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Hello,

I opened the gates as usual. Still dark, the security lights flash on. I found my office, revved up my computer and got on with stuff.

As the morning light came up, I started to think something was amiss.

Oh heck, out of the gloom it looked like a building door was hanging off.

It was, and we had been burgled.

As the CCTV footage later showed, 4 men at 1.37am on Friday 20th Sept were busy removing all our battery powered kit, including strimmers, hedge cutters, a blower, 16 batteries, and my old chainsaws. I felt a pang of attachment to my old kit, as its theft replayed on our video screen.

We are rebuilding and restocking slowly, but the real damage was to all of us. We were all victims.

So, as you can imagine, sometimes keeping a balanced view here is difficult, especially among our cohort of placements. Some of whom hated this experience, feeling (unduly) that they were under scrutiny.

With CCTV and fingerprints there are likely to be arrests.

As the days passed, the incident and visible police activity provoked some interesting thoughts and discussions about crime and punishment.

We again came back to sentencing and the question of what is punishment? There was absolute agreement that it is the loss of your time. Whether custodial or served in the community, the court sentence is the moment of punishment. After this it should be about resettlement support.

But I suspect this is out of kilter with public opinion!

Our panel of experts predicted in this case the judge would award a community sentence. Which the same informed group predicted that the offenders in question would just hear as “that they got off” by “swerving jail”.

We hear this a lot!

Through the ongoing discussion our experts suggested however that when a judge remains in contact with the offender, then the community sentence starts to mean something more and compliance increases.

Currently in certain drug and alcohol related offending a judge may order the offender to visit the court once a month to appear before them (for 15 minutes or so). To explain to the judge what they have done over the past 4 weeks and track progress.

We have seen first-hand how very powerful and effective this can be.

The judge is held in high regard and the fact that the judge is taking an interest is significant.

This could happen in many more cases. Not necessarily just reporting to a judge but, perhaps a court panel. Reducing the enforcement burden on probation officers. This could then allow good rehabilitative case management and making more use of the services of organisations such as LandWorks.

The Government’s Sentencing Review is coming soon.

And so is our own sentencing analysis. Our panel of experts (formed into a focus group, including some graduates) will also be reviewing sentencing, pulling their thoughts together to submit to the government review, and no doubt supporting the use of the above and perhaps encouraging greater use of problem-solving courts.

Now, I’m off to cut wood… by hand (at least until the insurance comes through)!

Chris

24th October 2024