Our criminal defence team, led by Daniel Martin and assisted by Emily Wright, has successfully appealed against a client’s sentence in the Court of Appeal.

Our client received a custodial sentence of two years, imposed in the Crown Court, for historic offences dating back to the 1960s when the client was still a minor.

Our client is a severely disabled and elderly gentleman, suffering from extreme ill-health. The appeal centred around his medical condition and the effect this had on his trial, and also on his suitability for incarceration. The team argued that our client’s complex medical needs meant that he could not access the appropriate level of care in prison.

Highly experienced criminal barrister Mark Fraser, of Furnival Chambers, skilfully presented the client’s case in the Court of Appeal on Friday (23 November 2018), securing the client’s immediate release after the Appeal Judges quashed the original term and substituted a shorter term (12 months), ordering that our client be released from prison the same day.

Both the original case and the appeal were extremely challenging and involved a number of medical experts. The restricted availability of public funding also meant that the team undertook much of the preparatory appeal work on a pro-bono basis.

Mr Fraser said: This is the most historic case in which I have ever been instructed. Lord Justice Leggatt said that despite cases of this sort coming before the courts with greater frequency, by any standards the period that has elapsed since the offences took place was immense.

“A combination of this and the defendant’s extremely poor health posed unique problems for both those instructing and counsel alike.

“Throughout [the trial and appeal], the efforts of both Dan and Emily to provide high-quality representation to the defendant never wavered. On the part of Emily, this extended to providing counsel with novel legal argument, which was both welcome and encouraging and is exactly what I have come to expect from them both.”

Our criminal appeals team is regularly instructed on complex appeals of both conviction and sentence. Should you wish to discuss a potential criminal appeal please contact a member of our team here.