Kevin Kelenda v R

Facts

The applicant, Kevin Kelenda, pleaded guilty at the Crown Court at Wood Green on 13 December 2024 to having an article with a blade or point. On 27 March 2025, following a trial at the Crown Court at Woolwich before HHJ Aubrey KC, he was convicted of the murder of Tyrone Pinnock, a stranger whom he had followed and stabbed once in the chest on 19 October 2023. On 19 May 2025 he was sentenced to detention during His Majesty's pleasure with a minimum term of 17 years less 526 days spent on remand, and to an 18-month detention and training order for the weapon offence. Because of the applicant's extreme violence towards prison staff at HMP Belmarsh, the trial judge, after hearing evidence from the prison's head of security and detailed representations from counsel, directed under section 51 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 that the applicant attend his entire trial, including when giving evidence, by live video link rather than in the dock. The applicant, then 18, argued that this deprived him of effective participation and rendered his murder conviction unsafe, and separately that his minimum term should have been reduced further to reflect his age, cognitive impairment and neglectful upbringing. The Registrar referred both applications for leave to appeal to the Full Court.

Decision

Issues

• Whether the direction that the applicant attend his entire trial by live video link under section 51 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 deprived him of effective participation, rendering his murder conviction unsafe.
• Whether the absence of a formal written security application under Criminal Practice Direction 3.1 undermined the fairness of that direction.
• Whether the minimum term should have been reduced further to reflect the applicant's youth, cognitive impairment and neglectful upbringing.

Reasoning

Giving the judgment of the court, Dame Victoria Sharp P held that nothing turned on the prison's failure to use the standard form required by Criminal Practice Direction 3.1, since the parties had proceeded in substance as if a security application had been made, supported by "current, specific and credible evidence" — the HMP Belmarsh risk assessment and the oral evidence of Mr Stevens, the prison's Head of Security — and the defence had a full opportunity to respond. On the substantive challenge, the court held HHJ Aubrey KC was entitled to find that the applicant, whose custodial history included seventeen assaults on staff and repeated threats of violence, posed a risk manageable only by additional officers in protective equipment in the dock or by a live link; Mr Zahir KC's proposed alternative of unprotected officers in court with others waiting in full PPE behind a door was not realistic, and the judge was right to reject it, a position Mr Zahir had effectively conceded before the judge. Applying section 51(4) of the Criminal Justice Act 2003, section 51(5) of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 and section 51(6) of the Criminal Justice Act 2003, as amended by the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022, the court held there was no requirement that the circumstances be exceptional, though such a direction demanded careful consideration; the judge had properly weighed the interests of justice and effective participation, and any prejudice was largely speculative given that the intermediary raised no concerns, the jury received appropriate directions, and experienced counsel represented the applicant throughout. On sentence, imposed under section 259 of the Sentencing Act 2020 with a minimum term fixed under section 322(2) of the Sentencing Act 2020 and section 322(3) of the Sentencing Act 2020 by reference to schedule 21 to the Sentencing Act 2020, the court held that HHJ Aubrey KC, who had heard the trial and the medical evidence of Dr Murphy and Dr White, was best placed to assess whether the applicant's mental and developmental difficulties reduced his culpability, and was entitled to find that they did not, since the applicant had followed and armed himself against a stranger without panic; notwithstanding Mr Zahir KC's reliance on R v ZA and the Sentencing Council guideline on sentencing children and young people, the minimum term was not manifestly excessive.

Case history