SENTENCING STATEMENTS
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HMA v Martin Bridge
Sep 3, 2024
On Sentencing Sheriff Wilson made the following remarks in court:
"Martin Bridge, you pled guilty to four charges, contrary to Sections 34(1), 33, 24(1) and 23 of the Sexual Offences (Scotland) Act 2009, in general terms libelling sexualised online communications, between 1 December 2022 and 24 January 2023, with two individuals whom you believed to be females aged 14 and 12, but who were in fact police decoys.
That you pled guilty by way of accelerated Section 76 procedure is to your credit, but this plea only followed upon the Crown initiating formal steps to force you to give the police access to your electronic devices.
This is an extremely serious matter. The charges to which you pled guilty reveal a course of conduct involving two individuals over a period of almost two months, and the Crown narrative of the details of your online behaviour is both harrowing and worrying. You stated to the social worker preparing the background report that you had no intention of progressing contact to the extent of meeting the decoys. Your intentions cannot be independently verified, and it appears your conduct was only brought to a stop by your being arrested and charged.
It is plain that the custody threshold has been passed, and a prison sentence is entirely justified.
Your actions have brought about the end of your marriage and career, and will have consequences for your relationship with your children. That is entirely of your own making.
However, the Criminal Justice Social Work Report before the court narrates that your remorse is genuine and you show a clear understanding of the significance and seriousness of what you have done. More importantly, you have sought help in the form of therapy, and have engaged, of your own volition, in the Stop It Now programme.
The court has to balance various factors, including punishment and protection of the public against the possibility of rehabilitation. Given your lack of previous convictions, that you have no outstanding matters before this or any other court, the relatively early plea and, most importantly, your full acceptance of your guilt and the steps you have taken since to address your offending behaviour, by the narrowest of margins a custodial sentence will not be imposed.
You will be made subject to a Community Payback Order of three years duration, during which time you must comply with a Supervision Requirement, including undertaking the Moving Forward 2 Change programme. In addition, you will be subject to a Conduct Requirement, as detailed in the Criminal Justice Social Work Report, allowing the police to readily monitor your online activity.
There requires to be a punishment element to the sentence imposed. Accordingly you will, as a condition of the Community Payback Order, be required to carry out 300 hours of unpaid work in the community within the next 18 months. This is the maximum available to the court – there is no discount in the number of hours for your guilty plea. You are to regard not being sent to prison as the discount.
Do you understand and accept the conditions of this Community Payback Order?
This Order is being imposed as an alternative to custody. This means that if you breach any of the conditions of the Order you can be brought back before the court and the sentencing process started anew, with the likely outcome thereafter being a lengthy custodial sentence.
I also certify that the offences to which you have pled guilty are ones that attract the notification provisions of the Sexual Offences Act 2003. You were made subject to these provisions ad interim when you tendered your pleas of guilty on 6 August 2024, and on that occasion the requirements were narrated in court.
Accordingly I do not think it necessary to repeat them. If you are in any doubt, the provisions will be detailed in the paperwork which will shortly be served upon you. However, I am required to state that the period for which you will be subject to the notification requirements is one of three years. As a matter of law, whilst the matters to which you have pled guilty may justify a longer period, that you have been made subject to a Community Payback Order means that the notification period cannot be longer than the Order."