Chaytor jailed for 18 months

I don't have any figures to hand, but I have the impression that, death
penalty or not, the crime figures in 18thC/early19C London were fairly
high anyway and as crims were hanged or transported, new ones took their
place every day. Deterrent; I doubt it.
Indeed, iirc, the vast majority of the transportees were bunged on ships
for offences we would find laughably minor. Whether this was a
deliberate policy to fill the empty spaces of the new colonies or not, I
couldn't say; I expect it was a happy (for the authorities) coincidence.

 

I noticed that. All his constituents were saying he got what he deserved and
all his parliamentary colleagues were wringing their collective hands.

 

Indeed. There are corroborated accounts of people's having their pockets
picked at the executions (which at that time were conducted in public) of
those who had been convicted of being pickpockets (which was a capital
offence).

--
des
'If all the girls who attended the Yale prom were laid end to end, I
wouldn't be a bit surprised'
(Dorothy Parker (1893 - 1967))
<http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/>

 

These are the people he's let down ...

... and these are the people thinking "But for the grace of God..."

 

He'll do no more than 4 months, you watch.

 

The standard rate is half the sentence for good behaviour, isn't it?

 

I kept expecting one of them to say just that.

 

Try reading The Fatal Shore some time.

 

The Home Service? This is something I'd expect auvache to come out
with. He's still listening to the Light Programme, you know.

 

The Light Programme? 2LO or nothing mate.

 

Can you get that with the old cat's whisker?

 

Or possibly it sends a message that there is no "one rule for them and
one rule for the rest of us", which might be beneficial overall.

The sentence did seem a bit heavy, but I don't really know what the
judge's options were.

 

Well, one thing's for sure: the *homicide* rate goes up in the short
term by 1....

 

I suspect that neither did the judge, until he was told them.

And for the record, I don't see 18months for multiple cases of fraud as
excessive. Particularly when remission and time of for being held in
remand are taken into account and I could tell you tales of how people use
the remand thing to their best advantage when they know they are going
dahn.

 

Indeed, it might just send that message. Unfortunately, that message is
complete baloney.

I personally don't see the point in incarceration for non-violent offences.

But then, when it comes to humanism and societal progress, I'm about four
to five hundred years ahead of everyone else.

--
des
'The same Europe that let Jews be exterminated on its soil is letting
Jews be exterminated now, looking away and letting itself off the
hook...'
(Giulio Meotti)
<http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/>

 

http://www.amazon.com/Fatal-Shore-Epic-Australias-Founding/dp/0394753666

I've read similar, will give Hughes a go, ta.
It might answer my speculation as to whether excessive capital
punishment was introduced as a repressive measure to make transportation
seem almost desirable as an alternative. Hard, nasty times back then and
I wouldn't be at all surprised at anything.

 

Remember that capital punishment existed in human society _before_ maritime
exploration became commonplace. It is thus not possible that it was
introduced to make a phenomenon that did not exist 'almost desirable'.

--
des
'If all the girls who attended the Yale prom were laid end to end, I
wouldn't be a bit surprised'
(Dorothy Parker (1893 - 1967))
<http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/>

 

Yebbut, I'd like to find out whether a raft of offences suddenly became
liable for capital punishment, just at the time it was handy to have
strings of folk to send abroad, or slightly before, iyswim.
I mean, were they hanging people wholesale for years before the
transportation options, in an attempt to reduce crime levels (as they
saw it)? Life was very cheap then, from what I can make out.

 

The Fatal Shore is a remarkable book, although (having been written for
Australia's bi-centenary) it's somewhat dated now and the horrors that
it revealed have become sanitised by our increased familiarity with the
story. I do think that you might have got things back-to-front, though;
the 'excessive capital punishment' had long been in existence in
Britain, and transportation was possibly introduced, in the Age of
Enlightenment, as a more modern and humane alternative.

There may, of course, have been the associated benefit of populating a
distant colony, but the authorities can have had few illusions about
populating a continent with nothing but wrong 'uns and sadistic guards.
At least Whitehall was safe in the knowledge that they really were on
the other side of the world, and would always (hah) be an arduous
six-month sea voyage away.

 

On which note, Gould's Book of Fish is a great read.