'Evil, manipulative' sex abuser who also introduced girls half his age to heroin avoids hike in 'very lenient' sentence

He encouraged her not to use contraception and when she had a contraceptive bar implanted in her arm he removed it with a Stanley knife. She became pregnant by him.

Vickers also had sex with the girl's friend, another young teenager, and introduced both girls to heroin.

In relation to the first girl, Vickers pleaded guilty to two counts of defilement of a girl under the age of 15, and three sample counts of defilement of a child under the age of 17, between June 2011 and August 2013. He also pleaded guilty to assaulting her, and to a count of defilement of a child under the age of 17, in respect of her friend.

He was sentenced to 11 years’ imprisonment with the final two years suspended by Mr Justice Michael White on May 22, 2019.

The Director of Public Prosecutions sought a review of Vickers’ sentence on grounds it was “unduly lenient”. However, the Court of Appeal declined to intervene, holding that although the sentence was “very lenient”, a wide margin of discretion had to be given to the sentencing judge in what was a “singular” case without much comparison.

President of the Court of Appeal Mr Justice George Birmingham said it was "quite an unusual case", because of the duration of the offending, and the fact there were two complainants.

As defilement cases go, it had to be regarded as "exceptionally serious". Vickers was twice the age of each complainant and there was no uncertainty or confusion about their ages.

When he first met the principal complainant, she was in her secondary school uniform. Initially, she was "plied with alcohol" and, subsequently, both girls were "introduced to heroin", which was a "particularly disturbing" aspect of the case that put it "right at the upper end" in terms of seriousness, the judge said.

At an early stage of the so-called “relationship”, the judge said Vickers had the first complainant supply compromising photos and he used these as a form of control, threatening to distribute them locally or to put them on the internet.

Furthermore, Mr Justice Birmignham said Vickers was violent and abusive. His efforts to control the first complainant, in particular, and to isolate her from her friends, while monitoring and controlling her access to her mobile phone and to social media, was “reprehensible”.

He said the trial judge’s description of Vickers as “manipulative, controlling, violent, narcissistic, and involving pure evil activity” was a “very apt one indeed”.

The chief difficulty presented in the case was the discount afforded for the mitigating factors, the only significant mitigation being Vickers’ guilty plea. While not without value, Mr Justice Birmingham said Vickers’ plea was not an early one, and was entered against a background of overwhelming evidence.

Mr Justice Birmingham said the judges of the Court of Appeal would have imposed a higher sentence, and would not have allowed the same discount afforded by the sentencing judge for the mitigating factors. But the fact that other judges might have arrived at a higher ultimate sentence did not mean the sentence actually imposed was “unduly lenient”.

He said the sentencing judge was being called on to deal with a case involving “singular facts”, where comparator cases were not readily available. It meant a considerable margin of appreciation had to be given to the sentencing judge.

Not without hesitation, he said the Court of Appeal had come to the view that the sentence was “very lenient” but not so lenient as to warrant intervention by the court.

Mr Justice Birmingham, who sat with Mr Justice Brian McGovern and Mr Justice Maurice Collins, dismissed the DPP’s appeal.