R v Vincent Foley

This is an appeal against sentence with leave of the single judge. The appellant, Vincent Foley, is a 44-year-old man. He appeared at Chester Crown Court before His Honour Judge Thompson and then was sentenced on 11 September 2025 for offences of attempted robbery an offence of possession of an offensive weapon and an offence of burglary. The sentence for attempted robbery was 5 years 4 months, 12 months concurrent for having an offensive weapon, and 20 months consecutive for burglary, giving an overall sentence of 7 years. Those sentences followed guilty pleas entered on 13 August 2025. All those offences had taken place on 4 July 2025. The pleas were entered not at the Magistrates' Court, but were made at a time when the judge decided that the appellant should still have a full-third credit because of issues relating to his mental health, which are also relied on by way of mitigation.

Mr Foley has many previous convictions: 43 previous convictions for 92 offences. So far as is relevant, they include five convictions for burglaries of homes and two previous convictions for robbery.

On 4 July 2025 Mr Foley went to the Greggs bakery, entering via a rear door. He was wearing a balaclava and he was armed with a hammer. He confronted one employee, Mr Laing, shouted at him and struck him on the head with the hammer, causing a wound which required stitches and which has left a permanent facial scar. We have seen the victim personal statement from Mr Laing, which was dated in September 2025, which talked about the effect of the scarring and the fact that children had ignored him for a period. Other staff fled in fear, including Mr Imrie. Mr Foley attempted unsuccessfully to access a safe before leaving the premises, leaving the key in the lock of the safe. We have also seen the victim personal statement from Mr Imrie in which he relates to the fact that he is concerned about going outside and was concerned about going back to work.

On the same day, and it seems shortly after Mr Foley had committed the attempted robbery, he committed a burglary at a nearby residential property. He forced entry to the property and caused significant damage within the house. He stole various items, including watches, a decommissioned shotgun and a cheque book. He subsequently made attempts to cash the cheques from the stolen cheque book, and he was arrested on 14 July (some ten days later) with related paperwork in his vehicle.

The offending did have an important impact on the victims: the physical injury, the psychological harm and the distress arising from the burglary. As was put in the victim personal statement, the home user of the house which was burgled felt violated.

There were three grounds of appeal which were originally advanced, but the single judge granted leave to appeal only on two, first that the judge failed to take account of the appellant's personal mitigation, including, importantly, his recent bereavement by loss of a grandchild, and secondly his mental health difficulties which had led up to the offending. It was also submitted that the judge had failed to apply the principles of totality when determining the overall offence.

Mr Lodge on behalf of Mr Foley submits that the judge was wrong to put the sentence for attempted robbery at the top of the guideline range without taking any account of mitigation; he failed to reflect mitigating features, including the appellant's bereavement following the death of his grandchild and his homelessness at the time of offending, because there had been a spiral of out-of-control behaviour following that death; his remorse; and the fact that since he was held in custody pending the pleas and sentencing exercise, he had engaged properly and was making real progress. Finally, it is submitted the judge had simply failed to deal with the issue of totality.

On behalf of the respondent Ms Schutzer-Weissmann opposes the appeal, submitting that the sentence was not manifestly excessive and might even be considered lenient. The judge was right to treat the separate incidents as justifying consecutive sentences in accordance with totality. Mitigation and totality must have been taken into account once one considers what the judge had said about this being at the top of the range and the final sentence that was imposed.

There were during the submissions some discussions about the relevant sentencing offence specific guidelines and how the judge might have structured the sentence to make all of this permissible. In our judgment it is necessary to look carefully at the points that Mr Lodge has raised because the judge in his sentencing remarks did not expressly deal with the issues of mitigation, nor indeed with the issues of totality, which explains why leave was granted. The judge had said that these offences were right at the top of the range, and the judge had said that he was structuring the sentence so as to make one offence concurrent (which was the offensive weapon) and the two major offences consecutive.

Dealing then with the relevant category in the offence specific guideline so far as the first offence was concerned, which is Robbery, street and less sophisticated commercial, there was a use of a weapon to inflict violence, which was a high culpability factor. So far as the harm category is concerned, the judge had categorised this as Category 2 “other cases where characteristics of categories 1 and 3 are not present”; and Category 1 is “serious physical and/or psychological harm caused to the victim”. We accept that there was physical and psychological harm caused to the victim, but we do not consider that would have justified placing it in Category 1 as suggested on behalf of the Respondent.

However, Step 2 is the “Starting point and category range”. A Category 2A offence (which this is) has a starting point of 5 years and a category range of 4 to 8 years (the judge put it at the top) he said this was offending at the top of the range before you then go to the dropdown under “Custodial sentences” where it says:

“The tables below contain a non-exhaustive list of additional factual elements providing the context of the offence and factors relating to the offender. Identify whether any combination of these, or other relevant factors, should result in a further upward or downward adjustment. In some cases, having considered these factors, it may be appropriate to move outside the identified category range.”

Mr Lodge points out, that the judge did not do this, but it is right to identify that there were statutory aggravating factors of relevant previous convictions, together with the other aggravating factors which were identified, which included: the wearing of a balaclava; planning; and this offence was committed to obtain drugs. There were important mitigating factors, and it is regrettable that the judge did not identify them, particularly from Mr Foley's point of view, which was the effect of the death of his grandchild and the subsequent spiralling out of control of his behaviour, before he was then arrested and put into a situation where he could begin to address his behaviour. That said, in our judgment the judge must have put this offence at the top of the range given use of weapons and injuries inflicted, albeit just falling short of harm category 1, to 8 years, he must have gone up from the 8-year period, then down to reflect mitigation, and then given the full discount of a third for the guilty plea. That was not manifestly excessive.

That then leaves the sentence for the burglary and totality. That was again an offence which was very serious, but in our judgment the judge had properly categorised that as category 2B, which had a starting point of 18 months and a range of 6 months to 3 years. The judge had said it was at the top, and there were the same aggravating and mitigating factors. The judge in fact took a figure of 30 months rather than 36 months in relation to that offence, before discounting for plea, and it is apparent that the judge must therefore have had some regard to issues of totality when doing that. So although it is regrettable that that reasoning was not expressly shared with the appellant when he was sentenced, in our judgment, stepping back and looking at this sentence overall, it was not manifestly excessive.

So for all those reasons and with thanks to Mr Lodge and Ms Schutzer-Weissmann for their helpful submissions, we dismiss the appeal.