Tuesday, July 01, 2008 

Victimhood, Jill Saward and civil liberties.

The anger and thirst for change that victims of crime often display, and the power that they subsequently have because of their misfortune has been discussed here before. Unlike Helen Newlove however for example, Jill Saward has decided to go to the electorate with her concerns, rather than promoting them through the prism of a tabloid newspaper campaign, although it's worth mentioning Saward's first article was in the pages of the Sun. For that, she deserves the same credit and praise that David Davis received for his stand on civil liberties. Putting your money where your mouth is and being prepared to argue the case in public rather than through the media is a step up from hollow campaigns where it's unclear where the media brand ends and the political principles begin.

Saward couldn't really have chosen a more inappropriate beginning to her article on Comment is Free though:
Not all men are rapists or sexual predators.

It's just that only men are, and that only they are potential rapists or sexual predators. That is Saward's point, is it not?

It's worth putting in a little background here. Jill Saward was the woman raped in the "Ealing Vicarage" attack; her father was the vicar. The judge in the case when it came to court gave those responsible a longer sentence for the burglary than for the rape, and said that the "the trauma suffered by the victim was not so very great." Deplorable certainly, and Saward's campaigning since then has certainly helped many in similar circumstances to overcome or at least come to terms with what happened to them. It is perhaps worth noting though that Saward is married to a journalist; something that always helps with getting publicity for such a campaign.

What's more, Saward is standing on what she says is a true liberty platform, calling for people to be "safe at home, safe at work and safe on the street." In this, Saward has entered into the same sort of thinking which was has led to the current set of criminal justice policies in this country, which was ably identified recently by Ian Loader. As globalisation has undermined the previous utopian ideal of the government being able to provide a job for everyone for life, or being able to secure at the least a decent standard of living, something that for a distinct minority is still a dream, attention has instead turned to the idea that the government can and must provide another form of security, a physical one, at both all costs and all the time. This, too, is another utopian unachievable fantasy, which to even start to fulfil would require the government to be able to step in as soon as human nature begins to manifest itself, but is one which has been bought into because through otherwise draconian policies it can begin to be moved towards. This thinking was understandable when crime was at its peak, from which it has since sharply dropped, but as Loader notes, the public due to how the government has responded to the original concern now no longer believes the statistics that say it is has fallen, and the popular media, if not the public themselves, who now seem to be divided over whether prison works or not, still demand endless punitive crackdowns.

As a result, and with the rise of technology, this has inspired the view that all crime is both eminently solvable and that this process can be greatly helped by the latest scientific innovations. It matters little that these innovations, such as the DNA database, are insecure and far from infallible; when the victims' rights are forgotten, or when notable and powerful commentators constantly suggest that they're being forgotten, the potential for injustice through presumed progress greatly increases. Saward, far from being concerned that the DNA database, through holding the data of thousands of completely innocent individuals holds the possibility that someone completely innocent may one day be connected with a crime they didn't commit through potentially unquestionable evidence (and as MrPikeBishop points out in the comments, the Omagh bomb case, which subsequently collapsed with the low carbon copy DNA process being questioned, first identified a 14-year-old boy from Nottingham as prime suspect) is instead convinced that one of the best ways of of preventing, or at least solving crimes of a similar nature to what she suffered is to establish a universal DNA database.

Like with the other victims of crime which pursue change in order to attempt to stop what happened to them from occurring again, it can't be disputed that Saward's heart is in the right place; it's that the method she suggests is strewn with unknowables which could in the long run cause more harm than good. The problems with a universal DNA database are manifold: would such a database even work when there are 60 million profiles on it, without throwing out numerous false positives or identifying dozens of people that would have to be methodically eliminated? Would criminals not attempt to adapt to it by contaminating crime scenes? How would we react if someone was falsely accused and imprisoned on the basis of DNA evidence once we'd reached the universal stage? This is without going into how the 60 million profiles would get onto it in the first place, and whether all those entering the country, whether as tourists or to live here would be required to give samples before they were allowed in.

Saward's argument is also coloured by her view that this would somehow be righting the injustice of the innocent already on the database by adding everyone else that err, also happens to be innocent. This is both a logical fallacy and correcting an injustice with even more injustice, something which should always be resisted. It's also not entirely clear with Saward is actually arguing against a straw man; David Davis released his personal manifesto on Friday, which made clear that he wants the "1 million innocent" on the database removed and the serious criminals left off put on it. There obviously however has to be some sort of compromise on the removal of the data of the innocent, as I've suggested before, because of the undoubted use the database has provided in identifying some of the most serious unsolved cases of rape and murder, such as that of Sally Anne Bowman, whose mother incidentally was another who joined Helen Newlove in putting together a manifesto in oppositon to that of Davis's. Those arrested but never charged should still have their data taken from them to ensure that they are not potential suspects in any unsolved crime, but if no crime is subsequently linked to them after a period of a number of years then the information should be destroyed. This would be relatively easy to achieve, but whether we could trust the police to do so would be another matter.

Some in the comments have questioned Saward's data on those whom have been the victims of sexual attacks, but it's the data on those who have been found guilty through the use of the database which has been directly challenged by GeneWatch, in response to Gordon Brown's recent speech on Liberty which was obviously directed at David Davis but which failed to mention him. Their conclusions were (PDF):

• The figures cited by the Prime Minister refer to an estimate of DNA matches, not solved crimes;
• The reported matches are not actual matches obtained with individuals’ profiles retained on the NDNAD following acquittal or charges being dropped, but are an estimate based on a number of unverifiable assumptions;
• DNA matches are not successful prosecutions and many matches occur with the DNA of individuals who are not the perpetrator of the crime, including victims and passers-by, or are false matches

Saward's arguments are in fact symptomatic of the view that the "criminals" have all the rights and that the victims have none. This has always confused the rights of suspects who are innocent until proven guilty with the rights of those whose name the case is being brought in, but Saward goes one step further than they often do in questioning the right to silence, as she does on her website:

For example, if the police have reason to believe that a person may have driven a few miles over the speed limit, that person is obliged to tell the police where they were at the time of the alleged offence. They have to assist the police; otherwise they can be punished to the same extent as if it were proved they were responsible.

But if that person was suspected of stabbing a young man to death; that person has the right to remain silent. He or she does not have to tell the police where they were – or even provide an alibi. They do not have to assist the police at all and they are not punished for not doing so.

The right not to incriminate yourself is treated by some as a sacrosanct part of our civil liberties. Why?


