Shooting Case Plea Results in Attempted Murder and GBH Acquittal
August 7, 2017
The case of David Jeffers was resolved last week when the Crown accepted a plea to a firearms offence, leading to Jeffers’ acquittal on the counts of attempted murder and causing grievous bodily harm with intent. Jeffers had inserted a firearm – a shotgun – into the victim’s vagina whilst the pair were together in a hotel in Stockport. The firearm had gone off, causing catastrophic injuries. In the immediate aftermath, the victim had told the emergency services that the man responsible had tried to ‘blow her insides out’. The Crown alleged that Jeffers had pulled the trigger deliberately – hence the attempted murder and section 18 charges. Jeffers denied that this was the case, instead asserting that the firearm’s discharge had been accidental and its insertion into the victim’s vagina part of a sexual fantasy that she had spoken about in the past. Text messages suggested a past association with firearms on Jeffers’ part dating back some months before the incident in the hotel room. As the victim lay injured, Jeffers fled the scene and in due course change his appearance, disposing of the gun in the process. In the event, the Crown accepted that the discharge had been accidental and took a stance which resulted in Jeffers being sentenced on the basis that it had been inserted into the victim’s vagina as part of a sexual game during consensual sexual contact.
The Basis of Plea was a carefully drafted and detailed one which afforded Jeffers substantial mitigation in the circumstances. Oral mitigation had to be advanced with real sensitivity. The Judge, HHJ Potter, described the case as an extremely unusual one. Oliver Saxby QC was leading Michael Collins of Park Square Barristers, instructed by Leeds firm Sugare & Co.
Please see links below for media coverage of the case:-