The family of PC Andrew Harper should have been supported in their time of need. Instead they were offered false hope and embarrassed on the public stage.

As a quick reminder Harper was tragically killed in August of last year as he was trying to apprehend three teenagers who were suspected of stealing a quad bike. He became entangled with the back of the car and was dragged more than a mile before the vehicle came to a stop.

The three defendants ended up being convicted of manslaughter rather than murder because the jury could not be certain that the driver knew Harper was still attached to the car. When it came to sentencing the driver got 16 years while both passengers got 13 years each.

For many this was far too lenient and in fact the Attorney General, Suella Braverman QC MP, decided to refer the sentences to the Court of Appeal for review. In an unusual twist she actually appeared before the court herself where her argument seemed to mostly centre around the public concern about the sentencing decision.

If you are a future lawyer or student reading this then it is my solemn duty to inform you that this is a terrible legal argument.

There are lots of legal rulings and decisions that might attract ‘public concern’ but the law does not bend to the whim of what might be popular or bump the Attorney General’s approval rating up a few points. Come wind, rain or storm the law stands and is applied equally to everyone.

It was therefore completely unsurprising when the Court of Appeal rejected the referral in no uncertain terms. As one lawyer put it, use of the phrase “unusual submission” in the judgment was very much akin to a “judicial kicking”.

Meanwhile the main thrust of the decision can be summed up by simply saying that there are sentencing guidelines and the judge followed those guidelines. In essence whether the referral was a result of Braverman’s legal incompetence (as has been discussed previously in relation to legal advice she gave the government) or an attempt at political point scoring, the case was a total waste of time from the very start.

For Braverman this will just be another mark against her name but for the family of PC Harper this will be a real dashing of hopes. In particular Harper’s widow, Lissie Harper, has campaigned for harsher sentences to be imposed on those who kill emergency workers.

This piece is not a comment on those laws or sentencing rules but there are open questions about whether they are appropriate and achieve the level of justice required. The point is that those sentencing rules are devised by Parliament and so if she wishes to change them then the Attorney General would find herself to be much more effective in the House of Commons than the courtroom.