No Justice: : Outrage As Rapist Of 13YO Girl Avoids Jail After SNP Justice Reforms

[Sugar Cookie]

A man who raped a 13-year-old schoolgirl has avoided jail following the introduction of SNP-backed justice reforms.

Sean Hogg, 21, was on Monday given just 270 hours of community service for attacking the child on various occasions between March and June 2018 at Dalkeith Country Park in Midlothian.

The judge in the case, Lord Lake, said that had Hogg been aged 25 or over when the offence was committed he would have been jailed for between four and five years.


However, new sentencing guidelines introduced last year state that offenders aged up to 24 should be dealt with more leniently by the Scottish courts, with prison sentences only to be given out as a last resort.

Lord Lake claimed that jailing Hogg, who was 17 at the time that he raped the school girl, was not “appropriate” due to his age and because he felt it would not “contribute to [his] rehabilitation".

“The lack of a prison sentence is a total insult to the young teenage victim in this case,” Jamie Greene, justice spokesman for the Scottish Tories, said. “It once again reaffirms how misguided the SNP’s sentencing guidelines are in reality and how judges hands are tied as a result.”

Hogg was found guilty by a jury and was crying when he appeared in the dock for sentencing, only to be spared a jail term. New guidelines introduced in Jan 2022 state that offenders aged under 25 on the day that they either pleaded guilty or were found guilty should not be treated as harshly as older criminals.

It is claimed that this is because younger people will “generally have a lower level of maturity, and a greater capacity for change and rehabilitation”. The guidelines also point to research which concluded that the brain did not fully develop until as late as age 30.

They were developed by the Scottish Sentencing Council, a body set up by SNP ministers in 2015. They were approved by the High Court in November 2021.

Whole-hearted backing​

While the council is independent, then justice secretary Keith Brown last year offered his whole-hearted backing to the new rules, saying they complimented the SNP's "vision for youth justice".

He rejected claims that they amounted to "soft justice", instead describing the overhaul as "smart" and promising Scottish government help to "make sure it is adopted".

Lord Lake told Hogg that rape was “one of the most serious crimes” with his actions aggravated by his victim’s “age and vulnerabilities”. However, he claimed that he also had an obligation to consider Hogg’s “age as a factor.”

Sandy Brindley, chief executive of Rape Crisis Scotland, said that her charity was ready to support victims.

“This is an extremely serious case and we are shocked this perpetrator has not received a custodial sentence,” she said. “Given the gravity of this crime and the fact it was tried at the High Court, this sentence appears to us to be worryingly lenient.

A Scottish government spokesman said: “Decisions on sentencing in individual cases are taken by the independent court within the legal framework where they consider all the facts and circumstances and the Scottish government does not comment on nor intervene in individual cases.

“Sentencing guidelines are the responsibility of the independent Sentencing Council, the establishment of which was backed by all parties in parliament.”

Outrage as rapist of 13-year-old girl avoids jail after SNP justice reforms

A man who raped a 13-year-old schoolgirl has avoided jail following the introduction of SNP-backed justice reforms.

news.yahoo.com

 

[cubby]

In ten more years, it will be children younger than 30 should be treated less harshly and will continue like this until no one is ever held to account for anything because there will be no judges, no courts, because everybody will be too young to understand being punished for wrongdoing.

Making rules like that just give the ones who take advantage of being young the impetus to do whatever they want because, why not?

 

[Khadijah]

he was too young hes brain isnt fully developped yet. he needs rehabilitation not incarceration

 

[knockout]

That’s what this law is for, I know some had stupid ridiculous positive comments about this law, but maybe now they understand

https://dreamindemon.com/community/threads/california-passes-lgbtq-law-that-legalize-adults-sleeping-with-“willing”-minors.138354/

 

[Sejanus]

You can't rehab a perp like this.
Rapists can not be cured... without a bullet.

 

[Sugar Cookie]

A child rapist deemed too young for jail is to have his sentence appealed by prosecutors after a backlash led by JK Rowling.

Sean Hogg, 21, was spared prison earlier this month and instead ordered to carry out 270 hours of unpaid work for raping a 13-year-old girl in a park.


The judge in the case, Lord Lake, said that had Hogg been aged 25 or over, he would have been sentenced to between four and five years in custody.

However, under Scottish sentencing guidelinesintroduced last year, courts are told to treat those aged up to 24 much more leniently, in part because it is claimed their brains have not fully developed.


