SENTENCING STATEMENTS

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When deciding a sentence, a judge must deal with the offence that the offender has been convicted of, taking into account the unique circumstances of each particular case. The judge will carefully consider the facts that are presented to the Court by both the prosecution and by the defence.

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Read more about victims of crime and sentencing.

HMA v Alastair Nicolson

Jul 19, 2024

At the High Court in Edinburgh Lord Weir sentenced Alastair Nicholson to 14 years imprisonment after the offender was found guilty 9 charges including assault and rape; assault to injury and assault to injury and danger of life.

On sentencing Lord Weir made the following remarks in court:

"You were found guilty after trial of a total of 9 charges involving four different complainers. The conduct concerned occurred when you were a mature adult at various locations, principally. You earlier pled guilty to charge 1 on the indictment, a charge of possession of cannabis, which is of no moment to the sentencing exercise I now require to undertake.

In determining a sentence which is fair and proportionate to the circumstances described in the evidence, the court has regard to a number of established parameters, including the Principles and Purposes of Sentencing and Sentencing Process Guidelines published by the Scottish Sentencing Council. In doing so I require to have regard to the seriousness of the offences of which you were convicted but also reflect in the sentence imposed any relevant mitigating factors, and that I have sought to do in your case, with the assistance of the submissions and the contents of the criminal justice social work report.

In that respect, I have considered carefully all that has been said on your behalf including that which has been submitted about your current state of health and the extent to which that has an impact on the assessment of risk where the possibility of re-offending is concerned. It is apparent that you maintain your denial of responsibility for any of the offending of which you were convicted. Indeed the social worker reported evidence that you sought to discredit the motives of your victims.

Standing the position you adopted with the social worker there is little in the background report of any mitigatory value. In returning guilty verdicts in respect of each of each of the 9 charges which they did, and on which basis I am bound to sentence, it is apparent that the jury were satisfied, on the evidence, that you were responsible for a disgraceful course of conduct towards the complainers who gave evidence against you, involving variously physical and sexual violence of the utmost seriousness over a protracted period of time.

The complainers have had to live with the consequences of your offending behaviour over many years, while you have shown no remorse. The victim impact information available to the court, and which I have studied, speaks eloquently of the impact of your offending and its profound and long-lasting effects.

In these circumstances there is no alternative to a substantial custodial sentence. For legal reasons I require to explain that had I been imposing individual sentences in respect of each of the four complainers they would have been (i) in respect of charges 2 and 3, 10 years; (ii) in respect of charges 6, 7, 8 and 9, 7 years; (iii) charge 10, 6 months, and (iv) charges 11 and 12, 4 years.

The cumulo nature of the sentence I intend to impose necessitates a reduction in what would otherwise be a disproportionate overall result. Accordingly, the sentence you will serve will be one of 14 years, which I will backdate to 13 October 2021, on which date you were originally remanded in custody. In respect of charge 1 I will impose a concurrent sentence of 12 months’ imprisonment.

The consequence of this disposal is that you will remain subject to the notification provisions of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 for an indefinite period as that term is defined in the legislation.