Commit the crime, do the (maximum) time?

[mcgillianaire]

From the Guardian live blog:

A student has today been jailed for six months for looting a £3.50 case of water from Lidl in Brixton, which seems to support the analysis provided by the Guardian datablog that magistrates appear to be taking a hard line with those convicted of riot-related offences.

Nicholas Robinson, 23, was walking back from his girlfriend's house in Brixton in the early hours of Monday morning when he saw the store on Acre Lane being looted.

Camberwell magistrates court heard the electrical engineering student took the opportunity to go in and help himself to a case of water because he was "thirsty".

But when the police came in, at around 2.40am, he discarded the bottles and attempted to flee the scene. He was caught and arrested by officers at the scene.

PA reports that there were gasps from the public gallery as district judge Alan Baldwin handed down the maximum penalty he could to Robinson, who has no previous convictions, for his part in the "chaos".

The judge said: "The burglary of commercial premises in circumstances such as this, where substantial and serious public disorder is or has taken place is commonly known as looting."

Robinson, of Borough, south London, had pleaded guilty on Tuesday to a charge of burglary.

He claimed it was an "opportunistic" crime, and he only went in when he saw the store unsecure and wanted a drink.

Robinson will have to spend three months in prison before being released on licence.

On the other hand an eighteen year-old IT student reportedly walked free from Highbury Magistrates’ Court after admitting stealing Burberry T-shirts. David Attoh from Hackney in East London said outside court that the judge had handed him a £100 fine but supposedly waived it after hearing he had spent two days in custody. This lack of consistency in dispensing justice for similar crimes does not paint the rule of law in the best light.