I'd say that if Saward doesn't understand why that is then she doesn't understand the criminal justice system at all. It's for the prosecution to prove its case, not for the defendant to have to prove his innocence, especially when the state is all powerful and has all the resources at its disposal while the defendant potentially has none. The right to silence is a fundamental part of that.

The thing that rankles most about Saward's campaign and also that of Newlove's is the disingenuousness of their arguments, and especially their personal victim status. It's true that much more could be done for most of the victims of crime, but the answer is not a rebalancing of the system as it is now, but more care before and after trials itself for them. Saward herself is right to be aggrieved at how she was treated in court, but when it comes to Helen Newlove, for whom the CPS, the state and the media at large bent over backwards to help, to claim the same thing is to go beyond what the state can reasonably be expected to provide. Indeed, both expect the state to provide constant safety and protection, something that it simply can't deliver. And fundamentally, Saward's case is flawed from the very beginning with the idea that men rape because they can get away with it. Only the most pathological do so. The others rape either because they can at that moment in time, and don't think of the possibility of getting caught, or do so out of power, which overwhelms any idea that they may be caught. Anger about being a victim is never a good place to come from in changing policy, and when it also makes it more difficult for those opposed to be critical as a result, it increases the possibility of systematic injustice from otherwise good motives. That is why David Davis, or indeed the Green candidate, deserve support and not Jill Saward.

Related post:
Though Cowards Flinch - Outflanking David Davis... to the right

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7/01/2008 11:17:00 PM | | | links to this post

Thursday, April 10, 2008 

Who's using whom?

I would be the one who puts the noose around the neck or presses the button for the lethal injection. And hangings should be public. People have stopped me and said they’re 100 per cent behind it.

This country is a terrifying place. No one is safe. I’m not ranting and raving. Come and sit here with us three and have the pain we’ve got. -- Probably not what Newlove said today, but what she has previously stated to the Sun.

The widow of Garry Newlove, the father of three who was murdered by a gang of drunken youths in front of his family, has agreed to help David Cameron draw up policies to strengthen families and tackle anti-social behaviour.

Helen Newlove will today appear at a Conservative Party summit to discuss ways of building more "responsible" communities and toughening Britain's criminal justice system.


Agreed to help dear old Dave draw up policies? Surely Cameron already knows what Newlove's demands are? After all, both he and Jack Straw met Newlove with the other "mothers in arms" to discuss how to solve "Broken Britain". Their 10 point plan was/is:

1 - Reintroduce the death penalty
2 - Set up compulsory DNA database
3 - Zero tolerance for minor crimes
4 - Repeal the Human Rights Act
5 - More bobbies on (blank) (presumably the beat?)
6 - Make parents responsible for their kids and restore discipline at home
7 - Victims' family's rights to be put above those of offenders with an end to ludicrous defences
8 - Juveniles to be named in court like adults
9 - Reserve plans to turn off street lights to save energy
10 - A crackdown on binge drinking

Some of these are already Conservative policy, with Cameron pledging to repeal the HRA and replace it with a "British" bill of rights, regardless of the fact that all that would mean in practise is that we'd have two tiers of law, with individuals still able to appeal to the European Court of Human Rights if their case was rejected under the "British" bill, just that it'd take hell of a lot longer than it current does. As much as a distinct minority in the Conservatives would like to reinstate the death penalty, that's something that simply isn't going to happen, and it'd be a major surprise if they suddenly decided after moving towards a more libertarian stance on civil liberties that a "compulsory" DNA database was a good idea. David Davis has talked of "zero tolerance" on occasion, but whether they would make it an actual policy or implement it when most of the police themselves despair of such a change, as they do of putting "more officers on the beat", which is about as blunt an instrument as you can use against crime, is also far from clear.

Quite how any government could force parents to "restore discipline" at home is an open question, and similarly daft is the idea that you can somehow exclude some legal defences because they're "ludicrous"; the answer to that is to impose harsher sentences for wasting the court's time and money when guilt is obvious. Courts already have the power to name juveniles if the judge decides that the crime is suitably heinous and that an example needs to be made, and the Conservatives have already announced that they would raise taxes on strong lagers and the so-called alcopops, something which hasn't been condemned with the same venom as Darling's across the board raising of duty in the budget even if it would have the same next to negligible effect.

The question then has to be exactly who is helping or using whom. Most of Newlove's demands are anathema even to the traditional hanging 'n' flogging party, and would move the country even further into the realm of authoritarianism. If Cameron is then cynically using a grieving widow when he has no intention of implementing her ideas, then even by his and the new Tory party's standards that's scraping the bottom of the public relations barrel. If Newlove is using Cameron however to panic Labour into coming down ever tougher on crime, something that it's more than happy to do at the proverbial dropping of a hat, then that's not much more devious. That Newlove's claim that the trial involving her husband's murderers was a "circus", where the defendants had the "human rights" (showing that despite her previously working in a court environment that she has no idea what human rights actually are outside a tabloid definition) on their side could not be less credible considering their conviction and sentencing suggests that despite the state bending over backwards to help her and all the sympathy she's quite rightly received, she has no interest whatsoever in compromise or rational debate. In time Newlove will like the other grieving mothers who demand change be forgotten, but for now those with their own agendas, even if more subtle than hers, are more than happy to associate with her and gain the short-lived kudos. Until then, it will remain difficult to comprehend just who is using whom.

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4/10/2008 08:31:00 PM | | | links to this post

Thursday, March 20, 2008 

Scum-watch: The paedo is coming!

A classic Sun front page today:



AND THEN HE'S GOING TO FUCK YOUR KIDS!


As usual, it's a case of reality imitating satire:


The Sun though is naturally conflicted. Outraged as it is by this disgusting paedophile being deported to Britain, it's fully in favour of "foreign" criminals in similar circumstances here being sent back to their home nation. All the Australians are actually doing is throwing their problem on to us rather than dealing with it themselves. If Raymond Horne had gone out to Australia and committed his crimes when an adult, then his deportation would have been fully justified. As it is, he went to Australia as a five-year-old. He is a product of Australian society, and therefore their responsibility, regardless of his nationality. This is the same reason why Learco Chindamo shouldn't have been deported back to Italy whenever his sentence ends; a decision which incidentally wasn't a result of the Human Rights Act, as the Sun today alleged again in its leader, which has since disappeared into the ether.

