mcgillianaire: (Scale of Justice)
The British government has (grudgingly) decided/been forced to end a 140 year-old ban on voting rights for prisoners, following a 2004 decision by the European Court of Human Rights which ruled that the blanket ban was discriminatory and breached the European Convention on Human Rights. Under the Forfeiture Act 1870, prisoners sentenced for felonies were denied the right to vote and this ban was retained in the Representation of the People Act 1983. Prisoners on remand, fine defaulters and those imprisoned for contempt of court can still vote. In addition, the Court allowed individual governments to decide which offences should carry restrictions on voting rights.

For several months, the government's lawyers tried to find a way to avoid enfranchising a potential 70,000 British inmates. But after exhausting every potential avenue the government realised lifting the ban was the only viable option, else taxpayers faced paying huge sums (upto £50 million possibly) in compensation from prisoner claims, and potential legal action from the EU. Most other European nations allow some prisoners voting rights. And despite two separate public consultations, the previous Labour government failed to implement any changes. The news has polarised the country with Tory and Labour supporters upset, though many acknowledge the government had no choice, while many Lib Dems are happy because they campaigned for the law to change. I too wanted the change. But what do you think?

[Poll #1639898]
mcgillianaire: (Scale of Justice)
Following on from yesterday's post, there were 2,649 British nationals detained around the world as of 31 March this year. But this figure only represents those nationals who were assisted by the Foreign & Commonwealth Office and does not include political prisoners for whom separate figures do not exist. Only 256 were women. The figures are produced every six months. Here's how they breakdown by country:
01. USA         - 652
02. Spain       - 346
03. Australia   - 286
04. France      - 133
05. Germany     - 124
06. Ireland     - 101
07. Thailand    - 90
08. Jamaica     - 65
09. UAE         - 55
10. Brazil      - 37
11. Canada      - 34
12. Norway      - 34
13. Peru        - 34
14. Netherlands - 33
15. Pakistan    - 27
It's quite a different composition from yesterday's list, reflecting the most popular emigrant and tourist destinations of British citizens.

[Source: Hansard, 25 October 2010]
mcgillianaire: (Old Bailey)
As of 30 June this year, there were 11,135 foreign national prisoners in England and Wales out of a grand total of 85,002. 3,342 were EU nationals, 774 were women. 6,434 were serving sentences longer than six months. 581 were being held under immigration powers after completion of their sentences. Wandsworth Prison in south London had the most number of foreign national prisoners at 497. Those of you with a sharp memory will remember that I visited Wandsworth Prison nearly two years ago and I made a post about my experience.

The foreign national prisoners belonged to 165 countries and this is how they brokedown:
01. Jamaica    - 942 
02. Nigeria    - 727
03. Ireland    - 681
04. Poland     - 642
05. Vietnam    - 596
06. Pakistan   - 440
07. Somalia    - 433
08. Romania    - 380
09. China      - 364
10. Lithuania  - 361
11. India      - 329
12. Iraq       - 234
13. Bangladesh - 216
14. Portugal   - 209
15. Iran       - 197
16. Zimbabwe   - 189
17. Algeria    - 175
18. Turkey     - 167
19. Albania    - 154
20. Latvia     - 150
Most of the usual suspects, though I was surprised at how high Irish nationals were in the table. It would be interesting to compare the data with different time periods, against the percentage of foreign nationals resident in the UK and with similar data from other western countries.

[Source: Hansard, 26 October 2010]
mcgillianaire: (Portcullis Logo)
A contender for the Labour leadership contest wishes he had assassinated Margaret Thatcher in the 80s and is applauded loudly. A twenty-six year-old accountant in South Yorkshire tweets about blowing his local airport sky high due to bad weather and is convicted.

Meanwhile, Harriet Harman the acting leader of the Labour Party believes half the cabinet should be made up of women. And there are more women Labour MPs than in all the other parties put together, but they make up just under a third (81 out of 258) of all Labour MPs. She says "Labour men are great - but they are not twice as good as the women". Fair enough, but her arithmetic falls short. 1/3rd women MPs should equal 1/3 cabinet posts right? Besides if she's so keen on gender parity, why didn't she and others join the leadership challenge?
mcgillianaire: (Default)

