Valdo Calocane was given an indefinite hospital order after he was sentenced to manslaughter by reason of diminished responsibility - but the families of the victims said the sentence was too lenient
Watchdog inspectors have called for significant changes to sentencing guidelines and a rethink of how homicide is categorised in the wake of the Nottingham attacks. His Majesty’s Crown Prosecution Inspectorate , which carried out a review of the Crown Prosecution Service's handling of the case, has published its findings and in a report called on the Government to consider whether homicide should be categorised into three tiers.
In highly emotional statements read outside Nottingham Crown Court in January, the families of the victims of the attacks were highly critical of Nottinghamshire Police, the NHS and CPS, saying failings led “It is unimaginable having to deal with the death of a loved one under such horrific circumstances, but having to deal with the criminal justice system at a time of heartbreak and grief adds a further dimension of challenge.
The law recognises that someone who kills another or others when their mental responsibility is diminished at the time in accordance with recognised psychiatric parameters is less culpable than someone with a sound mind. The other point is that questions that we have asked originally have not been answered in this report, why was he not tested for drugs, why was he not tested for alcohol, why were basic tests not carried out?"'Misunderstanding' over word choice caused upset, inspectors say
The Law Commission found that the potential use of the term second degree murder to describe the verdict a jury must reach when a partial defence of diminished responsibility is available was strongly supported by groups representing victims’ families. We found no record that the request by Barnaby’s parents on 9 October for clarification on diminished responsibility had been communicated by the FLO to the CPS. It was not until 13 November, after a further request from Barnaby’s mother, that the FLO informed the CPS, leading to the meeting of 24 November.
"We have never disputed Calocane's mental health problem but what I would say is that at the moment in this country, if you commit murder and you've got mental health issues then it's very unlikely that you're actually going to be tried for murder and it's abhorrent that it can be downgraded to manslaughter.
The psychiatric experts did not interview witnesses with whom the offender had engaged at the time of commission of the offences. The families’concern was that the experts’ failure to do so had led to the omission of potentially relevant evidence about the offender’s state of mind at the time of the killings.
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