SNP urged to review sentencing guidelines as Scottish rapist of 13-year-old teen avoids jail as KC labels sentence 'extraordinary'

The SNP have been urged to urgently review sentencing guidelines after the rapist of a 13-year-old girl avoided jail in a verdict a leading KC described as “extraordinary”.

Sean Hogg, 21, was found guilty of raping a teenage girl at Dalkeith Country Park in Midlothian when he was 17 years old.

The sentencing then prompted fury after Judge Lord Lake said he had to take Hogg's age into account when sentencing him, meaning he was given 270 hours of unpaid work but avoided jail.

Tommy Ross KC, who has worked on high-profile cases in Scotland including the murder of Margaret Fleming, described the 270-hour community sentence as "very unusual".

Sandy Brindley, chief executive of Rape Crisis Scotland. Picture: John Devlin

"It is an extraordinary sentence,” he told the BBC. "I have been working in the high court for around 20 years and I have never seen anybody avoid prison for rape until yesterday."

Scottish Tory MSP and Shadow justice secretary Jamie Greene has written to newly-appointed justice secretary Angela Constance imploring her to order a review of sentencing guidelines.

He said: “The public are understandably furious about this rapist avoiding a prison sentence after repeatedly attacking a teenage girl. I share their anger. The so-called punishment of a community payback order is a total insult to the victim in this case, who will be scarred for life by these attacks.

“It is clear that the sentencing guidelines brought into force last year and wholeheartedly backed by SNP ministers are behind this appalling decision.

“Judges hands are being increasingly tied as they have to follow guidelines, which effectively say adults under 25 should not be going to prison unless all other avenues have been exhausted.

“I warned at the time that these new guidelines were misguided and dangerous and sadly my worst fears have been realised. We must stop wrapping dangerous adult criminals in cotton wool.

“The case of Sean Hogg clearly shows SNP ministers were wrong to ignore the warnings from myself and victims organisations before imposing these new sentencing guidelines. The new SNP justice secretary Angela Constance has a chance to do things differently. She must urgently heed my call to review these guidelines and put the needs of victims before criminals.”

The guidelines were put in place last year by the Scottish Sentencing Council and backed by SNP ministers, with provisions that under-25s should only go to prison when a court is satisfied no other sentence is appropriate.

The guidelines made rehabilitation rather than punishment a primary consideration.

First Minister Humza Yousaf said he understood concerns over the sentence, but that he would not personally intervene, stressing such decisions had to be made independently of Government ministers.

"We don’t want people to be in that revolving door of going from prison, out in the community and back again,” he said. “But, of course in this case, in a case where someone’s been convicted of rape, I can completely understand the concerns that people have got about the sentence that has been given in this particular case.”Rape Crisis Scotland described the community payback order as “worryingly lenient”.

The organisation’s chief executive Sandy Brindley also criticised the fact it took four years for the case to come to court.

Ms Brindley said: "Of course the role of the justice system should be about rehabilitation, but there also needs to be a sense of it giving some sense of justice for victims of crime. I just don't see how this sentence can do that."

On the prospect of the sentence being overturned, Ms Brindley added: "It is hard to imagine a case more deserving of that judgement of unduly lenient than the rape of a 13-year-old girl."