Criminals will be forced to attend sentencing: Why UK is changing its laws

The changes in the law would mean that the killer will have to hear anguished victims' statements from families or listen as judges impose sentences.

The British government said that it will change the law to force serious criminals to attend their sentencing hearings. This came after an outcry from the families of murder victims after the refusal of nurse Lucy Letby to come to court this month to be sentenced for the murder of seven infants and the attempted murder of six others.

A handout image released by Cheshire Constabulary police force in Manchester on shows the November 2020 custody photograph of nurse Lucy Letby.

Lucy Letby, Britain's most prolific serial child killer in modern times, will spend the rest of her life behind bars, a judge ordered. Lucy Letby, 33, murdered te five baby boys and two baby girls at the neonatal unit of Countess of Chester hospital in northern England where she was working in 2015 and 2016. She injected the infants with insulin or air or force fed them milk.

The changes in the law would mean that the killer will have to hear anguished victims' statements from families or listen as judges impose sentences. Politicians and victim advocates called for the changes in the law to force criminals to appear for sentencing after several convicts chose not to face their victims in recent months.

Under the current law, offenders can be found in contempt of court if they refuse to attend, but they can't be forced to come. The law will be changed to make clear that custody officers can use “reasonable force” to make them comply and those who refuse will face up to two additional years in prison.

UK prime minister Rishi Sunak said the government would introduce the legislation this autumn asserting that it was “unacceptable that some of the country's most horrendous criminals have refused to face their victims in court. They cannot and should not be allowed to take the coward's way out.”