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Staff member assaulted at Manchester Piccadilly

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Antman

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This kind of comparison isnt helpful as you are not comparing like with like. Even the screenshot you presented shows the difference in injury and level of aggression to the situation under discussion.

If anything the Manchester Piccadilly assault sounds worse.
 
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Gems

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I think child protection should be looking closely at the antics of this fella to be honest. Anyone who can become so violent at something so minor really needs questioning as to his fitness to look after a child.
 

Antman

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I think child protection should be looking closely at the antics of this fella to be honest. Anyone who can become so violent at something so minor really needs questioning as to his fitness to look after a child.
Apparently the matter was referred to social services.
 

Gems

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Aww, the poor fella, gets all anxious because he has PTSD. So he goes spreading PTSD around. If he wants sympathy, go phone the samaritans.
 

yorkie

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Do you really feel qualified to diagnose him with a mental illness?
This is an extremely unfair comment; @Mathew S is not "diagnosing" anyone.
There is a responsibility on the courts to protect people from thugs like this. They have had ample opportunity and it has failed repeatedly.
Yes I agree this is a concern.
People like yourself actually encourage these people and are responsible - indirectly - for people getting violently assaulted. I would find that difficult to live with. IMO of course.
Having met @Mathew S I think it is very unfair and misleading to suggest that he, or people "like" him, are "responsible" for violent acts.
 

Dieseldriver

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Aww, the poor fella, gets all anxious because he has PTSD. So he goes spreading PTSD around. If he wants sympathy, go phone the samaritans.
Worth noting that evidently his PTSD only causes him to hit women, not men...
 

Monty

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Worth noting that evidently his PTSD only causes him to hit women, not men...

Is it me or is PTSD the new whiplash these days? It seems to be the popular thing that people claim to have (usually self diagnosed, but then again there is little means to prove if you do or don't have it just like whiplash). My fear is when people on social media claim to have it for the most obsurd reasons or like this guy try and mitigate their punishment because the can't stop themselves from beating up women... the more it stigmatises people who genuinely suffer from it.
 

farleigh

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This is an extremely unfair comment; @Mathew S is not "diagnosing" anyone.

Yes I agree this is a concern.

Having met @Mathew S I think it is very unfair and misleading to suggest that he, or people "like" him, are "responsible" for violent acts.
Well I am hapoy to apoligise and hope it will be accepted. I was annoyed but should not have run off at Matthew.
 

Starmill

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Is it me or is PTSD the new whiplash these days? It seems to be the popular thing that people claim to have (usually self diagnosed, but then again there is little means to prove if you do or don't have it just like whiplash). My fear is that more and more people claiming they have it because they had an argument with a stranger on the bus or to try and mitigate their punishment because the can't stop themselves from beating up women..
It's very unfair on people who experience stress related illnesses to try and use PTSD as a mere figleaf. In just the same way that it was and continues to be unfair on those who experience soft tissue injuries to claim compensation for made-up whiplash.
 

greyman42

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It is evident from your post that the kind of justice you are looking for is retributive justice. You want to see the perpetrator get his "just deserts" and (possibly) thrown into prison or, going back a many few years, put in stocks, humiliated or flogged in public.
All of the above would be fine.
 

Mathew S

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I am all for locking scroats up and am very happy to do so but we need to be honest about what that will cost. We already have a large prison population contained in prisons that are vastly over capacity and vastly under resourced yet the crime rate isnt falling.

If we want to lock more people up for longer ( and I do) we need:
  • More prison space (perhaps including building in nice, safe, middle class areas)
  • More prison officers
  • Higher wages for prison officers
  • More police
  • Higher wages for police
  • More Judges
  • More lawyers doing criminal work
  • Better legal aid ( I know this is presented by the Daily Hate as evil but it really isnt and is essential to the operation of a fair justice system)
  • More court staff
  • More forensic staff
  • More forensic laboratories
  • More police support staff
  • More and better drug rehabilitation programmes
  • More and better penal education systems
  • Better mental health care and support (both within the prison system and generally)
  • More probation staff
  • More bail hostels ( see point 1!)
  • More and better opportunities for ex cons
  • Better education about the law and the legal system

That means more government funding and a higher tax rate. Still keen?

