To think that the jo yeats jury should have been told about his strangling during sex fetish?

[pippala]

pleased for Joanna's family that he has been found quilty, their ordeal is hardly over though.
Min 20 years, so he will be 53 when he comes out, with still half his life left.
Now it appears he watch porn that involved strangulation, had sex with prostitutes and like choking them!
I have heard about better orgasms when you can't breath, Isn't that how Mike Hutchence died?
I can not understand why this was withheld from the jury.
I was on jury service and put away a pedo for 33years. at sentancing we were told he had done it before to 3 other girls! I can understand that we were not to know as we were hearing only that case but in Tabaks case he hadn't killed before,as far as we know but his personality was not the one portrayed by the defence.

I can understand why the Judge ruled this evidence as inadmissable and IMO this was a wise decision, given the verdict and the removal of any possible grounds for appeal. I'd be surprised if blatant lies such as Tabak was "monogamous" would have been allowed by the Judge without intervention and instruction to the jury to disregard and I think it more likely that the defence inferred monogamy, by painting a picture of a man in a functioning, first committed relationship.

However, outside of the legal context I believe Joanna was failed, dreadfully. Failed by a society that has allowed this sort of porn to be manufactured and so readily available. I have no doubt at all that this man's porn and prostitute habit had a bearing on his actions that night.

The Judge did comment disparagingly about the pornography aspect after the verdict, but IMO he should have been much more condemning of its existence.

It was only 'wise' as the jury luckily found him guilty. Doubt if we would consider it wise and the right decision if the verdict had been different.

hope someone may have mentioned this, but his 20 years is a minimum. He has a 'life' sentence, so spends 20 years in prison and then gets considered for release. When he is released he is supervised on a life licence. If he ever behaves badly ( not even offending), or shows any inappropriate thinking, then he is returned to custody.

and yes Charbon - there is a massive responsibility around stuff which he accessed which the judge could have commented upon and so gave campaigners against the availability of this material more power to the elbow.

Just he phrase 'life' riles me. Wish they would just do away with it and state the minimum amount of years. Makes a mockery of the system and means sod all.

it's tricky sozzled. eg. saying to someone 'you will be in prison for 10 years and then you will be released' gives them no reason whatsoever to change their attitude. Saying 'you will be in prison for 10 years and then you will be considered for release on a year-by-year basis' gives them an incentive to work on their attitudes and potential behaviour.

Also, for a prison to house a load of men with no hope of release presents a real problem.

FWIW, last time I looked, there are only about 40 people in prison with a 'stay in prison until you die' sentences handed down by judges. Most of those will be mentally disordered and shifting between secure hospitals and the prison establishment. Tabak hasn't the profile consistent with those people.
We don't have judicial execution anymore, so we must have measures on how to manage the risks they present.

At an emotional level, I think you're right that in the event of a not guilty verdict, most people wouldn't have thought the Judge's actions wise. But at a dispassionate level, the objectives here were to see justice done and for the verdict to be sound and not vulnerable to an appeal/re-trial. Those objectives have been achieved.

But once they were, I'd have liked to have seen much more comment from the Judge. What puzzles me is why the prosecuting counsel of all people, wanted details of Tabak's predilections kept from the press?

Pan, you make an interesting point but what about when 'life' means 2 yrs (ha, my IPad changed that to 2 hrs, how apt for onc) which one day might be the case.

charbon - Ihear it's because IF the prosecution insisted on full disclosure, then there were other 'defensible' stuff that defence could have produced. We will not ever have a full understanding as t ohow the barristers sorted htings out. I don't think.

sozzled - not sure what you mean. A 2 year tariff on a 'life' sentence would be highly unusual, and possibly given to a woman who had murdered her abusive partner. The Indeterminate sentence may attract that sort of sentence/tarrif, but that can be given for serious assaults etc, not murder. It does get really tricky, and I could bang on about it, but it's late!

Wow Snape. You must have some stories to tell. I have been in Crown Courts for sentencing this sort of stuff, but never such high profile, or not so cut n' dried stuff.

From where I wa ssitting ( about 200 miles away) his 'version' never sounded authentic.

I know Clifton. A friend had a flat on a really steep hill of a road, just near the bridge. Glad for you that you went.

sozzled - life sentence means that even if you get out, your sentence is never over.

That's what makes it a life sentence - you will never be a truly free person again. You are out "on licence", and can be recalled to prison, without trial, if you are involved in other illegal activity (or activities restricted by your licence).

Despite my feelings of loathing towards Tabak, I am glad to live in a society where it is very rare for people to serve "full-life" sentences.

