No: 2011/4985/A6
Neutral Citation Number: [2011] EWCA Crim 3176
IN THE COURT OF APPEAL
CRIMINAL DIVISION 
Royal Courts of Justice
Strand
London, WC2A 2LL 

Friday, 9 December 2011
 
B e f o r e:
 
LORD JUSTICE LAWS 
MR JUSTICE OWEN 
MR JUSTICE HADDON‑CAVE 
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
R E G I N A 

v 

CHRISTOPHER COULTHARD
 
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Computer Aided Transcript of the Stenograph Notes of  
Wordwave International Limited
A Merrill Communications Company 
165 Fleet Street  London EC4A 2DY
Tel No: 020 7404 1400 Fax No: 020 7831 8838
(Official Shorthand Writers to the Court)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Mr A Mahmood (Solicitor Advocate) appeared on behalf of the Appellant
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
J U D G M E N T
1.	LORD JUSTICE LAWS:  On 4th January 2010 at the Worcester Crown Court this appellant pleaded guilty to three offences of burglary respectively charged as counts 1, 2 and 4 on the indictment and one of going equipped for burglary, count 5.  On 29th January 2010 he was sentenced by His Honour Judge Hooper QC to three consecutive terms each of three years' imprisonment for the burglaries and two years concurrent for going equipped, making nine years altogether.  Ninety‑three days spent on remand were directed to count towards sentence.  Compensation orders were made in favour of three churches which, as we shall show, the appellant had burgled.  He appeals against his sentence by leave of the learned single judge.
2.	All the premises from which he stole were rural churches in Worcestershire open to the public.  On 11th June 2009 the chairman of the church committee at St. Bartholomews', Stourport‑on‑Severn, tried to get into the church safe.  He was unable to do so.  He did not see any damage to the safe and at that point gave up his efforts.  But the next day he succeeded in opening it.  Thirty pounds in cash had been taken away.  Damage to the lock of the safe cost about £100 to put right.  The appellant was identified from CCTV footage.
3.	Next, St. James' Church, Badsey was open to the public unsupervised all day.  On 20th September 2009 a lady called Teresa Comins found that there was damage to a vestry door.  The safe in the church could not be opened.  When at length a locksmith did open it it was found that £22 in change had been taken.  Teresa Comins gave a description of a man who matched the description of the appellant.  He had asked her whether the church was going to be locked.  She had noticed that he had a digital camera.  
4.	Thirdly, there was St. Leonard's Church in Bretforton.  On 29th September 2009, £350 in cash was taken from a safe in that church.  Again the circumstances were similar to the others.  On that day, 29th September, the police were alerted to what was described as a suspicious person who had booked into a hotel in Pershore, that is about 12 miles from the last church.  Officers attended.  They found the appellant near to a Vauxhall Astra motorcar.  He had on him £363 in coins and £75 in notes.  He had, it seems, paid £95 cash to stay at the hotel.  The car was registered to a Mr Leigh.  That was the name which the appellant had used to book into the hotel.  Officers searched the car.  They recovered large and small screwdrivers, adapted screwdrivers, pliers, crowbars, Allen keys, tent pegs twisted around each other and a digital camera.  All that paraphernalia constituted the equipment the subject of count 5.  The officers seized the money and arrested the appellant.  He gave a no comment interview.  It is to be noted he was on licence when the offences were committed.
5.	The appellant was born on 17th September 1962, so he is 49.  He has what can only be described as a spectacular record.  He has previous convictions for no less than 101 offences, most of them burglary and theft.  In the past he has asked for 502 other offences to be taken into consideration.  The sentencing judge observed that he had spent something like 30 of his 49 years in prison.  
6.	In prison following the current sentences he has had three adjudications and other disciplinary measures, but apparently is extremely assiduous in his work as a wing cleaner: "He does not seem to stop working", according to one officer in the prison.  
7.	This is an unusual and in some ways an extreme case, certainly as regards the appellant's past record.  We regard the offences as serious.  Churches are vulnerable places and there is in the court's view a special interest in keeping them open to the public whenever possible; and it seems from the materials before the court that the appellant has all too often targeted churches in the past.  
8.	We do not think that guidelines or previous cases are much help in these unusual circumstances.  Our conclusion is that notwithstanding the appellant's quite appalling record and the serious aggravation of these offences occasioned by the choice of victim, nine years is too long for the offending in question.  The right sentence would have been six years.  We propose to quash the nine year sentence and substitute concurrent sentences amounting to six years.  They may be two years, two years and two years for each of the burglaries and the going equipped sentence will remain unchanged.  The burglary offences will be consecutive as they were in the Crown Court.  The result is that the total sentence is six years.  To that extent the appeal is successful.