Hamid, R. v

Factual and Procedural Background

The Crown prosecuted the Defendant for multiple drug offences and one offence of criminal damage. The Defendant, then aged 23, pleaded guilty in the Magistrates' Court on 4 July 2025 and was committed for sentence in the Crown Court. The District Judge (Recorder) varied pleas and ultimately, on 12 December 2025, sentenced the Defendant to concurrent terms: 30 months' imprisonment for three counts of possession of a Class A controlled drug with intent and 18 months' imprisonment (concurrent) for a single count of being concerned in the supply of a Class A drug; no separate penalty was imposed for criminal damage. The Solicitor General applied for leave to refer the sentence under section 36 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 as unduly lenient.

Agreed facts (from the Solicitor General's Final Reference): the Defendant operated a branded drugs line ("Bobby") in 2021–22, was arrested July 2022 and sentenced in March 2023 for earlier offending. A further iteration of the line resumed in September 2022 and continued into March 2023 (the "2022/23 offending"). The Defendant resumed dealing again in 2025 (the "2025 offending") and was arrested in March 2025 with quantities of crack cocaine, cocaine hydrochloride and MDMA. The criminal damage involved damage to a vehicle in June 2025. Pre-sentence reports and a psychiatric report were prepared and considered at sentence; the Defendant has a history of previous convictions and a documented immaturity and mental health vulnerabilities.

Legal Issues Presented

1. Whether the sentence imposed was unduly lenient within the meaning of section 36 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988.
2. Whether the judge at first instance erred in his approach to totality by (a) failing to reflect the 2022/23 offending adequately (either by uplift or consecutive sentence) and (b) ordering that the 2022/23 sentence run concurrently.
3. Whether the judge erred in sequencing reductions by applying the guilty plea discount before, rather than after, mitigation under the guideline steps.

Arguments of the Parties

Attorney Hole's Arguments (on behalf of the Solicitor General)

• The recorder was wrong to conclude the 2022/23 offending would not have increased the March 2023 sentence; the second period of operating the "Bobby" line occurred while on bail and would have merited uplift or a consecutive sentence.
• The 18-month concurrent sentence for the 2022/23 offending should not have been ordered to run concurrently with the later sentence because it was distinct in time.
• The guilty plea discount was applied at the wrong stage (before mitigation) and thus produced an over-reduction (calculated as six months on the recorder's figures).
• The reduction for mitigation of 18 months from a four-and-a-half to six-year starting point was excessive given limited psychiatric mitigation and repeated breaches/recalls; overall criminality required a substantially higher aggregate sentence.

Attorney Birch's Arguments (for the Defendant)

• The recorder lawfully exercised discretion; the 2022/23 offending could be seen as a continuation of earlier offending and the recorder was entitled to the view that it would not have materially increased the March 2023 sentence.
• The delay in progressing the 2022/23 matters to sentence caused real detriment to the Defendant and his rehabilitative progress; that factor warranted the approach taken.
• The recorder properly took into account youth, low maturity and psychiatric vulnerability in allowing the reduction applied; the resulting 30-month aggregate sentence was not unduly lenient.

Table of Precedents Cited

Court's Reasoning and Analysis

The court applied the section 36 principles from Attorney General's Reference (R v Egan) to assess whether the recorder's sentence was within the range of reasonably open outcomes. It analysed the sentencing exercise in stages:

• Accepting the categorisation of the 2025 offending (significant role, category 3) and that the judge's starting point and mitigation reduction for the 2025 offending, taken alone, were within a defensible range.
• Identifying an error in sequencing: the recorder applied the guilty plea discount before reducing for mitigation, producing an over-reduction; the court accepted this was an error but, alone, not decisive to make the sentence unduly lenient for the 2025 offending.
• Critically, the court examined how to reflect earlier offending (the 2022/23 period) in line with the Totality Guideline (including factors a–h listed in the guideline). It concluded the 2022/23 offending was an active resumption (not an overlap) and, considered at the time, would have merited in the region of an additional two years' custody.
• The court rejected the submission that delay disadvantaged the Defendant: the Defendant had been repeatedly recalled and had re-offended, so delay did not produce real detriment that would justify excluding reflection of the 2022/23 offending from the global sentence.
• While the court found the 18-month mitigation reduction generous, it was not excessive; nonetheless, the recorder ought to have reflected the earlier offending (and the separate criminal damage) either by uplift or by making the earlier period consecutive. Failing to do so produced an overall sentence that did not properly reflect the totality of criminality.
• Having applied these considerations, the court concluded the appropriate overall sentence to reflect totality was five years' imprisonment.

Holding and Implications

Leave to refer was granted and the sentence was increased to a total of five years' imprisonment.

Disposition and immediate consequences for the parties:

• The court quashed the concurrent sentences of 30 months' imprisonment on the three possession-with-intent offences (Case Reference 01GD1114125) and replaced them with concurrent sentences of five years' imprisonment.
• The court quashed the 18-month sentence for the single supply offence (Case Reference 01MP1288923) and replaced it with a concurrent sentence of two years' imprisonment.
• All other sentences and orders were left unchanged; the aggregate (final) sentence is five years' imprisonment.

Broader implications: the court applied established section 36 and totality principles; the decision addresses application of totality where distinct periods of similar offending span earlier sentences and demonstrates that delay will not automatically preclude reflection of earlier offending where the offender has not suffered real detriment. The opinion does not purport to establish a new legal principle beyond applying existing authorities.