High Court substitutes ROLO with imprisonment in Crown appeal against woman’s attempted robbery sentence

About this case:

• Citation:
  [2025] HCJAC 52
• Judgment:
  External link
• Court:
  Appeal Court of the High Court of Justiciary
• Judge:
  Lord Matthews

Helen Moran (or Macdonald), aged 43, pled guilty to two offences under section 38(1) of the Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Act 2010, aggravated by being committed whilst on bail. Four breach reports in respect of the ROLO were submitted to the court by 11 August 2025, and the respondent appeared from custody on 15 August in respect of other charges.

The appeal was heard by the Lord Justice Clerk, Lord Beckett, with Lord Matthews and Lord Armstrong. Dickson KC, advocate depute, appeared for the Crown and Brannigan, advocate, for the respondent.

Cola over the head

Charge 3 on the indictment narrated that, on the evening of 14 April 2024, the complainer and respondent, who had grown up together, were at a friend’s house. The respondent became angry with the complainer, who left and went elsewhere. When she returned home at 1:00am the following morning, the complainer found the respondent there. The respondent pled guilty to calling the complainer and her family by derogatory names as well as throwing her laptop and other belongings to the floor. The complainer was terrified and called the police, who arrested the respondent. The respondent had been granted bail in respect of another matter on 4 April 2024.

Charge 5 libelled that at about 7:30pm on 10 November 2014, the same complainer heard the respondent shouting at her door and demanding money. The respondent smashed the glass panel in the front door with a brick, climbed into the house, and proceeded to restrain the complainer, pour a bottle of cola over her head, and punch her several times in the face. After she exited the property, she was traced by police and arrested.

A Justice Social Work Report disclosed that the respondent had been raised by the complainer’s family following the murder of her mother when she was 6 and left home at 15. She had a formal diagnosis of depression and used substances to cope. The sheriff considered that both charges met the threshold for a custodial sentence but considered the respondent’s personal circumstances to be a significant mitigating factor, particularly her efforts since the offences to engage with social work and psychiatric services.

For the Crown it was submitted that the sheriff attached insufficient weight to the force used to enter the complainer’s home, the humiliation involved in pouring cola over her, and repeated threats to kill. Although no victim statement was provided, the Crown narrative disclosed that the complainer remained in fear of the respondent. That the sheriff had placed too much emphasis on rehabilitation was demonstrated by the fact that the respondent admitted breaching the ROLO within weeks of its imposition.

Targeting of the complainer

Lord Matthews, delivering the opinion of the court, began by observing: “We can sympathise with the sheriff in this case. The offender had and has a number of problems, not of her own making, which have blighted her life from a young age. However, we are satisfied that the sentence was unduly lenient. Had the sheriff been dealing with charge 3 alone, this would not have been the case and, as the Crown conceded, this court’s jurisdiction would not have been invoked.”

He continued: “Nonetheless, that charge is of some significance. In the first place, it forms a background to charge 5 and shows that the respondent engaged in a course of conduct which entailed the targeting of the complainer. Secondly, the fact that the respondent carried out the offence libelled in charge 5 while on bail for charge 3 is an aggravating feature over and above the aggravation inherent in offending while on bail.”

Noting the determination of the respondent to enter the complainer’s home, Lord Matthews said: “The fact remains that she committed, in the space of a few months, two offences against the same complainer in her own home. The sheriff did not attach enough weight to the serious nature of these offences, especially charge 5. That offence, with its repeated feature of strangulation, could easily have resulted in the complainer’s death. Strangulation is an all-too common feature of assaults in modern times and the court must visit it with appropriate penalties.”

He concluded: “The fact that the respondent has breached the ROLO is not itself decisive but with the benefit of hindsight, it has some relevance. The respondent’s tragic background has to be factored into any disposal and the sentence we are about to impose recognises that.”

The court therefore quashed the sentence imposed by the sheriff and imposed one of three years and eight months’ imprisonment, reduced from four years to reflect the guilty plea. A Supervised Release Order was also made with a special condition that the respondent attend drug and alcohol counselling as directed.