We also need people to be honest and admit they would be happy for the system to apply to them just as much as the scroats. I know that you and other posters would never ever come before the court ( unlike this scum bag) because you are a decent person but the reality is it is very different. I have seen many decent people in court and convicted often because they made a mistake or lost control once.

It is funny how views change when confronted by that and what they actually mean is that the rules should apply to the scum and not decent people like them. I am also sure that if you and others did come before the court you wouldn't instruct a lawyer to try and mitigate your sentence, would pleased guilty immediately to the highest crime possible and insist upon the maximum sentence available. Course you wouldn't yet it is awful when the scum try this.

Like I said: I am very happy ( and want) to lock people up for a long time for minor crimes, but I am at least honest enough to admit that this will cost us and that there isn't a magic wand that can be waved, today, to meet the kind of sentencing structure I want to see.

BTW - my views aren't based on textbook knowledge but on actual, hands on knowledge. I still have friends in that system from the criminal to the judge. I wonder how many posters commenting have such contacts?

PS: If you aren't happy then get involved. Anyone without a record can apply to be a magistrate. More magistrates are needed, especially from the BAME community: https://www.gov.uk/become-magistrate/apply-to-be-a-magistrate
I would echo @DarloRich and say get involved as a magistrate if you can - or even just go along to your local magistrates court for a day and take a look for yourself at the reality of what has become of the criminal justice system in this country. I also can't recommend enough the book "Stories of The Law and How It’s Broken" by The Secret Barrister (buy it here, and follow them on Twitter).
 

Mathew S

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On restorative justice vs. punitive justice, some thoughts:

Let’s get one thing out of the way at the very start of this: prisons don’t work. According to the government’s own statistics[1], approximately 50% of all adult prisoners reoffend within one year of release from prison. For adults serving a custodial sentence of less than 12 months, that figure is more than 60%. The real number of people who commit further offences having been released from prison must logically be even higher than that, because these numbers only include those who reoffend in the first year ‘out’.

Prison is not, then, an effective deterrent even for those with first-hand experience. Nor, evidently, is the current prison system providing effective rehabilitation. If either of those facts were the case, the statistics quoted above would be very different indeed.

It is, undoubtedly, the case that if someone is serving a custodial sentence, they cannot commit further offences ‘on the outside’. However, given that the average cost of a prison place is more than £30,000 per year[2] (and in some prisons much more than that[3]), it’s only right to consider whether there are more effective alternatives.

It’s also worth pointing out that conditions in UK prisons are all too often inhumane and degrading, not to mention unsafe. This isn’t my view – though I have no reason to disagree with it – rather it is the view of a Dutch court[4] which, earlier this year, refused to extradite a suspected drug dealer to face charges in the UK, because to do so would have put him, “at real risk of inhuman or degrading treatment.”

Just about the only virtue of the prison system, then, is to satisfy society’s instinctive lust for vengeance. The awkward facts that it is expensive, actively harmful, and ineffective at reducing reoffending, are widely ignored since they don’t fit with our primal urge to see bad things happen to people who break the law.

It is unfortunate that, for a wide variety of political, educational, and other reasons, the UK public is averse to considering evidence-based solutions to societal problems. Aside from the inherent difficulty that we all experience in setting aside our emotional reaction to incidents such as the topic of this thread; as humans we often perceive such solutions as unfair. Our gut feeling is that two people who commit the same crime should receive the same sentence – you need only look at this forum for evidence of that. Reality, though, tells us that real life is not that simple. The most serious offenders are often those least likely to reoffend, whilst those who commit petty crimes live lives of seemingly incessant recidivism[5].

