Am I wrong to think this is wrong ??

Tombo said:
You don't seem to care that they stole a lot of money.
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and have you never 'stolen' anything, or committed a crime in your life? if you feel so strongly about this then you'd probably best go turn yourself in at your local police station :o

of course what they did was wrong, but putting them in prison/fining then is ridiculous, it puts far to much strain on a system which is already operating at its limits. the judge applied as much punishment as he could without it impacting to greatly on our prison system or our care system (or our benefit system).
 
vincent1989 said:
i'm with knip and vixen, the woman could not go to prison, she is wheelchair bound, and many people wheel chair bound end up putting on some weight, you would too. the man, whilst clearly obese is also her carer, had he gone to prison that would have just put more strain on the NHS/council to put a carer in place.

they stole money, but i doubt all those complaining on this forum are snow white ;)
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utter rubbish

they defrauded a lot of money and should have been punished just like everyone else would have been - jail
 
The prison might not be able to fully cope with their level of physical needs though is the point im trying to make.

If they were a rapist or a murderer then yes lock them up without a doubt, wheelchair or no wheelchair.

Yes they stole a lot of money, but the prisons are fit to bursting and so people who have commited petty crimes like this are going free every day, disabled or not. Its a lot easier (and cheaper) to let them be tagged and not be locked up in a prison cell. That doesnt make it right, just the press have decided to highlight this one case, and are ignoring all the other petty thieves who have been freed with a tag up and down the country.
 
vincent1989 said:
and have you never 'stolen' anything, or committed a crime in your life? if you feel so strongly about this then you'd probably best go turn yourself in at your local police station :o

of course what they did was wrong, but putting them in prison/fining then is ridiculous, it puts far to much strain on a system which is already operating at its limits. the judge applied as much punishment as he could without it impacting to greatly on our prison system or our care system (or our benefit system).
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Whether putting them in prison or not is ridiculous isn't the issue. The issue is that they have been treated differently for the same crime based on an arbitary factor.

Either everyone who commits that crime in similar circumstances gets jailed, or none of them do. Things like disability, gender etc can be raised as part of mitigation if they are relevant, but they should not be involved in sentancing once everything is said and done.
 
JBuk said:
utter rubbish

they defrauded a lot of money and should have been punished just like everyone else would have been - jail
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ah yes, i can see how someone who steals money is a far more dangerous person than a rapist, and we should use our limited prison space to jail them instead :rolleyes:.

the fact is, in a perfect world we'd have enough prison space, but then again, in a perfect world they wouldn't have stolen money.

i'm in agreement with you, they deserve no less than prison, but in the current situation there are far more dangerous people to put in prison ;)
 
Dolph said:
Things like disability, gender etc can be raised as part of mitigation if they are relevant, but they should not be involved in sentancing once everything is said and done.
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But they will be taken into account if the prisons couldnt cope with them.
The woman is obviously overweight for whatever reason, and would need at least one carer to help with her most basic of needs. For a prison to provide all these would not only be costly but also take from other areas of the prison the facilities they are already struggling to provide.

Imagine trying to lift someone that heavy, it would take two people who are trained to do so. I know how hard manual handling is from my own job, and you have to be trained to do so, it all costs money, something the prison system has very little of. She would also need help with pretty much every other aspect of her life from washing to dressing etc etc, and so its easier if she is tagged and remains in her own home.
 
knip said:
The prison might not be able to fully cope with their level of physical needs though is the point im trying to make.

If they were a rapist or a murderer then yes lock them up without a doubt, wheelchair or no wheelchair.

Yes they stole a lot of money, but the prisons are fit to bursting and so people who have commited petty crimes like this are going free every day, disabled or not. Its a lot easier (and cheaper) to let them be tagged and not be locked up in a prison cell. That doesnt make it right, just the press have decided to highlight this one case, and are ignoring all the other petty thieves who have been freed with a tag up and down the country.
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£32k is petty ?
 
I agree it's disgusting, however I think, as knip has been saying, the decision was reached because jails are most likely not wheelchair safe/accessible/whatever crap legislation the EU has come up with that they fail on this week.

I don't think it's positive discrimination - we're just incapable of housing them in a prison in a manner that can meet human rights standards.