The Sun article does carry some very pertinent points from Paul Roffey, director of the UK-based RWA Child Protection Service:

accused the Queensland Police and Corrective Services Minister Judy Spence of simply “shifting the problem offshore”.

He said: “Let’s make it English children instead of Australian children — that seems to be her attitude. It’s outrageous.

“These sort of committed paedophiles often live isolated lives by the very nature of their offending. They do not integrate well into society and that often leads to the formation of paedophile rings of like-minded people.

“Horne, who has lived most of his life in Australia, will have no network in the UK. He will feel even more isolated — increasing his risk of him reoffending.”


All very true. The Sun response to this? To directly ask its readers to inform them if they either knew Horne or where he's going to live, therefore ensuring that he will forever be isolated, moving from place to place and as a result even more dangerous than he already his. The Sun has betrayed children themselves before in its apoplexy; it's more than happy to do exactly the same now.

I was also going to take on the Scum's delusional "Hope for Iraq" leader, but as said, it's since gone like all their leaders now do, apparently unarchived. Elsewhere we do have the "mothers in arms" meeting both Jack Straw and David Cameron, carrying their copies of the Sun along with them. Neither seems to have demurred from their demands, or dared to directly criticise "their" campaign, and Jack Straw even says the following about their demand for a universal DNA database:

He vowed to raise with police the expansion of the DNA database, saying: “I don’t understand people who are not happy to give DNA samples.”

It couldn't possibly be because they're concerned about potential mistakes, or indeed that nostrum which the Sun so endorses, if you've got nothing hide, you've got nothing to fear, could it? Therefore if I've nothing to hide, why should the police have my DNA profile? The three mothers' proposals would make every single individual guilty until proved innocent, and the more questionable responses, that their proposals would be a step towards a police state, if not establishing one, aren't that far from hitting home.

She told Mr Straw: “Ninety-nine per cent of Sun readers want it back. You have to listen to the people and what they want.”

Quite right, because 99% of the population are Sun readers, aren't they? And there's more pleasantries about how they want their tormentors extinguished:

“I do not like the thought of Steve Wright just sitting in jail watching TV. I want him dead."

Doubtless Straw and/or Cameron just stared meekly back and didn't say anything, unable to respond to a demand that they can simply never deliver or appease.

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3/20/2008 10:46:00 PM | | | links to this post

Wednesday, March 12, 2008 

Sun-watch: If hospitals cure, then prisons must bring their pain.

After the last post, I might seem something approaching a hypocrite on this. After defending Fiona MacKeown, I might well be seen as attacking others in a similar position, in this case Helen Newlove, Linda Bowman and Kerry Nicol. The difference is that people like Fiona MacKeown and others such as Doreen Lawrence have not had justice served. All the other three have.

My question therefore is: what more can we possibly do for you? The state has bent over backwards, as it quite rightly should have done, found those that killed your relatives, and sentenced them to them to more or less the sentences that I think a majority would agree were the right ones. Sad, dreadful and unconscionable as it is, and my sympathies are with you, but how are we meant to stop an individual like Steven Wright, who showed no previous signs of being capable of killing the five prostitutes he did from doing so again? How are we meant to prevent those like Mark Dixie from living out their perverse fantasies unless we take incredibly harsh and some would say over the top action against others for offences such as his apparent masturbating in front of a woman? The crime that befell Helen Newlove's husband was the one that perhaps had the most chance of being prevented, but again, what sort of deterrent can be put in place that would have possibly stopped the gang that kicked him to death and made them think twice about what they were doing while they were drunk out of their skulls, and remember, when Swellings was old enough to buy alcohol legally? No, he probably shouldn't have been released on bail, but how can we possibly deny bail to all those accused of an assault? It would be a ridiculous use of state resources.

They've unveiled then their ten-point plan in the Sun for sorting out Broken Britain, and amazingly, it looks almost exactly the same as the Sun's prescribed diagnosis has for a long time (excepting capital punishment, which it claims to be against):

1 - Reintroduce the death penalty

2 - Set up compulsory DNA database

3 - Zero tolerance for minor crimes

4 - Repeal the Human Rights Act

5 - More bobbies on (blank) (presumably the beat?)

6 - Make parents responsible for their kids and restore discipline at home

7 - Victims' family's rights to be put above those of offenders with an end to ludicrous defences

8 - Juveniles to be named in court like adults

9 - Reserve plans to turn off street lights to save energy

10 - A crackdown on binge drinking

And what can I, or indeed anyone possibly say to this sort of mentality?:

LINDA: I’d love to watch Sally Anne’s killer get the death penalty. I want to see him suffer until he is squealing like a pig.

HELEN: I would be the one who puts the noose around the neck or presses the button for the lethal injection. And hangings should be public. People have stopped me and said they’re 100 per cent behind it.

This country is a terrifying place. No one is safe. I’m not ranting and raving. Come and sit here with us three and have the pain we’ve got.


Newlove is of course right. This is about pain. The natural reaction is to respond to pain inflicted upon you with pain towards the person that did so. The role of the government however cannot be to respond to pain inflicted upon individuals with state-sponsored pain, or at least not of the actual physical reality. Hangings should be made public? Has Newlove seen the photographs from Iran or Saudi Arabia of capital punishment being carried out in public? If it's meant to be for the deterrent purpose, then those grinning or celebrating the deaths of those condemned as they're killed certainly don't seem to be frightened by the prospect of the same happening to them if they were to commit a similarly heinous crime. Similarly silly statements are also made:

THE SUN:What do you see as the main cause of Broken Britain?

LINDA: The day the Government took discipline away from parents is the day this country went to pot.


When was that exactly? Perhaps we can pinpoint it so we can apportion blame to the right political party.

The most excruciating part is when the Sun asks them what it means to lose their loved ones in such a way. The grief, emotion and pain that is welled up inside these women at what has befallen them is not just real, it's visceral, terrifying even and incredibly powerful with it. The Sun knows this, and knows also that their anger cannot be answered by anyone, let alone a mere mortal such as a politician. I've said before that I was glad that Newlove was letting the hurt inside her out; that it was the best thing to do. Now I'm not so sure. It instead looks like the Sun is using these women for its own purposes, knowing full well that their pain will not be sated while they're still being asked for how it feels and when their hate is being directed not towards healing themselves and their families because of what has happened, but rather at not just their relatives' killers, but also British society as it is in their eyes at the moment. As patronising or cliched as it may sound, they need to come to terms with what has happened to them in their own time, in private, and then decide if they still feel the same way. The Sun is preventing them from doing so.

