tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3184990032979540229.post6234009633145487127..comments2023-10-25T09:49:43.089+01:00Comments on BEN'S PRISON BLOG - Lifer On The Loose: Life Sentencesprisonerbenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14923205052778958118noreply@blogger.comBlogger12125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3184990032979540229.post-13201488774511954702009-09-24T21:15:51.355+01:002009-09-24T21:15:51.355+01:00Ah well now, you would think twice about parking o...Ah well now, you would think twice about parking on a double yellow if the sentence was life, no? Certainly wouldn't be able to do it again... ;o)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3184990032979540229.post-70036936089950796732009-09-24T12:45:41.082+01:002009-09-24T12:45:41.082+01:00Anon. Yup, murder and life sentences are just the ...Anon. Yup, murder and life sentences are just the same as parking offences. Thats just the level of thinking that has brought us to a disasterous criminal justice system.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3184990032979540229.post-1638898414908453052009-09-24T10:15:16.407+01:002009-09-24T10:15:16.407+01:00I dunno, strikes me as being a bit like complainin...I dunno, strikes me as being a bit like complaining about the fine for parking on double yellow lines...Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3184990032979540229.post-57125583674101885262009-09-22T15:55:11.262+01:002009-09-22T15:55:11.262+01:00Being found guilty in court is sometimes a lotter ...Being found guilty in court is sometimes a lotter too! The sentencing should be consistent and fair!Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06316419478707629432noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3184990032979540229.post-21937678693041055712009-09-22T15:45:38.038+01:002009-09-22T15:45:38.038+01:00"sentencing is a lottery..." - er, but e..."sentencing is a lottery..." - er, but ending up being found guilty in court isn't, is it?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3184990032979540229.post-76875393167171816442009-09-22T09:39:52.642+01:002009-09-22T09:39:52.642+01:00Please sign a petition to help deal with some of t...Please sign a petition to help deal with some of the IPPs and pass it on to anyone with an IPP.<br /><br />http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/Indeterminate/<br /><br />good luck and keep up the blog.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06316419478707629432noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3184990032979540229.post-30225442207514772232009-09-18T19:17:13.230+01:002009-09-18T19:17:13.230+01:00Here is an official account of the various indeter...<a rel="nofollow">Here</a> is an official account of the various indeterminate sentences from the Prison Service.YagiBirdhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06779431797609509966noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3184990032979540229.post-66740098206461191672009-09-17T23:51:55.942+01:002009-09-17T23:51:55.942+01:00Jane: Sentencing is a lottery. I got lifed up in R...Jane: Sentencing is a lottery. I got lifed up in Reading Crown Court. My barrister and solicitor thought I would have got 7 years in Winchester.<br /><br />The Parole Board re-sentence, in effect, behind closed doors. Not for what was done in the past but what they think an offender may do in the future.jailhouselawyerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03795278184797990706noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3184990032979540229.post-16021172014010732342009-09-17T23:37:39.164+01:002009-09-17T23:37:39.164+01:00Before I say my piece, 'dangerousness' was...Before I say my piece, 'dangerousness' was invented by Dr Paul Bowden, who I would characterise as an imbecilic forensic shrink and a hired report-writer for the Crown Prosecution Service. Science, medicine, truth did not exist in his world. Really there was no use for them. Sorry, Jane.<br /><br />The life sentence or indeterminate sentence has to be challenged because of its proximity to torture. Lifers are kept in a state of uncertainty for up to ten, twenty, thirty years. The oppressive high-security environment in which they continue their limited lives destroys their social connections, alters the mind (probably permanently), weakens the body and causes the personality to go underground. After he has served his tariff and rehabilitation times, a lifer may be released into a changed, complex and competitive environment where, if he can conceal his past and conceal the vestiges of prison, he may obtain a low-paid job. If on the other hand he is honest, he will never find work. And in background, if he commits a further offence or causes his supervising probation officer to frown, he may be recalled to prison for an indefinite time.<br /><br />A humanely executed death sentence is probably less morally objectionable than the life sentence. Many lifers starting their sentences, if they knew what lay in store for them, would prefer death. Some indeed kill themselves. Until recently treason and piracy still attracted the death sentence, now the government has quite properly renounced it altogether. It is a shocking matter, an obscenity, that so many apparently ordinary offences should attract 'life'. Like the death sentence, the life sentence should not be used at all.YagiBirdhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06779431797609509966noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3184990032979540229.post-29019138885300338252009-09-17T14:26:45.516+01:002009-09-17T14:26:45.516+01:00I have just come across this blog - mentioned on a...I have just come across this blog - mentioned on another one I read. I find it fascinating (thank you)and do not mind giving my humble opinions based on being retired and reading an awful lot on line. I also have an interest in the CJ system...