Sentences don't reflect crimes
What sad reading in the Express & Star – two youths admit attacking a horse, leaving it for dead, and indeed the poor animal has to be put down as its injuries are so bad. What will the magistrates do to them? Smacked wrists – don't do it again?
What sad reading in the Express & Star – two youths admit attacking a horse, leaving it for dead, and indeed the poor animal has to be put down as its injuries are so bad. What will the magistrates do to them? Smacked wrists – don't do it again?
A football yob is released from prison, only to commit another crime very similar to the one he was sentenced for. Within days of an early release he assaults a visiting fan with extreme violence.
What justice do the magistrates dish out for him? He is sent back to do the remainder of his original sentence. No thought for the poor person he attacked, no justice for him.
I have only reached page three, and now I read of a yob who placed a good many people in danger by throwing a large piece of concrete off of a bridge, into the path of a train driver who was badly injured.
This criminal gets a third of his servable sentence knocked off – why?
A Dudley youth was sentenced but failed to turn up for his punishment (if I understand the article correctly). What if he does finally get arrested? He will probably be released on bail, and if such an established criminal, he will be let out to offend yet again.
I would love to hear the magistrates' views on such lenient sentences. One can imagine their excuses – the jails are too full, their hands are tied by Government guidelines and restrictions.
I would love to give these people a taste of their own medicine. Are we so lame brained as to accept this brand of justice?
Are we that complacent, saying nothing and hoping things will be better in the future? Don't we want to help the law enforcement agencies bring these criminals to court, and not handed down such lenient sentencing?
I feel so sad to read these articles and am left to wonder what help we would require, when it's our turn to be on the receiving end of these violent acts. What would the vast majority of decent people in this area desire of the justice system? Not what we read of in the Express & Star, I fear.
R Fairclough, Fir Street, Sedgley.
