Criminal Appeal Solicitors
A wrongful conviction or an excessive sentence is not the end of the road — but the window to appeal is short and the grounds must be clearly identified before the application is made.
Appeals against conviction or sentence in the Crown Court, Court of Appeal, and magistrates' court require a solicitor who can identify the legal basis for the challenge — whether it is a misdirection in law by the judge, inadequate representation at trial, fresh evidence, or a sentence that falls outside the guideline range. A specialist criminal appeal solicitor will review the trial papers, identify the grounds, and advise honestly on the prospects before any application is made.
Appeal Routes & Grounds
Criminal appeals — where you can appeal, the grounds available, and what the court is looking for.
The correct appeal route and the strength of the grounds determine whether an appeal is worth pursuing. A solicitor will identify both before advising on the application — and will not take on an appeal they do not believe in, because the courts do not grant leave on weak grounds.
Appeal from the magistrates' court to the Crown Court
A defendant convicted in the magistrates' court — or who pleaded guilty but wants to appeal against sentence — can appeal to the Crown Court within 21 days of sentence. The appeal is a complete rehearing before a Crown Court judge and two magistrates — the case is effectively retried, with the prosecution and defence calling all their evidence again. A solicitor will advise on whether the case is stronger on rehearing and prepare the appeal as a new trial — identifying what went wrong at the magistrates' court and how to present the case more effectively.
Appeal to the Court of Appeal from the Crown Court
A Crown Court conviction can be appealed to the Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) where the conviction is "unsafe" — meaning there was a legal error, inadequate representation, fresh evidence, or an irregularity in the proceedings that makes the conviction unreliable. Leave to appeal must be obtained from the Court of Appeal — and is granted only where there are real prospects that the appeal will succeed. A solicitor will review the trial papers, identify the specific legal basis for the appeal, and draft the grounds of appeal for a QC or leading counsel to settle and argue.
Grounds: misdirection in law
Where the trial judge gave a legally incorrect direction to the jury — on the elements of the offence, the burden of proof, the standard of proof, or the approach to a specific legal issue — the resulting conviction may be unsafe. Jury directions in complex cases (dishonesty, consent, joint enterprise) are particularly susceptible to error. A solicitor will review the summing-up and identify whether the direction given was legally correct — and where it was not, assess whether the misdirection was material to the verdict.
Grounds: inadequate representation at trial
Where trial counsel made fundamental errors that undermined the fairness of the trial — failing to advise on a crucial line of defence, failing to cross-examine a key witness on an important inconsistency, failing to challenge inadmissible evidence, or conceding an issue that should have been contested — the resulting conviction may be unsafe on the basis of inadequate representation. This ground requires a careful analysis of what was done and not done at trial, and why the outcome might have been different had it been done. A solicitor will review the trial advocate's decisions and advise on whether inadequacy is genuinely established.
Grounds: fresh evidence
Where evidence comes to light after conviction that was not available at trial — and which might reasonably have affected the jury's verdict — it can be admitted on appeal. The Court of Appeal considers whether the evidence is credible, whether there is a reasonable explanation for why it was not adduced at trial, and whether it might have led to a different result. Fresh evidence grounds are fact-specific and require the evidence to be genuinely new — not simply evidence that was available but not used. A solicitor will assess the fresh evidence and advise on whether it meets the threshold for admission on appeal.
Appeal against sentence
An appeal against sentence — from the Crown Court to the Court of Appeal — is available where the sentence passed was wrong in principle (a wrong type of sentence) or manifestly excessive (out of line with the Sentencing Guidelines). The Court of Appeal will not reduce a sentence simply because a different judge might have given a lower one — it requires a genuine error of principle or a sentence that is clearly too high. A solicitor will review the sentencing remarks, compare the sentence to the guideline range, and advise on whether an appeal against sentence is justified.