Committal for contempt of court: London Borough of Camden -v- Melvin Wright and others

Court of ProtectionCommittal for Contempt of Court

Neutral citation number: [2025] EWCOP 14 (T2)

Case number: 14030391

In the Court of Protection
In the matter of the Mental Capacity Act 2005
And in the matter of K

22 April 2025

Before:

Her Honour Judge Hilder
(the Senior Judge of the Court of Protection)

Between:

London Borough of Camden

-v-

(1) K
(by her litigation friend, the Official Solicitor)
(2) S
and
(3) Mr Melvin Wright

IMPORTANT NOTICE: This note of judgment has been approved for publication. It is subject to the terms of a Reporting Restrictions Order dated 3 February 2025 which provides that the anonymity of the First and Second Respondents must be strictly preserved. Failure to do so may warrant punishment as a contempt of court.

HHJ Hilder:

  1. Mr Wright, I am speaking to you directly as far as I can. Today I am concerned with the very serious matter of ensuring that court orders are obeyed. You have admitted breaching a court order so I am now considering what penalty should be imposed upon you.
  2. Your barrister, Mr Harrison, has very helpfully set out as an annex to his position statement for today a summary of the legal framework which applies to my decision about your penalty. I adopt that framework. In particular, I am bearing in mind the Court of Appeal’s judgment of Lovett v Wigan Borough Council [2022] EWCA Civ 1631:

• at para 33 of that judgment, I am reminded that the emphasis today is on the importance of ensuring compliance in the future with court orders;
• at para 43 of that judgment I am reminded that a custodial sentence should not be imposed if an alternative course is sufficient and appropriate;
• at para 45 of that decision, I am reminded that a first option can be to adjourn consideration of sentence, so that the court can have the opportunity of speaking to a contemnor directly. You will recall that that is what I did on 3 February 2025.

  1. I remind myself, and you, of the orders I made on 21 October 2024, which you have admitted breaching. At that time the order required that :

(1) There shall be no face-to-face contact between you and [K] except as organised and supervised by the local authority:
(a) You shall not make or attempt to make any arrangements for face-to-face contact between [K] and yourself except as organised and supervised by the local authority.
(b) If [K] attends at your home, you shall not admit her.

(2) You shall not send any communication to [K], whether by telephone, text, WhatsApp, social media or otherwise, between 6pm and 9am.

(3) You shall not send any communication to [K], whether by telephone, text, WhatsApp, social media or otherwise, even during the permitted hours of 9am and 6pm, which:
(a) makes any reference to sexual activities on the part of [K] or any other person; or
(b) refers to K’s personal health, any member of [K]’s birth or adoptive family, these Court of Protection proceedings, any professional involved in these proceedings, or [K]’s work experience or college placement opportunities; or
(c) uses or threatens violence against [K].

(4) You shall not make any complaint about [K] to the police, including about her being a missing person, without first explaining to the local authority the nature of the proposed complaint.

  1. On 3 February 2025, you admitted breaching those orders in the following ways:

(1) You admitted that, in late December 2024, you allowed [K] into your flat unsupervised, including by allowing her to stay for two nights at your flat and that [K] was found there by police officers. You admitted that you did not take steps, and you should have done, to inform the local authority of [K]’s whereabouts.

(2) You admitted that on various dates you have responded to messages from [K] during the prohibited time frame.

(3) You admitted that you have communicated with [K] about these proceedings insofar as you asked [K] to tell the truth about her communication with you, as the information [K] had relayed to another party had not been correct.

(4) You admitted making reference to [K]’s sexual activities in response to messages she sent to you about her sexual activities.

