History > 2006 > UK > Violence (I)

Just another British bank holiday:

police log more than 50 crimes

involving knives

Published: 30 May 2006
The Independent
By Jason Bennetto
and Geneviève Roberts

A man in his twenties has become the second person to be stabbed to death during the bank holiday weekend, provoking fears that knife crimes are running out of control.

The growing scourge of knife crime is further illustrated by a snap survey of British police forces which found there were at least 50 further stabbing incidents during the past three days.

And a separate study at a London hospital suggested only about half of stabbings were reported, giving further credence to the belief that only a small number of knife crimes are officially recorded. Pressure is growing on the Home Office to introduce new laws to combat knife crime, including calls by Sir Ian Blair, the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, for mandatory prison sentences for offences involving bladed weapons.

In the latest killing, the victim, who has yet to be named, was stabbed to death during an altercation at about 3.45am yesterday in the Hockley area of Birmingham. A murder inquiry has been launched. Police say there was no clear motive for the stabbing.

The killing follows the fatal stabbing of Thomas Grant, 19, from Churchdown, Gloucestershire, who was attacked on his way home from St Andrews University in Fife on Saturday. A 21-year-old man has been charged with his murder.

Concerns about teenagers carrying knives were highlighted by the murder of 15-year-old Kiyan Prince, who was knifed to death outside the gates of his north London school 11 days ago. And last Friday a second school pupil, named locally as Mohammed Ahmed Hussain, 16, was stabbed outside Heartlands High School in Nechells, Birmingham. He is still in hospital recovering from surgery.

The Government is running a national knives amnesty in an attempt to reduce the huge number of bladed weapons being carried in public. A survey in 2004 estimated that up to 60,000 children aged 11 to 16 carry knives. Knives are used in 6 per cent of all violent crime, according to the British Crime Survey, and crime involving bladed weapons rose by 3.5 per cent last year.

Inquiries by The Independent found police had recorded at least 51 knife attacks and seven gun incidents among the 52 police forces in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland during the bank holiday weekend. West Yorkshire Police had been made aware of 20 knife incidents, and Cumbria Police knew of 19.

In London, a 32-year-old man was stabbed at midnight on Sunday after he asked a gang of youths to stop smoking on a bus.

Many of the forces contacted, however, said that while they had details of "serious" incidents, their records did not show at this stage whether a gun or knife has been used.

Almost half of forces - mainly in rural areas - could say that there were no recorded gun or knife incidents during the weekend.

Commenting on the number of knife crimes recorded by the police, Lynn Costello, co-founder of Mothers Against Murder and Aggression, said: "These figures are just the tip of the iceberg, they are just the serious, reported crimes that have occurred over the bank holiday.

"We have to do something about this terrifying trend. We need to be arresting people for carrying weapons and giving them tougher sentences. Our children are attacking our children daily. And people will think twice before helping other people, as it can result in injury."

A leading criminologist confirmed that the police were only recording a small percentage of the total number of stabbings and incidents in which young male teenagers threaten other boys with knives. Roger Matthews, professor of criminology at London South Bank University, said a study he had carried out last year at a London accident and emergency hospital department found evidence to suggest that only half of stabbings were officially recorded.

He said: "Many of the people injured wanted to be patched up on the street - they didn't want to go to hospital and give their names and addresses."

He added: "The research on violent crime, such as stabbings, is pretty thin, but all the evidence suggests that many, many offences go unrecorded. People always think about how lethal guns are, but many do not work - whereas almost every knife can kill."

A weekend of violence across the country

GLASGOW

* A 17-year-old was stabbed early on Sunday as he got out of a taxi. He is in a serious condition in hospital.

* A man, 20, was shot and seriously wounded late on Sunday.

* A man, 34, is seriously ill in hospital after he was shot by police on Saturday after police were called to an armed robbery.

EDINBURGH

* Police were hunting two men after a man was stabbed on Saturday.

CUMBRIA

* Nineteen incidents include the death on Saturday of Thomas Grant, from a single stab wound to the heart while travelling on a train.

* A man aged 30 was arrested after "swaggering" around on Friday waving a replica handgun.

