R v LIJ

Facts

The appellant was convicted on 18 August 2025, following a trial in the Crown Court at Newcastle Upon Tyne before Her Honour Judge Mallett and a jury, of two offences of causing or inciting a child under 13 to engage in sexual activity contrary to section 8(1) of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 and two offences of rape of a child under 13 contrary to section 5(1) of the Sexual Offences Act 2003. The offending, committed between 2007 and 2011 against two younger siblings in the family home, occurred when the appellant was aged between 11 and 13. In relation to his younger sister, V1, he made her touch his penis as the price of using the family computer, on one occasion when she was about 5 and then, some two years later, on at least five occasions over about a month. In relation to his younger brother, V2, he twice forced him to perform oral sex, pulling his head down and threatening to push him down the stairs; he was acquitted on counts 5 to 8, which alleged further offending. The matter came to light in the summer of 2019 when V1 told her father and stepmother. On 11 December 2025 he was sentenced to a total of seven years' imprisonment, together with a Sexual Harm Prevention Order and a Restraining Order of indefinite duration. He appealed against sentence by leave of the single judge.