Drive for Justice: Only six killer drivers have sentences increased

Under the ‘unduly lenient’ scheme anyone can report a sentence as being too low.

But only six sentences were increased between 2012 and 2016.

Families have told The Star’s Drive for Justice campaign - which is calling for a review of sentencing powers in death by dangerous driving cases - of their anger at the jail terms received by motorists who killed their loved ones.

Karen Codling, whose husband Eric was killed by a speeding drunk-driver in 2013 when he was out cycling on Whirlowdale Road in Sheffield, said the four-year sentence handed to his killer was ‘ridiculous’.

More than 1,500 people have now signed a petition set up by The Star.

This year alone, nine cases across the country have been considered by the Attorney General under the ‘unduly lenient sentence’ scheme but only one has been referred on to the Court of Appeal.

A request for the Attorney General’s office to look at the sentence must be made within 28 days of a crown court hearing.

There is then a further 28-day time limit to decide if the case will be sent to the appeal court.

If it is referred, judges at the court will decide to either keep the term the same, refuse to hear the case, or rule it is unduly lenient and then increase the sentence.

Last year, two prison terms for death by dangerous driving were deemed ‘unduly lenient’ and increased.

One driver, sentenced at Snaresbrook Crown Court, was initially put behind bars for three years and five months, a term raised to five years and three months.

Another, locked up at Shrewsbury Crown Court, received a sentence of seven years and six months after the original four years and six months sentence was increased.

Two drivers’ sentences were extended in 2013, with a further two jail terms lengthened in 2012.

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Deliver stiffer punishments for drivers who kill on UK roads