SENTENCING STATEMENTS
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Read more about victims of crime and sentencing.
HMA v John Paul Riley
Mar 2, 2026
On sentencing Lord Matthews made the following remarks in court:
"You pleaded guilty to attempting to murder a former friend of yours, a young man called Dylan Brown, by lunging at him, knocking him to the ground and repeatedly striking him on the body with a knife to his severe injury, permanent disfigurement and the danger of his life.
I heard the full details of what you did when you last appeared in court.
Putting matters shortly, it appears that Mr Brown owed you money for drugs and there had been some communications between you about this. On 1 February 2024 you were on your dirt bike in the early evening when you saw Mr Thomas, who was with his 13 year old nephew. You rode up to them, got off your bike and seized hold of Mr Thomas from behind, saying “I told you I’d see you Dylan”.
You laughed then pulled Mr Thomas to the ground before repeatedly striking him with a knife and then riding away on your bike.
The young boy ran to the home of Mr Thomas’ mother to get help but, as she got ready to leave, she found that Mr Thomas had managed to make his way there.
She drove him to hospital and on the way he said that he could not breathe. As he had told his mother, you had inflicted 3 stab wounds on him. One was to the right side of his chest, which caused a collapsed lung. Another was to the left loin. The third was to the right groin, which caused part of the bowel to protrude through the wound. That needed an operation, which revealed that the wound, no thanks to you, had narrowly missed the femoral vessels. Had they been damaged the bleeding would have been catastrophic. The bowel was repaired with one stitch but the three wounds and the operation have left permanent scarring.
According to the victim impact statement, he had over 70 staples all over his body and the operation left him with a very large scar from chest to groin. He was in pain for months and struggled to go to the toilet. His confidence has been severely compromised and he feels constant embarrassment and shame. He has suffered from difficulties with his mental health, including panic attacks, flash backs and delusions of being attacked again. He lost his job and suffers from PTSD.
The attack was particularly cowardly since he has hearing difficulties and you came at him from behind.
His whole family has been affected, not least his nephew, who watched the attack and had to hold the wounds closed to try to stop the bleeding.
I have listened carefully to all that has been said on your behalf and have read the Justice Social Work report.
You are 21 years of age and were 19 at the time of the offence. You have a record consisting of two driving offences, which are irrelevant for present purposes.
There were some difficulties in your home life and problems with drug use and negative associations, which disrupted your schooling.
There may also be unresolved issues with bereavements.
The author of the JSWR assesses you as presenting with a high level of risk and needs and you have clearly shown yourself capable of causing serious harm, from which I have a duty to protect the public. Given the contents of the report, despite your lack of record, I cannot be satisfied that the conditions of an ordinary licence will be sufficient to protect the public from you on your release.
In these circumstances I propose to pass on you a sentence in two parts. The first will be a custodial term and the second an extension period during which, after your release from the first part, you will be subject to a licence, the conditions of which will be set by the Scottish Ministers. Breach of these conditions may see you returned to custody to serve the whole term of the sentence.
You are entitled to the protection of the Sentencing Young People guideline, so the custodial term is less than I would have imposed had you been a full adult. Had you not pleaded guilty when you did it would have been a period of 10 years. As it is, you pleaded guilty at a preliminary hearing but that was almost two years after you first appeared in custody and I propose in the first instance to reduce the period to one of 8 years and 4 months representing a reduction of one sixth. However, I shall reduce that further to give some recognition to the time you spent on curfew, albeit not on an electronic tag, and the result is a period of 8 years.
The extension period will be 2 years and the extended sentence of 10 years will run from 21 January 2026, 8 days earlier than I remanded you in custody, to take account of your remand for 8 days when you first appeared on Petition. "
2 March 2026