One of the best things about life is coming across something really fascinating which happened in the past, but about which you had never ever heard anything. For me, it's especially brilliant when the story has a British connection. You see a reference to an old event in a recent news report and curiosity takes over. The novelty keeps life interesting. Well today while reading an article in the Daily Mail about Zac Goldsmith, son of Anglo-French financier James Goldsmith and the Tory parliamentary candidate for Richmond Park in West London, I came across this sentence: "Miss Aspinall, 21, is the granddaughter of John Aspinall the conservationist and gambling entrepreneur who is believed by some to have helped Lord Lucan disappear in 1974." Helped someone disappear?! Two clicks to Wikipedia and hey presto:
    "Richard John Bingham, 7th Earl of Lucan (born 18 December 1934), known as Lord Bingham before 1964, sometimes colloquially called "Lucky" Lucan, was a British peer, who disappeared in the early hours of 8 November 1974, following the murder of Sandra Rivett, his children's nanny, the previous evening. There has been no verified sighting of him since then."
And a Rivetting tale it is! Hereditary peer, compulsive gambler, recently separated, murdered nanny, disappears for life! Agatha Cristie-like mystery aside, the story had an interesting legal impact. Lucky Lucan was "was the last person ever to be declared a murderer by an inquest jury, shortly before the procedure was outlawed by the Criminal Law Act 1977". Cool piece of trivia! And it doesn't end there. The wiki entry includes the usual section on "Reported sightings". Usually I come across just one cool unheard of story from the past every week, but like London buses two arrived at once in the space of a few minutes. According to Lucky Lucan's wiki entry "In December 1974, police in Australia arrested a man they believed was Lucan but who was in fact the British MP John Stonehouse, who had faked his suicide a month earlier." A British MP faking his own suicide and hiding Down Under?! I tell ye what, life used to be a lot more interesting in the good ol'days!
mcgillianaire: (Scale of Justice)
Last June I made a post about a landmark decision by the Court of Appeal that created English legal history by allowing a criminal trial to be heard by a judge alone. That trial, involving four men accused of armed robbery at a cash depot at London's Heathrow Airport in 2004, began yesterday at the Royal Courts of Justice. As I wrote back then, the origins of jury trials in England date back to the 12th century, so this is a pretty significant development to our criminal justice system. Let's see what happens...
mcgillianaire: (Scale of Justice)
The concept of ABH was considered by the Divisional Court (DC) in DPP v Smith (Michael Ross) (2006). The defendant held down his former girlfriend and cut off her ponytail with kitchen scissors a few weeks before her 21st birthday. The Magistrates acquitted him on the ground that, although there was undoubtedly an assault, it had not caused ABH, since there was no bruising or bleeding, and no evidence of any psychological or psychiatric harm. The victim’s distress did not amount to bodily harm. The DC allowed an appeal by the DPP, rejecting the argument for the defendant that the hair was dead tissue above the scalp and so no harm was done.

"In my judgment, whether it is alive beneath the surface of the skin or dead tissue above the surface of the skin, the hair is an attribute and part of the human body. It is intrinsic to each individual and to the identity of each individual. Although it is not essential to my decision, I note that an individual's hair is relevant to his or her autonomy. Some regard it as their crowning glory. Admirers may so regard it in the object of their affections. Even if, medically and scientifically speaking, the hair above the surface of the scalp is no more than dead tissue, it remains part of the body and is attached to it. While it is so attached, in my judgment it falls within the meaning of "bodily" in the phrase "actual bodily harm". It is concerned with the body of the individual victim."
~ Judge P in DPP v Smith (Michael Ross) ~

"To a woman her hair is a vitally important part of her body. Where a significant portion of a woman's hair is cut off without her consent, this is a serious matter amounting to actual (not trivial or insignificant) bodily harm."
~ Creswell J in DPP v Smith (Michael Ross) ~

(as copied directly from Wikipedia)
mcgillianaire: (Scale of Justice)
In a landmark decision, the Lord Chief Justice (the aptly named Lord Judge) has created English legal history by agreeing to allow a trial to be heard by a judge alone. The ruling invokes Section 44 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 and is dependent on evidence of a real and present danger of jury tampering taking place. The origins of jury trials in England & Wales date back to the 12th century.
mcgillianaire: (Scale of Justice)
Yes says the British government. No says the highest court in the land. What do you think? READ MORE.
mcgillianaire: (Scale of Justice)
An Outdated Law Still In Force

"Today’s main treason law is found in the Treason Act 1351. Under the Act, anyone is guilty if he “levies war against the Sovereign” or is “adherent to the Sovereign's enemies”. Also guilty is anyone who “compasses or imagines the death of the Sovereign”. Those words come from a 14th century language known as “Law French”. It’s a bit ridiculous to have to apply them to situations today. It’s also treason to slay the Lord Chancellor, or to violate (which in this context means to have sex with) the Sovereign's eldest unmarried daughter or the wife of the Sovereign's eldest son and heir. A person convicted of treason can be sentenced to life imprisonment. Although the death penalty for murder was abolished in 1965, it remained a lawful punishment for treason until it was ended by the Crime and Disorder Act 1998.

There have been some notorious treason cases. Sir Roger Casement is said to have been hanged by a comma. Casement was convicted in WWI of conspiring with the Germans to further an Irish insurrection. His conviction depended on how part of the 1351 Act is punctuated. You can, of course, significantly change the sense of one set of words by punctuation. For example, “a woman, without her man, is nothing” can be changed to “a woman: without her, man is nothing”. In Casement’s case, a comma appeared in a key clause of some, but not all, early versions of the 1351 Act. Ultimately, the court decided the comma was there (the judges inspected an ancient copy using a magnifying glass) and it allowed the definition of a traitor to include someone whose treachery, like Casement’s, was committed outside the realm. He made his nefarious plans with others while he was abroad. Casement was hanged at Pentonville Prison in 1916."

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