WEST YORKSHIRE

* At least 20 incidents involving knives over the weekend.

BIRMINGHAM

* A 14-year-old boy was stabbed outside school on Friday. Three youths have been arrested.

* A man was stabbed to death early yesterday in the Hockley area.

NORWICH, NORFOLK

* A boy aged nine and his eight-year-old sister were robbed at knifepoint on Saturday lunchtime while shopping.

LOWESTOFT, SUFFOLK

* A domestic-related stabbing was reported yesterday morning and a woman aged 45 detained. Her husband was in hospital.

KILBURN, LONDON

* A man aged 32 was stabbed early on Sunday after he asked youths to stop smoking on a bus.

PURFLEET, ESSEX

* A woman aged 26 was in a "very serious condition" in hospital after a stabbing outside a pub following a large fight early on Sunday.

BALLYCASTLE, CO ANTRIM

* A man was stabbed on Friday when he came to the aid of a woman threatened with a knife in a park. A suspect has been charged.

CATFORD, LONDON

* In a shooting outside a nightclub early on Friday, five people, including two women, were injured. Three men arrested.

CARDIFF, SOUTH WALES

* After a shooting early on Sunday at a nightclub, a man aged 18 was in hospital in a stable condition, and an 18-year-old was arrested.

NOTTINGHAM

* Two men were detained in hospital on Saturday morning with serious stab wounds after arriving at a casualty department in a car. The men, aged 26 and 35, had both suffered stomach wounds.

* A man aged 26 was in critical condition in hospital after an unprovoked attack early on Sunday.

BRIDGNORTH, SHROPSHIRE

* A man aged 18 was repeatedly stabbed at a hotel early on Sunday. A man was arrested but bailed pending inquiries.

    Just another British bank holiday: police log more than 50 crimes involving knives, I, 30.5.2006,
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/crime/article621775.ece

Stabbed student

was protecting woman

· Dead man was in first year at St Andrews university
· Attacker smashed window to flee locked carriage

Monday May 29, 2006
Guardian
David Ward

A student stabbed to death on a train had been carrying out a "gentlemanly act" when he went to the aid of a passenger in distress, it was revealed yesterday.

The student, named by police as Thomas Grant, 19, intervened to help a woman who appeared to be having an argument with another man on a Virgin cross-country express travelling between Penrith and Oxenholme in Cumbria with 200 passengers on board. Mr Grant died instantly from a wound to his chest.

Passengers in the same carriage looked on appalled before being ushered to other parts of the train by Virgin staff. The attacker was locked in but managed to smash his way out of the carriage when the train, the 10.10am service from Glasgow to Paignton, Devon, arrived at Oxenholme station.

A man was later arrested in nearby Kendal and was still being questioned last night.

Mr Grant, an only child, was in his first year at St Andrews University and was said to have had a "very bright future".

He was travelling alone back to his home in Gloucestershire after sitting an exam and had used the west coast route because he wanted to take his bike on the train.

It is believed Mr Grant, described by his father as his "best pal", was stabbed after carrying out what a source described as his "essentially gentlemanly act". He was said to have stepped into the argument and jumped to the defence of the woman.

Police travelled to Mr Grant's home to tell his parents of his death.

A Virgin spokesman said yesterday that passengers had raised the alarm as the incident developed. "The train manager was made aware that something was going on in one of the carriages at the rear of the train," he said. "She saw pretty instantly what the incident was and moved all the passengers out of the carriage - they all moved very quickly.

"She then locked the connecting doors. This left the man with the knife in a carriage on his own. He could not get at anyone and the passengers were safe. The train manager's extremely quick thinking may well have prevented anyone else from being injured or worse."

The train pulled into Oxenholme station, where the attacker kicked out an emergency escape window in the carriage and ran off. All passengers then left the train, which was sealed off as forensic teams moved in.

All Virgin trains carry CCTV cameras and a spokesman said that footage would be offered to detectives to aid the investigation. A British Transport Police spokesman said he could not confirm reports that the woman or the attacker were travelling with children.

