Where a jury acquits on a charge requiring proof of penetration but convicts on a lesser charge arising from the same incident, the verdicts may be reconciled if the evidence on penetration was equivocal, even where the offences arose from a single episode. The impact of the Reporting Act's reporting regime is a relevant consideration in exercising the discretion whether to record a conviction (the Bunton principle), but where the circumstances are sufficiently serious to warrant a term of imprisonment, the consequence that such a sentence will trigger reporting obligations is inherently unlikely to carry material weight. The question whether the 'statutory avoidance interpretation' of R v Rodgers is correct was expressly left open.
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