OFFENCES AGAINST SOCIETY

 

"It`s only a domestic".  Most people with an interest in the law would fail to recognise that distinctive phrase as having, so the story goes,  its origin in supposed police speak after being called to a home where a female  occupant accused her male co-occupant or "friend" of having assaulted her.  TV crime shows of  the 1950s, 60s or even 70s or modern films depicting events of that era often set the scene with Morris Minor so called panda cars and police  in uniforms fashioned unlike the para combat outfits often seen today. The underlying theme was of male dominance over women; a dominance considered normal.  Indeed it was an attitude prevalent today amongst some religious non Christian minorities. It is not coincidental that the aptly named women`s liberation movement became a mass movement around the 1960s and not just a fringe cult with a penchant for liberating their breasts.  Legislation also followed and continues currently not only to protect women from violent partners but to ensure that any apparent inequalities in society  to the detriment of women are ironed out. In that regard the emphasis has been on rape and the difficulty in securing convictions notwithstanding statistical distortions often produced by those whose political intent outweighs the accuracy of their use of statistics.  Stalking, workplace harassment, indecent exposure, non contact assault and other transgressions have encouraged legislation that offers now a degree of protection to women that their mothers and grandmothers could only dream about. No doubt such direction of legislation will continue in the knowledge that serious violent crime against women is often predictable from lesser events which might be condoned or ignored.  Indeed perhaps we are reaching the region of "overkill" when some are considering even the old fashioned wolf whistle to be a criminal offence. Nevertheless there is a glaring inconsistency in how violence against women or the threat of such is considered by the courts.  

Here I must declare a prejudice. I am totally unsympathetic to sexual predators  and sceptical of the courts` treatment of them.  Firstly when my wife was seven years old walking with a friend one afternoon through a park, as young children were able to do in those long forgotten days of innocence, from about twenty yards distant a middle aged man exposed himself to her.  To this day she can picture exactly his face and would be able to pick him out in a police line up.  Apart from that I have never asked her how she feels now about that incident but it must have deeply traumatised her.  Secondly I am less than impressed with Sentencing Guidelines.  Every year, fewer magistrates and judges, as retirement takes it toll, will remember that sentencers used to use their own well honed constructive sentencing ladder to arrive at a just outcome for offenders.  A decade ago I likened the idea of the Guidelines as a prelude to computerised sentencing.  Most readers will be unaware that as a prelude to its publication in 2004 those of the "great and the good" variety so embedded in the "British way of doing things" studied the sentencing manuals of the State of Michigan USA which used simple algorithms for the sentencing process.  That state now has taken that principle forward so far that in my opinion it will not be long before the computer takes over leaving only refinement to a human being.  

It is approaching seven years since MP Jo Cox was murdered.  Since then in October 2021 David Amess MP was murdered in his constituency office.  Not since the IRA embarked on its murderous campaign against MPs have our parliamentary representatives been under such a real or perceived threat and female MPs most of all.  This week Raymond Batchelor was found guilty to a charge of harassment without violence against the Bishop Auckland MP and her chief of staff Jack Bell.  This pervert was sentenced to custody suspended with the usual ancillary activities and restraining order. Court report is here.  His victim, the youngest MP in this parliament, has announced she will not be standing again as a candidate.  Of course nobody but her immediate family and circle will know how much effect the offender`s actions had on her decision. However much Steven Hood (DJ magistrates court) pontificated it is hard to believe that suspending custody was just on the basis of the evidence.  It is hard to believe that there is no pressure on publicly paid officials to severely limit the numbers of offenders being sent to vastly overcrowded prisons. It is hard to believe that high profile cases are virtually always assigned to those paid judges who will obey dictats from on high rather than magistrates who should be free to follow their consciences and oath rather than their Justices` Clerks` "advice". 

At the Crown Court also the tendency to suspend cases of threatened violence to women seems to be against a true sense of justice. The proportion of suspended sentences in 2021 given for indictable offences increased to 18% from 15% in the previous year. In practice that means that this victim, like so many others threatened with violence by her co-habitee, is unlikely not to fear that actual grievous violence will be directed towards her irrespective of a judge`s order.  

The bench at Cardiff Magistrates Court sentenced an offender who assaulted two women  to five months custody.  Given that six months is the maximum for common assault that is a significant indication of the seriousness with which his offences were considered.  Why then was that sentence suspended?  

Stalking has been shown often to be a prelude to actual violent behaviour.  This stalker was revealed in an excellent newspaper report [but which failed to tell us the actual offence committed] to be a prime candidate to fulfil that statistical prediction by his repeated bizarre behaviour.  He was not even give a custody sentence suspended.  Once again a District Judge (MC), this time  DJ Nina Minhas,  declined an appropriate outcome which I most certainly would not have done.  The offence of stalking has a maximum sentence of six months custody.  The outcome in this case was an offence against society. 

These reports are but the tip of a statistical iceberg.  An aspiring prime minister with an impressive background has pledged  to reduce a public`s fear of violent crime.  If in power he could appoint a Justice Secretary who shares his thinking and makes good the rhetoric with action.