Purchase, R. v

On 17 November 2005, this appellant was sentenced to two years' imprisonment. On 29 November 2006, he was transferred from Wormwood Scrubs Prison in London to Her Majesty's Prison Stanford Hill, a Category D open prison in Kent. He was last known to be present at the prison on the evening of 22 February 2007. Shortly afterwards it was discovered that he had escaped. At that time he had three months left to serve, his earliest release date being 17 May 2007.

He walked out of the prison on that date because it was his son's fifth birthday. His wife and children live in Poole in Dorset. He did not immediately go to Poole. He went to stay with friends. In circumstances which are not entirely clear, he sustained serious injuries in some sort of fight or assault. In due course he stole a car and drove it down to Poole. He held only a provisional licence.

He was arrested in Poole on 7 March 2007. He had therefore been absent from prison for 15 days or so. He claimed in interview (having initially made no comment) that he had escaped because his application for a transfer closer to his family had been turned down, so he took matters into his own hands.

On 20 April 2007, at Bournemouth Crown Court, he pleaded guilty to the single count of escape. He was sentenced to nine months' imprisonment to be served consecutively to the sentence to which we have already referred.

The authorities which have been decided on the appropriate level of sentence in this class of case divide roughly into two: cases like the present where a prisoner on his or her own escapes from custody and has some kind of personal pressure which persuades him or her to do so, and cases where professional criminals are assisted to escape by confederates outside (or sometimes even inside) the prison. The former category of case attracts sentences which are measured in months and the latter category in years.

In this class of case there are a number of factors which the courts have considered over the years in assessing where in the scale of months a particular case should fit. Was there planning or was this an impulse? Was there violence or damage caused? What was the reason for the escape? Did the offender surrender or make arrangements to surrender before he was caught? How long was he at large? What else did he do while he was at large?

In this case the court is prepared to accept that there was no great planning involved, albeit it is clear that the appellant must have known that he would have to commit crime in order to travel down to Poole from Kent. This was an open prison, and so there was no violence or damage necessary. The reason for the escape was a reason which is no doubt common to most prisoners who are worried about what is going on at home while they are in prison. In this case the further factor is put forward that, because of his move from London to Kent, it was more difficult for his wife to visit him. He was at large for just over a fortnight, but he made no attempt to surrender, albeit it is contended on his behalf that he intended to do so at some time. He did, in fact, commit crime in order to achieve his ultimate objective of travelling down to Poole.

A number of authorities have been cited by counsel to us, and there are a large number of others, all of which we have considered. In particular counsel refers to R v Banks-Nash [2007] 1 Cr App R(S) 18, in which the appellant escaped from prison and was at large for 188 days before he was arrested for shop-lifting. His motive, which the court accepted, was that he was genuinely in great fear of gang violence to him in prison connected with drugs. In that case the court reduced a sentence of twelve months' imprisonment to nine months. In addition, the older case of R v Clarke (1994) 15 Cr App R(S) 825 was cited to us. In that case the appellant escaped for family reasons (coincidentally concern about a 5 year old son). He had made arrangements before his arrest to give himself up some days later, but he was in fact arrested before that date on which he had arranged to surrender himself. In that case a sentence of twelve months was reduced to six. There is no record in the report of that case of his committing offences whilst at large.

We have considered this case carefully. The judge's sentencing remarks are brief. In the result we can find nothing to criticise in the length of sentence. This appeal is therefore dismissed.