There is no shortage of evidence that evidence-based justice, and rehabilitation, in the community is more effective at reducing reoffending than prison. For example, a study in Sussex[6] found that restorative justice lowered reoffending rates by 30%, at the same time saving hundreds of thousands of pounds from the prison budget, while intensive, cognitive-skills based probation work is proven to reduce reoffending rates by 6% - 10%[7].

All of these effective interventions have one thing in common: they seek to address the root cause of the offending by working with the offender to effect positive changes in their lives. For some, that will mean accessing mental health treatment. For others it may mean taking part in one of the many effective, evidence based, accredited offender behaviour programmes[8]. Whatever form these targeted interventions take, the idea is to prevent the offender committing any more offences because that – and only that – is the way to prevent anyone else having to become a victim.

Of course, no intervention is ever 100% effective. There will always be a small number of offenders who, for reasons of public safety, it is necessary to confine. For some, this confinement will be prison-based, for others secure hospitals, etc. I would contend, however, that the fact that the UK currently sends more people to prison than any other European country[9] other than Russia and Turkey – and yet also has persistently higher crime rates[10] – should be telling us that change is badly needed.

Footnotes said:
 
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https://www.manchestereveningnews.c...BY_moTaHHzySA0mjbgbGYzBvrgJrO2sAIpuGxlFBFYeDI

MEN said:
"People need to realise the abuse we get" - Train station guard slams sentence after man walks free for punching her in face

Christina Gledhill, 32, was struck in the face by Darren Corr at Piccadilly Station in July this year after she asked him to show his ticket

A train station guard who was punched in the face by a passenger was left in so much agony that she struggled to change her daughter's nappy.

Christina Gledhill, 32, was struck in the face by Darren Corr at Piccadilly Station in July this year after she asked him to show his ticket.


A court heard he then lifted his daughter over the barrier at platform 5, hitting her head in the process.

The 37-year-old, of Cheadle Hulme, shouted 'What have you f****** done?’ to his victim, before punching her with a clenched fist.

Corr avoided jail after pleading guilty to assault at Manchester Magistrates' Court on Wednesday.

He was ordered to carry out 200 hours community service for the unprovoked attack.

But just days after the sentencing, the dad-of-two was caught laying into critics on social media.
...
 
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LowLevel

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The reason many of us on the railway have little engagement and faith in the justice system is that if we are picked upon and used as a punch bag the perpetrators usually get a fine or community service and to add insult to injury are generally free to continue using the railway because it's too hard to effectively ban them.

We had a case whereby a train guard (one of the most slightly built, inoffensive and friendly people I've ever met) was grabbed by an unhappy passenger, put into a headlock and repeatedly beaten about the face while locked in a moving train until another passenger intervened, then said person had to be dragged off the train by multiple police officers, all this being carried out in front of her young daughter.

The result? She played the mental health card, escaped prison and is free to travel on our trains, and does so.

My colleague in the mean time is struggling to get back to work and has had all sorts of traumatic mental health issues as a consequence of this violent attack. Her confidence is shot and she is in a pretty bad way.

So we, her colleagues, are forced to sell this woman tickets and have her travel on board our trains while we know very well our friend is struggling to deal with the consequences. We'd quite happily kneecap her and instead we have to talk civilly to her.

It's not an isolated case. We have multiple individuals who come back time and time again for more. I honestly do not care about straightening them out. I just want them to disappear.
 

Eccles1983

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The real kicker is this -

I'm a robust character. If confronted with such level of violence I would be more than capable of meeting it head on.

The problem comes with TOCS. Within the law I'd be more than confident that my actions were legal. But I would be suspended for months and potentially sacked despite having a bulletproof right in law to defend myself or another.

I've seen it done. I've had to get hands on with "passengers" who decided to take swing at conductors of both sexes. Without union backing for the time I stopped a colleague from being sexually assaulted I was heading for the sack.

So forgive me if I think the punishments dished out by the courts and the railway are piss poor.

Restorative justice only works with those who genuinely display or emote remorse. This thug in this incident is nothing but a wrongun. His actions and repeated offences are proof of this.
 
