The law on transsexual sex has lost touch with humanity and common sense

There has been widespread concern expressed at the 8 year prison sentence passed on Gayle Newland, the 25 year old Chester University student who was recently convicted of assaulting her sexual partner by penetration.

Just weeks later, female to male (but pre-op) transsexual, Kyran Lee, appeared before the Lincoln Crown Court and received a suspended sentence for assault by penetration. The judge’s relative leniency spared the Ministry of Justice the dilemma of deciding if he should be sent to a male or female prison.

There were many differences between the two cases, not least the fact that Newland had been convicted after a trial, whilst Lee pleaded guilty. Lee also faced only a single count.

Nevertheless, the different treatment afforded to the two defendants was striking, and it perhaps serves to emphasise the confusion that now surrounds the law relating to transsexual people and the criminal law.

From shortly after Newland was dragged to the cells, screaming “I’m scared!” press comment has been almost universally critical of HHJ Dutton’s sentence (even though he was faithfully following the Sentencing Guidelines). An entirely unscientific online poll by the Daily Telegraph found that 72% of respondents thought the sentence was too severe, and a similar poll for the Chester Chronicle produced nearly identical results.

Gayle Newland: 8 year sentence widely criticised
Gayle Newland: 8 year sentence widely criticised

Continue reading “The law on transsexual sex has lost touch with humanity and common sense”

Neil Fox’s character has not been vindicated, it has been assassinated

The disc jockey Neil Fox was yesterday acquitted of ten charges of indecent and sexual assault against women and girls. The accusation was that he had committed the offences between 1988 and 2014.

As these things go, the allegations were not particularly serious. They involved unwanted “French” kissing, bottom and breast grabbing and the allegation that Mr Fox had put his hand up various skirts. The worst was perhaps an allegation that he had engaged in sexual activity with a 15 year old girl.

One of the more unusual aspects of the case is that Mr Fox chose to be tried in the Magistrates Court rather than in the Crown Court. This meant that the verdict would not be decided by a jury, but by a bench of magistrates or a (professional and legally qualified) District Judge. In fact, as things turned out he was tried by the Chief District Judge, Howard Riddle and a pair of lay magistrates. This is the Magistrates Court equivalent of a seven judge Court of Appeal. It is very unusual.

Continue reading “Neil Fox’s character has not been vindicated, it has been assassinated”

A few thoughts on Oscar Pistorius

Oscar Pistorius has had his conviction and 5 year prison sentence for culpable homicide overturned by the South African Court of Appeal. It has been replaced by a finding that he was guilty of murder. Instead of re-sentencing him itself, the Court of Appeal has sent the case back to the trial judge, Thokozile Masipa. Continue reading “A few thoughts on Oscar Pistorius”

We already have abortion on demand and it’s time the law made that clear

On Monday the Northern Ireland High Court yesterday ruled that the Province’s exceptionally strict abortion laws breached human rights law.

On Tuesday an attempt to tighten the liberal abortion laws in England and Wales was dismissed by the Administrative Court. The case arose out of a 2012 Telegraph investigation which had revealed that two doctors were apparently willing to arrange for an 8 week old foetus to be aborted simply because it was female. One of them, Dr S, was recorded saying “I don’t ask questions, if you want a termination, you want a termination.”

The evidence in the case was considered by the Director of Public Prosecutions (at that time Sir Keir Starmer QC) who decided that although there was just about a realistic prospect of conviction for “attempting to procure a miscarriage,” it was not in the public interest to prosecute either doctor.

A young campaigner, Aisling Hubert, tried to bring a private prosecution but the CPS stepped in, took the case over, and then stopped it. Continue reading “We already have abortion on demand and it’s time the law made that clear”

Death By Dangerous by Olly Jarvis

No other way to put this: Olly Jarvis, a Manchester barrister, has written a tour de force.

