11 years for the life of a child ffs

[The4thThe5th]

I have no words so I'll just leave this here. Fucking unbelievable sentence
Paul Marsh jailed for killing Jessica Dalgleish after she refused to eat lunch www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-kent-59730120

I was horrified by this too, especially in light of the recent longer sentences given to Emma Tustin, Thomas Hughes and Savannah Brockhill for similar crimes. How on earth is 11 years enough l?!

This is horrible, the case of Stanley Davis they each only got 10 years, another one with parent + step parent.

Pathetic sentence.

Why is the sentence do low?

This isn’t quite right. An Intention to cause grievous bodily harm can also suffice for a murder conviction

Yes, but essentially it comes down to proof of intent. While it's perfectly reasonable to conclude that forcibly throwing a child would result in injury to the child, I think it would be difficult to prove in a court that the intention of the perpetrator was to kill or grievously harm, even if that is one plausible outcome.

@ SanFranBear the facts speak for themselves. Baby p, killed by a step parent,more recently Arthur, killed by a step parent, Star Hobson, killed by a step parent,Jessica, killed by a step parent. There have been numerous others over the past years, there was another one which springs to mind but I can’t remember her name, Zoe something? Her stepfather went on national television appealing for her to come home, promising her a puppy and all sort, and in the meantime he’d murdered her.

In fact the only high profile case I can think of where the parent was involved rather than the step parent was Shanan Matthews, although she was hidden rather than killed.

people need to take responsibility for who the hell they’re introducing into their children’s lives.It’s just not ok to introduce your kids to God-knows-who because they feel they deserve a sex life and the kids shouldn’t have a right to get in the middle of that.

It's more the phrasing... broken home has such horrible connotations and gets my back up. I'm not surprised the stats back it up as without that parental bond, it's 'easier' to snap, I guess... but broken home is a really loaded term.

I couldn’t believe this either when I saw it, how can it be only 9 years for killing a child? Genuinely disgusting.

Is the definition of step parent anyone who casually shacks up with the biological parent nowadays? The ones named above didn't do much parenting for sure, and hadn't been around the child very long.

It's a shockingly light sentence OP but apparently "lessons have already been learned" and have been included in professional training now. So that's ok then.

@XDownwiththissortofthingX

You have to be able to prove intent to kill in order to make a murder charge stand up. Simply embarking on a course of action that could result in death is not enough.

Intent to cause serious harm that results in death can also actually result in a murder charge/conviction.

sanfranbear

It's more the phrasing... broken home has such horrible connotations and gets my back up. I'm not surprised the stats back it up as without that parental bond, it's 'easier' to snap, I guess... but broken home is a really loaded term.

I know it's an unfortunate phrase but the statistics show that bringing a non biological parent into the household can be a risk.

There's another awful case of Alfie Lamb - it seems new boyfriends & more recently girlfriends do pose a risk.

I saw this earlier and couldn't understand why it was such a short sentence given that he killed her?

RIP. Prayers.

You can ask for a Crown Court sentence to be reviewed - 28 calendar days from the date of the sentence.

www.gov.uk/ask-crown-court-sentence-review

Please please email: [email protected]

This is horrific.

@MissMinutes24 I had no idea you could do that!

I only found out from a thread here a while ago about a man who I think got a suspended sentence for sexually assaulting a child.

Mumsnet is truly the fount of child protection knowledge.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.thesun.co.uk/news/15014355/alfie-lamb-mum-should-stay-jail-forever/amp/

This killer boyfriend got 7 years and 6 months for ramming a car seat back into a 3 year old while Mum was sat in seat behind him (he was in the footwell). He's the adopted son of a former MP who probably got him a decent lawyer.