{"id":564217,"date":"2026-04-15T03:35:01","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T01:35:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kohenavocats.com\/jurisprudences\/r-v-robert-michael-thomas\/"},"modified":"2026-04-15T03:35:01","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T01:35:01","slug":"r-v-robert-michael-thomas","status":"publish","type":"kji_decision","link":"https:\/\/kohenavocats.com\/zh-hans\/jurisprudences\/r-v-robert-michael-thomas\/","title":{"rendered":"R v Robert Michael Thomas"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"kji-decision\">\n<div class=\"kji-full-text\">\n<p>MR JUSTICE PEPPERALL: 1 On 30\u00a0July\u00a02025, in the Crown Court at Inner London, Recorder Mercer sentenced the appellant to\u00a0a\u00a0total of\u00a043\u00a0months&#039; imprisonment for five offences of\u00a0theft, contrary to\u00a0section\u00a01 of\u00a0the Theft Act 1968; five offences of\u00a0breaching a\u00a0criminal behaviour order, contrary to\u00a0section 339 of\u00a0the Sentencing Act 2020; and one offence of possession of\u00a0a\u00a0controlled drug of\u00a0class\u00a0B, contrary to\u00a0section 5 of the Misuse of\u00a0Drugs Act 1971. The appellant now appeals against sentence with leave of\u00a0the single judge. The facts 2 The appellant, now aged 39, is a\u00a0prolific thief. When he came to be sentenced for these offences, among 121 different offences, the appellant had 26 previous convictions for theft and other offences of\u00a0dishonesty including five offences of\u00a0burglary. Further, the appellant had an appalling record of\u00a0failing to\u00a0comply with court orders. In particular, he had no fewer than 21 previous convictions for breaching a\u00a0criminal behaviour order. 3 On 3\u00a0February\u00a02025, the North London Magistrates&#039; Court sitting at Highbury Corner made a\u00a0Criminal Behaviour Order prohibiting the appellant from entering or alighting at Kings Cross, St Pancras and Euston stations, including the forecourts and shops at those stations. 4 The fresh theft offences involved in each case shoplifting from stores at St Pancras or Kings Cross on five different days between 14\u00a0November\u00a02024 and 21\u00a0June\u00a02025. The first three offences of\u00a0theft were committed at St Pancras between 14\u00a0and 26\u00a0November and on 30\u00a0December\u00a02024. Goods ranging in value from \u00a390\u00a0to\u00a0\u00a3263 were stolen. The appellant was then made the subject of\u00a0the Criminal Behaviour Order on 3\u00a0February. A\u00a0further theft was committed on 28\u00a0February\u00a02025 at St Pancras stealing goods worth \u00a3364. Such offence was also now in breach of\u00a0the newly imposed Criminal Behaviour Order. The appellant further breached the order by being at\u00a0the station on 6\u00a0March\u00a02025. He was arrested and later released, but the appellant was back at St Pancras in breach of\u00a0the order the very next day. Again, he was arrested and released. The fourth breach of the order was committed by being at Kings Cross Station on 4\u00a0June\u00a02025. 5 On 21\u00a0June 2025, the appellant stole goods worth \u00a3954 from a\u00a0store at St Pancras. Again, that put him in breach of\u00a0the Criminal Behaviour Order. On 3\u00a0July 2025, the appellant was arrested trying to\u00a0enter a\u00a0store at Kings Cross in further breach of\u00a0the order. Upon arrest, he was carrying a\u00a0small bag of\u00a0amphetamine. The sentence 6 The appellant pleaded guilty to\u00a0all offences. Although not all pleas were entered at\u00a0the first opportunity, the Recorder gave full credit for all pleas. He referred to\u00a0the guidelines issued by the Sentencing Council for offences of theft and for breach of a\u00a0criminal behaviour order. The Recorder considered that the breaches of\u00a0the criminal behaviour order were high culpability offences in that the offending was persistent. With one exception, he identified that the breaches were medium harm offences. Accordingly, the starting point was 12\u00a0months&#039; imprisonment with a custody range of up to\u00a02\u00a0years&#039; imprisonment for each of\u00a0those offences. The judge indicated that in view of\u00a0the appellant&#039;s previous convictions, the appropriate sentence after a\u00a0trial for a\u00a0single offence was 18\u00a0months, but that after credit for plea the sentence would have been 12 months&#039; imprisonment. 7 The Recorder treated the\u00a0June breach differently since on that occasion the appellant had simply been sitting at\u00a0the station in breach of\u00a0the order. This was, therefore, a\u00a0lower harm case with a\u00a0starting point of\u00a012 weeks&#039; imprisonment and a sentencing range of up to\u00a0one year. Again, the sentencing was aggravated by the previous convictions and the Recorder considered that the appropriate sentence after trial was 9\u00a0months&#039; custody, which he reduced to\u00a06\u00a0months after credit for the appellant&#039;s plea. 8 The Recorder treated the thefts themselves as medium culpability offences. With one exception, these were category\u00a02 harm cases in view of the value of goods stolen. While taken individually such offences might well have been dealt with by fines or community orders, such disposals had been tried many times by various Magistrates&#039; Courts over the years and yet the appellant continued to\u00a0offend and failed to comply with the community orders that had been imposed. Furthermore, these offences were mostly committed in breach of a\u00a0recently imposed criminal behaviour order. Accordingly, the judge concluded that the sentences had to be custodial. He indicated that the sentence for each theft after trial would have been 3\u00a0months&#039; imprisonment and that after credit for his pleas the appropriate sentence was 2 months for each theft. As\u00a0to the drugs, the Recorder identified the appropriate sentence after trial as\u00a03\u00a0months&#039; imprisonment, which he reduced to\u00a02\u00a0months to\u00a0reflect credit for the appellant&#039;s guilty plea. 9 The Recorder ordered that the sentences imposed in respect of\u00a0the five breaches of the criminal behaviour order should be consecutive to\u00a0each other but concurrent with the shorter sentences imposed for the theft and drugs offences. That would have led to\u00a0a\u00a0total sentence before further adjustment of\u00a04\u00bd years. The judge then considered the principle of\u00a0totality and reduced each of\u00a0the 12 months&#039; sentences to 10\u00a0months, and the 6-month sentence to\u00a03\u00a0months, thereby making his final sentence for this offending of\u00a043 months&#039; imprisonment. The appeal 10 By this appeal, the appellant argues that the overall sentence was manifestly excessive and was not just and proportionate when balancing the scope of\u00a0the offending behaviour. Gabrielle Compton, who appears before us as\u00a0she did below, argues pithily that although the judge considered totality, he failed to\u00a0make adequate adjustment to\u00a0the individual sentences. 