He added that officers were continuing to question a 21-year-old man from Skelmersdale, Lancashire, in connection with Mr Grant's death.

He was arrested on Saturday afternoon in Kendal, two miles from Oxenholme, but has not been named.

The attack comes as British Transport Police roll out Operation Shield in a bid to trap passengers travelling with weapons before they board trains.

The scheme involves the use of hand-held scanners and portable versions of airport style metal detector gates. The devices have already been deployed several times in the north-west of England and were in use at Piccadilly station in Manchester for four hours on Saturday night. They have not yet been used in Scotland.

    Stabbed student was protecting woman, G, 29.5.2006, http://www.guardian.co.uk/crime/article/0,,1785202,00.html

Porn UK

First major study

of online pornography

reveals 1 in 4 adults,

including 1.4m women,

downloaded images last year

Published: 28 May 2006
The Independent on Sunday
By Anthony Barnes and Sophie Goodchild

Record numbers of men and women are downloading pornography from the internet, making Britain the fastest-growing market in the world for the booming £20bn adult website industry.

In the first definitive portrait of the nation's consumption of pornography, The Independent on Sunday can today reveal that more than nine million men - almost 40 per cent of the male population - used pornographic websites last year, compared with an estimated two million in 2000.

In a major survey for the IoS by Nielsen NetRatings, a world leader in internet analysis, research discloses that women are among the fastest-growing users of pornography on the internet, with a 30 per cent rise from just over one million to 1.4 million in the past 12 months. The figures also show that more than half of all children - some seven million - have encountered pornography on the internet "while looking for something else".

Until now, the extent of the use by Britons of internet pornography had not been accurately measured. But the new figures show that one in four men aged 25 to 49 have visited an adult website in the past month - a total of 2.5 million. The surge in use of web pornography mirrors a huge boom in the number of hard-core sex films available to buy legally in the UK over the past few years. Film censors passed more hard-core sex films last year than 18-rated movies.

Relationship agencies have reported that as many as 40 per cent of couples with problems believe pornography has contributed to their difficulties.

Christine Lacey, a senior counsellor for Relate, said: "For many women, the reaction is exactly the same as if they discovered their partner is having an affair. They may not be having sex with someone else but the effect is the same if it is detrimental to their marriage."

Sandra Gidley, MP, Liberal Democrat health spokesperson, said she was "alarmed by the type of material accessible to people, particularly young people". "I'm concerned that the boundaries are being pushed on what is acceptable. Some of the hard-core stuff is quite shocking," she said.

While some specialists welcomed the figures, saying they show Britons have a more liberated attitude towards sex, others warned the search for graphic images of sex acts is contributing to relationship break-ups.

Phillip Hodson of the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy warned that this new generation of "voyeurs" risk problems in their love lives. "The internet has made sex-lazy men even sex-lazier where they get lost in their own world," he added. "It used to be said that men neglected foreplay, but now they are neglecting sex."

The UK porn industry is estimated to be now worth about £1bn, compared with £20bn worldwide. British internet surfers look up the word "porn" more than anyone in the English-speaking world.

    First major study of online pornography reveals 1 in 4 adults, including 1.4m women, downloaded images last year, IoS, 28.5.2006, http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/this_britain/article620728.ece

Crime rate soars as criminals walk free

Observer investigation reveals Labour failure
to halt slide in convictions

Sunday May 28, 2006
The Observer
David Rose

The true picture of rising levels of violent crime in England and Wales and historically low conviction rates can be revealed today by The Observer.

An investigation shows that conviction rates for many of the most violent crimes have been in freefall since Labour came to power in 1997 and are now well below 10 per cent. The chronically low figures for convictions come at the same time as reports that violent crime is increasing.

An analysis of Home Office figures reveals that only 9.7 per cent of all 'serious woundings', including stabbings, that are reported to the police result in a conviction. For robberies the figure falls to 8.9 per cent and for rape, it is 5.5 per cent.

The figures show that, 10 years after Tony Blair pledged to be 'tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime', the chances of getting away with rape, robbery, sexual assault or seriously wounding another person have never been higher.

