To think that there should be some consequences for Judge Nicholas Rowland

[BerryTwister]

I’ve just read that the boys who raped and filmed 2 girls have had their non custodial sentences changed to custodial ones. Judge Nicholas Rowland had originally let them off with non custodial sentences, but there was a public outcry and the Attorney General got involved. In court today it was stated that he had made a mistake, and the boys were remanded in custody.

I can’t find any information about what happens to Nicholas Rowland. Maybe nothing. But I really think there should be some consequence. Maybe some retraining, or perhaps not being allowed to try cases involving sexual violence against women and girls for a while.

In any other job, if you made such an error of judgement, you wouldn't just be allowed to carry on as you were.

Can we create a petition to get him sacked? How can we, the public, get heard by our own justice system?

If you’re going to remove Judges every time a decision is appealed successfully or a sentence is increased or decreased, you’re going to run out of Judges very quickly.

Being a Judge is highly intellectually demanding. They don’t always call it right, and that’s why appeal courts and procedures exist. It is not straightforward.

If you start having some sort of sanction all you’re going to achieve is (a) no one wanting to be a Judge, in a system which needs more of them, and (b) overly cautious, play it safe decision making.

And if they do their job so badly they’re effectively incompetent then there is a sanction.

With the greatest respect I do think you should read the thread in this case.

@WrongKindOfFeminist @OtterlyAstounding

I totally get your anger. I am furious at the leniency of rape sentences too.

But in this case, I am approaching it from the perspective of someone who works with teenagers, and with prisoners.

I have worked in a school with boys like this. Low intelligence. SEN. Poor impulse control. Usually chaotic home lives and poor parenting in the mix - often parents with low intelligence and SEN too, and drug/alcohol abuse, domestic violence, emotional/physical abuse, poverty, neglect, etc. A lot of them wound up in trouble with the police but they were not evil or monsters. They were children who had been horrifically let down by the adults around them, and hadn't been given the tools to function normally in society.

When it comes to the boys in this case, the reality is we can't lock them up for life for what they have done. The law doesn't allow us to.

So we have to think about - when their sentence ends, what do we want the outcome to be? That they are back out on the streets raping more girls? Or that they are able to reintegrate into society successfully without reoffending?

Statistically, the latter option is much more attainable if they don't go to prison. That will have partly been why the original judge went down that sentencing route. Young people are statistically proven to be less likely to reoffend if they don't go to prison but instead serve a community sentence (up to 50% less likely), and that is the result that is better ultimately for society as a whole, even if it's not immediately better for the victim.

This is the challenging and difficult nature of discussing sentencing and punishment and so on. It's not just about the victim and what's best for them. Of course it should be, but it can't be, because if, as in the majority of cases of crime, there is a reality that the perpetrator will not be in prison forever, there has to also be thought to what the outcome of that will be, and how to reduce the chances of there being future victims of that perpetrator.

As someone who volunteers in the sector, has interacted with a lot of prisoners and people working in the justice system, and has done a lot of reading around the subject, I am clearly coming at this from a different perspective than the majority of people on this thread, and I don't think that's a problem - it's a discussion forum, and all views should be valid and open to exploring.

I am angry about what happened to the girls. I am so sad for them and the trauma they have experienced, and I have a huge amount of empathy for them and their families.

But having taught hundreds of 14 year olds in my career, I can tell you that something has gone very, very wrong in these boys' home lives for them to have done this. It doesn't excuse what they have done or mean they don't need to be punished - I am just not convinced prison is the right form of punishment if the desired outcome is rehabilitation, which in my view, it should be when we're looking at people who are very young and have a lot of life left to live.

You do have a lot of compassion for these young men @EnidSpyton, would you have the same if they raped you, a colleague or your child?
would you be as concerned about the impact of facing the consequences on the rapists future and their “whole lot of life to live”?
what about the victim and their life to live? My friend at school was raped at 15 and her whole family ended up moving hundreds of miles away so they didn’t have to run the risk of seeing her rapist again, but you’ll be happy to know he’s living a wonderful fulfilling life, while the impact on her has been horrendous.

There's a lot of emotion on this thread for understandable reasons. Emotion is not always a good basis for decision making.

A number of well informed posters have tried to explain what the law is and how it works. I don't think it's helpful to ascribe dubious motives to them for do doing.

Many on here might like the law changed. 200 years ago and less these boys would have been hanged. Maybe we should go back to capital punishment. That could be a valid debate.

Certainly many on here are advocating locking up for life. But that costs us all £70k a year each. So locking these boys up for life might cost around £12m in current prices if they are in jail for the next 60 years. Do you want to pay that?

So sentencing policy is not just about retribution it's about practical issues too.

This thread would be improved by some practical suggestions. By all means argue to change the law on sentencing if you don't like it but maybe think through the implications too!

Yes, I like to think I would, because of the experiences I have had throughout my life in working with people in the justice system. I think before I started working in prisons, I would have struggled, though, for sure.

The reality is these boys are 14 years old. Their sentence is 4 years.

So, once they have served that sentence, if they live to the average lifespan of an adult male, that's over 60 years of them walking the earth.

If these boys are not given supportive rehabilitation, if the circumstances of their lives and how they came to commit this crime are not dealt with appropriately, the statistics tell us that in all probability, they'll spend those 60 years bouncing in and out of prison (at the cost of £50k + of tax payers' money per year) and doing all sorts of harm to many more people in the process.

In my view, regardless of how awful I feel for the girls involved, that is not a desirable outcome for anyone involved.

