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Original poster

To think the judge was right to throw the book at Just Stop Oil?

454 replies

StripedPiggy · 18/07/2024 19:30

Five Just Stop Oil activists, including leader & XR founder Roger Hallam have been sentenced to up to 5 years in jail for blocking the M25 & other main roads.
Their intention was to cause gridlock on roads in the South East. The disruption they caused resulted in people missing medical appointments, flights & business meetings.

Well done to that judge. The criminal justice system is right to pass serious sentences on these fanatics which will act as a strong deterrent to others who might try to cause mass disruption, and put people’s lives in danger, to further a political agenda, whatever it might be.

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parkrun500club · 19/07/2024 19:33

Gingerisgoodforyou · 18/07/2024 19:34

They've been driven to action by the inaction of all other channels. The impact of climate change will be far greater than a minor traffic jam inconvenience.

I think a jail sentence is disproportionate- we hear prisons are overcrowded and there's no room, and these people aren't a danger to the public (unless they've done this multiple times already and will reoffend, I don't see why a community sentence couldn't be used).

Tbh I'd like to see prison sentences for major polluters rather than protesters.

I agree. I don't necessarily disagree with a short sharp prison sentence (say 3 months given that someone COULD have died (but didn't)) but the length is ludicrous. I've posted before about a guy who got drunk and ploughed into two girls on a pedestrian crossing, killing them both. He got six years, for taking two lives. That was a stupidly short sentence and this is stupidly long.

As an aside, they need to stop having a go at ordinary people and blockade Farnborough airport and other places where you have the twits with their private jets.

IllMetByMoonlight · 19/07/2024 19:27

I, for one, am incredibly grateful for Roger's and other climate activists' tireless work.
Extinction Rebellion's peaceful activism shifted the Overton Window in the spring of 2019, and we owe so much of our current discourse on the climate to this.

So many of the asylum seeking families I work with share what is currently unfolding in their countries of origin ‐unprecedented heat, droughts during seasons which would normally be wet, freak weather events, crop failures, resource scarcity and resultant conflict and displacement.

Shakeoffyourchains · 19/07/2024 17:55

AccidentallyWesAnderson · 18/07/2024 22:29

Deliberately causing an obstruction, by blocking a road to say, ambulances, isn’t peaceful. I don’t care if their direct actions weren’t violent in the literal sense.

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It is peaceful in the context of peaceful and non-peacful protest, whether you agree or not, and the amount of disruption caused doesn't change that either.

Weirdly I don't remember there being the same outrage and accusations directed at farmers when they decided to block roads earlier this year, I wonder why that is? 🤔

Maybe the police should be encouraged to round the organisers of those protests and cart them off to jail too, after all 5 years prison time is apparently the justified punishment for those actions.

TheGoogleMum · 19/07/2024 17:44

No it was too long a sentence. People get less for violent crimes. A big sentence here is making it seem like violent protest is better legally (less severe punishment). Also we're letting people off jail time because prisons are so full, but not these people? I think the judge has given an inappropriate sentence

Allfur · 19/07/2024 17:30

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For the striking doctors too?

ATenShun · 19/07/2024 16:58

To look at it rationally, the justice system is there to have us atone for whatever crime we commited and show we knew what we did was wrong. I suspect part of the reason they got long sentences is that they still believe they were correct in doing it.

The justice system will also be giving these sentences to deter others from carrying similar out.

kittycloud · 19/07/2024 16:56

Yes. Throw the book at the lot of them. They blocked the road and stopped an elderly lady and a sick child getting to the hospital. Absolutely abhorrent behaviour, they deserve what they get.

DonnaBanana · 19/07/2024 16:53

I take it you think the truckers who blocked the roads in the 00s and 10s to protest against high fuel prices should have all got five years in jail as well? Also the Suffragettes.

IllMetByMoonlight · 19/07/2024 16:50

Tandora, "But it’s ok to force climate destruction on others?", you're right, this is precisely the point, isn't it? I hate it that this is a sort of default position, and that those who call attention to the peril we are in are vilified.