The Observer's analysis presents a fresh political challenge to the new Home Secretary, John Reid, who is struggling to get a grip over a department that he has described as 'not fit for purpose'. The figures show that recorded totals of these types of crime have risen steeply and while convictions have risen a little, they have not kept pace.

The record under Labour is worst for two crimes that arouse deep public concern. Serious woundings have risen by more than half in 10 years to almost 20,000 attacks each year, but their conviction rate has fallen from 14.8 to 9.7 per cent. Nearly 13,000 rapes were recorded by police in the year from April 2004, double the total for 1997, and over the period the conviction rate collapsed from 9.2 to 5.5 per cent. There was, however, a fall in the number of burglaries and the conviction rate for them rose - but only by 0.5 per cent.

The fall in total conviction rates began under the Tories in 1980 and Labour promised, before it won the 1997 election, that it would put this trend into reverse. Despite its failure to do so, Labour's ministers have claimed repeatedly that serious crime has been falling.

The Home Office insisted in a written statement yesterday that 'long term trends show substantial declines in levels of violent crimes'. The former Home Secretary Charles Clarke claimed earlier this year that the main problem society faces is not crime but the fear of it, and he set up a working party to investigate ways of making people believe the official position - that the huge rises in the levels of recorded violent and sexual crime are illusory, the result of more victims having the confidence to go to the police.

But The Observer investigation shows that since 1980, serious woundings have more than quadrupled, and recorded rapes have increased nearly elevenfold.

Last night, the country's top police officers working in the field rejected the claim that these figures did not reflect a real increase in the incidence of such crimes.

Terry Grange, Chief Constable of Dyfed Powys and the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo) spokesman on domestic violence and sex crime, who heads a team of more than 20 researchers, said: 'I don't think you can sensibly deny that there is a higher incidence of rape and a more routine use of violence, and also of weapons-based violence where it used to be fists and feet.'

He was backed by another Acpo expert, Leicestershire Chief Constable Matt Baggott, and also by Crown Court judges spoken to by The Observer. According to Baggott, the surge in late-night drinking was exposing young people to higher risks of both physical and sexual violence.

He called for a full debate on this shift in social habits: 'We need to line up the data from the health service with what we get from the police. There is a profit-driven competitiveness around alcohol and one of its consequences is young people becoming victims. We need to begin a fundamental, objective analysis of what has been happening.'

Judges said that serious offences of this type were not only more common, but had become more brutal and degrading. Crown Court judges said that they were routinely hearing horrifying cases that were once so rare that they would have been reserved for members of the High Court bench.

Last week, John Reid, echoing a pledge made earlier by the Prime Minister, promised to 'rebalance criminal justice' in order to 'to make the public feel safe again ... I won't rest until the law and the justice system works for law-abiding people, not criminals.'

However, The Observer's investigation reveals that fewer than a third of the 20,000 people acquitted of serious offences in the Crown Court last year owed their freedom to 'not guilty' verdicts by judges, not juries. Cases were often discharged by judges, usually when the prosecution decided not to proceed - because cases were not ready, because victims or other witnesses withdrew or had been intimidated, or because Crown Prosecution Service lawyers decided that the evidence was 'unreliable'.

The answer, said judges, was not to make sweeping changes in the law to reduce suspects' protections, and hence risk wrongful convictions, but to find ways of getting the CPS and the police to work more closely together when investigating crimes so that the evidence is more watertight.

    Crime rate soars as criminals walk free, O, 28.5.2006, http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1784623,00.html

Heroin addicts

could inject themselves

at supervised centres

in police-backed plans

· UK has most drug-related deaths in Europe
· Home Office to decide on whether to adopt findings

Tuesday May 23, 2006
Guardian
Rosie Cowan and John Carvel

Police chiefs have backed proposals which could see heroin addicts injecting themselves in officially sanctioned centres.

An independent working group, tasked by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, will today recommend the introduction of supervised drug consumption rooms to the UK, so that users could take illegal drugs in safe, hygienic surroundings.

