2. Background and Sentencing History
The offending
In the early hours of 12 September 2021, the appellant drove a Mercedes against the flow of traffic on the M25 between junctions 27 and 28. Initially travelling at approximately 25 mph in the third lane, he flashed his lights at approaching traffic.
Police officers attempted to stop him using a marked vehicle with illuminated blue lights and a rolling roadblock. He manoeuvred around that vehicle by partly mounting the central reservation. By the time a second police vehicle intervened, he was travelling at approximately 75 mph. He drove directly towards it, forcing the officers to swerve to avoid a collision.
Police subsequently located and arrested him at the registered keeper’s address. He initially attributed the driving to his sister and behaved erratically. In custody, he failed to cooperate adequately with the breath-testing procedure.
The pleas and original sentence
On 27 August 2024, the appellant pleaded guilty to dangerous driving under section 2 of the Road Traffic Act 1988 and failing to provide a specimen of breath for analysis under section 7(6). No evidence was offered on a separate count of failing to stop.
On 30 October 2024, the Crown Court imposed:
- For dangerous driving: 15 months’ imprisonment, suspended for 24 months, together with an unpaid work requirement and an 18-month driving disqualification.
- For failing to provide a specimen: no separate penalty, but a 12-month driving disqualification.
The appellant had no previous convictions. A short-form pre-sentence report recommended a community order. His mitigation also included substantial charitable work, outreach involving children and vulnerable adults, social housing projects, and efforts to establish a children’s home.
The grounds of appeal
With permission from the single judge, the appellant argued that:
- A custodial sentence was wrong in principle.
- Alternatively, the 15-month custodial term was manifestly excessive.
- The 18-month driving disqualification was manifestly excessive.
4. Analysis
A. Precedents and Legal Sources
No previous judicial decisions were cited in the judgment. There is therefore no chain of named authorities to analyse. The court’s reasoning rested on the statutory framework, the accepted sentencing categorisation, and its assessment of the offending and mitigation.
- Section 2 of the Road Traffic Act 1988: the statutory basis of the dangerous-driving conviction.
- Section 7(6) of the Road Traffic Act 1988: the statutory basis of the conviction for failing to provide a breath specimen.
- Section 34 of the Road Traffic Offenders Act 1988: the source of the obligatory minimum 12-month disqualification for dangerous driving, absent special reasons.
- The applicable sentencing guideline: the parties accepted category A2, with a starting point of 36 weeks’ custody and a range extending from a high-level community order to 18 months’ imprisonment.
The court also referred to the two-year statutory maximum applicable to the dangerous-driving offence before it. That observation concerned the sentencing framework governing this case; the decision should not be read as addressing every possible offence involving dangerous driving or resulting harm.
B. Why Custody Was Justified
The appellant relied on an unusually strong combination of mitigation: an otherwise blameless life, substantial public service, a professional sporting career, and no further offending during approximately three years on bail or afterwards.
The court expressly distinguished merely having no previous convictions from possessing positive, exemplary character. It accepted that the appellant fell into the latter category and expressed the expectation that his contribution to society would continue.
Nevertheless, the immediate danger created by the driving was extreme. Travelling against motorway traffic presented an obvious risk of catastrophic collision. The appellant then defeated one police intervention and drove towards another police vehicle at substantially increased speed. Those actions intensified the danger and were treated as aggravating features.
The absence of death or injury did not make the conduct suitable only for a community sentence. The court emphasised the catastrophic consequences dangerous driving can produce. The relatively light traffic in the early hours was fortunate, rather than a reason to overlook the risk created.
The pre-sentence report’s recommendation of a community order did not compel that disposal. The judgment demonstrates that such a recommendation informs sentencing but does not displace the court’s responsibility to assess seriousness.
C. The Distinction Between Imposing Custody and Suspending It
A central feature of the reasoning is that mitigation can affect different sentencing decisions in different ways. The appellant’s circumstances did not prevent the offence from warranting imprisonment, but they were highly relevant to whether that imprisonment should take immediate effect.
The sentencing judge had indicated that the appellant would not go directly to prison. The Court of Appeal considered it plain that the judge had taken the substantial personal mitigation into account when suspending the sentence.
Accordingly, upholding custody was not equivalent to disregarding good character. Its principal effect had already been reflected in the decision to suspend the 15-month term for 24 months.
D. Sentence Length and Guilty-Plea Credit
The appellant argued that the sentencing remarks did not adequately reveal how much credit had been given for his guilty plea. This difficulty was compounded by the failure of the Crown Court’s recording equipment: the appeal proceeded using an agreed note of the sentencing remarks.
The Court of Appeal acknowledged that those remarks were sparse. Nevertheless, it concluded that the Recorder had considered both the plea and the need for a discount. It also stated that a sentence following trial at or near the applicable two-year maximum would have been justified.
The judgment does not identify a precise percentage reduction or reconstruct the sentencing calculation. It should therefore not be treated as authority for any particular guilty-plea discount. Its conclusion was narrower: the information available did not establish that the resulting 15-month sentence was manifestly excessive.
The court did not formally reclassify the offence from the accepted A2 category. Its reference to a possible post-trial sentence near the statutory maximum was an assessment of seriousness, not an announced change to the guideline categorisation.
E. The Suggested Drink-Spiking Explanation
Counsel explained that the appellant could not account for the incident and believed his drink might have been spiked. His usual avoidance of alcohol or drug misuse was advanced in that context.
The court did not find that spiking had occurred. Nor did it treat that suggestion as an established explanation reducing culpability. The decision accordingly provides no basis for treating an unsupported possibility of spiking as proved mitigation. The appeal proceeded on the accepted convictions and the demonstrated driving conduct.
F. Why the Disqualification Was Reduced
The court considered the driving ban separately from the custodial sentence. It accepted the submission that disqualification looks forward to protecting the public.
Section 34 required a ban of at least 12 months unless special reasons existed. The court did not find special reasons or dispense with that minimum. Instead, it decided the appropriate duration above the statutory floor.
Importantly, it stated that an 18-month ban would ordinarily not have attracted appellate intervention. The reduction was justified by the particular circumstances, including the appellant’s exceptional character, the significant impact of the ban, and the fact that he had already been disqualified for 14 months and one week under an interim order beginning on 27 August 2024.
The resulting 15-month period therefore represented a modest adjustment, not a finding that the statutory minimum was sufficient. Although the judgment briefly refers to shortening the “suspension”, the context and operative decision make clear that the reduction concerned the driving disqualification, not the 24-month suspension of imprisonment.
G. Appellate Restraint
The decision also illustrates the limited nature of sentence appeals. The court asked whether custody was wrong in principle and whether the length imposed was manifestly excessive, rather than simply substituting its own preferred sentence.
It upheld the custodial disposal as properly available to the Recorder, while making a targeted adjustment to one distinct component. Success on the driving-ban ground did not undermine the remainder of the sentence.