R v Shaquille Williams

LORD JUSTICE EDIS: Shaquille Williams is now 25 years old, having been born on 2 March 2000. On 1 November 2024 he pleaded guilty at the first possible opportunity before the Magistrates' Court to an offence of possession of a bladed article in a public place, contrary to section 139 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988. He was committed by the Magistrates' Court for sentence in respect of that case, pursuant to section 14 of the Sentencing Act 2020.

On 23 January 2025 in the Crown Court at Minshull Street in Manchester, His Honour Judge Neil Usher sentenced Mr Williams to a term of 16 months' imprisonment. Other orders were made which it is unnecessary to recite. He now applies for leave to appeal against that sentence, the application having been referred to the full court by the Registrar.

The first thing we should say is that this morning the CVP link to the prison where Mr Williams is held has not worked. That is a national failing in the system and we understand that the CVP system is down for an unknown and unforeseeable period of time. Mr James, who appears for Mr Williams before us and who appeared for him before the judge as well, made contact with him directly by telephone this morning at about 10.05 and obtained his instructions that the application could be dealt with in his absence if the link had not been established in time. We therefore heard the application. We heard Mr James making submissions in support of it and Miss Sumnall making submissions in response on behalf of the prosecution. While we were in retirement, after we had actually made the decision which we are about to announce, we were informed that an email has been received from the prison indicating that Mr Williams would in fact now wish the application to be adjourned so that it can be dealt with in his presence. We do not know how long any such adjournment would have to be. We do know that he is currently expecting to be released from his prison sentence, if it is unaltered, in May. We consider that in all the circumstances it is appropriate that we should proceed to determine this application. We have full submissions from Mr James, we have of course read all the material which has been presented to us in documentary form and we consider that we are well able to dispose of it. This judgment will in due course be transcribed and Mr Williams will be able to learn precisely how his case was dealt with. It is unfortunate that he cannot be present because of a technological failure but we are satisfied that no injustice will result to him from that fact.

As will become apparent, the nature of this application is such that it involves consideration of the offence-specific guideline for the offence for which Mr Williams was sentenced. The Registrar when referring the application to the full court said:

Given that the case was referred for that reason, and given that we have heard full argument, we consider that it would be appropriate to give leave in order that the decision of the court may acquire such authoritative status as it warrants.

We should first set out the circumstances of the offence. This occurred on 30 October 2024 near the Trafford Centre in Greater Manchester. The Trafford Centre is a very large shopping centre which will usually be thronged with people going about their business, shopping, going to restaurants and the like.

The appellant was stopped in a motorcar by the police in the car park. The reasons for the stop are immaterial to what we have to decide. There were four people in the car. The appellant was arrested by a police officer who asked if he had anything in his possession which he should not have. He said that he did not. He was searched and nothing was found. He was then searched more thoroughly and a knife was found tucked inside his boxer shorts. This was a fairly small knife but it was a sheath knife and we shall describe it a little further later in this judgment.

In interview the appellant at first said "no comment" but later explained to the police that in the past he had been himself stabbed on a number of occasions and that he carried the knife for protection. The judge in dealing with the factual basis of sentence said this:

Having taken a starting point from that range of 18 months' custody, the judge increased that sentence to one of two years' imprisonment because of the previous conviction which Mr Williams has (to which we shall turn in a moment). The judge allowed full credit for the very early guilty plea and addressed the question of whether that sentence of 16 months should be suspended, referring specifically to the imposition guideline. The judge relied on the conclusion expressed by the author of the pre-sentence report and said this:

The author of the pre-sentence report had indeed expressed that view which the judge there referred to.

So far as the previous convictions of this appellant are concerned, he was convicted on only one occasion prior to his appearance before the magistrates in this case. That was on 8 November 2019 where for two offences of possession of class A controlled drugs with intent to supply he received a sentence of detention in a young offender institution of 28 months concurrently on each. He had entered guilty pleas to those allegations.

It is also relevant to record that at the time when this offence was committed the appellant was on bail. He still awaits trial later this year for the offending which caused that bail to be granted.

The judge had a photograph of the knife. We have seen that. He also had a letter from the appellant's mother and we have read that too.

There are three grounds of appeal argued by Mr James.

The two guideline features which are referred to in those grounds of appeal and which were referred to by the judge in the sentencing remarks we have cited above, appear in the identification of features which would cause an offence to be categorised for guideline purposes as Category 1 for harm. There was no scope for disagreement in this case that this was a Category A case for culpability, the weapon involved being a knife and a very dangerous knife at that. The category A factor therefore has some additional weight over and above the mere fact that the weapon was a knife.

So far as Category 1 harm is concerned, two of the factors which arise in this case are as follows: "Offence committed at a school or other place where vulnerable people are likely to be present" and "offence committed in circumstances where there is a risk of serious disorder." As we have explained, the judge found that both of those were present and that resulted in the sentence which he imposed.

We have heard helpful submissions on behalf of the respondent about this case in particular and also about sentencing policy and the application of the guideline in a more general way. We are very grateful to both counsel for the clear and helpful way in which they have presented their respective arguments.

First, the weapon in this case did place the offence within Category A for culpability and in a way which warranted something of an increase above the necessary level of culpability involved in carrying any knife. This was a sheath knife with no domestic or industrial use. It is sometimes called a hunting knife, although nobody uses knives for that purpose in the Trafford Centre. In that context the knife is constructed in such a way as to represent a deadly weapon. It is not very large but no doubt was chosen in order that it could be easily concealed. It was dangerous. It was no doubt chosen and carried precisely because that is the case.