Members of the group included Andy Hayman, a Scotland Yard assistant commissioner who also chairs the Association of Chief Police Officers' drugs portfolio, and his Acpo colleague, Met police detective superintendent Kevin Green.

The report has been sent to the Home Office, which will consider whether to adopt its findings.

The UK has had the highest number of drug-related deaths in Europe since 1996 - 1,388 in England and Wales in 2003 - while up to 40% of heroin users experience non-fatal overdoses at some stage.

Many robberies and much antisocial behaviour is drug-related, and discarded syringes present a big risk of infection. A large number of addicts are homeless, and tens of thousands of injections are carried out in public every month in England alone.

There are 65 drug consumption rooms (DCRs) in eight countries worldwide, including Switzerland, Germany, Spain, Australia and Canada, and the working group, which visited some of these during its 20-month research period, believe they reduce the risk of harm to the individual as well as the costs to society.

Unlike so-called "shooting galleries", which are largely unsupervised and where drugs are often purchased, or premises where prescribed heroin is available, users would bring their own drugs to DCRs, and although supervisors would not be able to intervene, they could advise and give immediate assistance if a user collapsed.

The initial pilot proposal is for injection facilities, but European countries are increasingly adding smoking rooms, where heroin and crack cocaine can be smoked.

Four years ago, the Home Office rejected similar recommendations from the home affairs select committee. But Dame Ruth Runciman, the chairwoman of the independent working group, hoped the government would now reconsider. "The Home Office rightly said in 2002 that there was not enough evaluated evidence from drug consumption rooms abroad," said Dame Ruth. "There has been a lot more evidence since. There have been millions of injections in drug rooms abroad and only one death, which was not due to an overdose."

She suggested the consumption rooms could be run by local authorities, the NHS and voluntary bodies, but added: "Most importantly and without question, they must involve the police."

She said the two police officers on the working group supported the group's findings as individuals, but she was aware there would be a range of reactions among the police.

An Acpo spokeswoman admitted: "There are reservations across the police service regarding the report's proposals. However, Acpo is eager to be part of the discussion to ensure the police perspective is considered and will continue to engage in dialogue with all those involved.

"The report provides much food for thought in trying to reconcile illegal drug consumption with trying to reduce the harm such dependency causes the individual and those affected by discarded drugs paraphernalia in public places."

Dame Ruth firmly rejected the idea that DCRs would create "honeypots" for dealers and crime. "It's clear that drug consumption rooms do not have a honeypot effect," she said. "They attract almost entirely local users because people don't travel long distances. They want to inject quickly."

She said evidence from abroad suggested that provision of drug consumption rooms reduced the public nuisance of large numbers of discarded needles in public places. The issue was controversial and made "governments institutionally nervous" but rational debate could do a great deal to mitigate public hostility. "Areas that suffer from injecting have a great deal to gain," she added.

Welcoming the report, chief executive of the drugs education charity DrugScope, Martin Barnes said: "The international evidence in favour of piloting drug consumption rooms in the UK is strong and persuasive and we particularly welcome the emphasis on local agency working and engaging with local communities."

A BBC poll found yesterday that three out of four people thought illegal drugs were a problem in their local area and 53% thought the police should be doing more to tackle it.

    Heroin addicts could inject themselves at supervised centres in police-backed plans, G, 23.5.2006, http://society.guardian.co.uk/drugsandalcohol/story/0,,1781014,00.html

Charity worker's stab horror

Graduate's death leads to calls for increased protection for mental health staff who visit patients in their own homes

Sunday May 21, 2006
The Observer
Jo Revill, health Editor


A young mental health worker who was stabbed to death at the home of a patient was described by her parents last night as a 'role model' daughter. The body of Ashleigh Ewing, a 22-year-old who worked for a mental health charity, was discovered by police on Friday, after a man walked into a police station claiming that there was a dead woman at his home.

Ashleigh was found, covered in stab wounds, in the kitchen of a local man who was being questioned by police last night. Ashleigh had been working for the Mental Health Matters charity in Newcastle since December after gaining a degree in psychology.

Part of her job was to visit people suffering from mental illness and help them develop social skills and integrate into the community. It remains unclear how such a routine visit could have gone so wrong.

