Where an offender's drug addiction developed in the context of childhood dysfunction, parentification, low intellectual functioning and personality disorder, these circumstances are capable of mitigating moral culpability for drug trafficking offences, not merely explaining the offending. Sentencing errors as to the commercial quantity threshold for a drug of dependence are capable of materially affecting the sentence, given the quantity-based nature of drug trafficking sentencing. The pre-amendment version of s 5(2H)(e) of the Sentencing Act 1991 (requiring 'substantial and compelling circumstances' without the additional requirement that they be 'exceptional and rare') applies to offending that occurred before 28 October 2018.
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