The shape of justice: Sentencing of mentally ill defendants convicted of manslaughter

In June 2023, a mentally ill man stabbed to death three people in the street and seriously injured three others. A plea of guilty to manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility (DR) was accepted by the Crown Prosecution Service and he subsequently received a restricted hospital order (sections 37 & 41) under the Mental Health Act 1983. There has been considerable public discussion around this case. This paper sets out the background to the partial defence to murder of DR as well as the current approach to the sentencing of mentally ill defendants convicted of manslaughter. The Court of Criminal Appeal later considered a referral that the sentence had been ‘unduly lenient’. The court considered the legal factors of the degree of retained responsibility and the extent to which a penal element should be reflected in the sentence. From the psychiatric perspective, the release regimes of the two options of a restricted hospital order or a hybrid order were also examined by the Court, as these related directly to protection of the public.