Her parents, Jeff and Aileen, were too upset to speak about the tragedy but issued a statement through Northumbria Police in which they told how their unassuming daughter's spirit would live on in their hearts.

'Ashleigh was cherished and admired by her loving family and friends and she was a wonderful role model for the youth of today,' said the statement. 'She was unmaterialistic, unassuming and full of care and compassion for others less fortunate than herself.

'Her family will remember her with love, pride and joy. Her tragic loss is hard to bear but Ashleigh's spirit will live in our hearts for ever.'

Her death is likely to renew calls for the introduction of increased protection of mental health workers who visit patients in their homes. Community psychiatric nurses working for NHS trusts make several million visits each year to see patients and check that they are managing to take their medication. There is, however, a strict protocol for defining risk, and staff will be accompanied by others if they believe that a patient presents any danger.

It is not known whether the 34-year-old man that Ashleigh was visiting had recently been in hospital or had suffered some kind of relapse. A full inquiry is likely to be carried out by the local NHS mental health trust into whether or not there were warning signs that he was not being adequately cared for within the community.

Last night police revealed that Ashleigh, who lived in Hebburn, South Tyneside, had suffered multiple stab wounds and was found in the kitchen of the property on Friday morning in the Heaton area of Newcastle. Detective Superintendent Steve Wade, who is leading the investigation, said: 'A man walked into Clifford Street police station claiming that a woman was dead at his home address.'

A post-mortem examination is due to be carried out. House-to-house inquiries were continuing yesterday and forensic tests were being carried out at the house.

Mental Health Matters was formed in 1984 to provide individually tailored solutions for people with mental illness. A spokesman for the charity said: 'The effect on all the people Ashleigh worked with has been devastating.

'I know Ashleigh's family were extremely proud of her and her choice to use her psychology degree to help others. She was extremely well liked by everyone and all of our thoughts right now are with her family.'

    Charity worker's stab horror, O, 21.5.2006, http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1779785,00.html

Pupil, 15, stabbed to death

in argument after school

· Victim seen in playfight with black teenager
· Schoolboy was member of QPR youth team

Friday May 19, 2006
Guardian
Sam Jones


Detectives launched a murder hunt last night after a promising young footballer was stabbed to death near the gates of his school as classes were ending for the day.

Kiyan Prince, who was 15 and a member of Queens Park Rangers' youth team, was attacked after an argument with another black teenager outside a block of flats close to the London Academy School in Edgware, north-west London.

Teachers found Kiyan covered in blood outside Stamford Court on Kings Drive at 3.35pm yesterday. They stopped a policeman, and an ambulance was called but Kiyan died two hours later at the Royal London hospital.

Phil Hearne, the principal of the London Academy, described Kiyan as "a lovely young man" who was idolised by his schoolmates.

"When I had to announce to people that he was dead, I had very tough senior members of staff in tears. Since then it has been absolute shock," he said. "This was a lovely young man. It's very difficult for us to comprehend."

Mr Hearne added: "We don't know of anybody that would have a grudge against him, and we know our youngsters quite well." A friend of the dead boy's family said Kiyan's mother, who lives locally, was still at the hospital in an "inconsolable" state.

The incident comes days before a Home Office knife amnesty designed to get to grips with Britain's growing problem with knife crime.

Uniformed officers remained at the murder scene last night as Kiyan's fellow pupils gathered at the school to remember their friend and leave flowers and messages.

One note, attached to a wreath, read: "Kiyan, I can't believe this has happened to you. I will miss you so much. I can't believe I have to say goodbye. You will always be in my heart. I will never forget you. You were such a good and funny person."

Daniel Saunders, 16, said his friend was developing a reputation as "the next Theo Walcott". "He has been injured for a lot of this season, but he was still the top scorer for the under-16s, even though he was only 15," said Daniel. "He was a really nice guy. He had no enemies."

Another friend added: "I am not joking when I say Kiyan must have been the most talented 15-year-old footballer in London. He ran rings around 18-year-olds.

"I looked up to him because, to be honest, he was living the dream at QPR. He had everything to look forward to."