So all you outraged people, who wants to pay another £15 tax a month to cover remoddelling prisons to cater for disabled prisoners? Or to build new prisons specifically for disabled people?
 
vincent1989 said:
they stole money, but i doubt all those complaining on this forum are snow white ;)
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Strawman, meet vincent1989, vincent1989 meet Strawman.

vincent1989 said:
and have you never 'stolen' anything, or committed a crime in your life? if you feel so strongly about this then you'd probably best go turn yourself in at your local police station :o
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If he hasn't committed a crime then what would be the point in turning himself in? The very act of turning himself in needlessly could lead to a charge of wasting police time which is against the law. You haven't really thought this through whatsoever.

vincent1989 said:
of course what they did was wrong, but putting them in prison/fining then is ridiculous, it puts far to much strain on a system which is already operating at its limits. the judge applied as much punishment as he could without it impacting to greatly on our prison system or our care system (or our benefit system).
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It depends if the prisons have the capability to look after them or if some suitable alternative punishment can be found. Fining them would indeed seem rather pointless if they are only going to be paying it back from money they receive from the Government anyway. The story doesn't mention fining them, nor does it mention that they've had to pay the money back that they stole (I'm hoping they did have - proceeds of crime and all that) but I'm slightly less than surprised if The Sun hasn't given the whole story here.
 
I agree with Vixen et al. I'm also disabled and I'm a big lad (6' 5"), but I'm not fat - judging by the comments thus far that's a good job, else I'd be lynched :p

What they did was thoroughly wrong though, of course. I'm still surprised that the person on the till managed to stop every three items, ring it up, give cash back, then carry on to the next three items LOL Wut?!

Collusion, perhaps? Or maybe s/he had the disability of being dumb? :o
 
vincent1989 said:
ah yes, i can see how someone who steals money is a far more dangerous person than a rapist, and we should use our limited prison space to jail them instead :rolleyes:.

the fact is, in a perfect world we'd have enough prison space, but then again, in a perfect world they wouldn't have stolen money.

i'm in agreement with you, they deserve no less than prison, but in the current situation there are far more dangerous people to put in prison ;)
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dont put words in my mouth, I havent said a thief is more dangerous than a rapist
they stole/defrauded a hefty sum of money, enough to deserve a jail sentence
are you saying prison shoulld only be reserved for dangerous people?

vincent1989 said:
^ this post wasn't?
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childish
 
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folks..the practicalities have to be taken into account. They may well deserve to be jailed and the Judge will have looked at the pros and cons of jailing them. But they have to look at the bigger picture as well..overcrowding in jails and such. So they prioritise. UK jails arent a bottomless pit we just throw "criminals" in and forget about them :p

I think the couple still have to pay back the £32k.
 
knip said:
But they will be taken into account if the prisons couldnt cope with them.
The woman is obviously overweight for whatever reason, and would need at least one carer to help with her most basic of needs. For a prison to provide all these would not only be costly but also take from other areas of the prison the facilities they are already struggling to provide.

Imagine trying to lift someone that heavy, it would take two people who are trained to do so. I know how hard manual handling is from my own job, and you have to be trained to do so, it all costs money, something the prison system has very little of. She would also need help with pretty much every other aspect of her life from washing to dressing etc etc, and so its easier if she is tagged and remains in her own home.
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If that is the case (and I have my doubts, we have plenty of disabled prisoners who get their needs met), then surely the house detention should be equivilent to the jail time and equally restricted?

A six month tagged curfew is not equivilent to 51 months (over 4 years) jail time. They have, by all accounts, been given a lesser sentance because they are disabled. It shouldn't matter. If there are practical considerations, then a reasonable equivilent alternative should be found.

It's nearly as annoying as that charity that keeps saying we're jailing too many women, when women already generally get lesser sentances than men who commit the same crimes...
 
Dolph said:
A six month tagged curfew is not equivilent to 51 months (over 4 years) jail time.
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Minor correction, it is 51 weeks in the story and if memory serves one is normally eligible for parole after approx half the sentence which would fit with the 6 months of curfew roughly. I'd agree though that it isn't equivalent.
 
Stuff you lot, I'm off to scoff loads of food for the next few months and then commit crimes as I will not go to prison.....yipppeeeeeeeeeeee :D

( Fat Cat Burglar :D )
 
semi-pro waster said:
Minor correction, it is 51 weeks in the story and if memory serves one is normally eligible for parole after approx half the sentence which would fit with the 6 months of curfew roughly. I'd agree though that it isn't equivalent.
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This is what I get for posting before coffee.

A 6 month curfew is still not equivilent of even a six month prison sentance though.
 
if they were mentally disabled I'd maybe think differently, but physically disabled (or just fat ********, as the case may be) they should be locked up
 
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