11 Like the Recorder, we agree however, that the appellant&#039;s persistence in shoplifting and his utter contempt for the Criminal Behaviour Orders made by the court could only properly be dealt with by a\u00a0significant sentence of\u00a0imprisonment. We acknowledge that some judges might have imposed a\u00a0shorter sentence, but the time had come for condign punishment and, in our judgement, the sentence of\u00a043 months&#039; imprisonment was not manifestly excessive. 12 We therefore dismiss this appeal against sentence. __________ Epiq Europe Ltd hereby certify that the above is an accurate and complete record of the proceedings or part thereof. Lower Ground Floor, 46 Chancery Lane, London, WC2A 1JE Tel No: 020 7404 1400 Email: rcj@epiqglobal.co.uk<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<hr class=\"kji-sep\" \/>\n<p class=\"kji-source-links\"><strong>Sources officielles :<\/strong> <a class=\"kji-source-link\" href=\"https:\/\/caselaw.nationalarchives.gov.uk\/ewca\/crim\/2026\/305\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">consulter la page source<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"kji-license-note\"><em>Open Justice Licence (The National Archives).<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>MR JUSTICE PEPPERALL: 1 On 30 July 2025, in the Crown Court at Inner London, Recorder Mercer sentenced the appellant to a total of 43 months&#8217; imprisonment for five offences of theft, contrary to section 1 of the Theft Act 1968; five offences of breaching a criminal behaviour order, contrary to section 339 of the Sentencing Act 2020; and one&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"template":"","meta":{"_crdt_document":""},"kji_country":[7608],"kji_court":[8238],"kji_chamber":[],"kji_year":[7610],"kji_subject":[7612],"kji_keyword":[7633,9757,7922,7707,8348],"kji_language":[7611],"class_list":["post-564217","kji_decision","type-kji_decision","status-publish","hentry","kji_country-royaume-uni","kji_court-court-of-appeal-criminal-division","kji_year-7610","kji_subject-fiscal","kji_keyword-appellant","kji_keyword-months","kji_keyword-offences","kji_keyword-order","kji_keyword-sentence","kji_language-anglais"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v27.5 (Yoast SEO v27.5) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>R v Robert Michael Thomas - Ma\u00eetre Hassan Kohen, avocat en droit p\u00e9nal \u00e0 Paris<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/kohenavocats.com\/zh-hans\/jurisprudences\/r-v-robert-michael-thomas\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"zh_CN\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"R v Robert Michael Thomas\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"MR JUSTICE PEPPERALL: 1 On 30 July 2025, in the Crown Court at Inner London, Recorder Mercer sentenced the appellant to a total of 43 months&#039; imprisonment for five offences of theft, contrary to section 1 of the Theft Act 1968; five offences of breaching a criminal behaviour order, contrary to section 339 of the Sentencing Act 2020; and one...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/kohenavocats.com\/zh-hans\/jurisprudences\/r-v-robert-michael-thomas\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Ma\u00eetre Hassan Kohen, avocat en droit p\u00e9nal \u00e0 Paris\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"\u9884\u8ba1\u9605\u8bfb\u65f6\u95f4\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"5 \u5206\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/kohenavocats.com\\\/zh-hans\\\/jurisprudences\\\/r-v-robert-michael-thomas\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/kohenavocats.com\\\/zh-hans\\\/jurisprudences\\\/r-v-robert-michael-thomas\\\/\",\"name\":\"R v Robert Michael Thomas - Ma\u00eetre Hassan Kohen, avocat en droit p\u00e9nal \u00e0 Paris\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/kohenavocats.com\\\/zh-hans\\\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2026-04-15T01:35:01+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/kohenavocats.com\\\/zh-hans\\\/jurisprudences\\\/r-v-robert-michael-thomas\\\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"zh-Hans\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/kohenavocats.com\\\/zh-hans\\\/jurisprudences\\\/r-v-robert-michael-thomas\\\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/kohenavocats.com\\\/zh-hans\\\/jurisprudences\\\/r-v-robert-michael-thomas\\\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\\\/\\\/kohenavocats.com\\\/zh-hans\\\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Jurisprudences\",\"item\":\"https:\\\/\\\/kohenavocats.com\\\/zh-hans\\\/jurisprudences\\\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":3,\"name\":\"R v Robert Michael Thomas\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/kohenavocats.com\\\/zh-hans\\\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/kohenavocats.com\\\/zh-hans\\\/\",\"name\":\"Kohen Avocats\",\"description\":\"Ma\u00eetre Hassan Kohen, avocat p\u00e9naliste \u00e0 Paris, intervient exclusivement en droit p\u00e9nal pour la d\u00e9fense des particuliers, notamment en mati\u00e8re d\u2019accusations de viol. 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