003 – the offender’s culpability and any harm caused – the courts will consider the sentencing guidelines to decide culpability and harm caused.
s.143(3) CJA 2003 – offending whilst on bail
s.145 CJA 2003 – racial or religious aggravation
s.146 CJA 2003 – hostility to disability or sexual orientation
Starting Point?
The court has a duty to follow the sentencing guidelines – identify the offence, its category and the starting point
Other Aggravating Factors?
See listed aggravating factors for the offence.
Always consider the following (page 356-357 of Permitted Materials):
Vulnerable victim
Abuse of position of trust
Value of items (sentimental or monetary)
Pre-meditation
Extent of injuries
Leading role in group attack
Public place
Targeting the victim
Mitigating Factors?
Credit under s.144 CJA 2003 for a guilty plea
Any other offender mitigation in relation to personal circumstances under s.166 CJA 2003
Remorse – guilty plea, Pre-Sentencing Report, letter of apology, repay goods.
Desperation
Provocation
Carer for disabled person or for children
Opportunistic
Motive for committing the offence
What Sentence?
Community Order
The court is likely to consider the offence to be not “so serious” as to require a custodial sentence (s.152 CJA 2003) because of [mitigating factors] but “serious enough” to warrant a community order (s.148 CJA 2003) because of [aggravating factors].
This sentence would comply with s.142 CJA 2003 which underlines the importance of punishing the defendant whilst still rehabilitating them.
Custodial Sentence
The court is likely to consider the offence to be “so serious” as to require a custodial sentence (s.152 CJA 2003) because of [aggravating factors]. Therefore, the threshold for a custodial sentence would have been passed and a community order would not have been enough to punish the defendant (s.148 CJA 2003).

Appeals

If the defendant pleads guilty then they cannot appeal against their conviction.
The defendant can appeal against their conviction (especially if they have not received any credit for their early plea under s.144 CJA 2003).
A notice of the appeal must be lodged within 21 days of the conviction or sentence setting out the nature and grounds for the appeal.
On appeal the court can confirm the sentence, increase the sentence to the maximum (statutory or magistrates maximum) or reduce the sentence.

Plea & Case Management

The PCMH is an administrative hearing and will be heard by the judge.
If no plea has been...

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