Hello,
Sometimes it just goes wrong.
Even though everything is going right.
Josh came here in the Autumn last year.
It had taken months to get him to engage.
He couldn’t deal with authority.
Traumatised from childhood.
Then it clicked. LandWorks was okay.
A tentative first day.
Then 2, 3 and then 4 days a week.
Unheard of for this troubled young man.
Mental health and anxiety were improving all the time.
His community sentence completed, he stayed on with us.
Lurking in the background was an historic offence from early 2020.
Court backlog had meant a delay of two and a half years.
Josh was guilty. Never denied it.
All the time he was maturing, developing, reflecting, taking responsibility, a new person emerging.
A Court (rightly) has a long memory.
He pleaded guilty.
Awarded a two-year custodial sentence.
A community sentence would have maintained his development at LandWorks.
The news from inside is that Josh is struggling to cope.
I will visit.
Josh always liked our sign hanging in the wood workshop… Un-F*ck the System.
Never has it held more validity.
Chris
3rd August 2023