PC Harper killers sentenced

[ChazsBrilliantAttitude]

16 year and 13 year sentences.

I doubt they would have got much more if the murder charge had been successful.

I am glad to see the judge wasn’t convinced by their arguments.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-46544144

The time served will be ten years for one offender, eight for the other two, hardly seems commensurate with the crime does it?

How are you measuring what is commensurate? Bear in mind they were (frustratingly but probably correctly) convicted of manslaughter -accidental killing - not murder. If 'commensurate' means to you that they should suffer the same fate as the victim, then I've got a problem with that. Come back and tell me this is the right thing if/when someone in your family accidentally runs a red light and kills someone.

But it will be defended as we all live in a "civilised society"! well some of us do, others don't and civilised punishments don't work on these people, they need uncivilised punishments and a life sentence with a min term served of 25 years would soon wipe the smirk of their grinning faces.

Where do you live? I live in the UK, which has something like the tenth-lowest murder rate in the world (i'm excluding micro-nations like the Vatican and Tuvalu here). I grew up on a pretty rough council estate where there was (relative speaking) plenty of crime but most people were still decent and law-abiding, and we had policing with consent. If we administer, by your own admission, 'uncivilised' punishments, then we are as bad as the criminals, and trust in the law breaks down. There's little evidence that that excessive sentencing functions as much of a deterrent.

Or is the dig at 'uncivilised society' a dig at travelling communities? I hope not because that would display prejudice and racism.

Anyone who thinks 10 years is a suitable punishment should ask themselves "what will he do when he comes out?" Perhaps become a counsellor ? or work in adult social care? OR go back to to being a thieving piece of scum only getting his 25 years when he inevitably murders some other poor victim?

Again they've not been convicted of murder. It's important that we provide education when people are in prison and take steps to find them useful employment when they come out. We don't know what these guys are likely to be like when they come out but for most of us our 30-year-old selves are very different from our teenage years , and given suitable support there's every prospect they will live fruitful lives. This has to be better than giving teenagers whole life sentences for manslaughter based on what they might do in the future?

We don't live in Scandinavia, don't have a criminal system based on rehabilitation and we won't be getting that anytime soon, so we have to lock these people away, if only to protect ourselves.

Our criminal justice system is meant to be rehabilitative. Others' systems work much better than ours. If you're going to call for change, wouldn't it be better to call for (i) better and more humane prison services with more scope for learning and living a worthwhile life on release than (ii) more whole-life sentences, including for manslaughter? The first has to be the better option and frankly is the more likely to happen as no developed society has anything like (ii). You know this is the right answer, don't you? Or are you more interested in revenge than justice?

I don't get why any criticism of the travellers community is being perceived as being racist. As someone who was a traveller and lived on many sites I can confirm that a lot of travellers live outside the law and are proud of that. They see everyone else as suckers. And the levels of misogynist behaviour and illiteracy are staggering. So until their community connects meaningfully with the wider community there are going to be issues. These thugs were raised to be criminals and protected by their families with no repentance at all.

Criticism of the behaviour of travellers who do things that are worthy of criticism is one thing. However, some of the posts on this thread went beyond criticism of individual behaviour. They targeted all travellers or they made comments which went well beyond criticism of behaviour into attacks on personal characteristics (it’s hard to explain without repeating the comments).

I'd add, ChazsBrilliantAttitude, that my experience of travellers has been largely positive. I used to live in a block of flats a few doors down from the entrance to a (settled) traveller community. The travellers were unfailingly lovely and friendly; our neighbours in the flats were to a large degree shithouses (incidentally, this wasn't some deprived estate; it was key worker housing).

Clearly, this isn't everyone's experience. Some travellers are decent, some are not. It's almost as if they are like - gosh - normal people. It's doubtless fair to say that among some traveller groups there 'issues' with integration with the rest of society. But lumping them altogether and dismissing them as a bad lot is the definition of prejudice.

Now we are equating what happened to PC Harper and a traffic offence? oh come on! talk about Whataboutery!!!

Once again, manslaughter is not accidentally killing someone.

Our prison system is not rehabilitative or people wouldn't get locked up in their cells and we wouldn't have a very real drug problem in prisons and if you read what i wrote earlier, you would recall i said i am all for early interventions but once into adulthood, change is very difficult.

No, i don't want revenge, i want deterrent, protection and rehab, i really do not want to hear in a few years time that a 28yo man has been convicted of murder shortly after his release from prison.

Long jail terms might not be the only answer but so long as these people are behind bars they are not out subjecting decent people to their criminal acts.

As for the out on licence rule, they have to caught and convicted first and as said, many criminal families are untouchable for all but the most serious of crimes.

Manslaughter can be accidentally killing someone. One of my previous points has been about the varying degrees of manslaughter... I know this is already taken into account in sentencing, but IMO not enough.

