75ZT Community

I've been sitting in Court quite a bit of the holiday period so far. Just a couple of observations:-

I signed a warrant of further detention for a 58 year old woman the other day. She was suspected of the murder of her partner by arson on Christmas day. 24 hours later she was charged and remanded in custody.

Remanded a 17 year old in custody yesterday for racially aggravated GBH, again, on Christmas day. I won't go into the horrific details. Suffice to say the charge is very likely to become one of murder.

Remanded an adult and a youth in custody again, yesterday, for kidnap, robbery and ABH. Take a wild guess as to which day those alleged offences occurred

Did everybody on the forum have a peaceful Christmas?

As a refreshing change I also dealt with a shop-lifter yesterday. As you may know, the defendant, when admitting guilt or following a finding of guilt after trial, is required to complete a financial means form. Some of those are often quite outrageous works of fiction but this particular one had a ring of truth about it:-

Rent / Mortgage - Paid by local authority
Mobile phone - £39 per month
Sky - £60 per month
Drinking - £35 per week
Smoking - £30 per week
Gas and electric - Cut off
Other - Entertainment £25 per week
Other - Catalogue £80 per month
Food - from food-banks.

Happy New Year to all my readers (as they used to say in the Beano annual )

Gobsmacked, where is this country heading?
(rhetorical question)

Is this just typical of our time, or have these things gone on before I wonder?


Cheers

Mike

The local authority should deduct the cost of the non-essential items from the amount that it pays out in rent/mortgage!

Perhaps local authorities could cross reference with TV and mobile providers and look at 'non-essential' spending on bank statements and deduct those costs from the benefits given (barring the basic landline cost) - or is that too Orwellian?

A mobile phone and basic Sky package come under essentials along with LCD wide screen TV and many other surprises when you ask Govt/Social Services for the essentials items for normal life/living.
Don't forget many prisoners have Sky TV.........................