Well, truth be told I was being a bit sarcastic there.
I watch ID Channel often, and I’ve noticed that both England and Australia seem to hand down very light sentences for serious and heinous crimes, and I can’t really understand that.
I mean heinous crimes too, and they’ll get a minimum of 10-13 years, and I just shake my head.
I agree, and so do most Britons.
I watch ID Channel often, and I’ve noticed that both England and Australia seem to hand down very light sentences for serious and heinous crimes, and I can’t really understand that.
I mean heinous crimes too, and they’ll get a minimum of 10-13 years, and I just shake my head.
Let me explain why it happens in Australia - I don't agree with all of it, but there is some logic to it.
Most serious crimes (Murder, rape, armed robbery etc) carry a maximum Life sentence, and that is the sentence that a court will give if they believe there is either no realistic hope of the person being rehabilitated, if the person is likely to be a threat for the rest of their life, or if the crime is so seriously outrageous that no other sentence is appropriate.
Therefore it follows that if a life sentence is not given, it is considered a person has a realistic chance of being rehabilitated, and of not being a danger to someone in the future. So non-life sentences are based on those assumptions.
This means that sentences of above about fifteen years are very rare unless they are life sentences. You are not going to see very many sentences of 20 or 25 years, for example - those people would have got life.
Life does not always mean life. Judges are encouraged to give even most prisoners sentenced to life imprisonment some hope of release for a couple of reasons - and these minimums can be high - 30 or 40 years. It makes them more likely to behave themselves in prison, but also it makes is less likely a future Judge (or government exercising clemency and pardon powers) will take it upon themselves to release somebody. We know from long experience that sometimes after crimes have passed into memory, an appeals court or a politician might say "Did this person really deserve to go to prison for life", and let them out - but are less likely to do so early, if they know that (A) the original Judge specifically considered the possibility this person might one day be eligible for release and said "Not for at least thirty five years" or (B) the Judge at the time had every option to decide the person might one day be eligible for release and Judges normally set some sort of minimum, so if the Judge did not do so in this case - that this is a true "Never to be Released" case, they knew what they were doing.
Most of the time, it actually does seem to work. The times when it doesn't can be tragic, though.