h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

That's the question Australia's being asked, or was being asked yesterday, after a judge handed down a landmark 55 year sentence with a 40 year non parole period to the 20 year old ringleader of a pack of (racially motivated) rapists who terrified four young Sydney women.

Internet and phone polls show overwhelming support from most people in the community for this sentence. Most people seem to think it's about time some harsher sentences were handed down to rapists. But there are people out there who are raising an outcry and claiming that this is much too stiff a penalty.

This sentence is allegedly almost three times the maximum given to murderers, and there's debate in the legal community over whether this was an appropriate sentence for the man. Why? Because his victims are still alive, whilst a murderer's are dead.

The leaders of the particular ethnic group these young men came from have already said that had this 'gang' performed these crimes in their mother country, they most likely would have been executed by now, so a 55 year sentence really is getting off lightly in comparison.

But the question is this - murder is considered the ultimate crime. It destroys a family and leaves a person or persons dead before what may have been their natural time. But rape destroys not only the family, but the victim who has to live with the terror and fear, and try to cope and get on with their life after the event...How do you deliberate between the seriousness of the two crimes, and how far is 'too far' when sentencing someone for either of them?

My parents were married in 1947 - 55 years ago.

It is a *long* time...

My instincts say that 55 years is too long. As always we have to ask what the sentance is about. Is it about protecting society, or about punishment, or about rehabilitation, or what.

There is no straight answer to this. And since I have dg not been raped I do not feel able to say whether this is ok or not.

B

I don't believe much in rehabilitation.
I know women who never raise the charges because they are afraid of revenge. If the rapist comes out from the jail in 5 years, he could destroy her life forever.
To some extent I think that rape is worse than murder. It includes such humiliation and usually it destroyes the life of the victim and due to it some other lives are poisoned too.
Still I am not sure if 55 years is the best solution...

By all means let the ...perpetrator out after 40 years...

however, his testicles should be made to serve the full sentence
without parole.

alec.

Although in theory a sentence like this can be passed in the UK (the maximum for rape is life), it would never get past the Court of Appeal, as it is manifestly 'unreasonable' in terms of sentencing for similar crimes.

The biggest sentences I have ever seen handed out are 28 years to a leader of a particularly vicious gang of armed robbers and life with a minmum recommendation of 24 years for one of the most genuinely evil people I have ever seen in a court who committed a particularly nasty and callous murder.

55 years for rape seems a tad over the top, and i doubt it will have a deterrent effect on the population at large-I don't ever get the feeling that many criminals of that type sit and argue about 'Jeez, that bloke last week got sent down for xx years'. They always assume they won't get caught.

Of course, if it gets round that you get longer for rape than you do for murder, then that's a potential encouragement to murder your victims, as it potentially lowers your chance of being identified as well.

But Austarlia's not my country to pass judgement on. There may be local conditions that meant this was appropriate that I'm not aware of.

Being one who has been raped I vote for castration.

it sounds like orginised criminal gang. in a lot of countries being a member of organised criminal gang is crime in itselfs and they get extra heavey sentences.

terrorising people systematicaly should be extra hard punshised, because you never know if evolves to killing.

German law states that rape will 'earn' you a minimum of one year in prision (up to a minimum of five years of some sort of weapon is used or the victim is beaten up).
I know two women who have been raped (one of them repeatedly) and I know what it did to their lifes. If I'd become a judge in criminal law I'd be handing down harsh sentences for this crime.

As for the 55 years ... well ... that would depend on the circumstances of that case. Could you give me the name of the case, so that I can take a look at the judgement? Ta!

Castration, like execution, is a primitive, barbaric and, more importantly, irreversible sentence.

If a man is wrongly imprisoned, he can be released and offered compensation. If a man is wrongly executed or castrated, what would an appropriate recompense be? The torture and killing of the woman who wrongly accused him? What century is this?

It *is* possible to be wrongly convicted, for all sorts of reasons.

While the possibility of wrongful conviction exists, irreversible sentences for any crime are indefensible.

H.

The reason I vote for the castration if perhaps more like revenge associated. They ruined my sex-life forever to some extent. With therapy one can cope with the emotions and nightmares but I don't think my body will learn to trust any man again.

Hoovooloo:
That's the reason I never took the case to the police - the law is for the rapist, not for the victim. I didn't think it was worth all the humiliation and everything if the result was just to see that they'll be at my front door in 3 years. Sorry, maybe we should consider if rape is a crime at all? Maybe I should shut up - too much emotions involved.

Ah, but one importat fact is he was sentenced for *three* attacks on four women meaning that he got 55 years (parole after 38 of them) for the lot of them. [see http://www.abc.net.au/news/2002/08/item20020816001129_1.htm
"The 20-year-old will be eligible for parole in 2040 for planning, leading and participating in the gang rapes of four women in three separate attacks in Sydney in 2000."]
That would break down to 13.75 years per victim or 18.3 years per attack. And that seems easier to justify than 55 years for a single attack on a single victim.

noname - don't get me wrong.

"the law is for the rapist, not for the victim."

The law is for society as a whole - not the rapist, nor the victim.

"Sorry, maybe we should consider if rape is a crime at all?"

Rape is undoubtedly a crime, like any other violent assault, and I agree completely with those in this thread who are unsure of the relative seriousness with murder - it's not an easy call. The punishment for it should be a long period of imprisonment, and the victim should not have to face the possibility of meeting their attacker after his eventual release.

My point was only that no criminal justice system is perfect, and I don't want to live in a country where a man could, even hypothetically, be killed or castrated for something he didn't do.

Stefan Kiszko confessed under intense police questioning to the murder of Lesley Molseed, an 11 year old girl who was found on the Yorkshire Moors stabbed to death and with the killers sperm on her underwear. He was convicted on July 21 1976 after a very poor performance by his defence QC David Waddington (a future Home Secretary...). If we had a death penalty, or some sort of castration-type punishment, Kiszko would undoubtedly have suffered that fate.

Kiszko suffered from hypogonadism. He could not produce sperm. It was impossible that he was the killer. The police knew this at the time of the trial, and witheld the evidence from the defence and the court. He was released in February 1992. He died eighteen months later at the age of forty one, on the eighteenth anniversary of his arrest.

While that sort of thing is possible - and given that the police are only human, it will ALWAYS be possible - we cannot consider killing or maiming people for crimes we may later discover they have not committed.

Lesley Molseed's killer was never found, and the investigation was not reopened when Kiszko was released.

H.

Details here: http://www.users.bigpond.com/burnside/kiszko.htm

H.

A couple of things not mentioned in the media(for various reasons)
All gang members were Lebanese Muslims who attended the radical Lakemba Mosque.
All victims were white Australian girls, who by muslim standards were immodestly dressed, thereby ligitimate targets.

Rod

Oh, please don't get me wrong, too.
I don't think that castration should be used as a punishment in general. But I'd like those who raped me to be castrated. And I am pretty sure they'd be exactly the right persons. No mistake.
My statements were and still are carried by emotions, I know that. Sorry.

Oh and the rapists were laughing in court, showed no remorse or contrition.

To be honest, sounds like the guy deserved it. Although rapists should not be given longer sentences than murderers. Personally, I'm all in favour of mandatory life (50 years +) sentences for murder's that aren't a crime of passion (ie, the murderer had contempt for the life of the victim, rather than suddenly lost his rag and acted out of character).

The guy in question sounds like scum. I doubt there's any point in rehabilitating him. Locking him up until he's an old man sounds like a wise decision.

Would it be ok for him to rape his fellow inmates?

B