R v Walad Abubakar

This appeal raises a short point about whether the appellant should have received a discount for his guilty plea larger than the 25 per cent he was in fact given.

The appellant was sentenced by His Honour Judge Del Fabbro at Snaresbrook Crown Court on 27 September 2024. The appellant had pleaded guilty, in circumstances to which we shall come, to a single offence of section 18 wounding with intent. The judge imposed an extended determinate sentence of 13 years, comprising a custodial term of nine years and an extension period of four years.

The underlying offence involved an attack by the appellant on the complainant, Jonathan Yates, who was living in the same multi-occupancy house for vulnerable individuals run by the local authority.

At around 7.00 am on 10 February 2024 the appellant knocked on Mr Yates' door. As soon as Mr Yates opened the door the appellant started stabbing him with a large kitchen knife. Mr Yates tried to defend himself and grabbed the knife. Mr Yates was able to break free and run down the stairs pursued by the appellant. The appellant caught Mr Yates just before the communal entrance and again repeatedly stabbed him. Mr Yates managed to stumble out into the road where he was assisted by members of the public and eventually by the ambulance service.

Mr Yates was found to have eight stab wounds to his chest, elbow, right abdomen, lower abdomen and back. He underwent emergency surgery where internal bleeding was dealt with and a stomach injury was sutured.

The appellant later disclosed to his psychiatrist that the knife he had used had been taken from the kitchen several days beforehand.

Within a few minutes of the incident the appellant was captured on CCTV footage leaving the premises with his hood up and carrying a bloodstained item of clothing. He then knelt down and apparently hid something in a nearby road. This was thought to be the knife used in the attack which was never recovered. The appellant then went to visit a friend in Luton where he washed his bloodstained clothing.

After his arrest, in a prepared statement, the appellant accepted stabbing Mr Yates and said that he was hearing voices telling him to stab Mr Yates at the time, and that he had acted like that because of his mental illness.

The appellant's first appearance at the Magistrates' Court was on 13 February 2024. The Better Case Management form records that mental health problems were identified. No plea was entered on that occasion. The appellant's solicitors instructed Dr Agarwal, a consultant forensic psychiatrist to report on fitness to plead. The matter was listed for plea and trial preparation hearing on 18 March 2024 but the appellant was not arraigned at that hearing because no psychiatric report was by that date available. Her Honour Judge Rosa Dean, the judge who presided at the PTPH, noted in the side bar on the DCS that the appellant was likely to be fit to plead "but D obtaining report".

Dr Agarwal reported on 18 March 2024. He concluded that the appellant was fit to plead (paragraph 6.3). He also said that the appellant met the criteria for a diagnosis of mental and behavioural disorder due to the use of multiple psychoactive substances (paragraph 6.3) and that his actions in attacking Jonathan Yates were under the influence of persecutory delusions triggered by the use of alcohol and cannabis because he was intoxicated at the time with alcohol and cannabis (paragraphs 6.22 and 6.13).

A further case management hearing took place on 1 May 2024. The appellant was arraigned. It was on that date that the appellant entered a guilty plea to the count of wounding with intent which was on the indictment as an alternative to attempted murder. The Crown accepted that plea.

The matter came before the court for sentence on 29 September 2024.

At the sentencing hearing the appellant's counsel invited the sentencing judge to allow full credit for the plea on the basis that the plea had been entered as soon as reasonably practicable after the psychiatric report was received. The judge declined to do so. In his sentencing remarks the judge confirmed that the appellant would have 25 per cent credit for, plea saying this:

The single ground of appeal advanced in this court is that the plea of guilty was entered as soon as fitness was determined so that the reduction should have been a third and not a quarter.

Mr Straddling, who appears for the appellant but was not his counsel below, relied on R v Murphy [2013] EWCA Crim 1951 where this court allowed an appeal, giving full credit for plea in circumstances where on the facts a proper and full view on fitness to plead could only be taken after a psychiatric report was obtained: see [16].

We have reminded ourselves of the Sentencing Council's Guideline on Reduction of Sentence for Guilty Plea which states at paragraph F1:

Although the judge was right to state the general principle that full credit is reserved for those who plead guilty at the first opportunity, there are exceptions to that general principle, as the Guideline indicates. One such exception is where it is not reasonable to expect the defendant to enter a guilty plea sooner than was done. In our judgment, this was such a case. The appellant's solicitors were investigating his fitness to plead. There were good reasons to do so given the circumstances of the attack and the appellant's own account that he was hearing voices at the time. It was not reasonable to expect him to enter his plea while those investigations were ongoing. Once his fitness to plead was confirmed by expert evidence, the plea was entered at the first available opportunity. In our judgment, the appellant should in these circumstances have full credit for his plea.

To correct the error, which we consider to be one of principle, we have taken the judge's starting point for the custodial element of the sentence which was 12 years, as to which there is no challenge. With a reduction of one-third that comes down to eight years. We therefore quash the nine-year custodial element of the sentence imposed by the judge and substitute a term of eight years' imprisonment. The remaining aspects of this sentence, including the four-year extension period, remain unaltered. That means that the total sentence is one of 12 years, comprising a custodial element of eight years and an extension period of four years. To that extent this appeal is allowed.