anton wrote:
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Do people here think that any driving offence which causes neither damage or personal injury should be dealt with by way of custody?
Jail should be reserved for people unlikely to respond to normal sentencing or community service.
You and I have to pay for that jail space and lose the tax income from an offender, so we pay twice.
Give 'em bread and water! Keep 'em in rat infested cells - then hang 'em all!

"That'll "learn 'em"!
Am being facetious of course!
Lawyers will plead for mitigation. Sadly, they seem to have more success with "tales of woe" than with most other cases. We seem to spend all our time rounding up the same old to appear before the same old .... it can be a bit soul destroying at times. Our fault though. We just could not get the evidence or prosecution failed to convince the court .

Or we made some minor error in the paperwork which the defence pounced on.

and turned into a "major error"
But of course, we seek to put away those who pose a real theat to society. The punishment is depriving them of their liberty. Locking them in a cell etc. As a society we should try to educate/rehabilitate and provide a means to make a living after their release.
This would help them "repay" the cost of locking them away as well as their learning from the experience.
BUT sadly.. to our collective cost
We also fail badly on that one as a society overall.

We then go into a downward spiral of recidivist/career criminality and "regarding prison as an occupational hazard"
We get the community service/let off with a tag/curfew/ASBO etc right some of the time - but markedly wrong in perhaps 40% at least of all cases

By this I mean some hard cases see an ASBO as some kind of "trophy" punishment.

But I think we tread a very thin tight rope on some of the cases and when a court's trying to balance up the evidence against any mitigating circumstance - one factor can "tip the balance". It's difficult to say on-line without being "specific" about cases I've been involved - but it does depend on how a case is argued in court to the judge/jury/magistrate in some of these "grey" cases which have some emotion in the background

The law likes to think in terms of "black and white". "Grey" areas cause it confusion.
Why it "likes" speeders. Nice clear cut black and white. You were either proven to be above a fixed lolly or you were not speeding at all. The calibrated evidence is pretty clear cut

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If a person is a repeat offender of drink drive, driving without insurance or twocking, or any two ban worthy offences then they have proved that the do not respond to normal sentencing.
Three strikes and you're out!
But we have to draw a line somewhere and I would agree that a court would have to consider a custodial sentence for serious repeat offences.
anton wrote:
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I do not support jailing people for a first offence of perverting the course of justice over speeding tickets. Usually community service is appropriate unless that person was part of the justice system.
Ah.. but the problem. You lie to a court. How can I be sure the person is not lying to me in the future?
That person might be a key witness to a serious crime. But with one count of blatant fibbing in his history.. how sure could a court be that he's not fibbing again?
It's serious. It's like fibbing to a boss over qualifications to get a job which you ain't qualified to do.
Anton - I am not going to spout the "law" at you. Nor do I pull the "holier than thee cos I have a uniform with proverbial shiny badges all over it"

I try to put things across relatively diplomatically

( I think

)
Fisherman - Ern's bus driver.
Once dealt with a bus which collided with a low bridge. Person on top deck was a fatal and two serious. This was way back when in the past. Driver was new to the route. There were three bridges and the third one was the one he hit. From his perspective on approach - he could not see or judge the third one would take the roof off the bus. Inquest at the time ruled a truly unfortunate accident and no charges were brought against the driver. The insurance company was probably stung though.
These days with Sat Nav. Alas the bossy woman giving the instructions is taken more note of than actual common sense of the road ahead

Along with a blind faith
As for the lorry driver? Heck - we'd have tried to have the key thrown away here

Steering a big lorry with knees whilst gobbling down a tin of spaghetti is a real

. He could have stopped at any one service area on the A55 (which to my memory does have parking lay-bies) to eat his meal without compromising his safety/other driver's safety or his digestive system
