The Policeman's Blog

Sad to say nothing suprises me withe courts anymore, its just another example of what a mess they are in. See this sort of thing every month with cases I deal with and its terrible that it has had to take a life for the MP'S to finally pull their fingers out and start looking in to things.
 

The thing is, the politicians KNOW what the problem is, It's just they don't want to admit that the social experiment has failed.

The only deterrent is prison. Prison does work in the sense that whilst our regular "customers" are banged up, the public are a little bit safer.

Build more prisons, bang more convicted criminals up. Watch what happens then.

I'm not saying prison does not need reforming, better drug rehab, skills training in prison etc, but also prisoners need to know they are being punished for their crime, that means no tv's or playstations, just hard work!
 

Our local court has an effective way of dealing with offenders who break their bail conditions. Remove the conditions! Thereby, they can't break any and clog up the court system!

P.S I'd be obliged if you would link to my blog.
 

Its the Bail Act 1976 that's the issue. Literally hundreds of thousands of defendants commit offences whilst on bail every year and nothing of consequence happens to them.

We have Bail warrants where people who have not Failed to Appear at court have a warrant issued against them. The Police arrest them and then as per the warrant orders Bail them back to court. Effectively Bailing someone who has Fail to Appear on Bail. Not worth the paper they are printed on.

We also have No Bail warrants where the person on Bail has failed to appear so many times the court gets annoyed (eventually) and issues a Warrant that requires the Police to arrest and detain for the next court day, which we do with glee. However when we take them to court they get granted bail, again. So the defendant who failed to surrender to bail so many times that he has No Bail warrant issued gets granted Bail. Its is really that crazy!

Even if a defendant has recent convictions for failing to appear at court, recent convictions for offending whilst on bail its still next to impossible to get a remand application through since the prisons filled up which is virtually the entirety of the last 10 years.

I am all for a Bail Act that presumes innocence over guilt, presumes everyone should get bail as a right and acts accordingly. Where i disagree with current pratices is how they deal with people who break the conditions of their bail whether that be failing to attend or some other condition.

My suggestion,:

Get rid of Bail warrants, they are pointless, they fail to appear they get kept for court.

Anyone who fails to appear gets one chance, they get tagged, placed on effective house arrest and anything after that and its automatic remand.

Anyone who has a conviction for failing to appear in the last three years gets automatically remanded.

Anyone who has a conviction for committing offences on bail in the last three years gets automatically remanded.

Anyone who breaks any conditions other than failing to appear at court gets automatically remanded technical breach or not.

Anyone charged with an serious indite able offence that carries a life tariff gets automatically remanded.

This would result in a large increase in prison populations over the next 3-9 years until the new bail regime started to settle down and people got the message but it would work.

We would of course have to build more prisons, we could even build remand only facilities where the non convicted don't live with convicted and maybe they should be relatively more comfortable than regular prisons (if that's possible) given that they are still innocent until proven guilty.

However they are housed, where and how well is immaterial to the fact that Bail Act like the Home Secretary is not fit for purpose.
 

How about also getting rid of the discount criminals get when convicted for "time served on remand" I recall many a criminal not opposing bail (while pleading not guilty) just to get most of their sentence cleared this way, simply because they know they are guilty.
What a joke.
 

11,231 (as of October 2007) Johnny Foreigners are enjoying bed and board at Her Majesty's pleasure in England and Wales.

That, by the way, is 6.25% of the daily passenger throughput of Heathrow airport.

I understand that we're still "negotiating" with the dusty armpits from whence they came to persuade them to repatriate them. Perhaps those negotiations would proceed at a slightly brisker rate if those 11,231 backsides were parked in Arrivals in their countries of origin.
 

Not in my court. I have today remanded in custody someone who didn't turn up yesterday. A no bail warrant was issued and he was detained last night. In court from the cells this morning and that's where I sent him after his "I forgot". Charge was dealing cannabis. I don't think his solicitor is running to the crown court on appeal so we will see him in seven days.

In my court, commiting further offenses on bail gets you remanded, as does a breach involving the victim or witnesses. Very common in domestic violence cases.

Not all JPs (I am a lay JP and a member of my local police authority and an ex special constable) are as lilly livered as has been suggested. I have no idea what I might have done in the Weddel case, but that's not the point.
 

At our station we have a list of 'bail curfews' which are checked on a regular basis to ensure compliance.

I recently reported 3 individuals who not only did not present themselves at the door, but someone else within the address answered and confirmed that the individual in question was not present, and a signed statement to that effect noted in each instance.

Absolutely 'cut and dried'reports.

The result? Three replies of 'no proceedings'!

The courts are simply not interested in persuing bail contraventions. Is this because they have to admit that they took the wrong course of action in the first place?

It's outrageous! The courts judgements are simply incompetant!

I'm still a probationer, and already I'm beginning to feel disillusioned with the incompetance of the court system and their unreasonable and unrealistic demands.......
 

"I'm still a probationer, and already I'm beginning to feel disillusioned with the incompetance of the court system and their unreasonable and unrealistic demands......."