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3/12/2008 10:41:00 PM | | | links to this post

Monday, February 25, 2008 

Scum-watch: A lesson in attempting to puncture its own emotional balloon.

It's interesting, these days, watching the Sun (No, please, come back!). Last year after the failed patio gas canister bombings it clearly didn't have the slightest idea how to respond to them: first with hackneyed blitz spirit type defiance; then scaremongering, and the resurrection of its demands to scrap the human rights act; and finally, resorting to patriotism, ordering everyone to fly the flag. This remember is the paper which over the 80s and up until recently was often considered the weathervane of the nation, or symbolic of how a majority of how it was responding, typified by how when it changed from supporting the Conservatives to New Labour that it was considered the final, death blow against John Major.

Since then of course we've had the online revolution; now the most visited UK newspaper website is the loony-left Guardian, closely followed by the Mail Online. Circulations continue to plunge, with the Sun recently slipping below the 3 million mark, only rising back above it because of price cutting. The real success story of today is the Daily Mail, and by far the most despicable, distorted press coverage of late, directed at asylum seekers and immigrants, has come not from the Sun but from the Express and Mail. Whether it's because the Sun's reflecting society at large or not, or that it's lost its way as the country has become more liberal and has tried but failed to follow, it no longer has the zest or vim that it had under Kelvin MacKenzie's editorship, as rabid as that was in places. The rot set in under David Yelland, the most memorable of his front pages one asking Tony Blair whether we were being run by a gay mafia, and Rebekah Wade, most notable beforehand for her "name and shame" campaign against paedophiles on the News of the World, has done little to change that.

Even so, it's surprising that it's been so surprised by the vehemence of the response to its call for a debate on capital punishment. For years it's been claiming without the slightest amount of evidence that judges are liberal loonies, that crime is getting worse while the figures suggest the opposite and that the criminal justice system is failing us all. The result of this campaign for "toughness", led not just by it but by the other right-wing tabloids also, is both obvious and apparent; our prisons are now so full that there is little to no room whatsoever left in them. Of late, the rallying cry has been against binge drinking and youth, or rather "yob" violence. This was crystallised by the death of Garry Newlove, a loving, caring father kicked to death by 3 teenagers who had drank large amounts of strong alcohol and smoked cannabis beforehand. It's one of those cases, like the murder of Rhys Jones, that pushes the press into a familiar period of soul-searching of how we've reached this lowest-collective ebb. The reality is of course that it's an aberration, a terrible crime that is thankfully very rare. Nonetheless, it gave the Sun and Newlove's loving widow, an opportunity: both want change, but for very different reasons. The Sun wants improved sales and to be able to crow about changing government policy, as well increasing its own influence; Newlove wants vengeance and for her husband's death to not be in vain. Newlove, along with a shopping list of other demands, clearly stated how she longed to be able to personally execute the 3 boys who killed her husband. Never mind that even in most American states it would have been highly unlikely they would have been sentenced to death because the crime wasn't premeditated, and that perhaps only in such freedom loving countries as China, Saudi Arabia and Iran would such a punishment have taken place, the Sun at the time didn't speak up and say that it was personally against capital punishment. It did all it could to encourage a grieving, deeply hurt woman to keep going.

Then, in quick succession, we've had other troubling murder cases, which due to their own individual circumstances have caught the public's attention, or at least certainly the media's. In Steve Wright's, because he murdered 5 prostitutes with no apparent motive, not even a sexual one, and was apparently not mentally ill; and Mark Dixie's, in that he stalked and killed a beautiful 18-year-old aspiring model, who had a whole string of portfolio photographs that the media could splash all over their pages. Today Levi Bellfield was convicted of the murders of two young women, and suspected, like the previous two, of having potentially killed before. While the relatives of Bellfield's victims haven't spoken out yet, it won't be much of a surprise if they too, like the next of kin of those killed by Wright and the mother of Sally Anne Bowman, Dixie's victim, suggest that they would also like to see the return of the ultimate penalty.

The Sun on Saturday then, presumably because of the response on its talkboards which are usually filled with individuals not always residing in this country demanding the restoration of capital punishment, set up an actual poll asking whether readers would like to see hanging back. The response seems on the surface to be overwhelming, and despite the Sun personally coming out against it. 99% of 95,000 wanted it brought back, according to their you the jury poll. The poll result is of course questionable; you can vote multiple times on the online poll, and doubtless can on the actual phone lines too. Even if you consider that it is a seemingly massive response, the Sun has over 3 million sales, which means that 3% of its readers' responded and want it back. The Sun also claims to have an actual readership of 8 million, meaning that the figure goes even lower when you factor that in.

Despite its past polls returning similar overwhelming results, the paper in this case genuinely seems taken aback by the response. The question has to be: why? Its attitude to crime has always been leading towards such a policy, even if it actually balks at the possibility. I very much doubt it's because polls that are representatively sampled suggest around 60% or lower (albeit from a few years' ago) are usually in favour of capital punishment being brought back, with even only 65% of Tory voters wanting hanging to return; rather, it's because it's greatly perturbed that its readers aren't hanging off their every editorial word. The Sun is, first and foremost, pure propaganda, and it expects its line to be swallowed. Secondly, it almost seems worried that it can't control what it's started off.

As Tim Ireland writes, it almost seems as if the paper is trying to control the mob it set in motion. Wade couldn't do it when she named and shamed paedophiles and a paediatrician ended up being hounded out; how on earth could she manage it now? In any case, she's making an attempt: as well as listing all the relatives of victims who want capital punishment back, the paper remarks on how Sara Payne, one of those whose line in criminal justice policy based purely on her own experience as a victim has been pushed relentlessly in the paper, doesn't want it back. It points out how Pierrepoint didn't believe that it was a deterrent (although Wikipedia asks whether this was just a selling tactic for his book), without mentioning how he, merciful and humane despite his role as executioner, was only interested in making sure that the end for the person being put to death was as painless and quick as possible, something at odds with many of those calling for its return, who clearly want those put to death to suffer. It even says that the hated Germans brought hanging to this country, almost as if wanting to put its readers off it by its pure heritage; the page 3 girl, the paper's purest piece of propaganda, asks for life to mean life rather than for capital punishment; and only two of the Sun's gor blimey commentators, both of them the loathsome talk radio hosts Jon Gaunt and Fergus Shanahan, want it back.

