From: Violet Beck (seizansha@hotmail.com)
Date: Tue Feb 26 2002 - 17:21:41 MST
Bah! And good for them--kids run rampant these days. I would know--I AM one.
Even if this is robbing teens of a personal liberty, they have a commited a
crime and are thus paying. More power to the law enforcement.
Now, if ONLY we could get something like that going in the states...where we
REALLY need it...
>From: "Zphobic" <zphobic@softhome.net>
>Reply-To: virus@lucifer.com
>To: virus@lucifer.com
>Subject: virus: Barcodes On People
>Date: Tue, 26 Feb 2002 15:58:19 +1300
>
>http://www.guardian.co.uk/crime/article/0,2763,658294,00.html
>
>Blunkett plans to tag young offenders
>
>Staff and agencies
>Tuesday February 26, 2002
>
>The home secretary, David Blunkett, today announced plans to electronically
>tag juvenile offenders as young as 12 to crack down on repeat offences by
>teenage "thugs".
>In an extension of the existing tagging scheme, Mr Blunkett plans to
>enforce
>bail restrictions by attaching an electronic device to the arms or legs of
>offenders aged between 12 and 16.
>The courts will have access to tagging if they believe the teenagers are
>likely to commit further imprisonable offences on bail.
>The project - expected to tag 1,800 young offenders in its first year - is
>also a bid to restore confidence in the justice system, which magistrates
>believe is failing to stop young troublemakers appearing before them time
>after time.
>Mr Blunkett said: "My message is that there will be no untouchables in our
>criminal justice system. It is not acceptable for young criminals to carry
>on offending after they have been arrested and placed on bail."
>He told BBC Radio 4 that tagging child offenders was essential to tackling
>street crime "because people are sick and tired of them being put back on
>the street unsupervised, untagged and insecure, actually carrying on doing
>what they did before".
>Tagged children will face lengthy curfews in a bid to keep them off the
>streets and out of trouble while they are on bail.
>Tagging will provide an additional option to magistrates who do not want to
>jail juveniles but who fear they will re-offend if released on
>unconditional
>bail.
>Adults are not tagged on bail because it was not considered "cost
>effective"
>and are remanded if magistrates feel they will re-offend, a Home Office
>spokesman said.
>The tags work by triggering an alarm installed in an offender's home, which
>alerts operators by phone that they have broken the curfew.
>A pilot scheme will begin in six areas - London, Greater Manchester,
>Northumbria, West Midlands, Thames Valley and Avon & Somerset - in eight
>weeks and go national on June 1. Young offenders will not need to have a
>criminal record to be tagged and could feasibly be put on the scheme after
>being arrested for serious offences for the first time.
>A Home Office spokesman said a maximum of 6,000 youngsters could be tagged
>but refused to disclose how much the initiative will cost.
>Not everyone agrees that tagging is the answer, and some fear that tagging
>convicted juveniles will lead to youngsters treating the tags as badges of
>criminal honour.
>The home secretary today also announced the creation of the London youth
>crime task force to tackle street crime by improving the youth justice
>system.
>It will target mainly under-18s involved in street crime. Police believe
>each London borough has a hardcore of about 20 to 30 prolific young
>offenders.
>The Metropolitan Police have launched a crackdown on street crime,
>Operation
>Safer Streets, and reassigned 500 officers to tackle the problem after
>figures showed it had risen 49% in January compared with last year.
>Mr Blunkett said the task force would involve all agencies dealing with
>prolific juvenile offenders by looking at "blockages and obstacles to
>effective and swift justice from crime investigation through to
>sentencing".
>
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Wed Sep 25 2002 - 13:28:44 MDT