Yes I wondered the same and if the lack of education in an organised setting meant warning signs and opportunities were missed.

highly intellectually demanding.

My arse.

Rapists walk free.

If they want people to respect the rule of law they'd better start acting respectably.

And this 'bouncing in and out of prison' - every bounce a woman harmed?

Best keep them in, in that case.

@WrongKindOfFeminist Do not be so ridiculous. The idea is to avoid repeat offending by making some effort with them.

I don't believe these boys are monsters. I know they are rapists.

I've no doubt there are reasons for their behaviour.

I don't think rape is an accident, or something that happens to any lad who is confused or stupid or has a bad day. It's likely going to be the outcome of longstanding trauma and abuse and bad circumstances and treatment. Especially in a case like this - I have to admit I couldn't stomach reading all of the details but what I read suggested they were organised, had intent, recorded it, menaced the victims, and knew enough to know what they were doing.

Unfortunately that isn't considered bad enough to jail them.

Jail is necessary for their safety as well as that of the girls, if you want to consider that.

When a community feels that justice hasn't been done, it puts people in a dangerous situation. It inflames tension. It can lead to far worse outcomes than a loss of liberty for a few years.

I suggest jail is going to be more likely to 1. remove these boys from their contextual situation that has caused the behaviour, 2. protect the girls, 3. show that justice has been done, 4. offer more opportunities for treatment of the offenders.

Yes, rehabilitate and treat them when they're in there. But get them off the streets and out of the situations where they have offended.

Other things that need considered are : the effect on the community, on girls and women in the local area and beyond. The cost of treating the victims for possibly a long time. The trauma of a trial that has come to nothing may worsen that.
Trauma from abuse like this can be life shattering. They may not recover. The effect on other boys who see them getting away with it and may feel that maybe rape isn't such a big deal after all, maybe it even has cachet.

Given that young males have the highest offending rate of any group, it's mindblowing to me that there are assumptions of leniency.

@WrongKindOfFeminist We don’t have Gaols for 14 year olds. You don’t seem to understand the justice system for children. They are deprived of their liberty but they need help to prevent reoffending if at all possible. All this retribution and locking up gets us nowhere and you are not in charge of sentencing or anything to do with the law. Crimes are interpreted for severity and other issues, and judges weigh up various considerations. This judge weighted incorrectly and it’s been changed. You savage views are not helpful and won’t ever be adopted.

@MeetMeOnTheCornercan you show us statistics that the approach you advocate for is working in this country? I'd be interested to see that.

So you're passing judgement on the sentences despite not being able to stomach reading what was found to have actually happened?

It's 'savage' to think that rape should mean prison. I see.

I found the graphic descriptions of child sex abuse hard to read. I read more than enough.

They are horrid to read, it i don't think you can have an informed opinion on the case unless you do read it all.

Fortunately, you don't have to force yourself to read it, but then I don't think you can criticise the decision making of people who have read it.

Well yes, I do wonder about women who are more concerned with the wellbeing of the rapists with their virtual signalling savage of us @WrongKindOfFeminist

@WrongKindOfFeminist Did anyone ever tell you “two wrongs don’t make a right”? For dc, in particular, the states role is mostly trying to rehabilitate these boys. It’s not prolonged incarceration or retribution. It’s people like you who whip up vigilante groups and it’s wrong. The state is not about imprisoning minors for very long periods. There must be a balance and I think the court of appeal sentence is correct.

I am so glad to see a thread on this as I felt exactly the same. I really hope they go back over every rape case he has ever presided over and check up on the perps and his track record of understanding the rapist' mindset. I also suspect that if they searched his devices they would have some interesting findings.

It's interesting how the victim is thrown under the bus at every point in your framework. First raped, then forced to accept that her attackers will get a slap on the wrist because it's better for them and everyone else, and meanwhile the focus is on the offenders' rehabilitation, never mind the fact that the victim's mental and emotional health may have been permanently severely damaged, and she may never live a normal life.

Girls and women are just supposed to put up with their rapists being coddled, for the good of society? The burden of suffering is being placed on them? They must bear the harm of someone else's crimes, while the criminal is catered to? No. That's not acceptable.

As I said, someone who will rape as a boy is even more dangerous than the average adult offender – what will they escalate to by the time they get to adulthood? How deeply, irreversibly ingrained is their hatred of and disdain for women and girls? How likely are they to ever not be abusive/dangerous to the women and girls around them? Given their learning disabilities, damaged upbringings, and current actions, I find it difficult to believe they'll ever be a net positive or even a net neutral within society.

The law should put the burden of their crimes back on the attackers, not the victims. The best way to ensure they're not a danger to the public is to either lock them up forever, or execute them. I don't particularly care which, but as I said before, humans – especially dangerous, misogynistic males – are not an endangered species. There's no need to try to preserve those who insist on harming others.

The victims are considered within the sentencing mechanism. They are for every case but they don’t make the sentencing guidelines or get to say what the sentence is. When young people are the perpetrators, sentencing guidelines are not the same as adults. The guilty dc are not “catered to” unless you mean attempts at rehabilitation? Obviously that’s one of the outcomes the Justice system is looking for and that’s no bad thing. It’s clear for some offenders it certainly can work.

As for going over the judges cases! A bit late for that. Any inappropriate sentences would have been called in, as with any other judge too. All this baying for retribution is ludicrous and clearly shows misunderstanding of our system. Of course judging quality matters but a witch hunt? Really not acceptable.

'Baying'

All this compassion and care for 'minors'. What about the girls who were gang raped? Not a word about their wellbeing? What's the 'balance' for them?