One of the killers of six-year-old Arthur Labinjo-Hughes must spend longer in prison over the child’s death, the Court of Appeal has ruled.
Arthur’s father Thomas Hughes, 29, and his new girlfriend Emma Tustin, 32, were both convicted of killing the boy in June 2020, after a sustained campaign of torture, neglect and abuse.
Hughes was found guilty of manslaughter and Tustin, who inflicted the fatal injuries, was convicted of murder and jailed for life with a minimum term of 29 years.
At the Court of Appeal on Friday, judges concluded Tustin’s sentence should not be increased to a whole life prison term, after a failed challenge by Attorney General Suella Braverman.
But judges found that Hughes’ jail term, 21 years, should be increased by three years.
Arthur endured horrendous abuse at the hands of the couple towards the end of his young life, including being made to sleep on a hard living room floor, stand in isolation for hours, and being starved of food.
On the night before the murder, Hughes sent a text to Tustin saying they should “just end him”, and shocking CCTV captured incidents of slapping, smacking, and grabbing the terrified young boy.
Arthur, who was poisoned with salt by Tustin and denied food, was killed on June 16, 2020, after being subjected to a torrent of verbal abuse.
“Stand up f***ing straight, you wait til we get home, I’ll put you six feet under”, Hughes shouted at him, later threatening to “rip his head off and use it as a football”.
Hughes was out of the house in Solihull with Tustin’s other children when the murder happened, as Arthur was violently shaken and his head bashed repeatedly on to a hard surface.
She then made no effort to get him emergency medical help, trying instead to feed him Calpol.
Tustin did not appeal against the length of her life sentence for murder, and judges concluded it was not a case where an increased jail term was justified.
Turning to Hughes’ manslaughter sentence, they said: “We consider that there is substance in the Attorney General’s argument relating to manslaughter that in encouraging Tustin to harm Arthur in the way he did there was a substantial risk that she would do something that would kill him.
“That is an additional feature beyond the question of what he intended when he encouraged her to harm Arthur.
“The manslaughter bristled with aggravating features including as grave a breach of trust as can be imagined in respect of a small boy who was especially vulnerable, not least as a result of Hughes’ own conduct.
“He lied to Arthur’s school to keep him at home to protect both himself and Tustin. “The judge, in our view, was right to sentence in the range appropriate for manslaughters with ‘very high culpability’.”
Increasing the jail term to 24 years, the judges said Hughes’ killing of his own son “fell just short of murder” against a background of extreme cruelty.