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I have read this quite late, but just disgraceful actions.
Where I come from such behaviour would have result in many years of imprisonment.
I too share the opinions of many others above that this shows so many things which are wrong with the legal system England and indeed many of the Western countries today.
At first I admit I empathised with him to some extent when I read that he claimed to suffer from stress which angered him in some way. But I quicklyllost all sympathy for him when I read of his previous convictions, he is clearly a bandit and this just was only act of pure criminality.
Violence to woman should be to the knast!
 

cambsy

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This absolute Scrote of a Neanderthal specimen, may be using the PTSD card, but if he was truly trying to deal with it he would be getting anger management etc, learning how to control his anger, not hitting female barrier worker, I have got an on off missus who had anger problems, hit me etc in the early days, but over time has leant how to control her anger-mental health issues, learnt that hitting people just doesn’t work long term , and now is a lot calmer, she argues and gets heated but doesn’t lash out anymore, so if this specimen was really dealing with his problems and not just banding PTSD about, he wouldn’t have done this, i think karma will bite him back big time, he will try do this gain to wrong person and end up sparked out, and he will deserve it, vile human being.
 

jamesst

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The real kicker is this -

I'm a robust character. If confronted with such level of violence I would be more than capable of meeting it head on.

The problem comes with TOCS. Within the law I'd be more than confident that my actions were legal. But I would be suspended for months and potentially sacked despite having a bulletproof right in law to defend myself or another.

I've seen it done. I've had to get hands on with "passengers" who decided to take swing at conductors of both sexes. Without union backing for the time I stopped a colleague from being sexually assaulted I was heading for the sack.

So forgive me if I think the punishments dished out by the courts and the railway are piss poor.

Restorative justice only works with those who genuinely display or emote remorse. This thug in this incident is nothing but a wrongun. His actions and repeated offences are proof of this.

And this is it in a nutshell. Traincrew have absolutely no confidence that if an incident happens that they will get any backing from there own TOC , from Btp or the Cps.
I've seen it happen at my own TOC which every time goes into find a scapegoat mode regardless of who was or wasnt to blame.
At a guess I'd say only about 20% of violent incidents at my TOC are reported and when you see an outcome like this I can fully understand why.
 

FrodshamJnct

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That's splitting hairs. What matters is 14 offences. Even if there were 'only' 9 it would be equally appalling. Unfortunately we allow people like this to get away with it.

And let's face it, realistically someone who has committed 14 offences will no doubt have done far more that they weren't convicted for.

We are far too soft on violent offences. I know some people strongly disagree with me but I stand by it.

He didn’t get away with it. He was sentenced according to the sentencing guidelines.
 

Adsy125

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On restorative justice vs. punitive justice, some thoughts:

Let’s get one thing out of the way at the very start of this: prisons don’t work. According to the government’s own statistics[1], approximately 50% of all adult prisoners reoffend within one year of release from prison. For adults serving a custodial sentence of less than 12 months, that figure is more than 60%. The real number of people who commit further offences having been released from prison must logically be even higher than that, because these numbers only include those who reoffend in the first year ‘out’.

Prison is not, then, an effective deterrent even for those with first-hand experience. Nor, evidently, is the current prison system providing effective rehabilitation. If either of those facts were the case, the statistics quoted above would be very different indeed.

It is, undoubtedly, the case that if someone is serving a custodial sentence, they cannot commit further offences ‘on the outside’. However, given that the average cost of a prison place is more than £30,000 per year[2] (and in some prisons much more than that[3]), it’s only right to consider whether there are more effective alternatives.

It’s also worth pointing out that conditions in UK prisons are all too often inhumane and degrading, not to mention unsafe. This isn’t my view – though I have no reason to disagree with it – rather it is the view of a Dutch court[4] which, earlier this year, refused to extradite a suspected drug dealer to face charges in the UK, because to do so would have put him, “at real risk of inhuman or degrading treatment.”