Today's leader column is extraordinary therefore for a couple of reasons. Firstly, because I agree with large parts of it, which is almost a first; secondly, because of its sheer flaming hypocrisy:

THE clamour for the death penalty is deafening.

Some 99 per cent of 100,000 voters in our poll demand its return.

Such an overwhelming response is no surprise after the killings of Garry Newlove, Sally Anne Bowman and the five Suffolk Strangler victims. Not to mention the anarchy that has erupted in some parts of Britain.

No one reading the heart-rending interviews with any of the victims’ families could fail to understand their desire for the ultimate revenge. Most of us share it.

But The Sun does not believe in capital punishment. It will not be brought back on a wave of public emotion, however much we sympathise with it.

Emotion cannot dictate a nation’s system of punishment

Yet that is exactly what it has wanted by giving over so much space to Helen Newlove and others. Helen Newlove claims in her own case for why it should be brought back that it isn't about revenge or vengeance - yet anyone reading her demands and frankly chilling account of how she'd like to execute her husband's killers couldn't fail to realise that was exactly the motive on which she was acting. Emotion or revenge cannot possibly even begin to be a part of any justice system which is going to attempt to be fair - yet by not pointing that out forcefully enough the Sun has failed those that it's given such succour to.

This is the Sun's main argument for what should take capital punishment's place - and it's just as flawed as capital punishment itself is:

Demands for capital punishment are only so strong because the justice system fails at every turn.

Too few police. Too few arrests. Too few offenders being locked away because there are too few jails and, scandalously, they were allowed to become too full.

Too few judges taking public safety seriously.

And far too many serious offenders whose “life” terms mean nothing of the kind.


Except we've got almost the most police ever. How can you possibly say too few offenders are locked away when there's currently 82,000 in prison and we are among the most heavy users of prison as punishment in Europe? Yes, the jails are too full, but that's not just the fault of the government but of the very same newspapers that have demanded ever tougher punishments, got them, and then demanded even harsher sentences. The very reason we're currently at bursting point is because when we have these sporadic bursts of draconian sentiment the judges are inclined to send those they might have previously fined or put on a community order to prison. They're reflecting what is apparently public opinion, even if polls now suggest that the country is split equally over whether more prisons are the answer. Judges are doing their very best in difficult circumstances; and "life" terms are usually about right. Learco Chindamo perhaps should have got more than 12 years, yet when the evidence suggests that he is a rare success story of prison actually working beyond just locking the dangerous away, he gets attacked, the victim of his crime is given centre stage to voice her disgust, and the demands for tougher sentences grow once again. Who could disagree with Dixie being sentenced to over 30 years, meaning he'll be 70 and a danger to no one if he is eventually to be released? Wright's sentence was also the right one, as was mostly the ones given to Newlove's killers. Life should only ever mean life where this is no chance whatsoever of redemption, or in the case of someone committing multiple murders. Despite common belief, life sentences have never meant life in this country, and the time served for a life sentence has actually continued to rise since the abolition of capital punishment. Believe it or not, and I'm sure I'm not the only person who thinks this, our current justice system model gets it about right. The occasional cases where it either gets it wrong, with both miscarriages of justice and with those who either get away with it or kill again needed to be taken into consideration, are relatively few.

The most true and again, also line which contains the most chutzpah on the Sun's behalf in this one:

Revenge is the real motivation behind the calls for the return of capital punishment. That’s not enough in a civilised society.

And who knows just how the average supporter of capital punishment will take to being spoken to in such a tone by the "reactionary" Sun newspaper?

Related post:
Impotent Fury - Tabloid legislation - why do we bother having a government?

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2/25/2008 11:59:00 PM | | | links to this post

Thursday, February 14, 2008 

Scum-watch: Newlove makes more demands, while Putin gets attacked.

I realise we've been a bit heavy on Scum-watches this week, but I can't help that they keep printing such utter tripe.

Today sees Helen Newlove given yet more room to list her shopping list of WHAT MUST CHANGE, this time on alcohol and access to it:

THE brave widow of murdered Garry Newlove last night demanded LIFE BANS for pub bosses who sell booze to children.

Widow Helen said: “Unless binge drinking goes unchecked, our town centres will turn into battlefields.

“Any bar manager or pub chain boss selling alcohol to minors – deliberately or not – should be banned from the industry for life.”


And what would this achieve exactly? There are already hefty fines in place for those who sell alcohol to anyone under 18, and more or less everywhere now demands ID if you look under 21. This only inflicts collective punishment on those who are old enough but who refuse to have to carry ID everywhere with them in case they decide to buy age restricted products. Common sense ought to be the order of the day, but Newlove seems impervious to that sort of logic. In any case, is it really the underaged that are turning "town centres ...into battlefields"? No, it's those old enough to drink being irresponsible. As ought to be pointed out, of the group that killed her husband, Swellings was old enough to buy alcohol, and presumably was the one who did.

Helen, 46, also wants:

LESS boozing on TV soaps because it makes heavy drinking seem “cool and normal” to teenagers.


Hear that TV producers and writers? Despite the fact that you're meant to be reflecting British life, and who knows, perhaps even generating debate about our culture and where we're heading, you've now got to censor your output because Mrs Newlove thinks it makes our rebellious youth decide it's cool. Now, far be it from me to suggest that they don't need television to think that drinking, getting drunk and all that entails in general is a bit of a hoot and that they'll do all of that regardless of what the ham actors are doing on EastEnders or Hollyoaks, but I think that Newlove really might be talking out of her arse.

COMMUNITY service for landlords if drink-fuelled violence starts outside their pub.

Right, so they'll be responsible if those they serve just happen to kick off outside. Sounds fair and proportionate.

STRICTER checks on ID at pubs, bars and clubs.

How many times does it have to be pointed out that the problems aren't happening because underage drinking is taking place in pubs etc? As Lee Griffin has pointed out, if anything the problem has been exacerbated because those who did used to drink in pubs have been shown the door due to the crackdowns. When once they would have behaved in the pub or been kicked out and barred, they now instead drink either at someone's house or out in the open, usually either with alcohol that has been bought by the parents themselves or by someone they've asked to get it for them. This is when the rowdiness and aggravation happens, not in pubs where if you behave like that you quickly get thrown out.

LAWS to stop companies from targeting kids with booze.

There are already such ones in place, and the Advertising Standards Authority's code explicitly bans anything that is seen as targeting children.

