OFFENCE AS A CRIME // MY DIARY 4/4/2010

 

I doubt many of my readers will have noticed my original diaries from 2009 have been digitalised and are now available at https://amagistratesdiaries.blogspot.com/.  I have today decided for the very first time to publish here the entry for 4th April 2010.  Free from the constraints of HMCTS I can add that the case was heard at my old court and I was the dissenting vote for acquittal. IMHO this case and perhaps others similar was an early example of what is now termed "woke" culture.  It was a miserable prediction of what is becoming increasingly prevalent in all our lives; the criminalisation of "offence".  Indeed there is current controversy reaching even the final stages of the spectacle of the "election" of a new prime minister as to the candidates` views on a bill currently passing through the House of Commons. 

04. Apr. 2010. – 12:57:57

Like millions of others I can enjoy watching John Cleese in Basil Fawlty persona almost as much as his silly walking etc at Messers M. Python.  Indeed one phrase from the sixth episode has stood the test of time and is well remembered today thirty years later, "Don`t mention the war". His goose stepping scene with a finger across his upper lip will be shown in TV clips a hundred years from now as an example of the last throw of the intellectual freedom of the late 20th century because it is extremely doubtful that the inhibited grey suits with their political correctness, who control many visual media diluting writers` and performers` talents, would today sanction such a sketch. If it is thought I am, to coin a phrase, going over the top on this..........going back to that episode of Fawlty Towers I was watching recently, it reminded me of a case two or three years ago.

The defendant of previous good character  was a veteran of World War 2.  He had been charged with using threatening abusive or insulting words or behaviour or disorderly behaviour within the hearing or sight of a person likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress contrary to Section V[1] and [6] of the Public Order Act 1986........a "catch all offence". Those whom he had been charged with receiving his "words or behaviour" were two Police Community Support Officers.   He had been arguing with a car driver who, he asserted, had almost hit him on a zebra crossing.  The PCSOs had told the pair of them to desist; the driver drove away and our 80+  year old defendant had then performed a Basil Fawlty Hitler goosestep around the PCSOs to demonstrate in his words their bloody interference.  One member of the bench dissented with the verdict of guilty but guilty he was found.  He was sentenced to a Conditional Discharge for six months and to pay £50 of the £350 costs asked for by the prosecution.

The only conclusion I can draw from this tale and from others of a similar nature is that whilst police officers have discretion, and long might it continue, these ill educated poorly paid apologies for Chinese neighbourhood  wardens [spies], now defunct traffic wardens  or park rangers of my childhood are little better at replacing police officers than repairing a damaged Rolls Royce with filler and expecting it to be as good as new.  It might be cheaper at the time but in the long run the value of the Rolls can never be recovered. And thus the ship of state sails on its being only a matter of time before all the holes below the waterline coalesce and the deluge begins.