It appears that the appellant's case was that he habitually carried a knife because he always felt at risk from rivals from the criminal world whom he might encounter wherever he went. It does appear to be the case that he has indeed been attacked in the past and suffered wounds as a result of that. On this occasion when he travelled from Preston all the way to Manchester with his knife, the judge was entitled to sentence him on the basis that he went there looking for trouble or at any rate seriously concerned about the prospect of trouble and was armed quite deliberately for the purpose. That places the case abundantly within Category A for culpability.

Moving on to harm, we have had the benefit of the citation of some previous decisions on the points raised by this appeal. We do intend to say something about them but make the obvious point that every case, including this one, turns on its own facts. The guideline has to be applied flexibly by sentencing judges to the facts as they find them to be in the case which they are dealing with. We therefore deal only briefly with the cases which have been cited to us. The first is Manzeke [2019] EWCA Crim 1287. That was a case in which a young man was hanging around outside a primary school with a very large machete concealed about his person in order that he could sell drugs. The Court of Appeal said at paragraph 17:

Next, Akinjiola [2023] EWCA Crim 158, is a case which on its facts is somewhat more similar to the present than some of the other cases which have been cited. The scene of the fracas which resulted in that appellant being convicted of the offence was a restaurant where families were having their dinner. The court said this at paragraph 18:

Next, our attention was drawn to a decision in Dabin [2023] EWCA Crim 399. That was a case which was very different in its factual situation from the present. It involved brandishing a knife at a location where it was known that a young child was actually present. The person at whom the knife was brandished was not the child but the child's father. We do not derive very much assistance from the decision of the Court of Appeal in that case but we note in relation to ground 3 in the present appeal that the judge found that it would be wrong to suspend the sentence, saying the sentence cannot be suspended, "it will result in wholly inadequate punishment and it would not deter you or anybody else from similar behaviour in the future." The Court of Appeal Criminal Division agreed with that sentiment.

Finally, we were referred to a decision in Dunn [2024] EWCA Crim 1651 from last December. That however is a case in which the point before the Court of Appeal was totality, which is not something with which we are concerned and we shall say nothing more about it.

Turning then to the first of the two guideline category 1 harm factors which we are required to consider, we make these observations. All offences under this provision are committed in public places. It is one of the elements of the offence. All places to which the public has access are likely to be visited by vulnerable people from time to time. This cannot on its own justify placing some offences in a higher category than others because it applies to all offences. The guideline factor under consideration is, in our judgment, clearly intended to capture conduct where the offender has taken the knife to a school or other comparable place, such as a hospital or a care home or a place where it is known that children, old people or other vulnerable people have deliberately gathered, intending to create a risk that an incident will occur there which will cause harm to the vulnerable people found there. Hanging around outside a primary school selling drugs while carrying a machete (as in the decision in Manzeke) would appear to fall within that definition. In our judgment the Trafford Centre would not. It will however be noted that in the passages quoted from Manzeke and Akinjiola the Court of Appeal Criminal Division said that whether conduct fell within this guideline factor or not, the risk of harm to vulnerable people will always be a relevant aggravating factor. That this offence was committed by the carriage of a knife through crowds of families in a shopping centre can be reflected in that way.

The second of the two guideline factors relates to a risk of serious disorder. In our judgment this was plainly present here. At the point of arrest it appears that the appellant was in the process of leaving the shopping centre having visited it and perhaps had some breakfast, carrying, all the while, a knife. As we have indicated, the judge was entitled to deal with the case on the basis that he was anticipating that trouble may well occur and he was armed with a deadly weapon in case trouble crossed his path. That would involve all probability young men fighting with knives in public places. That form of serious disorder is a terrifying spectacle and one which creates risk of harm to bystanders. In our judgment on the facts of this case as explained and found by the judge, he was very well entitled to identify this Category 1 harm factor as being present. A case, of course, can be placed in a category even if only one of the factors is present, as was the case here.

That means that the judge's categorisation of the offence was appropriate and his starting point of 18 months also appropriate. He was in our judgment entitled to increase that starting point, as he did, to take account of the previous conviction to which he referred. The judge did not refer at this point to two particular further factors which also justified that uplift. The first of these is the fact that this offence was committed while on bail. The second is that on his own admission this appellant was a habitual carrier of a knife. It would appear that he went armed with a knife whenever he went out. The judge was therefore right to increase his sentence before giving full credit for the guilty plea (which was very early) of one-third to two years, bringing him to the sentence of 16 months which he imposed.

It remains to consider ground 3 which relates to the decision not to suspend the sentence. The judge specifically addressed the imposition guideline and decided that he could not suspend the sentence for the reasons which he gave. He was not satisfied that there was a real prospect of rehabilitation and was satisfied that there is a risk to the public from the behaviour of this appellant. Those conclusions were properly open to the judge on the facts and findings which we have referred to earlier in this judgment. In those circumstances, the conclusion which he reached that it was not appropriate, applying the guideline properly, to suspend the sentence was one which was undoubtedly open to him and in our judgment was also plainly right for the reasons which he gave. We note that that was unhesitatingly the conclusion of the Court of Appeal in the decision of Dabin to which we have also already referred, but decisions of this kind are not principally governed by previous decisions of this court but by proper application of the relevant guidelines, which is what occurred here.

For all those reasons, this appeal, for which we have given leave, is dismissed.