Magistrate Cynthia Toose has summed up the feeling of a community this week while sentencing yet another car thief to jail when she simply said “the community was sick of the epidemic of car thefts in the region”.
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Ms Toose sentenced Jordan Anderson who pleaded guilty to multiple car thefts to 10 months jail after he breached breached a CCO.
“He has children of his own, what message he is sending to the children?” she said. “(And) how must those people (victims) feel? It’s a total disregard for anyone but himself.”
In the week of Father’s Day, these directions speak of the significant repercussions of criminal actions to their own families and to the community as a whole. The sentence this week should send a clear message.
Nevertheless on the very next day in an unrelated incident another group were wreaking their own selfish havoc on another family. Not content with invading somebody’s home, the thieves made off with two of the families cars later found dumped in a bog on the outskirts of town. They even had the audacity to return to steal the third car.
While this terrible story should encourage everyone to take a look at their security to prevent these small minded thieves getting in, it is indeed a sad extreme that people can only feel their cars are safe when the keys themselves are locked up or hidden.
People’s exasperation is even more understandable when these youths are caught, sentenced, released and simply wander on to the next fit of boredom and crime.
There must be a degree of reassurance in the announcement that groups of armed offenders who enter homes could face up to 25 years jail under tough new laws
This is not to advocate punitive sentencing will alone solve the problem. There are many facets to preventative action but demonstrable severity in sentencing must play a part in the solution.
It must be a deterrent if even that seems to be of limited utility when the criminals' mental capacity is so bestial as to comprehend no consequence.
But it must also assure the public that there are fit jail punishments for those who are so indifferent to community good.
It must demonstrate that recidivists will be removed where they can do no harm and even find a fitting end to the enormous amount of work and resources these low-level but stupid crimes cause.