BANS on booze-filled sweet fizzy drinks such as alcopops.

This is yet another misnomer. The group that killed Newlove's husband had drank strong cider and lager, which is far cheaper than the so-called alcopops and therefore infinitely more attractive. Those who drink them tend to because they're not great fans of alcohol, not because they're intending to get drunk on them, as those Newlove wants to target do.

“Every time you turn on the TV you see a soap set in a bar or club. Coronation Street and EastEnders revolve around pubs. Hollyoaks constantly features boozing teenagers.

“The end result is that kids are totally acclimatised to alcohol. They can’t draw the line between TV and reality and so grow up thinking it’s cool and normal to get hammered.”


If you could distil nonsense down into a couple of paragraphs, I think you'd likely end up at the above.

Moving on to the Scum's leader:

ONCE again the murk of a suspected Moscow-approved assassination hangs over Britain.

Tycoon Badri Patarkatsishvili, living here in exile from Georgia, dies mysteriously at his Surrey mansion hours after striding around London in the spring sunshine.

Mr P had the misfortune to be the enemy of another Mr P.

The sinister Vladimir Putin, President of Russia.

The dead tycoon had opponents at home, where he was suspected of plotting a coup.

But he also crossed Putin — who has huge influence in Georgia — by making billions from Russian oil.

Mr Patarkatsishvili told police he feared he would be killed.

He hired 120 minders — but it was no good.

Perhaps he did die of natural causes.

Perhaps Mr Putin is a lovely chap with all the charm of a country vicar.

Perhaps pigs might fly.


Putin might have huge influence in Georgia, but he and the government in that country don't see eye to eye.

Still, it doesn't hurt to slander Putin some, does it? I mean, especially seeing the results of the initial post-mortem:

An exiled Georgian billionaire who had spoken of assassination fears died of natural causes, according to initial post-mortem tests, Surrey police said.

A Surrey Police spokeswoman said there was "no indication that the sudden death of Badri Patarkatsishvili was from anything other than natural causes".

She said: "Extensive toxicology testing is yet to be carried out. This will take a number of weeks."

Oh.

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2/14/2008 10:05:00 PM | | | links to this post

Tuesday, February 12, 2008 

Scum-watch: UFOs, even more Helen Newlove, bashing the bishop and Guantanamo myopia.

Continuing in a similar theme to the last post, this ought to be the standard by which any Sun story is judged. Can you believe in a single thing it publishes when it gives such space to as blatantly fake photographs of UFOs as this one? Believe it or not, this is currently the top story on the website at the moment.

Ignoring the paper descending to Daily Sport style-territory, I wondered if Helen Newlove's apparent silence yesterday after her husband's killers were sentenced had something to do with her previous exclusives with the paper. Imagine my surprise to find that she's given an exclusive video interview to the Sun, where she makes these comments:

Helen, who believes in capital punishment, added: “If this country still had the gallows, I’d be happy to sit back and watch as they were strung up.

“If we had the electric chair like in America, I’d watch them fry without the slightest feeling of sympathy. If I could push the button, if I could deliver the lethal injection, I would — I wouldn’t hesitate. It’s an eye for an eye in my book.”


In other words, Newlove feels that descending to the depths of inhumanity that her husband's killers did is an acceptable way for the state that condemns such barbarity to behave. That's perfectly reasonable, and she's fully entitled to her view; it just so happens that her view makes me think that she's a complete cunt.

Then there's whose account you want to believe on whether the three showed any remorse or not. According to other reports, Cunliffe wept as the sentences were read out, but according to Newlove he was only holding his head in his hands because of embarrassment. I'm also wary of these accounts of what they supposedly drunk before going on to beat Newlove to death; where did they come from, bravado from the three themselves? I'm at a loss as to how they could even stand-up after supposedly drinking nine or 10 bottles of wife-beater and 3 litres of strong cider; it stinks of hyperbole.

I don't think it's really worth even bothering to indulge Newlove's arguments about the "liberals running our justice system", but suffice to say, if she really thinks there's a deterrent provided in America or that they have a model that we should follow, she's more than welcome to go and live in a major city out there and reach her own conclusions. Scanning the comments, I tried to find a single one which disagreed with Newlove. This was the closest:

I'm not sure capital punishment is the way to go. I have always felt that a more productive solution would be lobotomisation for any serious crime - murder / rape / paedophilia - as then they won't ever harm again. They can be put into the fields to work and earn their keep and also would require considerably less looking after. Let's try to kill two birds with one stone, get them out of society and make them useful!

Moving on to the coverage of Williams at the synod, there's still no mention of the standing ovations, although it admits that he received warm applause:

but it could not disguise the hostility of many Anglicans.

Finally, there's the Scum leader on the charging of the six al-Qaida suspects held at Guantanamo. There's no mention of the allegations of torture, no suggestion that the trials will be anything but fair and no mention of Osama bin Laden and his continuing evading of capture. It does however say the trial will answer many critics of Gitmo (it doesn't in the slightest), that it's a vindication for Bush, when the top two in al-Qaida who authorised the attacks are free, and accepts every suggestion that Khalid Sheikh Mohammad is indeed the master terrorist he wants to be known as. You really couldn't ask for a more myopic editorial in any newspaper.

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2/12/2008 09:21:00 PM | | | links to this post

Monday, February 04, 2008 

Scum-watch: Potential breach of PCC code, gloating over Kevin Greening and more Helen Newlove.

Some of those with a tendency for remembering tedious nuggets of information about the media and its personalities might well recall that the News of the Screws under Piers Moron was heavily criticised for publishing photographs of Earl Spencer's then wife leaving a detoxification clinic. The Press Complaints Commission's code of practice quite clearly states that

ii) It is unacceptable to photograph individuals in private places without their consent.

Note - Private places are public or private property where there is a reasonable expectation of privacy.

Someone with a rather short memory then on the Scum has sailed close to the wind in publishing a photograph of Amy Winehouse not leaving the clinic she's undergoing drug treatment at, but apparently walking between buildings of the complex. It might of course be that the two buildings are in the line of sight of the general public, where the Sun can claim that there wouldn't be a reasonable expectation of privacy, but it might also be quite the opposite, as the snap is publicised as being taken by a paparazzi agency. The Scum could also argue that it's well known that La Winehouse has entered rehab, which mitigates against any claim that she has a reasonable expectation of privacy, but they seem to still be chancing their arm. The dog might yet snap it off. I certainly won't be weeping if it does.

