Guidance on Sentencing for Non-Violent but Highly Disruptive Environmental Protest Offences

1. Introduction

The decision in Hallam & Ors v R ([2025] EWCA Crim 199) addresses a number of appeals concerning custodial sentences imposed on protestors affiliated with Just Stop Oil. This commentary examines the background, the parties involved, the key issues raised, and the Court of Appeal’s rulings.

The appellants comprised sixteen individuals who participated in non-violent but deliberately disruptive protests performing activities such as tunneling under roads, climbing over motorway gantries, blocking key motorway intersections (notably the M25 motorway), and even throwing soup onto a precious painting in the National Gallery (“Sunflowers” by Vincent van Gogh). Their collective aim was to force governmental change on climate policy, drawing attention to fossil fuel consumption and other climate-related concerns.

The case presented two main legal questions:

How courts should treat conscientious motivation and the European Convention on Human Rights (Articles 10 and 11) when sentencing non-violent protestors.
The relevance of recent statutory developments, including Section 78(1) of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022, which has replaced the old common law offence of public nuisance, and raised the maximum sentence to 10 years.

The parties ultimately asked the Court of Appeal to evaluate whether the sentences passed by the Crown Courts were correct in light of these new principles and existing authorities such as R v Trowland ([2023] EWCA Crim 919) and R v Roberts.

2. Summary of the Judgment

In the Hallam & Ors v R judgment, the Court of Appeal:

Upheld or varied each defendant’s sentence depending on the level of their culpability, the harm they caused or intended, and any mitigating personal circumstances that might reduce the sentence.
Confirmed the relevance of conscientious motivation and engagement of ECHR Articles 10 and 11 to the sentencing exercise, while emphasizing that disruptive protests can significantly weaken such mitigation.
Reaffirmed that highly disruptive or extreme methods of protest often invite severe custodial sentences, even where the offending is non-violent. The Court must still consider whether the punishment is proportionate and the shortest commensurate with the seriousness of the offence.
Reduced some sentences (particularly in the M25 Conspiracy group), where the original Crown Court sentences were considered “manifestly excessive.” Other sentences, for example in the “Thurrock Tunnels Case” and “Sunflowers Case,” were upheld.

Collectively, the Court used Trowland and other precedents as benchmarks to highlight consistent guidelines for future cases of this nature, while reaffirming that conscientious or political motives do not by themselves preclude tough custodial penalties if the disruption and harm are deemed severe.

3. Analysis

3.1 Precedents Cited

The Court of Appeal cited several significant authorities, but R v Trowland ([2023] EWCA Crim 919) was paramount. Trowland tackled protestors climbing the Queen Elizabeth II Bridge over the M25, providing authoritative guidance for sentencing under Section 78(1) of the 2022 Act. This included:

Conscientious Motivation: A conscience-based reason for protest can reduce culpability to a limited degree. However, where the protest takes deliberately extreme or coercive forms, that factor alone may not lower the sentence significantly.
Articles 10 and 11 (ECHR) Rights: These rights are “engaged” in non-violent protest, but a salutary principle is that the greater and more disproportionate the disruption, the less weight these rights carry for sentencing, because protestors move away from the core protections of free speech and assembly.
Deterrence: Citing Roberts, Brown, and Cuadrilla Bowland, the Court endorsed that courts may adopt strong sentences if the conduct is repetitive or the protestors show few signs of rehabilitation. The seriousness of ongoing, orchestrated disruption to the road network strongly warrants deterrent sentences.

The Court also relied on:

R v Roberts [2018] EWCA Crim 2739 and R v Brown [2022] EWCA Crim 6, both of which address non-violent protest and the balance of conscientious motivation with sentencing severity.
Colston for clarifying that damaging property can amount to violence, though whether an offence is properly categorized as “non-peaceful” may depend on the nature and extent of any property damage.
Kudrevicius v Lithuania (European Court of Human Rights) for distinguishing protests that incidentally create disruption from those intending large-scale coercive public disorder.

