R v Sapiano
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | THE LORD CHIEF JUSTICE |
| Judgment Date | 25 July 1968 |
| Judgment citation (vLex) | [1968] EWCA Crim J0725-1 |
| Docket Number | No. 3944/68 |
| Court | Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) |
| Date | 25 July 1968 |
[1968] EWCA Crim J0725-1
IN THE COURT OF APPEAL
CRIMINAL DIVISION
Royal Courts of Justice
The Lord Chief Justice of England (Lord Parker)
Mr. Justice Melford Stevenson
and
Mr. Justice Bridge
No. 3944/68
MISS P. JOHNSTON appeared as Counsel for the Appellant.
On the 16th November of last year Police Officers searched this Appellant's house; there they found a large brown suitcase full of clothing, also three dresses with the shop labels still on them, a number of luncheon vouchers, and perhaps more important, from pawn tickets they recovered 16 wedding rings and 17 bracelet charms. All these articles had been stolen fairly recently, the rings from a jewellers shop, the drosses from a dress shop, and the suitcase, clothing and vouchors from a van. Her account to the Police was that she had bought the clothing found in the suitcase, the three drosses from a salesman and the vouchers and the pawn tickete she obtained from a fellow in a pub. This resulted in her being brought before Middlesex Sessions charged with three counts of receiving, and to those she pleaded guilty; after a probation report had been obtained the Deputy Chairman sentenced her to nine months' imprisonment in respect of the count relating to the rings and bracelet charm.
Then in regard to the other two he said this: "On the other two counts I passed a suspended sentence also of nine months, those to be concurrent to each other and consecutive to the effective sentence which takes effect today". It was because of that rather odd sentence that leave to appeal was given by the single (Judge. The Court is quite satisfied that it is a wrong sentence, wrong in both ways, firstly that it is really against the spirit and intention of the Act, because the main object of a suspended sentence is to avoid sending anyone to prison at all; secondly it is wrong because in many circumstances it just will not work, because the nine months suspended might only become automatic in say, the last three months of the three year period, and at that time the nine months which would come into force could not be consecutive with the nine months the subject of the immediate imprisonment which would then have been served.
This is clearly a wholly wrong...
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