I came across this case yesterday.
https://www.scottishdailyexpress.co....years-32537321
Not much shocks these days but reading about this one did.
I have been involved in criminal law since the late 80s.
Based on what I see, the nature of crime is changing.
When I first started out, robbery was a rare crime to come across, but now they seem to be ten-a-penny. That may be driven by the fact that most people will have mobile phones on them, but I don't think it's the whole of it.
Gang crime has increased. I cut my teeth in a town with a significant drugs problem. In the 90s and 00s, the street level dealers were mainly users who were funding their habits. Nowadays a couple of gangs have taken over bringing with them the capacity for extreme violence and a tendency to use kids as runners.
Females seem to be more involved in violent crime far more often now than in the past.
Knife carrying amongst kids has reached epidemic levels.
I'm going to stop now because I'm depressing myself.
In other words, there's no major deterrent for taking someones life.
Our prison system is already over populated and maybe that's why you now read of violent acts not receiving the correct custodial sentences as there's no where to place anyone. Time and again it's 'suspended for 18 months/ suspended for two years' where's the justice in all that for the victims.
No for me, violence is just increasing more on a daily basis and it's getting out of control. I recall the 'Up to 5 years imprisonment' if caught carrying a bladed article. What do we often read on cases like this, 'a curfew for a few weeks or a suspended sentence'. No one hardly gets put away in a youth offenders institute or sent to prison, if deemed as an adult, for carrying a knife. You've only got to watch Police Interceptors for similar cases where 'the weapon was destroyed' and the youth received a court order etc.
A life sentence seems like a fairly major deterrent to me. Deterrence is overrated however. People who commit murder generally don't plan on getting caught. In addition the murder rate in the US is far higher than that in the UK despite the death penalty being available in many states.
As for sentences for knife crime, check out section 315 of the Sentencing Act 2020, which makes a minimum sentence of 6-months obligatory for an adult convicted of a second weapons offence and a minimum of 4-months obligatory for a youth.
Section 315 re-enacts a similar provision from the Powers of the Criminal Courts (Sentencing) Act 2000.
Why give them a second chance with a knife? Isn't the likelihood the first deterrent did nothing so they persist and could quite easily take it to another level, murder even? Be interesting to find out how many who were initially not jailed for carrying a knife, later went on to use one to deadly effect.