Ed Vickers QC successfully appeals Life Sentence in Court of Appeal

June 13, 2022

On 8 June 2022, Ed Vickers QC successfully represented W in The Court of Appeal, overturning a High Court Judge’s sentence imposed for murder at Cambridge Crown Court in December 2021.

In a tragic case, V was violently attacked in 2006 by W (then aged 17) and another, receiving traumatic brain injury which left V in a permanent vegetative state. W pleaded guilty to s18 GBH at the time and received a sentence of Imprisonment for Public Protection (IPP), with a minimum of 42 months to serve before the Parole Board could consider release. W served just short of 6 years in prison before being released. When V died 13 years later due to illness as a consequence of the original injury, W and his original co-accused were charged with Murder. W pleaded guilty after expert reports were obtained to investigate the cause of death, and in December 2021, received a Life Sentence with a minimum term to serve of 9 years.

On Appeal, the Court, presided over by Lord Justice Fulford, agreed that W was entitled to have the full term served count towards his sentence (rather than just the 42 months of the original IPP) and accepted Ed’s submissions that the sentencing Judge had increased the notional term by too much and that the resulting term to be served was manifestly excessive. The Court reduced the term to be served to 7 years and 5 months.

Ed Vickers QC was instructed by Claire Thorneley of BDS Solicitors, Peterborough, and led Paul Evans of Red Lion Chambers in the proceedings before the Crown Court.