Pan is right, I believe, about the different motivations of a person who may one day be able to live a limited life outside, and one who is going to prison with no chance of ever being released.

Also - the reason the prosecution didn't want these details released post-trial was to avoid prejudicing possible future trials of Tabak based on that evidence. I imagine having not been allowed to make use of it in this trial, they wanted to make sure it would be potentially useful in future. I think it was unrealistic to imagine it could be kept out of the public eye indefinitely.

Wow, Snapes, how fascinating. I would be interested (if you can bear to think about it again, no worries if not) what you mean by his "performance". Was it credible in any way? Did it evoke any sympathy in you? Were you confused as to what the verdict would/should be?

An appeal would be so awful for JY's family. If I was the judge, knowing that a manslaughter conviction was guaranteed, exacerbated by his behaviour after the death, then I'd have tended to be particularly strict with the prosecution too to save them from an appeal.

Charbon - good post at 00:43:46.

I agree that inferences, rather than evidence, seem to be taking over some parts of discussion. I don't remember any particular stress on his being either sweet or monogamous; I do remember his admitting to being a deceitful, manipulative liar.

I've just seen a commentary on the BBC, and their expert was attaching importance of avoiding an appeal over the admissibility/inadmissibility and a potential retrial. Just think of the impact on the family if that had happened?

I think also that this thread shows why it was the right decision to exclude: despite patient explanation by many posters, there was still a strident insistence that motive was relevant to this case, and an inability to grasp the difference between intent and motive. This tends to support the view that the information would indeed have wrongly influenced the Jury (I mean wrongly in the sense of attaching weight to motive, which is not required for a safe conviction, though it is logically and emotionally satisfying).

Finally charbon: I agree, on the basis of what has happened so far, that there are wider factors which may have failed Joanna, in terms of tolerance of porn. And there is no definitive answer to your question about where the prosecution was in all this.

But I have a guess - remember the aftermath of Baby P, and why anonymity was seemingly inexplicably kept in place. It was because further charges, and convictions, followed. There has been a hint in the press that more action may happen on this. So it seems they have taken the most serious charge first, and then will examine the others. This has several important advantages; all the things in relation to this trial and avoiding appeal that have been explained in this thread, separate and sounder basis for potential future charges, and IMHO the very important emotional reason of sparing Joanna's family from sitting through detailed evidence on porn charges if everything was taken together. It would have made the trial much longer, and much more distressing.

Oh dear.

There is a difference, and I thought it had been explained rather well. And it is a legal point, and I suppose you do either understand it or you don't.

I wasn't talking about the reference to prostitutes, and I'm so sorry you got hold of the wrong end of the stick.

I was talking about the posts which continued to confuse motivation and intent.

I see I was quite mistaken about the tone of the thread following the insightfulness of the more recent posts (notably charbon's). I'll leave you to it.

I think if it were just that he'd watched the porn at some point in his past, then no it shouldn't be revealed at trial. But the fact that he continued watching it, downloading it or whatever after the murder makes things a bit different for me, as it does build up a picture of him. The average person may well fantasise about things, but the reality of those scenarios would not be sexually exciting. If I fantasised about strangulation, but then witnessed an actual strangulation, I would not be able to go back to my original fantasy as I would instead override it with the reality.

I know that probably doesn't make much sense!

You should help him - he needs you

Another

Scarevola I have understood what you are saying perfectly well.

Presumably someone has added legal adjective of this. ? Please god they have.

Agree 100% with thunderbolts on this thread. I was up all last night with nightmares about this case - not because there was one lone nutter who tragically killed one woman - there will always be lone nutters, sadly. But because I was horrified that viewing strangulation porn could be regarded as so normal an activity that it could not be proved to demonstrate anything in particular about how that kind of person might choose to act. What kind of country do we live in where watching what is close to a snuff movie is just viewed as a normal and harmless piece of entertainment?

This sort of violent porn should be outlawed and its viewers liable to prosection for that alone - whether or not they go on to act it out - as is the case with child porn.

i can't answer the legal arguments in this particular case but absolutely echo the point made earlier by another poster that one of the sad results of this case is that it seems to have accidentally normalised the use of strangulation porn. How many other men who view this kind of stuff will have been getting off on the facts of this case - will this increase copy-cat crimes as it is seen how nearly he got away with it (and indeed, it now appears the police think he may well have got away with it on previous occasions)?

i'm very glad he's down for a minimum of 20 years though agree that seems ridiculously short for one so young, or indeed for anyone given the nature of the crime.

:(