Rishi Sunak and Lucy Lenny Case

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Why on earth didn’t Rishi Sunak rush to change the law to make it mandatory for offenders to appear in court at sentencing.

One would assume he has known about the Lucy Letby case for months, if not years. As usual with this government, the horse has already bolted.

Why doesn’t he want a statutory inquiry into the Lucy Letby case, where witnesses are legally compelled to present evidence?

Why would he want to rush it and in my opinion miss facts/gloss over such harrowing events?

It’s a complete insult to those poor parents and consultants.

Where the convicted won't attend court for anything, including sentencing, the proceedings should be live streamed to their cells. The court can chose to show them it not friending on his they are behaving. This way they are made to see and hear even if they don't want to.

Because its utterly ridiculous to suddenly rush through a law

I heard this. He was very interesting and put a good case against forcing someone like Letby into court. With a whole life sentence there is no leverage to stop them creating an upsetting scene in court which could make it worse for the relatives. With a lesser sentence the judge could extend the sentence for refusing to attend court or begaving badly. He changed my mind on the issue.

Forcing a defendant to sit in court is not always appropriate. Some will make it worse for the families. This needs to be properly thought out and legally dealt with to ensure human rights are protected and to ensure the courts don't become a stage for them to perform. It isn't just the conservatives who have been on the back foot with this. I have never seen it included in any manifesto or as a top priority for anyone. I suspect this horrific case and the case of the little girl Olivia who was shot in her own home have cast a spot light on something few people thought about before. It is good the discussion has started but it needs delicate balancing.

If Lucy had any remorse or any thought for anyone but herself she would have pled guilty and not put the family through a horrific trial at all. I agree defendants should have to face the judge for sentencing but would forcing her to face the jury and families in the trial helped the families? I doubt it

There is an obvious answer to this.

Convicted criminal is held in cell and judge addresses them directly via monitor. Then they can shout and yell all they want but mic is turned off and speaker kept on.

They can hear but cannot disrupt.

Victims can read their statement and see that they are hearing their every word.

might be better if the law was changed to allow the judge to insist on the defendant’s presence at sentencing in cases where s/he sees fit.

Practically, Letby was only read her final verdict on Friday, and parliament is in recess anyway, so there is absolutely no mechanism for
"rushing" a law change through.

Not that any responsible government should be legislating like that in any case, but this isn't a responsible government, so pfft.

But nobody can force her to watch, and it’s easy to tune out a video hearing. Live streaming wouldn’t achieve anything

Insisting on attendance in person would not achieve anything either.
When someone refuses, what does the judge do, increase the whole life sentence to?

It wouldn't be about seeing, it would be hearing what was said without having the power to disrupt. She could very well put her hands over her ears or make noise, but some of it would be heard.

Reality is, she was never going to be remorseful for anyone but herself, but she managed to get away with not hearing the sentence handed down or the victim impact statements.

This approach would take away the option to avoid that.

Absolutely bonkers idea.

People who are being done for multiple murders and attempted murders aren’t stable. They don’t have the same moral code as you or I do- they won’t feel guilt or contrition because they’ve been given a public rollicking at their sentencing hearing.

Forcing them to go won’t make them feel any remorse, and in fact could make them lash out verbally at the victims family/families. Instead of families getting closure, it could turn into a circus.

That’s without even considering the physical danger you’d be asking prison workers to put themselves in by transporting and guarding an uncooperative prisoner.

The sentence is the punishment. Changing the law here would be a knee jerk reaction that might cause more harm that good.

I'm usually the last person to defend Rishi Sunak, but I don't think he can reasonably be blamed for this one. Are you seriously suggesting that the PM should have predicted that this particular defendant would refuse to attend court for sentencing, and pre-emptively changed the law in response?

There are very good reasons why PM's cannot realistically rush through new legislation at a couple of days notice. I don't want to live in a country where the likes of Sunak can change the law on a whim with no checks and balances in place. I dread to think what would happen.

I am opposed to making the convicted attend their sentencing.

I am very unimpressed by this band wagon.

Maybe we should ask Andrew Malkinson what it's like to attend a sentencing, get all that hate piled on you, when you're not guilty.

i cannot believe juxtoposition of these stories in news cycle.

I am not saying LL is not guilty. I'm saying this is a bad law being proposed that achieves nothing good. I'm also sick of hearing about LL. If she did those awful crimes to get attention, she's got more attention than ever now. <slow hand clap>

I don’t think she quite counts as human. She gave zero fucks about the human rights of the babies she murdered, why on earth should anyone care about hers? I’d quite like to play the victim impact statements at full volume over a tannoy in her cell, on repeat for the rest of her miserable days.

There was never any evidence to convict Andy Malkinson.

The evidence against Lucy Letby is overwhelming.

Exactly this.

Our criminal justice system has moved on from the days of stocks in the town square so we can all jeer at the convicted.

She will know what her sentence is regardless of whether she is present or not because she'll be told.

Victim impact statements are for the judge to hear how the crime has affected the victims and for them to use in their consideration of the sentence, they're not for the accused because, a lot of the time, the accused doesn't care. You can't appeal to someone's sense of guilt/contrition if they don't possess one. She knows how her actions affected the families, it was discussed during the trial, she didn't give a shiny shite and in fact sought out opportunities to witness their pain so why provide her with yet another opportunity for that?

People, 99% of whom have no personal connection to this case, baying for her to be dragged into court kicking and screaming or bound and gagging and forcibly restrained in the dock so that she can be shamed alongside her sentencing basically just want the drama and the public spectacle. It's mob mentality and it has no place in our justice system.

If you change the law for one you change the law for all including the next potential Andy Malkinson

One would assume he has known about the Lucy Letby case for months, if not years.

You wanted the person in charge of our country to change the law before the verdict on the presumption of guilty before guilty was proven?

Well that's a hell of a slippery slope OP

She probably couldn’t give a shit even if she heard it. She murdered countless babies I’m not sure why you’re holding her up to a standard that doesn’t exist for her

People go to prison as punishment, not for punishment. They lose their civil rights but not their human ones.

Picking and choosing who can have human rights and who can't is a slippery slope, allowing state-sanctioned torture of one group (e.g., prisoners) on the grounds that they do not possess human rights (i.e., are no longer classed as human beings) then opens the door to the government deciding to remove those rights from other groups, or to bow to pressure from the baying mob to do so. All well and good when you're part of the mob but what about when there comes a day where you find yourself a member of one of those groups who has had their rights removed?

That woman will never be free.

Thats enough for me. Provided she does the time, I don't want prison officers to risk injury dragging her into court. She's not worth our time.

I didn’t say we should remove prisoners’ human rights (mostly because of the Andy Malkinsons of the world), but I sure as hell know what I would like to happen to Lucy Letby.

I think this is a case where it’s up to the courts and judge to do their jobs - which they have. Politicians don’t need to get involved.

She has been given 14 whole life sentences ,she will.never see a day of freedom.again to what purpose is dragging her to court to hear her sentence going to.acheive?
Is it just so.the public can scream murderer at her ?
She knows that we know that ,and although the families can never get back what they have lost justice has been served.

And if they smile or laugh at it, what then?