Can anyone offer advice on appealing a crown court sentence?

[Lostbeyondwords]

Just that really. Not my sentence, someone else's I do not agree with. I have tried to google it and believe it is "unduly lenient", I can see the process is to email the Attorney General with the case details and they will decide whether or not to pass it to the appeal court to look at.

But is that literally it? I don't want to do it wrong.

I do understand nothing at all may come of it, but need to be able to say I wasn't happy with it and at least tried.

Get in touch with your local CPS on Monday and ask to speak to the lawyer responsible for the case. Explain your views in a concise way. Are you a witness/victim/parent etc of victim? They will take you more seriously if you are in this class, rather than an interested observer. If you know the officer in the case, contact them too and say you want to appeal the sentence. The grounds for appeal are narrow but the timescales are short, so better to get in quick. Don't be fobbed off by reception/PA. Tell them you ar aware of short timescales and you are thinking about contacting the press in the absence of a quick response. Be nice but firm.
Good luck

You need the Attorney General, not the CPS, and trying to bully them with threats of contacting the press won't get you anywhere.

You need to give the Attorney General's office as much information as you can - the name of the person sentenced, the date sentence was passed, which court was involved, the crime and so on. That is genuinely all you need to do. Note, however, that the Attorney General will only get involved if the sentence is one that can be reviewed (which depends on the crime committed) and the sentence passed is significantly out of line with the relevant sentencing guidelines.

Thank you Granny I'm the parent of the victim. I have emailed the officer in charge this morning to let them know our feelings on it and why. It's not simply not liking the sentence, I think the judge dismissed some aggravating circumstances that should have been considered, as well as giving a very mixed judgement.

The sentencing was friday so I can give them a couple of days to get back to me. We've had three different people acting as prosecution over two court dates (two on friday as the first had to leave to go to another case so called a stand in!) so I wouldn't know who to ask for in that sense but the officer in charge of the case has been helpful so I've started with them.

prh47bridge the cps can also appeal though can't they? Though nobody mentioned it at the time so I'm not sure they're bothered.

Yes I see only some crimes and it is a sexual offence against a child which I see is covered but only some in that category and I don't know if this will qualify specifically. But I figured if I try and it works that's great, and if not, I have it a go.

the cps can also appeal though can't they

No they can't. All the CPS can do is refer cases to the Attorney General. The legislation is clear that only the Attorney General can appeal against sentence.

You may want to take a look at the sentencing guidelines for sexual offences. That may help you to see whether or not the sentence is unduly lenient.

No that's what I meant, that they can refer cases. I've looked at the guidelines in depth beforehand and since, thank you for the link though.

I contacted the AG direct in similar circumstances. You can just email them. They were very helpful and thorough. Ultimately the AG said in my case (I was the victim) the sentence was very lenient and other judges may have given a tougher sentence, but it was not so lenient as to be classed as "unduly lenient" - this is a tough legal hurdle to overcome. I got a very detailed 4 page response (I'd quoted the sentencing guidelines prh refers to above) so I felt they had taken the time to look at it properly. If you search you can download a spreadsheet with details of all the sentences they have reviewed which is interesting background.

Stats
www.gov.uk/government/statistical-data-sets/outcome-of-unduly-lenient-sentence-referrals

Details of scheme - just email with as much info as you can.
www.gov.uk/ask-crown-court-sentence-review

I should also add I was glad I had given it a go, I'd have always wondered otherwise.
Don't delay for too long, the AG only has 28days after sentencing to refer to CofA and you want them to have enough time to look at it properly. (The need to get case papers, court transcripts etc)

Finally thank you. I'm sorry you didn't get the outcome you were hoping for but I'm glad they gave you detailed reasoning on their decision. I didn't realise they did that. Being realistic I think our outcome will probably be similar. But it's not having to carry on with "what ifs" that will be better, whatever the decision.

Police have offered to get some feedback from cps for me but are supportive of appeal. A different outcome would be preferable but trying is enough.

Lost - I included lots of reference to the sentencing guidelines about why I disagreed with the judge's view on the harm and culpability levels (I thought it should have been a "higher" rating, which would have given a longer sentence option) - but the AG felt that the judge was not clearly wrong to rate it as he did. (I got the impression throughout their response that they thought the sentence was on the low side, but unfortunately not low enough to send to CofA)

Has anything been in the press? I worked with the police press officer on a press release after the sentencing (me saying how amazing the police had been) - it was all over his local press :-D (no identifying details for me of course) - in some ways that was the worst punishment for him!