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Courts go Mad

A

alexa

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What do people think about the retributive punishment way above normal levels. A mother of two who stole a pair of shorts has just been sentenced to 5 months in jail but that seems mild when you think of the 21 year old with no criminal record who was not rioting but took some water worth around £3 from a store as he walked home with his girlfriend. He got six months. :shock:

This guy will never drink again
Facebook cases trigger criticism of 'disproportionate' riot sentences | UK news | guardian.co.uk

Although previously of 'good character' he was sentenced to 4 years.

What do people think?

I think some of these are mad. They are going to cost an enormous amount in paying for the jail sentences, appeals and inability to get employment later.

What do you want? Retribution? I do understand the argument of giving people the message to think twice but this is too OTT for me.

I would prefer to see more proportional sentences and much more working on restorative justice and think some of this is just mad and likely to produce more rather than less crime as they get their criminal degrees in jail.
 
 
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Public opinion and word from higher ups will affect the sentences that people involved in the riot will get. The punishments are going to be steep in order to satiate the drooling masses. Cameron said that he is committed to restoring order to London and punishing the rioters. I wonder if he's equally committed to restoring the lives of the poor as well?

People should be punished for looting and committing acts of violence, but I don't feel the British system is about to actually address the root problems of the rioting. Police brutality was just the straw that broke the camel's back. Citizens don't riot for no reason, especially at the levels we have been seeing. There are major grievances behind it.
 
Temporal said:
People should be punished for looting and committing acts of violence, but I don't feel the British system is about to actually address the root problems of the rioting.
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Addressing the root cause of riots is not the role of the criminal justice system.
 
 
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Many of us in America are amazed at the relatively light sentences being given by the UK courts. In the US, it is an unfortunate fact that people committing the same crimes here under the same conditions would go to prison for years. What's more, we're amazed at how quickly the British courts have handled the trials. Here in the US it would be months and months and months before the same accused would go to trial.
 

You need to speak for yourself unless you provide a link.
 
 
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That you Paul but I wasn't wanting a copy of a report, I was simply wondering what you believed was the contradiction between this project and human rights

The Family intervention project 2006 is an excellent idea in principle but in my opinion not robust enough, probably down to contradiction with humans rights issues
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alexa said:
That you Paul but I wasn't wanting a copy of a report, I was simply wondering what you believed was the contradiction between this project and human rights
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From my experience irrespective of what the guidelines state the offending family has to be willing to participate, and participate wholeheartedly. So, rather than authorities, now this may be different depending on which local authority you look at, taking a robust approach some are still reluctant to pursue for example repossession orders for properties [authorities are fully aware they have to be housed somewhere, if children are involved]. Gaining access to the family can be very difficult [enforced entry is very difficult to obtain, unless immediate danger is suspected]. I'm sure you get the picture. The process on some occasions is still dictated by the offender.

I have been involved in two such cases. Both with successful outcomes for the Community, but as an example you would not believe the hoops agencies had to jump through to get the family to engage. If the family unit has sickness/disability issues all the more complicated.

Paul
 

Have you read the report you gave the link to? It looks a bit against human rights to begin with.


I am at a loss to see why this should go anywhere but into the bin...but to imagine just because bad policy did not help, good policy would not is a mistake.
 
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alexa said:
I suspect England is moving in a fascist direction.
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It is at the moment but I suspect the Lib Dems and Labour Party will smack the Conservatives around a bit and the legislative will return to normal very soon. The sentences handed down at the moment are far more than a similar sentence for a similar crime before the riots. So on appeal most of the sentences will be downgraded I suspect. The Lib Dems and Labour are already talking about the Conservative ministers sending "orders" to the judges to make sure there are harsh sentences, and if that is right and can be proven, then the Conservatives are in for a very rough time.

But what is most worrying is the naming of people and the "perk walk" .... it is turning more and more into a US style legal system and that is a problem. The lack of protection of the accused by the courts is shocking and will influence eventual judgements and trials and that is a huge problem as well. I always respected the British legal system, but right now it looks more like the McCarthy communist trials of the 1950s or show trials under Nazi Germany/Stalin USSR than the cornerstone of world legal history.
 
 
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gunner said:
Place yourself in close proximity to one of these families, and believe me you would be singing from a different hymn sheet. I feel it only right, considering your on the attack,
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My 'attack' as you call it was as a response to your being happy that we are using disproportionate sentences concerning anyone involved in any way in the looting and rioting, you making some suggestion that 'human rights' interfered with ways you had found helpful, you providing a document on this method which makes it quite clear this was about dealing with minor issues forcing vulnerable people, people with for instance mental health problems into projects to get 'reprogrammed' for fear they would lose their home, benefits or children and did not address the underlying causes. As a scheme, according to the report you linked it was neither an effective scheme, nor one able to address the problems of the people it was meant to be helping because as far as I can gather there were supposed to be two sides to this - on the one the council could get lazy neighbours to tidy up, pay their rent, stop making noise or it could evict them but on the other hand it was supposed to address the problems they people had.

From your report.
http://www.crimeandjustice.org.uk/opus1786/Family_intervention_projects.pdf

You provided this document to illustrate what you believed was a good scheme hampered by the inability to take away more of the human rights of the people involved. I, reading the report you provided said it should be binned.



