Time on remand off sentence / Bail

[blue17]

If a prisoner spends 3 months on remand and then is granted bail before a main trial is the original 3 months spent taken off any final sentence, some say it is lost so do not take bail and some say it is taken off? depends who you speak to down the pub! can an expert advise, thanks

[Buenchico]

The 3 months is not taken off the sentence, but it is taken off the time served.

Here's an example:
Let's suppose that the judge decides that the correct sentence for offence should be 18 months imprisonment. He'll pass that sentence irrespective of any time spent on remand. However (if we ignore tagging schemes here) someone sentenced to 18 months imprisonment will normally spend 9 months in prison. If the offender had been remanded on bail he'd serve 9 months from the date of sentence, but if he'd already spent 3 months remanded into custody he'd only have 6 months left to serve.

Chris

[Buenchico]

PS: I should have also stated that ANY time spent in custody is deducted from the time left to be served. For example, if the offender had to attend a police station (even for a few minutes) when surrendering to bail, that counts as a 'police day' and a day will be knocked off the time served. (However, that doesn't always happen automatically. The offender usually needs to make an application to the prison authorities, to have 'police days' taken off the time which he'll serve).

[blue17]

Thank you Buen very much appreciated