<br /><br />I do not agree with Life Sentences and feel that the Courts should determine the length of sentence imposed. I also believe that any Murder Charge should be similar to that in the US. For example, a fight outside a Pub resulting in death, or a spontaneous act, should attract a lower sentence. (As far as I know the charge of Manslaughter can be a lottery although I do not know if this is accurate)? This is preferable to me than a tariff when length of time served is not done in "the open". I do not like this type of justice as one reads that unless you "comply" with courses that somehow make you safe, you will not be released. <br /><br />I can understand the thinking behind Indefinite Sentences for Public Protection as I must assume this was to cover the rare case of predatory paedophilia, dangerousness etc. I assumed that this would relate to 50 or so people a year. Now the system is using spurious tools to assess risk and putting information before Judges which they have to respond to. This sentence seems to be one of "I don't know" what to do and therefore the system will assess risk to the public over a period of time. Better safe than sorry. I think it is an infringement of rights when sentences are being determined being behind closed doors. What happens if your face does not fit? Is there not a system such as than which ensures people detained under the Mental Health System can have reviews undertaken by independant tribunals.<br /><br />Lest you think I am opposed to punishment - I most certainly am not. I do believe in openess. I also do not feel we are a safer sentence as a result of tougher sentencing policy as I see this as political manoevrings. After all - we are told that Crime is falling and yet we have a higher prison population. Too many long sentences and far too many public protection sentences as you say.<br /><br />Best wishes - JaneAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3184990032979540229.post-22494383571270854682009-09-17T13:35:08.504+01:002009-09-17T13:35:08.504+01:00fascinating & illuminating.
keep up the good w...fascinating & illuminating.<br />keep up the good work.<br />thank youTomnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3184990032979540229.post-27581854157216449122009-09-17T12:31:07.407+01:002009-09-17T12:31:07.407+01:00Lots here, Ben, and all, typically, very cogent. W...Lots here, Ben, and all, typically, very cogent. When it comes to doing the math, the public's numeracy is subverted by fear and loathing - as you discovered in the Guardian the other day. Even pinkos go pallid then puce when crime and punishment are under discussion. <br /><br />This innumeracy extends also to money matters. YOIs, as you know, cost £100,000 per YO per year, and achieve a reoffending rate of 4 in 5 within 2 years. Good value for money? 60 per cent of all adults do the same, at a mere £65,000 pa. Makes Eton College look like a bargain. <br /><br />You'd think that this conspicuous waste would cause taxpayers to call time on it - all that money being spent to recycle human beings as angry social exiles with nothing to lose. <br /><br />But no. We are in the realm of unreason. And there are so many things they don't know. <br /><br />They don't know prisoners as individual people. This is why your blog is so important. It enables them to understand that people like you are people like them: individuals, not homogeneous members of a vitiated sub-species.<br /><br />They have no understanding of how a life sentence translates into the experience of actually serving it. In particular, they have no understanding that it is impossible for people of heart and spirit and intelligence to thrive in a context of such inhumanity and enraging stupidity. <br /><br />They think, for example, that murderers are people who suffer from a pathological compulsion to murder people. They don't understand that, having killed the person they wanted (or didn't mean) to kill, they don't actually want to murder anyone else - it's over. This impression is reinforced by the early release of so many sex offenders. These are the people who suffer from an often insuperable compulsion to reoffend. They are not simply the victims of bad choices (or a Friday night muddle). But everyone gets lumped together.<br /><br />I'm sorry, Ben, but the public, in its cowardice, wants to see offenders rendered inoffensive by being converted into broken-spirited penitents. The most admirable thing about you - and it's a truly remarkable testimony to the strength of your character - is that you will not fall for the Uncle Tom makeover. <br /><br />It's a fucking awful way to spend your life. Your integrity leaves you no choice but intractable defiance. Your stand is wholly admirable. I only hope that there is - to use what is possibly an odd word - some beauty in that.Charles Cowlinghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06757185376546920527noreply@blogger.com