Elsewhere, the Scum's been given another familiar, disgustingly prurient exclusive about Kevin Greening, details of which I'm not going to reproduce here. Last time it suggested someone had died in similar circumstances it was forced into giving an apology after it turned that the allegations were completely untrue.

Finally, Helen Newlove is given yet more space to talk about her anguish. Snipping out most of the personal, melodramatic crap:

MURDERED dad Garry Newlove’s widow Helen told yesterday how she contemplated suicide after vicious teen yobs beat him to death.

She sank desperately low, but has vowed to stay strong for their daughters Danielle, 18, Zoe, 15, and Amy, 13 — AND to campaign to drive thugs off our streets.

She said: “I’m going to do all I can to rid the streets of yobs. I don’t want anyone else to go through the hell we’re facing. The charter and the girls keep me from going under.”

As she's doomed to inevitable failure, one has to wonder whether she's either bullshitting or being thoroughly naive. Either way, the very last thing we need is her ludicrous charter.

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2/04/2008 08:16:00 PM | | | links to this post

Saturday, February 02, 2008 

Gun crime? What about being press ganged?

THERE seems to be a sense that it is no longer safe to walk the streets, and that anyone who pops out at night for a tasty kebab is going to come home spouting arterial blood from a bullet wound to the neck.

David Cameron, however, is undaunted. He made a speech in which he said that gun crime is spiralling out of control.

He brought up the tragic story of Garry Newlove who was kicked to death on his own doorstep and little Rhys Jones who was shot dead in a car park on his way back from football training.

Well, there’s one. And I suppose if I scoured the internet for half a day, I could come up with maybe five more people who’ve recently been gunned down by a gang of savage teenagers in hooded tops.

<This means, then, that so far this year 59,999,994 people in Britain have sustained no bullet wounds at all.

More people, and this is true, are killed by their trousers.

Yes, I’m sure that it would be very scary for a concave-chested little man to walk through certain parts of Liverpool at night while carrying a gold ingot.

But be assured, it was also dangerous to be on Brighton beach in 1965 when the Mods and the Rockers were throwing motorcycles at one another.

It was dangerous in the 19th Century because you’d pop out for a pint of milk and end up in the Navy. And I assure you that it was extremely dangerous on the streets of Doncaster in 1977.

On many occasions, burly miners would offer to “glass” me and when I tried to explain “glass” is a noun, not a verb and therefore couldn’t be conjugated, it seemed to make things worse.

The truth, then, is this: The vast majority of the country is completely safe. The vast majority of the people who live here do not want to murder you. And it is still extremely difficult to buy a gun.


Which politically correct, blind, ignorant and complacent moron wrote this then? Err, Jeremy Clarkson. Can some of our politicians perhaps follow his example and give his message more credence than Helen Newlove's?

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Friday, February 01, 2008 

Here is my grief, tell me yours.

After reading out her list of grievances at the conclusion of the trial of the teenagers charged with her husband's murder, Helen Newlove's back, this time with a more expanded one, and all give ample space in the Scum.

The main article, headlined "Mourning mum could be YOU", has to be one of the most hackneyed and pathetic attempts for sympathy that a newspaper could conjure up.

Mum-of-three Helen, 45, fought back tears as she made her first heartbreaking return to the spot where her loving husband of 21 years was brutally murdered by a pack of teenage savages.

...

Helen moved away from the family home with daughters Amy, 13, Danielle, 15, and Zoe, 18.

But the grief-stricken family summoned up the courage to return there in front of our cameras in order to press home their call for action.


Or, in other words, to get a photograph of Helen crying so she can express just how much she means it, and how badly her demands must be acceded to by the politicians the Sun spends so much time decrying.

Arm-in-arm, heads bowed to hide the pain and sorrow etched on their faces, mum and daughters approached the spot where Garry was found dying 100 yards from his front door.

Once there, they knelt to place flowers and said a silent prayer to their fallen hero, a miracle dad who had beaten cancer 15 years previously.

Carrying a photo of her beloved husband – and clutching his favourite cuddly toy, Leo the lion – Helen said: “It’s traumatic just to be here. It’s still so raw and so painful but we had to come. Leo the lion stands for courage. We gave him to Garry to give him courage when he was in hospital fighting cancer. We brought him along today to give us that same courage. Leo goes everywhere with us now.”

Turning to hug her tearful girls, Helen added: “This is so much harder for them. But if people witness the pain we’re going through, they might just sit up and take notice.


Or they might just think that you're milking your understandable grief and anger to make a political point that politicians are incapable of disagreeing with for fear of being called heartless, cold and indifferent to those who are victims of crime. That's exactly what you're doing, and it's unfair both to all the other parents that have lost children or families that have lost parents to thugs but who haven't decided that it demands that something must be done, and that sad as it seems, it unfortunately happens, and will continue to happen regardless of any campaign. More than anything, it's deeply cynical.

What then, are Newlove's demands? Would you believe that they tie in almost directly with the Sun's own viewpoints?

Sentences that fit crime

THERE are decent, sensible judges in this country, but too often their hands are tied by barmy guidelines and nonsense about human rights.

To stem yob violence we need real deterrents before it’s too late.

We have a mandatory life sentence for murder, but I fear Garry’s killers will escape with as little as ten years each behind bars.

That’s not justice. They will be out on the streets at half his age. For me, life should mean life, and at the very least 25 years. Surely it is time to re-open the debate about bringing back the death penalty — or at least the birch? These people deal in pain - it’s the only commodity they understand.

If Garry’s killers were put to death I would feel absolutely nothing for them. Why should I? They knew full well they were committing the most heinous of all crimes.

Ignoring the jibe about human rights, in actual fact, judges under the last Criminal Justice Act to come into effect have been given far more power over the sentences they can hand down. Life should only ever mean life in the case of multiple murders, or where the offender poses a distinct, special threat to the public, and judges can also now opt for an "indeterminate" sentence if they feel that's the case. The few in prison that are on effective life sentences - Ian Huntley, Ian Brady, Peter Sutcliffe, etc - are those that do genuinely deserve them. It should also always be the judge and not a politician that decides on what requires a life sentence that means life, for obvious reasons. As for bringing back the capital punishment or the birch, apart from the fact that the former doesn't work as anything approaching a deterrent as America aptly demonstrates, it brings us down to the level of those who commit the crimes themselves. A yob beats someone up, so we give him a good state-sanctioned thrashing in return? A wonderful example, to be sure. I also doubt that when they beat her husband up that they had the intention of killing him, whatever despicable bravado they've since displayed.

