R v Adel Khalaf

The provisions of the Sexual Offences (Amendment) Act 1992 apply to these offences. Under those provisions, where an allegation has been made that a sexual offence has been committed against a person, no matter relating to that person shall during the person's lifetime be included in any publication if it is likely to lead members of the public to identify that person as the victim of the offence.

On 7 May 2025, following a trial before the Teesside Magistrates' Court (Youth Court) the appellant was convicted of the following offences: rape, contrary to section 1 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 (offence 1); disclosing private sexual photographs and films with intent to cause distress, contrary to section 33(1) and (9) of the Criminal Justice and Courts Act 2015 (offence 3); sexual assault on a female, contrary to section 3 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 (offence 4); and possession of indecent photographs of a child, contrary to section 160(1), (2A) and (3) of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 (offence 5). He was committed to the Crown Court for sentence, pursuant to section 16 of the Sentencing Act 2020.

On 6 June 2025, in the Crown Court at Teesside, the appellant, then aged 18, was sentenced by His Honour Judge Nathan Adams (“the judge”) as follows: four years and six months' detention in a young offender institution in respect of the rape; and concurrent terms of six months' detention in a young offender institution in respect of the offences of disclosing private sexual photographs and the sexual assault. No separate penalty was imposed for the offence of possession of indecent photographs. The appellant was also made the subject to a restraining order for a period of ten years.

The appellant now appeals against sentence with the leave of the single judge.

The appellant was born in 2007 and was aged 15 when he committed these offences.

The female victim was aged 15 at the time of the of the offences. She and the appellant had previously had consensual sexual intercourse, during which the appellant had recorded their activity without the victim's knowledge. On 24 March 2022, having found out that she was alone at home, the appellant threatened to show that recording to her parents unless she agreed to let him come to her address. He had previously made the same threat in order to pressure her into sending sexualised images to him. These were discovered by the police on his mobile phone after his arrest.

Once at the victim's address, and despite a clear indication that she did not wish to engage in sexual activity with him, the appellant continued to push the issue. He put his hand down her shorts in the living room (the sex assault charge). He then suggested that they went upstairs. When the victim said no, the appellant went upstairs on his own. When he did not return, the victim went to find out what he was doing and found him in her room. The appellant repeatedly said that he wanted to engage in sexual activity with the victim, and she repeatedly said no and told the appellant he was to leave. However, the appellant then threatened to damage her house if she did not consent and he coerced her into removing her clothing before he raped her. He left straight afterwards and uploaded sexual images of the victim to his Snapchat account, where they would have been visible to his friends. This was done with the intention of causing the victim further distress. When her mother returned home, the victim told her what had happened.

The appellant has two convictions for three offences. In 2023 he received a conditional discharged for possessing an offensive weapon in public. In January 2024, he was sentenced to a Youth Rehabilitation Order ("YRO") with Intensive Supervision and Surveillance for two offences of conspiracy to supply Class A drugs. These offences post-dated the sexual offending in March 2022.

The Sexual Offences – Sentencing Children and Young People guideline emphasises that children and young people are less emotionally developed than adults. It sets out a series of steps for the sentencer to follow.

At Step 1, the sentencer must consider the seriousness of the offence. Examples are given of when a custodial sentence or an Intensive YRO may be justified. These include: "any penetrative activity involving coercion, exploitation or pressure" and a "sustained incident".

At Step 2, the sentencer must consider the aggravating and mitigating factors in order to complete the assessment of seriousness.

Step 3 states that having assessed the seriousness of the offending, the sentencer should consider personal mitigation to determine whether a custodial sentence is necessary.

Step 4 relates to guilty pleas and is not relevant in the present case.

Step 5 states that the sentencer should review the sentence to ensure that it is the most appropriate one for the young person, including an assessment of the likelihood of them re-offending and the risk of them causing serious harm. Reference is made to the Sentencing Children and Young People – Overarching Principles guideline. Paragraphs 6.1 and 6.2 of this guideline indicate that where the offender has crossed an age threshold, such as turning 18, before the finding of guilt, the sentencer's starting point is the sentence that is likely to have been imposed on the date at which the offence was committed, albeit that where the offender is now aged 18, the purpose of sentencing adults has to be taken into account.

Paragraph 6.45 provides that if the court is satisfied that the offence crosses the custody threshold and no other sentence is appropriate, the court may consult the adult sentencing guideline for the offence in question. Paragraph 6.46 indicates that the court may feel that it is appropriate to apply a sentence broadly within the range of one-half to two-thirds of the adult sentence, where the defendant was aged 15 – 17 years old at the time of the offending, although the text makes clear this is only a rough guide that is not to be applied mechanistically. The emotional and development age of the young person is at least as important as their chronological age.