Katie Hunt, a former student at the London Academy school, said she had been told by people who saw the stabbing that it started as a playfight but "got out of control".

She said: "A young innocent boy everyone liked has been killed over somebody thinking they are hard."

Detective Superintendent Steven Morgan, who is leading the murder inquiry, described the killing as "a tragic incident" but said he was keeping an open mind as to the motive. He asked for anyone who was in the area at 3.30pm yesterday to contact the police. "It was busy at that time and people have so far come forward but we would like to make sure that we have spoken to everyone."

Det Supt Morgan said the suspect, who was black and about 16 years old, was last seen running away from the scene towards a nearby block of flats.

Teenage victims

The fatal stabbing of Kiyan Prince in Edgware is the latest incident in Britain involving teenagers and knives. Recent killings include:

2006
April Christopher Alaneme, 18, stabbed to death in Sheerness

2005
Sept Kashif Mahmood, 16, stabbed to death in a fight in Ilford
July Anthony Walker, 18, murdered with blow from axe in Huyton
May Mary-Ann Leneghan, 16, stabbed more than 40 times in Reading
April Charlotte Polius, 15, stabbed in the neck at a party in Ilford

2004
June Kieran Rodney-Davis stabbed in the chest near west London school

2003
Nov Luke Walmsley, 14, stabbed fatally by fellow pupil at Lincolnshire school

    Pupil, 15, stabbed to death in argument after school, G, 19.5.2006, http://www.guardian.co.uk/crime/article/0,,1778730,00.html

Rural peace and tranquillity.

Then, enter an expert

in the art of mental torture

· Asbo on woman who made life in hamlet hell
· Embattled neighbours treated for depression

Friday May 19, 2006
Guardian
Martin Wainwright


A high-flying businesswoman who retired to the north for the warmth of its people and easy pace of life was convicted yesterday of turning her adopted home into the hamlet from hell through a "rampaging campaign of hatred and pure evil".

Rival CCTV cameras sprang up in the battleground at Bottomley in the Yorkshire Pennines, where 57-year-old Jeanne Wilding dumped oil, animal corpses and broken glass on neighbours' drives while blasting out choral works depicting rape and murder in the middle of the night.

She was finally restrained yesterday by an Asbo so tough that her defence counsel accused the court of trying to use the penalty to change the former financial consultant's personality. A judge ruled that, after 257 complaints from 15 neighbours and organisations, 30 arrests and a spell in jail on remand, Mrs Wilding had lost touch with reality when it came to quarrels about boundaries and access.

Disputes began over a rambling clematis whose roots and pruning rights led to an argument of the sort heard hundreds of times a week - except that in Bottomley it spiralled out of control. Unbeknown to her new neighbours on the moorland tops between Yorkshire and Lancashire, Mrs Wilding had learned tactics during similar quarrels at her former home in the Wiltshire countryside.

James Ward, prosecuting for Calderdale council, which took up the fight for Bottomley villagers after some of them broke down through stress, asked her: "You are an expert in the art of mental torture, aren't you?" Outside the court she ran a gauntlet of reporters including one who asked: "Are you evil?"

"No," she replied. "But all this may be pushing me that way."

The court heard that Bottomley had been a large working farm until the late 1990s when it was divided into expensive homes aimed at commuters in a pretty area halfway between Leeds and Manchester. The hamlet perches on the hillside above the small town of Walsden which, appropriately, made a name for itself adapting textile processes to weave protective body armour.

Mrs Wilding claimed that families were already at war when she arrived and had united against her after a boundary dispute. She said her own ordeal had included binbags ripped open, rubbish strewn around her garden and broken bottles left outside, sometimes with attempts to frame her for the mess.

But the court heard that Calderdale had been overwhelmed with evidence about her own campaign, which left three Bottomley residents seeking treatment for depression and another in tears because he could not protect his young family from harassment. Mrs Wilding's specialities allegedly included directing CCTV inside neighbours' homes and making boobytraps from paint tins and flowerpots with what Mr Ward called the expertise of "a professional troublemaker".