YOU rarely meet a cop these days, if you do they are often overweight.

This is because most of them drive around instead of being where people need them — on the streets.


Really? I think it's a long time since I've seen an overweight police officer, but then what do I know? I haven't had my husband killed.

We’re entitled to a proper response to every 999 call. CCTV and community support officers are no substitute for a bobby on the beat.

A proper copper knows his beat. He can sense trouble and intervene before it’s too late. And officers need to be fit and strong.


And I'm sure that the Sun will be delighted with the rise in taxes necessary for every community, street, or estate to have its own individual set of police officers, as will those that have no need for them. We already have around 140,000 police officers, and over 15,000 community support officers. Exactly how many more are needed, or necessary? A far better idea would be genuine community policing, not necessarily involving the law itself but active citizenry and groups working together to nip problems in the bud themselves. That though might make too much sense, or involve trying to rebuild a sense of community that has vanished through the rise of ruthless individualism.

I’VE worked in courts and seen the justice system from both sides.

All too often the victim’s family are made to feel like second-rate citizens. Their rights come second to the rights of perpetrators.


Or as they're also known until convicted, the accused.

When Garry’s killers stood trial, the defendants came to the dock smiling and laughing. They were staring at us as if we were scum.

Nobody told them to pack it in. We were the ones told not to show emotion or call out in case it swayed the jury. Why wasn’t there a place for us to watch proceedings free from the menacing glares of yobs?


Why didn't you make a stand and ignore the advice? If you can do this now, why not then? Besides, the layout of most courts often means that those in the dock have to turn right around to stare at those in the public gallery. We could put closed off sections into courts or curtains, but why when most of the time they wouldn't be used? She perhaps does have something a point when they could watch proceedings in a side room via CCTV, but surely most also want to be in there and experience what's going on as well as watch?

I’m so angry at the way these kids play the system. The law says children of ten know what’s right and wrong — so why do we treat teenage killers like babies? They can have their mums sit with them and get refreshment breaks. No wonder court holds no fear for these kids.

Possibly because children mature at different ages, especially as we don't consider them adults until either 16 or 18. Again, they're not killers until they're convicted, and it's worth pointing out that not all of those tried for Newlove's murder were convicted. That's been conveniently forgotten.

BAD parenting is at the heart of Britain’s demise.

We live surrounded by incredible technology — yet some kids behave as if it was the dark ages.
When are lazy parents going to realise life is not a soap opera or a PlayStation game? I’ll tell you — when we strip their benefits, fine them heavily and shame them in the papers.

All of which has been shown to work so effectively in the past.

Parents need to instil respect in kids and teach them right from wrong. If kids run wild their parents should be hauled into court alongside them. And if kids get community service, the parents should have to join them.

Courts come down hard on pensioners who don’t pay council tax. So why pussyfoot around parents who don’t give a damn? And I’m sick of women playing the single mum card.


But this also risks punishing parents when they've tried their hardest. How many youths commit the odd offence, mostly receive a caution and never do anything like it again? You can imagine the parents becoming embittered if also having to attend community service meant them losing their jobs. How would impoverishing families impress upon them the need to bring their children up right, or indeed enable them to do so? It might be reasonable for repeat offences, but not in all cases. The council tax example is also ludicrous: perhaps one or two get sent to prison a year for refusing to pay, if that.

... When a head expels a violent pupil I want him or her to decide without having to explain it over and over or fill out endless forms. A head should be judge and jury without having his authority questioned. Teachers should also be free to intervene if they see a fight without the fear of losing their job.

Except the appeals process has time and again shown that decisions over expulsions are often made hastily and without thinking out the consequences. As for teachers intervening in fights, in all my years at school I never saw them being in the slightest bit afraid of breaking them up or cracking down hard on those who did.

And they should have the right to search pupils for drugs or weapons - a child who has nothing to hide won’t mind.

There's no better way to earn the respect of someone than to spend every morning either frisking them for something they haven't got or peering into their pockets using x-ray machines or metal detectors. There's a lyric that seems to sum this up: "And our schools look like prisons / and our prisons look like malls."

Finally, there's the Sun's leader:

ONE minute, Gordon Brown claims crime has fallen under Labour. The next we learn gun and knife deaths have spiralled by a chilling 20 per cent in one year.

There's nothing like selectively relying on the figures. Overall, homicides were down last year, and gun crime was also down. The quarterly figures showed a rise from 49 deaths involving guns to 59, but then the annual figures to September last year showed them falling back down to 49. Deaths involving knives were up from 219 to 258, which perhaps shows a change in weaponry or the force used, or even failings in hospitals. It's difficult to tell.

Yesterday, Justice supremo Jack Straw promised new prisons — but don’t hold your breath.

Today we discover 3,000 violent offenders are being released early because jails are full.


By a whole 18 days, and those that have re-offended have done so on a surprisingly low level. The Sun and others' demands led to the overcrowding crisis, yet all they want now is.. more prisons and ever harsher crackdowns. Just where does it all end?

Ministers seem hopelessly adrift.

But as murder victim Garry Newlove’s devastated widow Helen points out today, there is a simple remedy.

More bobbies on the beat, tough action at home, discipline in schools and real justice in court.

It comes to something when a bereaved wife and mum can come up with a better cure for crime than our cops and politicians.


Except it's the same cure that's been tried for over a decade and which in their opinion has so egregiously failed.

Where is the liberal response to this sabre-rattling? Where is the politician brave enough to stand up and say, yes, there are problems in certain areas, just as there always has been and always doubtless will be but that we'll try as hard as possible to try to change? That the the police, good as they are and as hard as they work, cannot be everywhere at once? Where despite populists and opportunists claiming that Britain is either broken or a failing society, by most accounts we're doing quite well, and up until recently, the middle classes, unlike the poor and vulnerable, have never had it so good? Or indeed, to end all taboos and stand up to a bereaved person and tell them that grief or anger is never a good motive for change and that their solutions are not necessarily the best ones? The Liberal Democrats have said they'll oppose any return to the "sus laws", but where are they or indeed anyone else with different solutions or suggestions that don't involve either the military, the birch, a "rebalancing" of the criminal justice system or ever more prison spaces? It's time that the narrative was changed and that the needle was taken off the broken record.

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2/01/2008 08:55:00 PM | | | links to this post

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