Bystander Once again the press is making a meal of the story that Charlie Gilmour, the spoilt brat student fun-revolutionary has been freed from a nominal 16 month prison sentence after about a quarter of the time pronounced by the judge. There are plenty of papers and saloon-bar experts who love the chance to have  [ Read More ]

Lex Ferenda Some Magistrates seem to be miffed that they didn’t get to hear some of the cases against the rioters. From the comments on their blog we should all be grateful that they did not or they would all have been bailed and given community sentences. The city riots were an extraordinary event and  [ Read More ]

Bystander John Thornhill, the MA chairman, is quoted in yesterday’s ‘Times’ (paywalled, I’m afraid) as defending magistrates against allegations of ‘conveyor-belt justice’ and over-harsh sentencing in riot cases. Once again, he did not go out of his way to stress that magistrates had little to do with it, as almost all of these cases have  [ Read More ]

Bystander It’s been another night when courts have sat to deal with those arrested in connection with the riots. A couple of thoughts occur: The great bulk of the cases have been handled by District Judges. Some lay justices’ noses have been put out of joint by this, but it was probably inevitable, firstly because  [ Read More ]

Bystander All we can do while riots are still going on is to support those who are tackling the trouble on the ground, and to wish them well. The criminal justice phase will begin shortly. I am not commenting on the system but here are some of the issues: Those arrested have to be taken  [ Read More ]

Bystander This really seems a step too far. When you think of the gravity of the case, much too serious for magistrates of course, the pre-sentence reports, the majesty of the Crown Court, the judge’s consideration, the solemn pronouncement of sentence, what did he end up with? Four months served, much of it probably on  [ Read More ]

Bystander I saw my second ever case of Causing Death By Careless Driving the other day. We were easily persuaded to send it to the Crown Court to be dealt with, despite the fact that it was a run-of-the-mill driving error, that had devastating consequences. I can’t say too much about it, but it came  [ Read More ]