Sophie Moss killing: sentencing of Sam Pybus was test case for new ‘rough sex defence’ law - and it failed

Labour MP Harriet Harman wrote to the Attorney General yesterday (8 September), asking him to refer the four year and eight month sentence given to a man who strangled and killed a woman during sex to the Court of Appeal, for being too lenient.

The sentence, which was handed down earlier this week in Teesside, has caused uproar among campaigners, charities and the wider public, with Ms Harman accusing the judge of sending out “the message that killing your girlfriend during sex is a minor matter”.

Sam Pybus drank 24 beers over 10 hours one day in February, waited for his wife to fall asleep, got in his car and drove to “vulnerable” Sophie Moss’s house where he choked her to death.

“I wonder how much time he would have got if he had knocked someone down while driving to her house?” I thought, while reading the details of the case.

So we found out.

Analysis of the Ministry of Justice database on court outcomes shows that over the last five years, the average custodial sentence given to people who killed through careless driving while under the influence of drugs or alcohol was four years and eight-and-a-half months.

Slightly more than Pybus got for deliberately placing his hands around Sophie Moss’s neck, then squeezing the life out of her.

Pybus does not deny he did so - he admitted it, albeit claiming her death was accidental. But he also said choking Ms Moss was something he did regularly, and that she  both enjoyed and encouraged it.

It’s an example of the so-called “rough sex” defence, that has gained increasing notoriety in recent years.

Campaigners such as Ms Harman and We Can’t Consent To This have highlighted what they said was its increasing use in courts across the country, which has often resulted in men blaming deadly acts of violence against women on consensual acts gone wrong.

The law was changed in April when the Domestic Abuse Bill gained Royal Assent. It supposedly outlawed the use of the defence by making it crystal clear that no person can consent to the infliction of harm that causes injury or death.

We may have just witnessed the first test case of that legislation in our justice system – and it failed.

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