'Victims of crime should have no say over what happens to criminals because some just want revenge, senior judges declared yesterday. Two leading Appeal Court justices condemned plans to allow victims more say in court because many, they said, confuse justice with vengeance. The feelings of victims have nothing to do with the public interest and they should be cut out of punishment decisions, said the judges. The ringing rejection of victims’ growing role in the justice system was delivered by Lord Justice Thomas, deputy head of criminal justice, and Lord Justice Goldring, the senior presiding judge in England and Wales. It was a powerful rebuke to Justice Secretary Kenneth Clarke, who plans to make statements by victims ‘routine’ in criminal trials and to tell judges to take them into consideration when setting the sentence. This is just appalling as a concept. Clarke is advocating a crazy system where criminals who are subject to vengeful families will be sentenced differently to criminals who have committed an identical offence but face up to those willing to forgive. After all the 'guidelines nonsense' over decades designed to homogenise sentencing in different courts - we get this!
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1374227/Kenneth-Clarkes-sentencing-reforms-denounced-judges.html#ixzz1Ip1NiUET
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