Tandora · 19/07/2024 16:48

smooththecat · 19/07/2024 02:45

If you’re getting very riled up by it and posting on social media, you’re playing into their hands, it’s what they want you to do. Whether you like it or don’t like it, agree with it or disagree, that’s not really the question. I’m not an activist myself but I can see they are going to be on the right side of history; when we look back at irate people in cars on blocked motorways being slightly inconvenienced, they’ll be the ones looking pretty stupid.

I can see they are going to be on the right side of history; when we look back at irate people in cars on blocked motorways being slightly inconvenienced, they’ll be the ones looking pretty stupid.

yep. This.

Tandora · 19/07/2024 16:47

TempestTost · 19/07/2024 01:03

Climate issues are in the news all the time.

Just because any group thinks a certain things should be done does not give them the right to cause civil disruption in order to force people to do them.

None of us have the right to violently force the causes we think are important on society at large.

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But it’s ok to force climate destruction on others?

PToosher · 19/07/2024 16:13

Collexifon · 19/07/2024 14:22

Looks as though the new Attorney General is going to look at it. Hopefully the sentences will be lessened.

Hopefully not.

coupdetonnerre · 19/07/2024 14:39

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Collexifon · 19/07/2024 14:35

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OK Miss Farage.

FinalCeleryScheme · 19/07/2024 14:32

Collexifon · 19/07/2024 14:25

Okaaaay backs away slowly

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Whatever. If people cause huge public nuisance and economic damage they should face strong sentencing.

Caroparo52 · 19/07/2024 14:29

At the end of the day they are right though. Although I do not condone their methods of protest there is no way of getting the message across... we are fucking up the planet big time and it will all end in tears. Already started with unprecedented weather occurances worldwide and probably too late to stop our little blue planet getting rid of a species hell bent on self destruction.

coupdetonnerre · 19/07/2024 14:26

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Collexifon · 19/07/2024 14:25

FinalCeleryScheme · 19/07/2024 14:25

No. They were too lenient.

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Okaaaay backs away slowly

FinalCeleryScheme · 19/07/2024 14:25

Collexifon · 19/07/2024 14:20

Do you think the sentence was proportionate?

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No. They were too lenient.

Collexifon · 19/07/2024 14:22

Looks as though the new Attorney General is going to look at it. Hopefully the sentences will be lessened.

Collexifon · 19/07/2024 14:20

FinalCeleryScheme · 19/07/2024 14:18

Because the correctness or otherwise of a scientific view is not relevant to or probative of guilt or innocence of a criminal charge. Neither is ‘moral conscience’.

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Do you think the sentence was proportionate?

FinalCeleryScheme · 19/07/2024 14:18

Collexifon · 19/07/2024 14:13

What makes you think that?

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Because the correctness or otherwise of a scientific view is not relevant to or probative of guilt or innocence of a criminal charge. Neither is ‘moral conscience’.

Collexifon · 19/07/2024 14:13

FinalCeleryScheme · 19/07/2024 14:09

Bill McGuire doesn’t seem to understand criminal law or procedure.

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What makes you think that?

FinalCeleryScheme · 19/07/2024 14:09

Collexifon · 19/07/2024 14:04

Just adding this - "Bill McGuire, the emeritus professor of geophysical and climate hazards at University College London, whose expert evidence the judge said could not be heard in court, derided the trial and verdict as “a farce”.

“They mark a low point in British justice and they were an assault on free speech,” he said. “The judge’s characterisation of climate breakdown as a matter of opinion and belief is completely nonsensical and demonstrates extraordinary ignorance.

“Similarly, to suggest that the climate emergency is irrelevant in relation to whether the defendants had a reasonable case for action is crass stupidity.”

Bill McGuire doesn’t seem to understand criminal law or procedure.

Collexifon · 19/07/2024 14:04

Just adding this - "Bill McGuire, the emeritus professor of geophysical and climate hazards at University College London, whose expert evidence the judge said could not be heard in court, derided the trial and verdict as “a farce”.

“They mark a low point in British justice and they were an assault on free speech,” he said. “The judge’s characterisation of climate breakdown as a matter of opinion and belief is completely nonsensical and demonstrates extraordinary ignorance.

“Similarly, to suggest that the climate emergency is irrelevant in relation to whether the defendants had a reasonable case for action is crass stupidity.”

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