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Hmmm
Former Member
Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
Strange, they don't seem to have trouble finding prison places for certain dangerous criminals but not others.
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That just undermines the whole justice system then, doesn't it? That a specific crime should give a specific punishment. If you were sentenced 3 weeks ago you will have received a harsher punishment than if you were sentenced today.
It sounds to me like the judge is just trying to get his mug in the papers- a man should only be remanded if there is a high chance of him committing further offences.
In the circumstances relating to this case, absolutely. And it's a very light sentence anyway.
Well the crime itself was motivated purely by the identities of the victims. Those in public life are particularly vulnerable to this sort of thing. The average person on the street isn't.
atm almost 25% of people in UK prisons are on remand
in 1993, only 120 shoplifters were in jail, over 1200 are now
this says a lot about why prisons are overcrowded
Given the circumstances of the two cases, I'd say the decisions were about right, tbh. The eavesdroppers should have got more than four months porridge, too.
The actions of some people at the NOTW were completely unacceptable and illegal and there has to be a proper deterrent. A fine would be insufficient, the media would probably knowingly break the law and see any fine as an 'operational cost' to their business.
And it's ridiculous scaremongering frankly to believe that a paedophile will be automatically freed directly because of this sentence. (I'd imagine that those jailed in the NOTW case will end up in an open prison anyway, not usually the case for paedophiles).
Well of course, and so was I. But the point still stands that the reason that prisons are overcrowded is because there are thousands of people like the NOTW journalists, who shouldn't be in there ("because that's what the public wants" - Geoff Hoon on Question Time the other night - I notice he didn't say, "because that's the most effective way of cutting crime rates and rates of reoffending."). They just happened to be a convenient example at the time. If I'm honest, I would actually agree with Kermit that, depending on the precise circumstances, someone caught downloading child porn shouldn't automatically be put in prison.
I suspect that by jailing some journo's it will act as a major detterent for any others who were thinking about hacking into mobile phone calls.
But it'll also protect the public.
True.
I wouldn`t be so sure about that.
Here are a couple of clues from that article:
Maybe you find it acceptable to be LEGALLY "vulnerable to this sort of thing" ?
As to the main issue of prisons and over crowding, of course we have loads of people there for no good reason, the government listens to the Tabloids more than anything else, and if it was up to the Mail they'd jail everyone who looked a bit foriegn.
About 75% of prisoners cant read above an 11-year-old level, a good half have a serious drink or drug problem..... the list goes on. If we want to cut the prison population we must cut re-offending, and that means serious money into rehabilitation.