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	Jersey Unreported Judgments
You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> Jersey Unreported Judgments >> 1998/27 - Bellamy v AG [1998] UR 27 (9 February 1998) URL: http://www.bailii.org/je/cases/UR/1998/27.html Cite as: [1998] UR 27

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ROYAL COURT (SUPERIOR NUMBER)

(Exercising the appellate jurisdiction conferred upon it by

Article 22 of the Court of Appeal (Jersey) Law, 1961)

9 February 1998

Before: Sir Philip Bailhache, Bailiff, and Jurats

Myles, Gruchy, Vibert, Herbert, Rumfitt, Potter,

Quérée and Tibbo.

Claire Colleen Patricia Bellamy

-v-

AG

Application of Claire Colleen Patricia Bellamy for leave to appeal against a total sentence of 15 months youth detention, passed by the Inferior Number on 5 September 1997, following the guilty pleas to:

1 count of: grave and criminal assault, (count 1), on which count a sentence of 15 MONTHS YOUTH DETENTION WAS IMPOSED; and

1 count of; assault (count 2) on which count a sentence of 3 MONTHS’ YOUTH DETENTION,CONCURRENT, was imposed.

Leave to appeal was refused by the Bailiff on 14 October 1997; application renewed to the plenary Court under Article 39 of the Court of Appeal (Jersey) Law, 1961, on 16 October 1997.

Advocate Mrs SA Pearmain for the Appellant

AJ Olsen Esq., Crown Advocate

JUDGMENT

THE BAILIFF: This is an application for leave to appeal by Claire Colleen Patricia Bellamy against a sentence of 15 months Youth Detention imposed by the Inferior Number for an offence of grave and criminal assault and a further offence of assault upon a police officer. The brief circumstances of the offences are that the Applicant, together with her co-accused, one O’Sullivan, attacked a drunken man in the precincts of St. Helier in the small hours of the morning, and during the course of a sustained attack kicked him on a number of occasions about the head and body. The Deputy Bailiff in passing judgment in the Court below described the offence as a totally unacceptable piece of gratuitous violence and this Court is entirely in accord with that description.

It is clear, however, that at the time when the Inferior Number passed sentence upon the Applicant it was concerned, as it was obliged to be concerned, by the Criminal Justice (Young Offenders) (Jersey) Law, 1994, to establish whether there was some other way of dealing with the Applicant who was at the date of sentence aged 20. It was only because the Inferior Number could find no place at which the Applicant could be accommodated that it was driven to the conclusion that a custodial sentence was unavoidable.

Mrs Pearmain for the Applicant has based her argument in essence upon the fact that there has been a change of circumstance since sentence was passed in that the parents of the Applicant are now willing and able to offer her accommodation in their home.

Mrs Pearmain also drew attention to a further grievance on the part of the Applicant in that confidential reports of the Probation Service, the Consultant Psychiatrist and the Consultant Psychologist found their way into the hands of her co-accused O’Sullivan. It seems that these documents were included in the Court Appeal bundle and that at some stage that bundle was sent to O’Sullivan by his Counsel in connection with his consideration of his own appeal. This was unfortunate. These are confidential documents for the information of the Court and an accused person who co-operates with those preparing the reports is entitled to expect that the information given to the reporting officer will remain confidential to the service and to the Court. We express the hope that the Judicial Greffier will revise the practice so as to ensure that the Probation Reports and other confidential documents are not released to Counsel acting for any co-accused.

It is unnecessary to go into the difficult background which this Applicant has undergone in any detail. She has now served the equivalent of a nine months’ prison sentence and we think it is sufficient to say that justice is best served by the substitution of a sentence which will ensure that she receives the benefit of supervision by the Probation Service. We therefore grant the application for leave to appeal, allow the appeal, quash the sentence imposed by the Inferior Number, and substitute therefor a sentence of 12 months Probation subject to the usual conditions: that the Applicant lives and works as directed by her Probation Officer and is liable, of course, to be brought back before this Court if there is any failure to abide by the conditions of the Order and to be of good behaviour during the existence of the Order.

Authorities

AG -v- Norris (3 June 1992) Jersey Unreported

AG -v- Le Main (2 October 1996) Jersey Unreported

Evans, Phillips -v- AG (9 April 1997) Jersey Unreported Cof A