The sentence caused outrage from Ms Rowling, the Harry Potter author, who claimed it sent a dangerous message to young men that they could attack girls with impunity.

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Daniel Sanderson
Fri, April 28, 2023 at 12:19 PM EDT·2 min read


In this article:

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  J. K. Rowling
  British author and philanthropist (born 1965)

A child rapist deemed too young for jail is to have his sentence appealed by prosecutors after a backlash led by JK Rowling.

Sean Hogg, 21, was spared prison earlier this month and instead ordered to carry out 270 hours of unpaid work for raping a 13-year-old girl in a park.

The judge in the case, Lord Lake, said that had Hogg been aged 25 or over, he would have been sentenced to between four and five years in custody.

However, under Scottish sentencing guidelines introduced last year, courts are told to treat those aged up to 24 much more leniently, in part because it is claimed their brains have not fully developed.

The sentence caused outrage from Ms Rowling, the Harry Potter author, who claimed it sent a dangerous message to young men that they could attack girls with impunity.

The Lord Advocate, Scotland’s top law enforcement officer, said that the Crown would appeal the sentence on the grounds that it was “unduly lenient”. The appeal court will now consider whether to quash it and impose a harsher sentence.

“Sentence is quite rightly the domain of the independent judiciary,” Kenny Donnelly, deputy Crown Agent for the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service, said.

“However, the law provides for some limited circumstances in which prosecutors have the right to appeal against sentences.

“The Appeal Court has set a high test to be satisfied for this to happen. The sentence must be unduly lenient, which means that it must be outwith the range of sentences which the sentencing Judge, taking account of all relevant factors, could reasonably have imposed.

“The question of Crown appeal against sentence in this case has been carefully considered, and the decision to place this matter before the Appeal Court has been communicated to the complainer through her representative.”

Continue reading at link

Sentence of 21-year-old child rapist deemed ‘too young for jail’ to be appealed

A child rapist deemed too young for jail is to have his sentence appealed by prosecutors after a backlash led by JK Rowling.

news.yahoo.com

 

[Satanica]

Disgusting.

 

[Sugar Cookie]

Wed 11 Oct 2023

A man who prompted an outcry about lenient sentencing for young offenders when he was given a non-custodial sentence after his conviction for raping a 13-year-old girl has had that conviction quashed.

Campaigners and politicians reacted with outrage in April after 22-year-old Sean Hogg was given a 270-hour community payback order by a judge, Lord Lake, who said that had he been older than 25 when he committed the offence he would have faced a four- or five-year custodial sentence.

The Scottish Sentencing Council’s guidelines on young people, which came into effect in January 2022, advise against custodial sentences for those under the age of 25, and recommend that judges take into account an offender’s intellectual and emotional maturity.

They have been challenged after a series of cases in which violent and sexual offenders were given lighter sentences on account of their age.

Hogg smiled as he left the court of criminal appeal in Edinburgh on Wednesday morning after the judge Lady Dorrian told him: “There was an insufficiency of evidence for a conviction and the inevitable result of the appeal must be acquittal.”

Hogg, of Hamilton, South Lanarkshire, was convicted by a jury in the high court in Glasgow in April of raping a 13-year-old girl, who cannot be named for legal reasons, when he was 17.

The solicitor general for Scotland, Ruth Charteris KC, said the crown had decided not to seek a new prosecution. She accepted that the girl’s experience of the criminal justice system “has been very difficult” and offered to meet her and her family.

Sandy Brindley, the chief executive of Rape Crisis Scotland, told BBC Radio Scotland that it was clear the girl had been “completely failed” by the justice process.

“There’s a young woman at the heart of this who has reported rape, which is not easy to do, gone through the lengthy justice process only to see the conviction overturned on the basis of a judge’s misdirection.”

The Scottish government is planning significant justice reforms including the creation of a specialist sexual offences court and a pilot of judge-only trials for rape cases, but these face serious opposition from the legal profession.

Man convicted of raping 13-year-old girl in Scotland acquitted on appeal

Judge says there was insufficient evidence to convict Sean Hogg, whose 270-hour community sentence prompted anger in April

www.theguardian.com

 

[knockout]

The whole world going woke, pro criminal, totally disgusting on part of solicitor general for Scotland, Ruth Charteris KC and the cronies, I mean crown