Not to worry old pal, you'll be able to put it all behind you sometime in the early 2040's, that's if you live through the civil unrest.
Good luck, 14 to go ;0) A. Harvey
 

There aren't many things from the USA that I envy but I think the bail system is one of them. To get bail, a sum of money has to be put up - none of this 'own recognicance' crap. If the offender then fails to answer bail an arrest warrant, usually backed up by the presence of a court official (bounty hunter), is issued. Not only will this cut down the number of non appearances but it will aid the employment problem (even if the bounty hunters ARE Polish). Perhaps I'm thinking outside the box.......?
 

So a breach of bail conditions is not serious. So why have conditions in the first place if they aren't applied?
 

From reading Bystander's blog, I've come to the conclusion that what Magistrates really care about is that the accused swap their Kappa for an ill fitting shirt and tie, mumble "Yes y'r hon'r" and tug their forelocks in a show of contrition. What they've actually done outside the courtroom seems to be a secondary consideration.
 

I have never met a criminal who has NOT offended on Bail. Think about that for a moment.
 

IG:

I have to say that i have met the odd one or two persons, who were later convicted and became criminals, who haven't offended whilst on bail and by that i exclude 34mph in a 30mph for example. They may be the exception rather than the rule but they do exist.

However if by criminal you mean one of our regular customers then i would largely agree.

I cant however ever completely agree with an argument based on absolutes. Life inst that simple and whether you would admit or not, you like me, purely on probability will have met a criminal who didn't offend on bail.

However the Bail Act is still terrible and should be amended as per my previous comments above.
 

How does anybody get bail once they've been charged with murder? I can see how you might get bail if you were suspected of murder, or accused of murder, but I'd have thought that once you'd actually been charged with it, that would be you in custody until the trial date.

Obviously, his being a police inspector had nothing to do with this and you'd be a fool to think otherwise. I mean, from the comments, if he'd been a cannabis dealer, he'd have been straight to the cells. Obviously a much more serious offence than, you know, actually killing someone. Good to see the War on Some Drugs being prosecuted with such fervour.

I can see how his friends and colleagues in the system might have taken his service and rank into account if he'd been charged with almost any lesser crime. I can see how they'd not want a man who'd given years of service to the community to go through the ignominy of custody, if he'd been fiddling his expenses, or smoking a bit of blow from the evidence room.

But murder? What, did he say he was sorry, promise not to do it again, then slip the magistrate the right handshake?
 

From a justice system that was not only the envy of the civilised world, but a template. To this!
It must be time to take a leaf out of those countries that have left us in the shade.
Prisons & punishment has to be the answer, if they dont learn the first time, make the second tougher, and so on.
Problem solved.
 

I think the underlying problem is actually the amount of time it take to get a case through court. If every case was heard within, say, a few days then a) the remand population would be much smaller and b) remanding someone wouldn't be such a huge restriction on their rights - they are after all not convicted at that stage.
 

I'm assuming the reason ex-Inspector Weddell got bail was down to the silky persuasional skills of his barrister brother who would have been treated as the Holy Trinity by the presiding judge. After all, members of the Bar don't deceive their brethren do they?
 

I was recently working on a Proactive team and were tasked with finding and arresting a very nasty prolific force criminal. This fella was responsible for breaking into an elderly women's house, intimidating and beating her. All to steal £200 he had seen her take out of her post office savings account. He has numerous convictions for burglary, robbery and serious assaults.

Despite RIPA, health and saftey rubbish, tight fisted senior officers and all the other red tape we seem to have wrapped ourselves up in we mannaged to arrest the prig.

It took a DS, a DC and 4 PC's EACH 20 hours of police work to arrest, investigate, interview, charge and put the remand file together. It was water tight and we were all knackered but smiling and really pleased that we had managed to do some cracking police work that would put a very dangerous and violent man behind bars. He was due in court the next morning and we all went home patting ourselves on the back.

The next day 6 bleary eyed cops came in and the OIC rang the court to find the result. He was told the Prig had been released on bail!!. We were all gobsmacked.. How could it have happened?.
After much ringing around and self doubt the OIC spoke to the CPS prosecutor. In her own words why this man had not been remanded in custody..

"I DID NOT PUT THE REMAND APPLICATION FORWARD BECAUSE I DID'NT LIKE THE LOOK OF THE BENCH. THEY WOULD HAVE JUST RELEASED HIM ANYWAY. IT WAY A WASTE OF MY TIME".

Six cops had worked thier arses off and had had 4 hours sleep in 2 days, an old woman had been tortured in her own home for £200 and she, a qualified lawyer did not put it forward as she DIDNT LIKE THE LOOK OF THE BENCH!!!.

This is what we are dealing with. Utter fucking incompetence and a total lack of empathy by the British Courts. You might as well roll dice. Snake eyes your in prison, anything else and your free to walk the streets and prey on the vulnerable and innocent.
 

Hi!
Nice Blog!
Change Your Life Today What has drug abuse done to your life? Are you overwhelmed, confused, out-of-control? Looking for a Drug Rehab Treatment?

Drug addiction is something that is not planned. A person struggling with drug addiction changes. They don't seem to be the person they used to be. In dealing with an addict, the drug becomes the deciding factor for all aspects to their life. An addiction drug rehab program is the farthest thing from their mind. Family, work, friends are all damaged by the addiction. It isn't hopeless and it doesn't have to be. The drug rehab program at Synergy Treatment's drug rehab facility is always here for drug rehab help.
 

maybe if the government paid real lawyers to do the work rather than caseworkers you would have been better off!