If you were the judge, what sentence would you give to someone who repeatedly sexuaully abuses children ?

Question

In the light of all the uproar about sweeny , who could be out of prison in 5 yrs for kidnapping & abusing a 3 yr old girl.
If i was the judge i would give him a life sentence, and that would mean 'LIFE'. Or better still, be recommended for surgical castration.

Thankyou everyone for your answers.
I think we all had the same views on this,
And millions of others.
sorry, but i cant seem to choose the best answer, i will leave it for voting.

Answer 1

I would be surprised if he made it out of jail...offender of crimes against children don't sometimes...

Answer 2

My personal view is that freaks like this guy have a genetic imperfection, a part of the brain which is hard wired wrong, a design fault if you like which means that you can never rehabilitate or cure them.

Their crime is so counter intuitive to the human (or most animals) insinct which is to protect children, means to me that they are beyond redemption.

A close relative of mine was until very recently a prison governer, and had spent his life mixing with murderers, terrorists, drug addicts etc, and because he was very professional at his job dealt with all of them on equal and human terms.

His view after 40 years of service was that most people who had commited a crime knew that ultimately it was wrong, and would often share that thought and start to make the journey back to being a valued member of society, even though many would fall on the way.

Child molesters however were a different matter in that his experience told him that they were very different in attitude to say an armed robber or murderer. Paedophiles actually beleive that the children enjoy it and that it is ok to do it, and its just a problem with society not accepting it. He sais that the really dis-quieting thing about Paedophiles is that they will make a very rational and convincing argument for why what they do is actually acceptable.

In short he never met one who ever believed what they had done was wrong.

Therefore in the absence of a terminal sentence, these awful people should be locked up and never see the light of day again. One sentence fits all.

Life....meaning life.

P.S Surgical or medical castration only makes the person more violent.

Answer 3

The answers so far are understandable and predictable. So I will be somewhat controversial. Don't these people have a serious emotional problem? or maybe are psychologically deficient in some way. I am trying to get away from the usual knee jerk reaction.

Child sex abuse has been brought to the for in recent times, and rightly so. It has always gone on though, but was suppressed in the past. And it was not always perpetrated by men, and still isn't. I don't know how you would castrate a woman though?

This crime is far more likely to occur, and I am not talking here about very young children, where the father is not the natural parent of his partners children. Natural fathers are much less likely to carry out acts on their own offspring. However, todays society seems to be discouraging marriage.

I am also a little concerned by the umbrella term, "paedophile" because it embraces serious acts, like the one referred to in your question to, for example, sex between an eighteen year old and a fifteen year old. They shouldn't even be on the same scale.

Your suggestion regarding castration smacks of feminism. And they certainly couldn't be trusted with such an answer, because they would be happy to castrate all men.

It has to be remembered, by way of background information, that men, particularly young men are cursed with strong sex drives, as nature intended. The problem that this presents, is that it has to be controlled every minute of the waking day. I am tempted to think that, if females had the same degree of sex drive as men, that the crime of sexual assault would be abolished, thereby becoming a human right. Ok, slightly cynical perhaps.

I know that I have talked around your question somewhat, but I wanted to present another perspective at your question.

Of course, children have to be protected against people like Sweeny, but more effort needs to be put into trying to understand what is motivating them to do it. It's ironic, that with almost all other crimes, rehabilitation of the offender seems to be the main priority, almost to the exclusion of punishing them. If we could understand a little more about about a sex offenders background, then we might be in a stronger position to prevent some of these crimes in the future.

Answer 4

I would agree that life should mean life in these case but I just wanted to clear a few thinks up. The judges in these cases are in no way to blame. They are legally bound to work to the sentancing guidelines drawn up by government. The judge in this case specifically said that he shouldn't be granted parole unless he was no longer a danger. There is no way he will be released after 5 years. 2ndly what needs to be looked at are the sentancing guidelines and a review of the parole boards.
3rdly I am interested that so many people answered with "Death" This case was in the UK where we no longer have the death penalty. Personally I think it make us a better nation that we do not execute our citizens.

Answer 5

chemical castration and life in prison with no chance of parole.

What is life? I always though it lasted until your heart stopped, but now it seems to be 25 years. Life should be until death, like it says in the dictionary, not some arbitrary number a judge decided on.

Answer 6

well obviously life. For a repeat offender i'd recommend a minimum service of 15 years per child he abused (not just in the trial, but including previous convictions) so say someone abused a child and got paroled only to abuse another, as the judge, my recommendation for minimum service before being considered for parole would be 30years. Now while 15yrs doesnt seem like that long for the gravity of the offense, just remember that it would be a MINIMUM amount of time to be served.

Answer 7

Surely they need to be sectioned into a secure mental unit, as they're not right upstairs and it's a matter of public safety?

there may not be any criminal intent there, they might just be mentally ill, but some kind of custody needs to be imposed til a psychologist can give them a good workup and see what's going on, if they can be cured, if the illness is intractible, or if they're just plain evil / psychopathic.

it tends to be a vicious cycle so they might have been badly deranged by abuse in their own childhoods

Answer 8

I believe there is a need for our special forces to practise.

The child abusing people should be hunted down in a wood, for weeks, knowing they will be chemically castrated, hung, drawn, and quartered.

If I was a judge, the guards would have to protect them from me, not vice versa.

Answer 9

I think they should serve a full sentence. We, in my opinion, can not correct a problem that runs that deep. Also, upon release from prison, if ever, castration should be mandatory. There is no other way curb these puke's cravings.

Answer 10

My initial answer was to say REMOVE HIS equipment. By that NO I DO NOT mean casturation. His pipe if you know what I mean. Then sentence him to prison, general population. NO solitare Let the general population take care of the problem. OH yeah, it would be a LIFE sentence to boot.

Answer 11

If I could do whatever I wanted, I would sentence a child molester to be used in a testing lab, for something like cancer research or even product research (you know, injecting chemicals into the eyes) so at least they could serve some purpose to society.