Thread by @BarristerSecret

In today’s Telegraph, Boris Johnson turns his famous eye for facts and detail to “our cock-eyed crook-coddling criminal justice system”.

And we have some problems. [THREAD]

telegraph.co.uk/politics/2019/…

Johnson’s supposed ire centres on a story featured yesterday in the press, in which it was revealed that a man sentenced in 2016 to a sentence of imprisonment for drug offences has attended a spa day with his mother.

Luke Jewitt was sentenced in 2016 to imprisonment for importing and/or supplying cocaine. He was sentenced to either 10 years (if you believe The Telegraph, left) or 9 years (if you believe Boris Johnson writing in The Telegraph, right).

His release, apparently on temporary licence (“day release”, as the papers have it) has Johnson in paroxysms of disgust. A jacuzzi??! THE NATIONAL SEA LIFE CENTRE???! IS NOTHING SACRED??!?

From this, Johnson lines up a medley of propositions.

Drug dealing causes untold misery (agreed).

Prisons are at once too ghastly and too cushy (Hmm)

We need to be “tough” on those who carry knives (See obligatory blank space where a practical definition of “tough” should be)

Stop and search should be increased. It is not used in a racially discriminatory way, because Johnson says it’s not. So that’s one complex and nuanced debate settled. Thank goodness.

But Johnson’s primary concern appears to be early release of prisoners, from murderers and rapists reoffending to drug kingpins spa-ing it up with their old mums. And the blame lies, clearly, with the “politically correct” Parole Board:

This, Johnson posits in a stream of consciousness, is an example of the “need to root out the Leftist culture of so much of the criminal justice establishment.”

So, some facts. Johnson seems to be under the impression that release is always governed by the Parole Board. It’s not. For the vast majority of prisoners serving a standard determinate sentence, release on licence is automatic once you’ve served half of your prison sentence.

Parole Boards tend to focus their attentions on dangerous prisoners sentenced to life imprisonment or other sentences for which release is not automatic, such as (now abolished) imprisonment for public protection (IPP) or “extended sentences” imposed on a dangerous offenders.

Now Parole Boards are not infallible. We saw that with the John Worboys case. But I’m afraid circumspection requires that we ask Johnson for a little bit of evidence for this startling claim:

If we were trading in boring facts, we might observe that England & Wales has more prisoners serving indeterminate & life sentences than any other country in Europe, suggesting that neither courts nor Parole Boards are overly eager on frivolous release of dangerous prisoners.

But back to drug lords sentenced to standard determinate sentences. They have nothing to do with the Parole Board. They get automatic release at the halfway point, and as they approach that point can be entitled to release on temporary licence (ROTL), subject to a risk assessment

Johnson describes ROTL as “criminally stupid.” The government - the one of which Johnson was until very recently a member - has published evidence. And it’s pretty positive. The analysis is “consistent with the conclusion that ROTL reduces reoffending.” gov.uk/guidance/relea…

However, there remains an understandable public bugbear with the concept of automatic release at the halfway stage of a prison sentence. I’ve written about this in my book. The public hear “10 years”, and feel understandably deceived when they discover that 10 means 5.

Part of the reason is that this mechanism saves the government money, giving them the tabloid headlines of long prison sentences without having to actually pay for them. But there are also less cynical reasons for automatic release.

It’s argued that it helps reintegrate prisoners into society & aids rehabilitation. If they reoffend on licence, they can be recalled.

But let’s park that to one side. Why do we have automatic halfway release at all? Which MPs were in Parliament when such a thing was introduced?

Automatic release at the halfway stage of all determinate sentences has been a fixture since the enactment of section 244 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003.

Boris Johnson was an MP when this legislation passed. Can you guess how many impassioned speeches he gave in the Commons against the “criminally stupid” idea of automatically releasing prisoners early?

In fact, how many times has he ever spoken in Parliament about early release?

It’s almost as if this newly-discovered zeal for making the lives of prisoners more miserable and antagonistic baiting of “politically correct” and “left wing” criminal justice is merely cheap fatty red meat for the Party Faithful hurled by a charlatan blowing with the wind.[END]

POSTSCRIPT: It has been widely reported that the individual Johnson is referring to was automatically released due to an administrative error, when he should have been referred to the Parole Board instead. To present his release as a parole board decision is simply dishonest.