Ethnic origin of the victim as an aggravating factor in sentencing sexual offenders

ABSTRACT

This article examines R v Jamal Muhammed Raheem Ul Nasir, a Court of Appeal case where leave to appeal against a seven-year custodial sentence for sexual offences against children was refused. The appellant argued that his sentence length was excessive because the judge viewed the female victims’ ethnic and religious origin as an aggravating factor. In light of a number of charities’ condemning the judgment, this article evaluates whether the Court of Appeal made the correct decision, particularly in the wider context of sentencing principles. It also considers whether causing shame to a victim and her family can be regarded as an aggravating factor when sentencing sexual offences, and discusses the circumstances where the victim’s ethnic origin should be taken into account.

KEYWORDS:

• Shame
• sentencing principles
• aggravating factors
• South Asian victims

Acknowledgement

Many thanks to the anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments on an earlier draft of this paper. We would also like to thank Professor Gerry Johnstone (University of Hull) and Professor Tony Ward (Northumbria University). Any errors are of course our own.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by British Academy [grant number SG122150].