The point I made is that when people have a flagrant disregard for others’ lives and for the law, when their behaviour is frequently Such that it endangers others, it’s very different from a one-off event or a genuine accident where someone has been careless. It’s interesting to read your post because the main thrust of my argument was about public protection. In an ideal world, sentencing would be about proportionate punishment, rehabilitation and public protection. It’s extremely difficult to balance all three and the U.K. system is notoriously bad at the second of those purposes. But the third one, public protection, is IMO not given enough weight.

People who routinely go to burgle people’s homes armed with weapons, and routinely drive extremely dangerously to evade capture, are behaving in such an extreme way that it’s as near as dammit to showing ‘intent to endanger life’ as it’s possible to be. The fact is, everyone out on the roads that night was vulnerable and could have been killed by these thugs. Yet if this terrible event hadn’t occurred, the incident wouldn’t even have made the news. It would be just another quad bike theft and the hassle of insurance for the owner. I don’t think that’s right. When people have no regard for human life, they might be “lucky” to never actually kill or maim someone but morally they’re no better than someone who behaves in the same way but accidentally knocks someone down

Now we are equating what happened to PC Harper and a traffic offence? oh come on! talk about Whataboutery!!!

FGS. That was the exact opposite of the point I was making. I asked you what you meant by commensurate as if it means 'punishment equal to the consequences' then you're treating a momentary lapse of concentration leading to a fatal RTA in the same way as Harper's killers, which can't be right.

If that's not what you mean, then what do you mean by 'commensurate'? How do we assess what the right length of sentence is? 10+ years in prison banged up 23 hours a day sounds to me like hell on earth, and strikes me as about right (given they weren't convicted of murder). If you disagree, what sums would you use?

Also would you really bang someone up for an extra five years at a cost of hundreds of thousands of pounds, rather than spend that money trying to rehabilitate them?

You recognise

'But lumping them altogether and dismissing them as a bad lot is the definition of prejudice.'

But DancingBear you yourself said earlier their 'lives were fucked from the day they were born', this was ok apparently because it wasnt 'lumping them altogether', oh nooo it was just explaining why they were all criminals! I'm not sure how you can generalise and others can't though tbh.

@GetOffYourHighHorse

'But lumping them altogether and dismissing them as a bad lot is the definition of prejudice.'

But DancingBear you yourself said earlier their 'lives were fucked from the day they were born', this was ok apparently because it wasnt 'lumping them altogether', oh nooo it was just explaining why they were all criminals! I'm not sure how you can generalise and others can't though tbh.

The specific families that these young men were part of clearly have not given them a good start in life or positive role models.

That doesn’t mean that is true for all traveller families. Why do you keep assuming the comment is wider than the specific circumstances of the offenders.

But DancingBear you yourself said earlier their 'lives were fucked from the day they were born', this was ok apparently because it wasnt 'lumping them altogether', oh nooo it was just explaining why they were all criminals! I'm not sure how you can generalise and others can't though tbh.

FGS this is ridiculous. I was obviously talking about the people who committed the crimes, not all travellers. I've mention above the traveller settlement down the road from me, where everyone was universally kind, law abiding, the kids went to school etc.

You can't muster any rational arguments so you just resort to insults. It's plain to anyone with half a brain reading the thread.

where they lived, what so called community they came from is irrelevant on thread about sentencing.

would be if we were discussing crime and its causes but for these criminals, that is all a bit too late.

anyway @thedancingbear you called me a 'Mail reader and quite frankly that is an insult to end all insults lol!

anyway @thedancingbear you called me a 'Mail reader and quite frankly that is an insult to end all insults lol!

Fair enough, if you genuinely don't read the Mail, I revoke that and apologise. In fairness you had been talking about pushing repeat offenders off cliffs, which I'd taken at face value; there are plenty of people who would be happy to see that happen, and it's really wasn't clear to me that you were taking the piss

where they lived, what so called community they came from is irrelevant on thread about sentencing.

Yes and no. We clearly agree should be irrelevant. But practice people's race and class profile does have an influence on sentencing. There are plenty of good studies to back this up.

Though you wouldn't believe this, i am really quite liberal in my prison/crime views.
Definitely believe in rehabilitation and early interventions, especially early years, even pre birth, most mums want the best for their children but if you can't read, then you won't know about that handy leaflet on breastfeeding etc etc.

However, i do think that some crimes are beyond the pale and this is one of them.
they knew what they were doing and choose to ignore their victims screams and so if i had my way, they would get that whole life tariff.

'You can't muster any rational arguments so you just resort to insults. It's plain to anyone with half a brain reading the thread.'

Where did I insult you?! Anyway aren't you insulting me by suggesting I can't muster any rational argument just because I disagree with everything you say, hmm?

'they knew what they were doing and choose to ignore their victims screams and so if i had my way, they would get that whole life tariff.'

Exactly.

I've just read another case about a man convicted of the murder of his wife, despite no body being found. Thankfully that jury didn't expect some convenient dash cam recording with a full confession and could actually interpret facts.