Report to the People
3rd March 2008
Damian’s Law
The
tragic case of Damian Muir, pointlessly and brutally murdered by a known
criminal last July, has raised some hard questions for the justice system.
Why
was Mr Muir’s murderer out on bail after being charged with a series of
vicious assaults? And why are
people still routinely carrying blades and other weapons?
It
seems that, despite the public campaigns and the toughening of the law under the
2006 Police, Public Order and Criminal Justice Act, the message still isn’t
getting through. Something needs to
be done to make knife-carriers realise that their actions have consequences.
One possible move which has been suggested - and which to me makes good sense - is the imposition of mandatory custodial sentences for carrying a knife.
We
know that, if not nipped in the bud, an offender’s so-called “low level”
criminality too often escalates. And
a spell behind bars for carrying a blade may well divert a potential murderer
from getting caught up in a spiral of ever-more-violent crime.
As
was reported in the Telegraph last
week, this is something on which I have been pressing the Justice Secretary and
he has now promised to look into the issue.
His first move, though, must be to scrap the Government’s current
policy of letting even more criminals who should be jailed off with community
service.
No-one
in a democracy wants direct political interference in the judicial process.
But the courts must reflect the seriousness with which our community
regards senseless, violent crime.
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