The judge correctly noted that as he was now 18, the appellant was to be sentenced under the sentencing powers applicable to an adult, but that he should assess what the sentence would have been when the offences were committed and the appellant was 15 years old.

As regards Step 1 of the Sexual Offices – Sentencing Children and Young People guideline, the judge noted that the offending entailed penetrative sexual activity involving coercion and pressure and that, accordingly, the court must consider a custodial sentence or an Intensive YRO.

As regards Step 2, the judge identified the blackmail as an aggravating factor. He referred to the absence of previous convictions at the time, as mitigation. Then turning to personal mitigation, as required by Step 3 in the guideline, the judge said he had regard to the level of maturity which the appellant had at the age of 15 and to the contents of the PSR which indicated that he still had a long way to go in terms of growing up and maturing. The judge also referred to the appellant's difficult background, as set out in the PSR. The judge noted the appellant's lack of insight into his offending, as revealed by the PSR, explaining that this fed into the risk assessment in terms of his re-offending. The author also referred to the circumstances of the drugs offences.

The judge then indicated that he was satisfied that only a custodial sentence would be appropriate in this case, given the seriousness of the offending. The judge noted the indication in the guidelines that the court may want to consider the equivalent adult sentencing guidance as a starting point, saying he considered this was the appropriate approach to take in this case. He identified that under the adult guideline for rape, the offence would have been within Level 2 in terms of Harm and Culpability Category B. This would give a starting point of eight years' custody, with a range of seven to nine years custody. The judge noted that this starting point would have been aggravated by the other offences, but that the mitigation would have been the matters he had already identified. He concluded that the appellant would have been looking at a custodial sentence in the region of nine years if he had been an adult when he committed the offences. Taking account of the Sentencing Children and Young People – Overarching Principles guideline, the judge concluded that the shortest sentence that could be justified, given the serious nature of the offending, was half of the adult sentence, namely four and a half years' custody.

Ms Horton contends that the judge did not apply Step 3 of the Sexual Offices – Sentencing Children and Young People guideline when fixing his starting point, which led him to adopt a starting point that was too high.

Ms Horton accepts that the sentence for an adult offender would have come within Category 2B of the Rape Guideline. However, she says that the judge did not apply an appropriate level of reduction to reflect the appellant's age. She contends that there were no aggravating factors other than the uplift that she accepts was required to reflect the other offences. She emphasises that the appellant was 15 years of age at the time of the offending; and even at the age of 18 he was assessed as immature. She also emphasises his unstable background and his vulnerability. She submits that the judge failed to make an appropriate deduction to reflect the appellant's personal mitigation and failed to consider his successful completion of the Intensive YRO between the commission of the offence and the sentencing hearing.

We have set out the judge's reasoning. Contrary, to Ms Horton's first ground of appeal, it is apparent that the judge correctly applied Step 3 of the Sexual Offences – Sentencing Children and Young People guideline. Having considered the Appellant’s personal mitigation, he explained why he concluded that a custodial sentence was necessary. We are in no doubt that a significant custodial sentence was indeed warranted in light of the appellant's offending.

We consider that the judge was right to identify a figure of nine years' custody, prior to making the 50 per cent reduction. Contrary to the suggestion in Ms Horton's grounds, it does not appear that the judge uplifted this figure, other than to take account of the additional offences, which, as we have said, Ms Horton accepts he was quite right to do. His reference to the blackmail element being an aggravating feature came earlier in his reasoning at Step 2 of the exercise, where it was identified as an additional factor to those he had referred to at Step 1, in terms of why a custodial sentence was warranted. The judge also took account of the appellant's good character, but in light of the overall offending he was entitled to arrive at his notional figure for an adult offender of nine years' custody.

In then making a reduction of one half to four years six months' custody, the judge adopted an approach that accorded with paragraph 6.46 of the Sentencing Children and Young People – Overarching Principles guideline. To address a specific submission made by Ms Horton this morning, the guideline does not contemplate a reduction of two-thirds from an adult sentence for a 15 – 17-year-old offender; rather it refers to the sentencer considering a reduction of one third to one half of the adult sentence. In other words, to a sentence that is one half to two- thirds of the adult figure.

We also recognise, as the guideline states, that it is not to be applied mechanistically. However, the judge did apply a substantial discount, which we consider sufficiently reflected the appellant's relative immaturity and the factors that lay behind it, including the factors detailed in the PSR which we have already summarised, in terms of his background, his immaturity and his exploitation. Whilst the appellant had made good progress in relation to the Intensive YRO, as the author of the PSR noted, this did not take account of the index offences or of the appellant's continuing marked lack of any insight in respect of his sexual offending or of his risk of re-offending in respect of these types of offences.

Accordingly, for these reasons, we do not consider that the sentence was manifestly excessive and we dismiss the appeal.