Is this a good result?

[underthetrees1234]

New poster. DD (21) plead guilty for perverting course of justice. Three charges, concurrent etc. First offence, MH issues etc and she got 18 months suspended for 18 months and 12 month Mental health treatment requirement. I didn’t have chance to ask solicitor/ barrister what he thought on result but I just think this seems a little harsh? I thought a community order. I won’t go into much detailed but she told multiple lies etc to police. NO one was arrested as a result of her lies. she had MH issues. Probation recommend community order so I I think this seems harsh tbh. Any one any experience.

Impossible to say if you're not going to give details of what she's done.

She made false allegations of getting threatening phone calls and death threats

Nobody can say when we don’t know the details. But she hasn’t gone to prison and she will now have to get mental health help so that sounds like a good result to me. Hopefully the punishment feels harsh and she learns for it as lying to the police at 21 is pretty bad. I hope the mental health support works out for her

She made false allegations of getting threatening phone calls and death threats

I still think the punishment sounds perfectly fair

Probation will recommend an order within the community, however, if the offence crosses the custody threshold, which it evidently has, the court can choose to suspend the sentence if there are
compelling reasons to do so. Threats to kill could have resulted it custody for whoever she accused. Be thankful she’s not in prison.

She needs the support and is clearly got the mindset to cause damaging accusations. So it’s very fair. Just sad for you to watch

Yeah, I’m not defending her. She has serious MH issues and previous abuse. But she’s my baby and I’ll always stand by her. I just thought as no one got arrested due to her allegations she’d be community order.

Those kinds of lies have led to the alleged perpetrator also suffering with bad mental health; some have even killed themselves. There was a documentary on Netflix recently about just this. She needs MH support and she’s getting it now. I think it’s fair personally

I think it’s a positive outcome. She clearly needs help and this will hopefully stop her doing anything like it again.

Here are the sentencing guidelines for perverting the course of justice. Fans of The Archers will know that you can get a two year jail sentence for it

https://sentencingcouncil.org.uk/guidelines/perverting-the-course-of-justice/

She clearly has mental health issues and needs help.

By the court mandating 12 months support, it's long enough that the level of continued treatment make actually have a positive impact for her.

The court have even her an opportunity. She should embrace that.

She's your baby but she's a 21 year old woman making fictitious allegations. Were they against a specific person?

Yes. Several people

Were they aware of the allegations and questioned?

Never questioned. One was aware others were not. One was in a position of authority.

You must realise that’s not normal behaviour
Why are you aghast at her having to have treatment for her mental health issues?

I’m not against Mental health treatment at all. She needs it. I just thought it would be community order with MH treatment

I’m not. She needs it. I just thought community order.

That doesn’t mean the punishment is harsh. When you commit a crime you don’t get a say in the punishment, she should be feeling grateful she didn’t get prison.

She is very grateful. She thought she would get a prison sentence. I was obviously naive and thought they would follow probation with community order.

Perverting the course of justice is a really serious crime, OP. The sentence sounds reasonable to me, even if it isn’t what you hoped.

Well there you have it, YABU

Hi OP
I'm a police officer (detective) so I hope I can give a little insight.

We get ppl lying to us all the time. We hardly ever push a wasting police time, or perverting the course of justice, or perjury (if in court) because of the regularity of it (not enough resources to prosecute every incident!) and also to not turn people away from the criminal justice system should they have future needs of us.

I am explaining this to say your DD must have caused significant work for officers and wasted significant resources to be worth this prosecution.
Eg if she alleged digital offences (calls, media comments etc) and we have spent time and money trying to investigate these (some of our requests for digital takes days to arrange, authorise, examine etc) and it was all for nothing - it's such a waste of our already depleted resources.

I am really sorry about your DD's MH issues and I really hope she gets support.

ETA: she had a suspended sentence so nothing onerous. Broadly preventative, to dissuade doing it again.

I think you need to give some thought about what the effect of false allegations might have had on that person. People don't shrug these things off, they risked facing a court case and punishment for something they hadn't done.

I think you need to realise that sometimes someone needs to face up to the seriousness of what they have done, and the effect it could have. Sometime a sharp shock early on will do more good than being too lenient, which might get her into even more trouble later.

I hope your DD gets the help she needs to get her life on track