Just about the only virtue of the prison system, then, is to satisfy society’s instinctive lust for vengeance. The awkward facts that it is expensive, actively harmful, and ineffective at reducing reoffending, are widely ignored since they don’t fit with our primal urge to see bad things happen to people who break the law.

It is unfortunate that, for a wide variety of political, educational, and other reasons, the UK public is averse to considering evidence-based solutions to societal problems. Aside from the inherent difficulty that we all experience in setting aside our emotional reaction to incidents such as the topic of this thread; as humans we often perceive such solutions as unfair. Our gut feeling is that two people who commit the same crime should receive the same sentence – you need only look at this forum for evidence of that. Reality, though, tells us that real life is not that simple. The most serious offenders are often those least likely to reoffend, whilst those who commit petty crimes live lives of seemingly incessant recidivism[5].

There is no shortage of evidence that evidence-based justice, and rehabilitation, in the community is more effective at reducing reoffending than prison. For example, a study in Sussex[6] found that restorative justice lowered reoffending rates by 30%, at the same time saving hundreds of thousands of pounds from the prison budget, while intensive, cognitive-skills based probation work is proven to reduce reoffending rates by 6% - 10%[7].

All of these effective interventions have one thing in common: they seek to address the root cause of the offending by working with the offender to effect positive changes in their lives. For some, that will mean accessing mental health treatment. For others it may mean taking part in one of the many effective, evidence based, accredited offender behaviour programmes[8]. Whatever form these targeted interventions take, the idea is to prevent the offender committing any more offences because that – and only that – is the way to prevent anyone else having to become a victim.

Of course, no intervention is ever 100% effective. There will always be a small number of offenders who, for reasons of public safety, it is necessary to confine. For some, this confinement will be prison-based, for others secure hospitals, etc. I would contend, however, that the fact that the UK currently sends more people to prison than any other European country[9] other than Russia and Turkey – and yet also has persistently higher crime rates[10] – should be telling us that change is badly needed.
None of the 'lock him up and throw away the key' endorsers seem to be countering any of these points, hmm...
 

Jonfun

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None of the 'lock him up and throw away the key' endorsers seem to be countering any of these points, hmm...

What's worth countering though? The far left wing will just come along with their views that we can make all these backward criminal types better through restorative justice and by making prisons a place of learning and development, and pooh-poohing the normal types who just want to see the offender punished in a way which is going to have a significant impact on their lives - eg a substantial prison sentence (in a non-holiday camp prison!) or a heavily punitive fine.
 

baz962

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None of the 'lock him up and throw away the key' endorsers seem to be countering any of these points, hmm...

Because you can't compare. They re offend yes . But how much of that is because prisons are like holiday camps and they are not bothered about going back. Make prisons a place you don't want to be , not a place run by inmates with TV , games consoles , drugs , phone's etc . Bet re offending would plummet then.
 

baz962

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So much so that we have had an extradition request refused because of the conditions in our prisons?
Wrongly assumed conditions. You not seen the documentaries. In fact there was one on just the other day about the prison on the Isle of Man , watch it and then comment.
 

Llanigraham

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Because you can't compare. They re offend yes . But how much of that is because prisons are like holiday camps and they are not bothered about going back. Make prisons a place you don't want to be , not a place run by inmates with TV , games consoles , drugs , phone's etc . Bet re offending would plummet then.

That suggests that you have never been inside one and only believe what you see on TV. Let me tell you that that is a very sanitised view and very little like the truth. I have friends who are prison officers (Birmingham, Wrexham and Leyhill) and have visited several prisons, including Leyhill, Birmingham and Long Lartin, and the one thing they are NOT is a holiday camp.
 

Adsy125

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Wrongly assumed conditions. You not seen the documentaries. In fact there was one on just the other day about the prison on the Isle of Man , watch it and then comment.
The Isle of Man is mostly independent from the UK, not really relevant. And the point is you have just ignored the evidence that prison is expensive and doesn't work as well as other options, in favour of a purely idealogical stance which ignores evidence to the contrary.

Anyway, this is going of topic so I suggest this thread be locked.
 
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