When John Anderson, a successful prosecution barrister and the son of a still ambitious circuit judge, apparently falls asleep at the wheel and kills two people, everyone advises him to plead guilty at the first opportunity. Continue reading “Death By Dangerous by Olly Jarvis”

A visit to York Prison in November 1888

Readers – especially those with an interest in the history of prisons – might be interested to read this account of a visit to York in 1888 by my Great Aunt, Mabel Scott.

She kept a diary between 1887 and – though eventually rather fitfully – well into the Great War. After her death it was given to her brother Norman, a Norfolk clergyman, and on his death in 1955 it was found by his nephew, my own father Martin Scott who died in 2002.

I realise that reading other people’s family history can be about as exciting as clearing out their garden sheds in the rain, but bear with me. The extract below is fascinating.

If you actually are interested in knowing more about Mabel and her family – then my father wrote a short introduction to the diaries which I have reproduced below.

For the moment all you need to know is that in the autumn of 1888 Mabel – then a seventeen year old girl – and her family decided to stay in York for a fortnight. Her descriptions of the nineteenth century city are interesting enough if you know York (as I do), but they come alive with her visit to York Prison. Continue reading “A visit to York Prison in November 1888”

Should we always prosecute people who make false allegations?

What should happen to people who make false allegations?

The issue has been put into stark focus by the publicity given this week to the case of Geoff Long.

Mr Long had a daughter called Tina from an unsuccessful first marriage. In 2010 she went to Brighton police and claimed that he had systematically abused her over thirty years earlier when she was aged between 8 and 16.

There was apparently no corroboration to her allegation, but it led to Mr Long’s prosecution. The jury believed Tina, and he was convicted. He received a sentence of 5 years imprisonment.

To rub salt into his wounds Tina then gave her story to a magazine, which published it under the headline “34 years on I finally made him face up to his hideous crimes.” Continue reading “Should we always prosecute people who make false allegations?”

Free the Naked Rambler

It is rare for anything in Fly Fishing and Fly Tying to make much of a splash. Articles such as “How to tie a Hairy Hotchkiss” or “Agostino Roncallo demonstrates how to tie an extended body dry fly purely from cul de canard feathers” emerge (if at all, because the latter is sadly paywalled) onto the surface of the general public’s consciousness with all the fanfare of a mayfly hatching on a misty morning in a quiet meander of the Itchen.

But fishermen are patient, so it is not surprising that having cast his damsel onto the limpid waters of the letters pages of Fly Fishing and Fly Tying last November, eventually the wider press took an interest in Nigel Bond’s complaint about skinny dippers in the River Dart. According to Mr Bond, there is a growing “scourge” of swimmers disturbing the peace of Devon rivers:

“On a recent visit to Black Pool upstream of Buckfastleigh, I found the peace of the river shattered by several very aged, lily white and scrawny humans cavorting stark naked in what is one of the best pools on the lower river.”

It was not the effect on the fish that he objected to, but the effect on his own peace and quiet:

“I don’t think that the fish would have been too disturbed – the passage of an otter would have disturbed them more – but to an angler, having paid good money to enjoy a little tranquillity by the river, the sight was altogether too much.” Continue reading “Free the Naked Rambler”

Rugby World Cup: a festival for lawyers too

The laws of Rugby are notoriously incomprehensible to most spectators, many players and top referee Craig Joubert.

But if you thought the rules about behaviour in the scrum were murky, spare a thought for the maul of rugby loving lawyers who administer an equally complex set of disciplinary rules. Continue reading “Rugby World Cup: a festival for lawyers too”

Exaro has created nothing but misery and confusion. It’s time for it to shut up.

I had not really wanted to blog yet again about Exaro. There are many other subjects about which I would prefer to write. The subject matter is unpleasant, to express any opinion invites a torrent of abuse, and I would, frankly, like this blog to move away from the rather sterile trench warfare that has now developed between Exaro and its voluble supporters and those, like myself, who think that its influence has been malign.

And yet … Continue reading “Exaro has created nothing but misery and confusion. It’s time for it to shut up.”