I pointed out that we were giving disproportionate sentences and asked whether people wanted retribution. You appeared to reply yes and said our laws were not tough enough. I pointed out that England has more people in jail than any other country in Europe, that it has been wanting to get tougher and tougher on crime for years, that it gave up on rehabilitation schemes for criminals resulting in more re-offending, that it has failed to address the problems of an underclass of people and that giving out disproportionate sentences supposedly based on the will of the people shows a society not grounded in it's justice system.

Harsh and harsher ways have been tried. You wish even harsher. You wish to remove from people who you consider to be presenting problems their human rights. You provide a document on a scheme you liked and said it would have been better if it could have removed more of people's rights. I read such scheme and see it is hopeless in addressing the problems it claims to be addressing.

You may have got rid of these people but unless you go for the death penalty for them, without proper and appropriate help, the situation continues and gets worse and worse as they are more and more marginalised from society.

gunner said:
The actions of a fascist?

As for emotions. Your dead right, I'm extremely 'passionate' about the problems of society.

Paul
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Your emotional outburst was that you did not give a 'feck about human rights'.

I never said you were a fascist. You are making all this too personal. I said England was moving in that direction. Disregarding normal justice, scapegoating and stereotyping people and not giving a 'feck' about human rights is a good start.


Only if we start addressing the issues of the marginalised and bring them back into society where they can have hope of possibilities and opportunities within society and where those with mental problems who used to be kept in asylums or other difficulties which need addressing can be given appropriate support will harmony be resumed.

The way this country has been going for years is to be harsher and harsher on the marginalised and marginalising them more and more. When will it stop. No home, no benefits, no hope of a job. When popular opinion decide they are so bad they should be hung? Yes, I think England is moving in the direction of a fascist state.
 

You have gone on an extremely long babble unfortunately misunderstanding the fundamental point i made. FIP are not robust enough. That means IMO they are not working as it stands, but are a good idea in principle. If you had took this on board it would have saved you one hell of a lot of typing. I simply gave you a link as you had NO idea of their exsistence, I find that initself very starnge for someone pertaining to be a bastion for Human Rights.
I will ask you one question, which you previously ignored. What about the Human Rights of the 78yr old lady who endured months of harassment verging on torcher? Also you very much need to look into the length and breadth covered by 'Mental Health' issues. Did you know depression comes under that umbrella? In one of the two examples i have been involved in the mother had Crones disease. Does that give her family the right to terrorise and cause many people to be fearful of leaving their property?
Alexa its very easy to pass comment as you have on issues and processes that you really know very little about, and believe me when i say the community tried engaging with these families on numerous occasions, but its not until you follow that process that some people are never going to change. The disfunction is so bad 'you' only read about it in papers and magazines.
As for the present processes and procedures i totally agree they are not working correctly. As i have neither the ability or power to change legislation i work intimately with the relevant agencies in alleviating the burden on the wider community. I am a firm believer in personal responsibility and human rights for 'all', not just a minority of people, as you advocate.

Paul
 
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It was the link which you provided which I highlighted. You claim a good program. They claim it is not. Read the report. It is ridiculous to say that one incident is sufficient to take away the rights of everyone, or that one incident makes a bad policy into a good one. It does not. This system is clearly not a good system and is harming the vulnerable and not offering needed support. That is what your own link says. To argue otherwise is just trying to be difficult.

You appear to believe you know it all and want this to be a personal issue. I was a counsellor. I have a pretty good idea of what makes people change and it is about empowerment not 'reprogramming' as if we were the USSR.

I suggest you look at what you and I have said rather than coming out with your allegations.
 
 
 
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PeteEU said:
The first appeals are in and they seem to be correcting the insane sentences handed out in the first few days.

BBC News - England riots: Woman wins sentence appeal
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Well that is one but the jails are overflowing and there is concern both over the cost and over the safety of particularly first time offenders.

I think however the problems are deeper and have been simering for decades. Cameron is wanting to diminish human rights in the UK


It is David Cameron who is 'twisting and misrepresenting' human rights | Benjamin Ward | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

I fear we are moving away from democratic values and this has been a gradual thing over the last 30 years or so as people have felt, in Britain certainly, impotant politically – almost certainly aligned to the fall in Unions and 'working men's' clubs and so on where everyone was able to both get support and argue on a political level.

It is something I am becoming more and more concerned about. After the terrorism in Norway, Quilliam came out with a paper where they saw a possible hope for the future in encouraging Arab nations to vote 'in' democracy, not vote 'for' democracy. The writers angle seemed to be that maybe we had actually forgotten the values of democracy, liberal values and human rights and that if this could be presented as a 'good cause', it would be more likely that this would be taken up in the ME. If we are not living it ourselves.......?

John Keane talks about the slide out of democracy in this article


Greed and Democracy | John Keane

Now the Quilliam article suggested that both anti muslim extremism and muslim extremism have become Global. To his thinking this puts people who believe in democratic values, such as a liberal society and human rights, at a disadvantage as they have not cottoned onto this. I think we could put it further than just for extremists. I think liberal democracy with human rights is both standing in danger and could be what sorts out all the extremists who are going around whether muslim, anti muslim, anti human rights, out on the riot, bankers and so on.

I am still puzzling how you make democratic values the good cause and start addressing it in a Global way because I suspect that is what is needed.
 
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