3.2 Legal Reasoning

The Court’s reasoning can be distilled into several key points:

Culpability and Harm: Under Section 63 of the Sentencing Act 2020, courts must examine an offender’s culpability and the harm caused (or intended, or which might foreseeably have been caused). Here, the Court consistently found the level of harm very high—particularly for individuals blocking principal motorways during rush hours, shutting down vital roads leading to energy terminals, or causing potential damage to revered works of art.
Balancing ECHR Considerations: While Articles 10 (free expression) and 11 (peaceful assembly) were engaged in all cases, they were given markedly less weight due to the extreme nature and broader impact of the protest actions. The Court distinguished between mere persuasion and an intent to create large-scale blockades and gridlock.
Conscientious Motivation: The Court recognized protestors’ genuinely held beliefs and concerns but noted that extreme or disproportionate measures minimize the mitigating effect of that motivation. Nonetheless, the Court emphasized that conscientious motivation must be taken into account, even if, in practice, it does not drastically lower a sentence for extremely disruptive actions.
Deterrence and Recidivism: Many appellants were repeat offenders who mentioned their continued willingness to carry out similar protests. This justified imposing longer terms to deter both the individuals involved and others contemplating future large-scale disruption. The Court rejected arguments that minimal jail time or suspended sentences would be adequate to deter such dedicated activists.
Avoiding Sentence Inflation: The Court reminded sentencing judges about the tension between passing an adequately deterrent sentence and “inflating” sentences on incomplete or inexact comparisons. Specifically, setting a “benchmark” from Trowland (3 years for climbing the Queen Elizabeth II Bridge) as a typical reference point could inadvertently raise punishments beyond appropriate limits. Each case must remain firmly fact-sensitive.

3.3 Impact

The Judgment sets out important practical guidance and clarifications on sentencing non-violent but orchestrated protest offences:

It re-establishes conscientious motivation as a factor in determining culpability, though not a blanket mitigating factor when the protest is highly disruptive or poses significant risks to public safety.
It affirms that maximum penalties up to 10 years’ imprisonment for public nuisance under Section 78(1) of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 remain firmly on the table for extreme conduct, especially if repeated or representative of a wider conspiracy.
It warns courts against “inflating” sentences purely by reference to the facts of Trowland or other stand-out cases but signals that Trowland remains the controlling authority on the interpretation of Section 78 and sentencing methodology for such offences.
It confirms that, in assessing severity, judges are entitled to weigh not only the actual harm caused by a protest but also alternative potential harm if the protest escalated, became more difficult to dislodge, or threatened significant public infrastructure.

In short, this Judgment will serve as authoritative guidance for future sentencing decisions involving non-violent but drastically disruptive protest activity, particularly climate activism.

4. Complex Concepts Simplified

Although the Judgment contains many intricate legal points, the central concepts can be distilled more simply:

Public Nuisance: Historically a common law offence requiring proof that the defendant’s actions “endangered the life, health, property, morals, or comfort of the public.” Under Section 78 of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022, the courts now have a statutory offence with a potential sentence of up to 10 years.
Conscientious Motivation vs. Disproportionate Impact: Courts do take note when protestors are driven by genuinely held moral beliefs, acknowledging such motives may reduce the level of culpability. But if the protest’s scale and severity are significant—e.g., shutting down entire sections of motorway or damaging a culturally priceless painting—that disruptiveness outweighs much of any mitigating effect.
Articles 10 and 11 (ECHR): Guarantee rights to free expression and peaceful assembly. While these protect many forms of protest, deliberate trespass, substantial property damage, or large-scale public safety hazards push a protest beyond the “core” protections, diminishing how far courts must mitigate sentences on ECHR grounds.
Deterrence in Sentencing: In protest cases, courts often emphasize deterring the offenders themselves (who may be inclined to re-offend) and deterring others who might emulate these methods.
Risk of Harm: Even where protestors do not cause direct physical injury, the courts check whether the potential harm could have been much greater. For instance, had the soup thrown at Van Gogh’s Sunflowers seeped underneath the protective glass layer, the painting might have been irreversibly damaged.

5. Conclusion

The Court of Appeal in Hallam & Ors v R has clarified and refined the domestic legal framework around sentencing environmental and climate protestors under Section 78(1) of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 as well as conspiracy to cause public nuisance. While the Court acknowledges defendant protestors’ rights to free expression and conscientious beliefs, it confirms that extraordinarily disruptive or extreme methods place the protests on the outer limits of Articles 10 and 11 protections.

Central lessons of the Judgment include:

The more severe and elaborate the disruption, the higher courts will assess culpability, and the less weight conscientious motivations will carry.
Proportionality must govern the sentence, but the Court will permit prison terms of multiple years—particularly if the protestors show blatant disregard for others, repeat offences, or proclaim their intention to re-offend.
The statutory offence of public nuisance carries a considerable sentencing range, new to English law, reflecting Parliament’s specific concern over orchestrated protest campaigns aimed at major infrastructure.

Overall, Hallam & Ors v R stands as a significant authority guiding courts in achieving consistency and proportionality in sentences for major protest-related criminal cases, especially where non-violent but widely disruptive methods are deployed. By weaving together pre-existing and newly introduced sentencing principles, the Court has provided a coherent roadmap for handling these complex prosecutions in future.