You’ve understood it correctly .Boot …
It’s both.
On the one hand there is an appeal for a sentence review … to reduce it.
On the other there has been a call to lenghten it.
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AFAIK, only the BBC has reported the ULS request.
Such a request seems unlikely to be granted:
https://www.cps.gov.uk/legal-guidance/unduly-lenient-sentences
Meaning of ‘Unduly Lenient’
The ULS regime applies only to sentences that are unduly lenient and not to sentences that are simply lenient.
A sentence is unduly lenient:
‘… where it falls outside the range of sentences which the judge, applying his mind to all the relevant factors, could reasonably consider appropriate. In that connection, regard must of course be had to reported cases and in particular to the guidance given by this Court from time to time in the so-called guideline cases.’
It is important to note that the judgment continues:
‘However it must always be remembered that sentencing is an art rather than a science; that the trial judge is particularly well placed to assess the weight to be given to various competing considerations; and that leniency itself is not a vice. That mercy should season justice is a proposition as soundly based in law as in literature.’ (Attorney General’s Reference No 4 of 1989 11 Cr. App. R. (S) 517 - Lord Lane CJ.)
There must have been some error of principle in the judge’s sentence, such that, in the absence of the sentence being altered by the Court, public confidence would be damaged. The court should only grant leave in exceptional circumstances, and not in borderline cases. (Attorney General’s Reference No 5 of 1989 11 Cr. App. R. (S) 489 - Lord Lane CJ.)
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Thanks for clarifying it.
I could understand the defence team’s appeal - but was amazed to see there had been an “unduly lenient” appeal.
To be honest, I had no idea that a member of the public could apply to the Attorney General to appeal a sentence they thought was “unduly lenient”
I had a bit of a search around to find out more and found an official list of the cases that had been raised with the AG and I see that the AG only referred a small percentage of those he received to the Appeal Court - and not all of those he referred had their sentence changed - so he may decide Ms Grey’s sentence does not require referral for being unduly lenient.
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https://www.cps.gov.uk/legal-guidance/unduly-lenient-sentences
How referrals arise
Unduly lenient sentence referrals can arise in a number of ways:
- Areas may consider the sentence unduly lenient;
- interested parties including victims or the bereaved may contact the CPS;
- media coverage may prompt the Area to consider the case;
- the Attorney General may also be contacted directly, by MPs, peers, pressure groups or members of the public. In those cases, the AGO will request papers from the Area with casework responsibility for the case.
I may be missing something but that link produces a title page only … 
This may be more indicative:
https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN00512/SN00512.pdf
In my link, there was 3 tabs on the page - it was the Raw Data tab which gives a list of cases - but the bar charts you provided gives a summary which is much easier to read than a list of individual cases - the summary chart shows what my cursory glance of the list showed - that the Attorney General refers only a low % of cases he receives to the Appeal Court and not all of them result in a changed sentence - so there is plenty of hope for Ms Grey that her sentence will not be increased.
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The trial at which she was convicted was a retrial because at the original trial the jury (unsurprisingly) failed to reach a verdict. Auriol refused to give evidence at the retrial and that probably led to her conviction. She didn’t tell them how she was regularly cruelly taunted by youths on scooters shouting at her to “get off the path you spastic”. She didn’t explain her cognitive impairment or how her disabilities and years of bullying have programmed her to react aggressively to sudden obstacles in her path. Who knows what she went through during lockdown and how she has coped in a society that increasingly stigmatises disabilities in favour of the able.
I’m surprised how many here are so vocal in condemning her given that any one of us as we age could end up with physical impairments and have to face the same obstacles to the little freedom you have left which is the safety of a pavement that is not going to have users who make you jump out of the way (when you can no longer jump). I really don’t understand how anyone cannot understand the council’s liability here or the prejudice against a disabled woman who for whatever reason chose not to defend herself during trial.
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The council didn’t cause that 77 year old to fall in front of a car .
Nor did they deliberately stand in the middle of the pavement obstructing her way I do feel sorry for her because it does sound like she has a sad lonely life but she caused that poor woman to die in a horrible way and must face the consequences .
I expect she will go to a minimum security prison and will at least be warm and cared for .
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This council and many others around the country are causing mayhem by mixing pedestrians and cyclists and giving the impression that it’s ok to ride on a shared path. This is simply lazy planning and it’s causing hell for the most vulnerable pedestrians. So yes they are totally liable here for not providing a safe cycling infrastructure and a separate safe pedestrian infrastructure.
Many cyclists are totally against shared paths too and feel the same about lazy planning. There’s a total lack of policing of cyclists on pavements (which are not shared paths) in many areas.
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Thanks !
I can see the raw data now - how do I get the bar charts?
ETA I managed to obtain this one:
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I didn’t try to get any summaries or charts from the list I looked at - I just had a quick look at the list to get a rough idea of how many sentences got referred by the AG -
I thought the bar charts you posted were easier to read than the raw data I looked at.
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Not being a regular spreadsheet user, I thought I’d missed something again … 
Here’s another chart from the HoC:
Interesting … 
Annie
If you feal that strongly you might want to sign this.
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I think you would expect it to be a fairly high percentage for these cases which were referred for being Unduly Lenient, because they have already been vetted by the Attorney General - he wouldn’t refer them on to the Court if he didn’t think they were unduly lenient.
I expect the percentages look very different for the cases where the Court is reviewing Sentence Appeals made the defendant - hopefully, there will be a much lower percentage of sentence increases.
Won’t achieve anything if the judge is a cyclist. It’s like a religion.
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I am saddened at the lack of empathy and understanding for Auriol Gray.
Unlike Auriol I was not brain damaged at birth or suffered mental and physical disabilities,( which meant she lived in sheltered housing for disabled people ), and yet I have encountered the same problem of having a pavement riding cyclist approaching and it is scary and causes anxiety. I have put my hand up involuntarily, fearing for my safety.
But I am not disabled and partially sighted like Auriol.
Anyone criticising this poor woman can never have known or worked with people with learning difficulties or they would realise how traumatic the incident must have been for her.
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Absolutely! I have worked for many years with children and adults with learning difficulties. Often what you see is what you get and people unused to this find it hard to understand. If most people are asked a question like “do you like my new dress?” We might try to be polite and say we do when really we don’t. A person with LD will usually say exactly what they think!
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Very well put …
I too wonder when we became such an uncaring society considering we have entered the era of wokeism in so many other respects.
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Blimey, there’s an awful lot of “expert” opinion from people who’ve never met Auriol Grey and weren’t in court for either trial … 
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I know people with LD, autism, mental health issues and they can overreact to a situation simply because they don’t have the ability to restrain their emotions. A situation that is stressful for us can be overwhelming for them. It’s very sad that so many do not understand this and particularly that the legal system is trialing them equally to others. Reminds me of that last man hanged for shouting “let him have it”
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