UK: Kriminologenes ønskesamfunn?

Nok en gang opprøres Storbritannia av en sak der unge kriminelle nærmest har fått frie hender til å terrorisere enkeltpersoner og hele nabolag. Etter å ha blitt regelmessig terrorisert av lokale bøller i hele 10 år uten at myndigheter og politi grep inn, valgte den fortvilte Fiona Pilkington (37) å ta livet av seg selv og sin 18 år gamle, mentalt tilbakestående datter Francecca.

Gjennom 10 år tråkket guttegjengen systematisk ned familiens hekk, satte fyr på gjerdet rundt huset, kastet stein og egg på vinduene, skjøv hunde-ekskrementer gjennom brevsprekken deres, skrek obscøniteter – spesielt mot datteren som mentalt befant seg på stadiet til en fireåring – og truet Fionas 19 år gamle sønn med kniv. Men til tross for 33 desperate anrop på nødtelefonen, avviste politiet Fiona Pilkington med at hun «overreagerte» og klassifiserte saken som «lav prioritet». I oktober 2007 satte den dypt deprimerte kvinnen fyr på familiens bil og tok livet av datteren og seg selv.

En jury har nå konkludert med at politiets holdning til Fiona Pilkington og påfølgende mangel på inngripen bidro til at Fiona handlet som hun gjorde. Juryen konkluderte også med at de lokale myndighetene sviktet familien ved deres manglende forsøk på å gjøre noe med den aktuelle guttegjengens anti-sosiale atferd.

Sakens detaljer er sjokkerende, og avisen Daily Mail skriver at de er så opprørte at de derfor har valgt å offentliggjøre navn og bilder på familien hvis eldste sønner utpekes av nabolaget som hovedansvarlige for den systematiske terroriseringen av familien Pilkington.

Leicestershire social services were also blamed for not realising Miss Pilkington was suicidal, even though they had been told.

Olivia Davison, assistant deputy coroner for Rutland and North Leicestershire, who has presided over the inquest into the deaths at Loughborough Town Hall, used special powers to heap further criticism on the council.

In an unusual step, she said she was sending a report to the council and Justice Secretary Jack Straw.

She added: ‘I am concerned about the evidence I have received in this inquest about the process for gathering and recording information from victims of anti-social abuse.’

Today, as the Independent Police Complaints Commission launches an inquiry into the case, it can also be revealed that police simply asked hooligans to write ‘letters of apology’ to their victims instead of dragging them before the courts and failed to implement 2005 national guidelines treating abuse of the disabled as a ‘hate crime’.

Last night Home Secretary Alan Johnson said the police and councils had ‘some hard lessons’ to learn, adding: ‘I expect every force to treat allegations of intimidation and harassment with the seriousness they deserve.’

Mens høringen vedrørende familien Pilkington har pågått, har også en lignende sak blitt kjent: Siden desember 2008 har en 39 år gammel alenemor, Nikki Collen, for to tenåringer blitt systematisk trakassert av en lokal guttegjeng. Gjengen trakasserer familien verbalt når de viser seg ute, kaster kondomer på huset deres, knuser vinduer og sprayer huset med grafitti. Til slutt sparket en eller flere av gjengen inn døren deres og overfalt moren i huset.

Etter overfallet ringte Collen politiet som lovet å sende en politibetjent. En time senere mottok hun imidlertid en oppringning fra en kvinnelig politibetjent som forklarte henne at det var best om ingen politibetjenter viste seg ved huset – fordi situasjonen da ville «eskalere».

Mother-of-two Nikki, who is studying an Open University degree in nursing, said: ‘I couldn’t believe it.

‘I was attacked and wanted to report it but the officer was persuading me not to press charges.

‘She even told me that if the bullies saw a police officer at my home it could escalate the problem further.

‘I was so scared I asked what I should do and she told me to try and sort it out on my own. I was really upset and felt really alone.

‘It’s a horrendous way to live and has got to the stage where I fear going out because of the abuse I will get.

Hva har vi politi for hvis de ikke vil takle unge kjeltringer?, spør kommentator Melanie Phillips – som mener situasjonen skyldes trendy kriminologer.

For ti dager siden satt Phillips i panelet på Politiforbundets årlige konferanse, hvor hun ble forklart at politiet er nødt til å unngå å «kriminalisere» unge, for dersom de havner i fengsel er det større sannsynlighet for at de begår ny kriminalitet etterpå. – Men dette betyr selvfølgelig at ved å ikke havne i fengsel, så er disse bøllene frie til å fortsette å begå kriminalitet. Dette er sikkert åpenbart, men ikke for de ideologene for hvem fengsling heller enn forbrytelser har blitt ondet som må unngås, skriver Phillips:

When asked to explain this failure [i Pilkington-saken], the police response was astounding.

Superintendent Steve Harrod told the inquest that ‘low-level anti-social behaviour is mainly the responsibility of the council’.

Come again, Superintendent? So what are the police for? Whatever happened to the first duty of the police to ‘preserve public tranquillity’? No wonder the Home Secretary is spitting tacks.

Certainly, the local councils in this case can also be faulted in failing to share information about this family’s situation. But at one point Anthony was marched at knife-point into a shed and threatened with an iron bar. If this isn’t a police responsibility, what is?

Many, many other unfortunate people are being forced to live in a similar state of siege from local yobs, with the police unable or unwilling to end the attacks. Other police forces, accused of ignoring the plight of terrorised residents, have claimed that the hurdles erected by prosecutors mean they can’t get criminals to court.

There may be something in that. But to Superintendent Harrod it appears that the police can only prevent crime if the criminal justice system is avoided altogether. The police, he said, had to avoid youngsters being ‘criminalised’ because if they went to jail they were more likely to re-offend.

Oppressive

But, of course, by not going to jail these thugs were free to carry on offending. This is surely obvious – but not to those ideologues for whom imprisonment, rather than crime, has become the evil to be avoided.

So as a result of the kind of half-baked propaganda from trendy criminologists with which today’s police officers are indoctrinated on their training courses, young thugs are left free to terrorise a vulnerable mother to the point where she is in such despair she kills herself and her daughter.

But now look at what the police are investigating with unalloyed zeal. Two Christian hoteliers, Ben and Sharon Vogelenzang, were charged with using ‘threatening, abusive or insulting words’ which were ‘religiously aggravated’ after having a heated conversation about religion with a Muslim guest at their hotel.

We don’t know what was said. Maybe it was no more than a heated argument; maybe the Vogelenzangs were indeed offensive and unpleasant. But however horrible they may have been, how on earth can this be a proper matter for the police?

Similarly, last week a senior diplomat, Rowan Laxton, was found guilty of racially aggravated harassment after he shouted ‘F*****g Israelis’ and ‘F*****g Jews’ and that Israeli soldiers should be ‘wiped off the face of the earth’ while watching television reports of the Israeli attack on Gaza as he exercised in a gym.

Laxton was guilty of bigotry, to be sure, and should lose his job – and his membership of the gym. But prosecuting him was surely oppressive. If bigotry is to be treated as a criminal offence, it’s not just young thugs on housing estates who would be criminalised but vast swathes of the population.

Certainly, the police should step in where hateful speech is likely to incite people to commit criminal acts. But, as often as not, such incitement doesn’t lead to prosecution, while what is no more than an insult can bring down the heavy hand of the law.

Criminal offence has been redefined in such cases as the giving of offence. Bad ideas are thus considered worse than bad deeds.

…

It is also a means for the incompetent to avoid being held accountable for the failings on their watch. Right and wrong, victim and bully are being turned upside-down – and the police, who hold the line for a society’s values, are now in the very front of the charge.