Ali Ahmed [2019] EWCA Crim 1183
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Ali Ahmed [2019] EWCA Crim 1183 concerned an appeal against a sentence of 13 years’ imprisonment imposed by His Honour Judge Smith at Maidstone Crown Court on 13 January 2017 for conspiracy to rob, which the Court of Appeal reduced to 11½ years.
The appellant, who was then aged 21, had pleaded guilty at a pre-trial review hearing on 12 January 2017. He was at the time a serving prisoner having been sentenced in July 2016 to four years’ imprisonment for two separate offences of street dealing in class A drugs and one week for a connected Bail Act offence; he had been on bail for one of those drugs offences at the time of the robbery. The judge had made the 13-year sentence concurrent with the drugs sentences.
The offence arose out of a planned attack on a traveller site at Wheat Gratton Stable Yard in Kent on 26 April 2016 at around 11.30 pm. More than seventeen men, wearing dark clothing and face masks or balaclavas and armed with crowbars, a baseball bat, a machete and knives, stormed the site hoping to find substantial quantities of money. They brought cable tie handcuffs to restrain victims. Mary Pownell was tied up with cable ties and threatened, suffering significant psychological harm; her husband Phillip was punched and tied up. Moses Smith, who came out of his caravan when alerted, suffered blows to the head and stab wounds to his arms and leg requiring hospital treatment; his wife and seven children were in the caravan. Gerry Connor, his partner Cheri Powell and their four children were attacked and tied up with cable ties. The occupants of the site eventually drove the attackers from the site by pursuing them and driving at their parked cars.
The attack involved groups from London, Essex and Sussex who came together to carry it out, with the communications hub being in Tunbridge Wells. The appellant was a representative of the London group. He travelled to Tunbridge Wells the day before the attack to meet others involved in the planning. The car he was using was involved in a reconnaissance journey to the site that day. He was involved in buying gloves, masks and demolition bars at B&Q on the day of the attack. A receipt for the purchase by others of cable ties, reinforced tape, torches and gloves was later found in the same car, which was abandoned after the attack.
The appellant’s relevant previous convictions were for robbery aged 17, for which he received a nine-month referral order, and the two drugs convictions mentioned above.
Judge Smith explained in his sentencing remarks that he drew no distinction between the roles of all those involved in the attack. He took account of the appellant’s youth and personal mitigation, noting that he had been brought up in difficult circumstances and had been drawn into offending by beginning to supply drugs. The judge, who had also been the sentencing judge for the drugs offences, noted an eloquent letter written by the appellant acknowledging wrongdoing and accepting responsibility. The judge took the appropriate sentence after a trial as 16½ years and reduced it by about 20 per cent to reflect the guilty plea, arriving at 13 years.
The appellant’s sentence came to the Court of Appeal after ten other participants in the same offence had successfully appealed in a judgment reported at R v Myers & Ors [2018] EWCA Crim 1552. In that judgment Treacy LJ had explained that the circumstances of the offence were of particular gravity and themselves justified taking a starting point above the top of the category range of 16 years, but that it was necessary to take some account of the different roles played by the appellants.
Mr Justice Popplewell, giving the judgment of the court, observed that useful comparisons could be made with two of the appellants in the earlier appeal, Jenks and Issah, both of whom had been convicted following a trial. Jenks was involved in the purchases prior to the attack and had been in touch before it with Myers, who was described as the communications hub for the planning and whose custodial term of 18 years was upheld. Jenks was aged 22 at the time and had had a difficult childhood. He had what was described as a limited record, involving a robbery aged 14, and had had no recent convictions since one in 2011 for shoplifting. His sentence was reduced from 16 years to 14 years. Issah was also aged 22 at the time of the offence. He took part in the reconnaissance but was not otherwise involved in the planning or organisation. He had no relevant previous convictions. His sentence was also reduced from 16 years to 14 years.
The court considered that the appellant was younger than both of those two and had significant personal mitigation. On the other hand, his involvement in the preparations prior to the attack itself was greater, his record was not as favourable, he was on bail when he committed the offence and a significant part of his sentence for the drugs offences was effectively forgiven by reason of the sentence for the attack being made to run concurrently.
The court concluded that a sentence of 16½ years after a trial for this appellant was manifestly excessive and that a sentence of 14½ years would have been appropriate. After credit of just over 20 per cent for his guilty plea, that fell to be reduced to 11½ years. The court therefore quashed the sentence of 13 years and substituted a sentence of 11½ years’ imprisonment. In short, the appeal was allowed and the sentence reduced by 18 months to reflect proper parity with co-defendants whose appeals had already succeeded.