4 yrs for cutting down tree, no jail time for rape

[Barnbrack]

Why are 2 men being given custodial sentences for cutting down a tree when men convicted of rape regularly get suspended sentences.

Is an important tree more important than a random woman! Justice system seems to think so.

Should trial by national scandal be a thing?

Agree with this. No end of trees up and down the country get cut down without permission in neighbour disputes. People generally don’t go to prison. Cutting the tree down was terrible but it seems if it’s a famous tree then the punishment is more severe?

They should have got longer.
Rapists should also receive longer sentences.

No.

I confused headlines I'd read regarding and sexual assault.

I then made a quick post questioning my knee jerk emotional reaction.

I took on board the point re rape in England having looked it up. I didn't realise I was submitting some sort of abstract for scientific publication.

You do seem very very stuck on the specifics of rape sentencing even when statistics on SA sentencing were shared. That's all I'm getting at

I dunno, English people in particular seem very annoyed about a tree

Four years for two working class blokes for upsetting a few middle-class walkers! A tree worth about £400 and they didn't even take it away.
Middle Class students who smash very expensive windows and vandalise statues causing thousands of ponds of damage in the name of "Just Stop Oil" usually get conditional discharge.
It is certainly 2 Tiers for justice.

I don't understand what purpose jail time will serve for anyone - I'm sure they've already learned a lesson, I doubt they're a danger to the public and it's taking up two crucial prison places that could be filled by, for instance, men found guilty of downloading images of child sexual abuse - I've seen case after case where such dangerous men get no jail time at all.

In cases like the tree vandalism surely the most important aspect should be to make reparations to the affected community in some way?

Yes.

More backtracking.

I’m not stuck on anything, you mentioned rape not SA originally and that’s what I originally commented on. The fact you want to now go down another path doesn’t mean I have to follow you.

I don’t even get the abstract for scientific publication comment. Weird.

Oh, and I am English and am no more annoyed about the tree than I am about any other criminal damage. It is illegal, they were found guilty, they were given sentences. Justice was served.

Ok

You definitely get prisons for sex offenders, there is one not far from where I am

www.gov.uk/guidance/littlehey-prison

It was a hundreds of years old eco system for wildlife. It would take hundreds of years to create a similar environment.

Of course women being raped is more important, but let’s not be ridiculous. The crimes these particular men committed should be punished. Just as rapists should be.

You have a valid point about the contrast between the length of this sentence and of rape sentencing more generally, but let’s not pretend that what these guys did wasn’t idiotic vandalism on a national scale.

Rapists should get more prison time, these guys shouldn’t get less.

I don’t.

If you pick it out of a statute book. But that's not the whole story.

there are 2 main reasons why the majority of us are law abiding citizens

1. morality
2. legal consequences

and I think criminal damage very much falls under (2) as to why people don’t. For high profile cases such as this a statement is made as to the consequences of criminal damage in the 6 figure range (even though cut off is £5,000)

Out of interest, you responded to 1 of the rape convictions no jail time articles saying he was conditionally released due to dementia but the sycamore gap situation one of the perpetrators had mental health issues and suicide attempts yet he's being sent to prison.

Seems wild to disregard someone's mental health for chopping down a tree but not for child rape.

Also they did damage Hadrians Wall!

Yes, OP, I agree with you. It was a tree. You can't arbitrarily assign ridiculous jail time because it was an especially special tree.

Too bad there are no especially special women that seem to be worthy enough to actually get justice.

Being working class doesn’t absolve people of all wrongdoing. It’s patronising to the working classes to suggest they can’t enjoy walking. The tree was important to the nation, it was iconic to millennials for its staring role in Robin Hood Prince of Thieves, it was important to the wildlife living in it. The reason they got four years was because it fell on and damaged Hadrians Wall. I’d suggest most people with a brain cell regardless of class understand not criminally damaging national treasures because they belong to our children and grandchildren. Those ‘ordinary blokes’ also wasted police time and taxpayer money with their lies. If someone is willing to drive in the dead of night to a beauty spot to spoil it for everybody and have a right good laugh about it, then I really doubt that they are secretly a misunderstood and upstanding individual.

You need to take that up with the judge.

My comment was that a suspended sentence and a conditional discharge are not the same thing.

They aren't full of people who have written something on social media. HTH.

I'm glad they've got 4 years.
Rape sentences should start at 25 years.

It was a national 200 year old landmark and a living thing. What they did was simply yobo behaviour. I’d have given them a lot more time than 4 years. You can’t compare the two crimes.

I voted YABU because I don’t think the two are related. Rape sentences should carry almost the same sentence as murder imo and to be perfectly honest, I wouldn’t be all that adverse to knackers being cut off. The cutting down of the Sycamore Gap tree is a completely unrelated crime and yes, I do believe it deserves a decent length prison sentence. I think 4 years is an appropriate sentence for the tree but not for rape.

there is an epidemic of male violence and misbehaviour and I would love to know what the government is going to do about it. I don't care that many men say not all men, We know that but we want to know what is going to be done about those men who are so messed up.

Why did those men cut the amazing tree, changing the landscape forever. It was an act of entitlement and violence. They deserved the 4 years.

Yes, violent assault on women is a different thing altogether. I think that men who abuse women in this way should be given life imprisonment.

I mean, it shouldn't be comparable yet here we are