  1. There are four heads of admission. They include a very serious admission that you allowed [K] to stay for two nights at your flat. They also include a serious admission of repeated communication with [K] on various dates during the prohibited timeframe.
  2. You should be in no doubt that the Court regards all this admitted conduct as a clear, unequivocal failure to comply with a court order, characterised by persistent and deliberate choice. These breaches are contrary to the very purpose of the proceedings in which they arise, namely, to advance [K]’s best interests. It is reasonably clear to all concerned that these breaches are likely to have caused [K] significant harm and distress.
  3. In reaching my decision on an appropriate sentence, I have in mind the following general principles from MacDonald J in Re Dahlia Griffith (application to Commit) [2020] EWCOP 46 which were also adopted by Poole J in Sunderland CC v Macpherson [2023] EWCOP 3 at para 51:

(1) The penalty chosen must be proportionate to the seriousness of the contempt.
(2) Imprisonment is not the starting point and is not the automatic response to a contempt of court.
(3) Equally, there is no principle that a sentence of imprisonment cannot be imposed on a contemnor who has not previously committed a contempt.
(4) In circumstances where the disposal chosen must be proportionate to the seriousness of the contempt, where an immediate term of imprisonment is appropriate it should be as short as possible having regard to the gravity of the contempt and must bear some reasonable relationship to the maximum sentence of two years imprisonment that is available to the court.
(5) Where a term of imprisonment is the appropriate sentence, the length of the term should be determined without reference to whether the term is to be suspended or not.
(6) Having determined the length of the term of imprisonment, the court should expressly ask itself whether a sentence of imprisonment might be suspended.

  1. I now consider the situation since 3 February 2025, which was when your admissions were made and the issue of sentence was adjourned.
  2. I am aware from the wider Court of Protection proceedings that [K]’s living and care arrangements have changed. This has gone some way to reducing opportunity for you to breach the Court’s orders.
  3. I am aware from an email from [K]’s legal representatives to the Court (sent at 11:10 on 17 April 2025), in which they sought permission for their attendance to be excused at this hearing, that [K] is experiencing heightened anxiety and ‘may be coming under pressure’ from you, Mr Wright, ahead of this hearing.
  4. Nonetheless, I reach my conclusions today on the basis that there is no evidence before me of you further breaching the Court’s order since 3 February 2025. As Mr Harrison says at §11(d) of his position statement, the local authority has not filed any evidence since the last hearing alleging any further contempt by you. As Mr Harrison says at §11(e) of his position statement, you are therefore to be taken as though you have abided by the Court’s injunctions since the last hearing. Mr Harrison tells me you have shown that you are capable and serious about complying with the Court’s orders in the future. At §11(f) of Mr Harrison’s position statement, he assures the Court that those acting on your behalf have impressed upon you the importance of complying with the injunctions going forward. I accept, through Mr Harrison, your affirmation and commitment to abide by the Court’s orders in future.
  5. In those circumstances I am satisfied that these proceedings, if not perfect, have had a significant and beneficial impact in ensuring that you comply with this Court’s orders.
  6. I remind you, Mr Wright, that the injunctive orders, as remade on 3 February 2025, remain in force. You must continue to abide by them. If you do not, it is highly likely that new committal proceedings will be brought against you. The Court would inevitably regard any further breach as requiring a heavier penalty than on this first occasion.
  7. It is open to the Court to impose a financial penalty on you. Today, I have very limited information about your finances. Today, I am not going to go along that route. You should be in no doubt that this is a once-only approach. Were the Court to find itself in a similar situation again, lack of available information would not be a bar to a financial penalty.
  8. I bear in mind that your health is such that you are, to use Mr Harrison’s words, reaching the end stages of your life. I also bear I mind that [K] is finding these proceedings difficult. She and her representatives take no part in today’s sentencing exercise. You must understand and take from that that there is absolutely no justification at all for you taking any step that could conceivably burden K with any worry about this Court’s approach to your conduct.
  9. Finally, I bear in mind that it is proportionate and just that the sentence for your admitted breaches recognises the Court’s preference for allowing you, Mr Wright, to end your life respectfully, and for [K] to see that opportunity being given.
  10. In conclusion, for breaches of the Court’s order (having already been recorded in the order of 3 February 2025), I formally impose no penalty today for those breaches. The injunctions stand. This Court expects you, Mr Wright, to conduct yourself now in such a way that no further committal proceedings will be required.
  11. That is the judgment of the Court.