Two sex attackers, one of whom was dubbed the UK’s most prolific serial rapist, have had their 30-year jail terms increased by a decade each.
Reynhard Sinaga, 37, was sentenced to life in January at Manchester Crown Court for a total of 159 offences, including 136 counts of rape, committed against 48 men – although police have linked him to more than 190 potential victims.
Sinaga preyed on lone, drunk young men around nightclubs near his flat in Manchester, posing as a Good Samaritan who offered them a floor to sleep on or promised them more drink.
The Indonesian student drugged the men then filmed himself sexually violating them while they were unconscious, with many of his victims having little or no memory of the assaults.
Judge Suzanne Goddard QC, who originally sentenced him to a minimum of 30 years, described Sinaga as “an evil serial sexual predator” and a “monster”.
Joseph McCann, 35, was given 33 life sentences at the Old Bailey in December for a string of horrific sex attacks on 11 women and children during a 15-day cocaine- and vodka-fuelled rampage.
McCann carried out a series of sex attacks in London and the north-west in April and May 2019, just two months after the convicted burglar was wrongly freed from prison following “major failings” by probation staff.
He was found guilty in December of 37 charges relating to 11 victims, aged between 11 and 71, and was described by the sentencing judge, Mr Justice Edis, as a “classic psychopath”.
It is the first time two separate offenders’ sentences had been challenged jointly as being unduly lenient.
But a panel of five judges refused to impose a whole-life term on either man, as sought by the Solicitor General Michael Ellis QC at a hearing in October.
Giving the court’s ruling on Friday, the Lord Chief Justice Lord Burnett said: “The offending in the cases of McCann and Sinaga, very serious indeed though it is, does not, in our judgment, call for either to receive a whole-life tariff.
“This is not to minimise the seriousness of their offending but instead to ensure that the most severe sentence in our jurisdiction is reserved, save exceptionally, either for the most serious cases involving loss of life, or when a substantive plan to murder of similar seriousness is interrupted close to fulfilment.”
However, the judge said their minimum terms would be increased to reflect the serious nature of their crimes.
Lord Burnett said that, in the collective experience of the senior judges who heard the case, McCann and Sinaga’s crimes are some of the most serious offences of rape to have been tried within England and Wales.
He added: “Neither man has shown any remorse and the long-term psychological damage for at least some of the victims in both trials is profound and will only be understood in the years to come.”
The judge said that, whether either man is in fact ever released from prison will depend on the Parole Board’s assessment of the risk they pose after they have served their minimum jail terms.
Ian Rushton, north-west deputy chief Crown prosecutor, said in January: “Reynhard Sinaga is the most prolific rapist in British legal history.
“His extreme sense of sexual entitlement almost defies belief and he would no doubt still be adding to his staggering tally had he not been caught.”