The case ended yesterday after nine days - the climax of three years of claims and counter-claims - with an unequivocal ruling from deputy district judge Sandra Keen. Granting the Asbo, she told the court that Mrs Wilding had "little or no appreciation of the effect her behaviour has on other people. If her views are challenged, she responds in a wholly inappropriate manner. She takes a confrontational stance, causing others harassment or distress. But her view remains that there is nothing antisocial in how she behaves. She has shown a complete lack of comprehension of the situation, something emphasised by her manner and behaviour while giving evidence".

The judge was not able to make the points directly to Mrs Wilding, who gathered up her purple scarf and blue-tinted spectacles and left the court after hearing 10 minutes of the 35-minute judgment. The hearing had just started hearing evidence from neighbours such as Nigel Pratt, the operations director of an engineering company, who had broken down as he described his family's ordeal.

The saga, which has also involved damage to cars and the beaming of high-powered floodlights into homes next to Mrs Wilding's, is not expected to end unless she moves house. Her daughter and a number of friends and colleagues gave evidence that her character had been misrepresented in court.

Her lawyer, Danielle Graham, said: "She has appeared in court on so many occasions, she spends more time with court security officers and staff than she does with her own family. Can you really apply an antisocial behaviour order in order to change someone's personality?"

But the judge said that as well as direct evidence, the court had also heard of Mrs Wilding's past behaviour from her previous neighbours in Wiltshire. "The evidence of the past and subsequent behaviour of Mrs Wilding reinforced the credibility of the neighbours," she said.

Under the Asbo Mrs Wilding is banned from playing music louder than 30 decibels after 7pm and installing any lights or CCTV cameras which cover anywhere except her own home and garden. She must also pay £75,000 in costs to the council.

Mrs Wilding, who paid £330,000 for her share of Bottomley in 2002, also owns four properties in London, which she rents out. She said after the hearing that she would appeal. "They got everything they wanted, those bullies. I just can't believe it. It's completely changed my view of British justice and the media."

Banning orders

· Chris Wood, a Teesside car thief, is banned from wearing a woolly hat, cap or hooded top so that he can be more easily identified.

· A Londoner convicted of repeated con-tricks on homeowners has been banned from knocking on any door.

· Caroline Shepherd of East Kilbride is forbidden from answering her door in underwear after neighbours said she wore skimpy clothes to upset them.

· A Birmingham woman has been banned from owning a TV, radio or stereo after playing Eminem and Dido at the decibel levels of a passing train.

· Kim Sutton has been ordered not to "dip one toe or finger" in any river, nor to loiter in multistorey car parks, after a series of suicide attempts were described as a waste of police time.

    Rural peace and tranquillity. Then, enter an expert in the art of mental torture, G, 19.5.2006, http://society.guardian.co.uk/crimeandpunishment/story/0,,1778654,00.html

1.15pm

'Hamlet of horrors' woman gets Asbo

Thursday May 18, 2006
Guardian Unlimited
Staff and agencies


A retired businesswoman accused of turning a Yorkshire village into a "hamlet of horrors" was given an anti-social behaviour order by Calderdale magistrates court today.

Neighbours in the village of Bottomley, near Huddersfield accused 57-year-old Jeanne Wilding of a "rampaging campaign of antisocial behaviour, acts of hatred and acts of pure evil" since she moved there in 2002.

The dispute initially centred around an unruly clematis plant, but prosecutors claim that Ms Wilding is responsible for 250 alleged incidents over 16 months, including dumping dead animals, rubbish, dog faeces, glass and nails around the village, damaging neighbours' cars, and plying local children with alcohol.

She has also been accused of booby-trapping paint pots, dazzling neighbours' homes with floodlights, throwing compost at her neighbours and assaulting them with her wheelbarrow.

The prosecutor James Ward told the court that Ms Wilding was a "professional trouble-causer" and said the order was needed "to protect the community".

"Like all hamlets in Agatha Christie's books and the village of Midsomer, something evil arrives and misery descends," he said.

"Bottomley was no exception. In 2002, Jeanne Wilding arrived as a retired businesswoman. From then on, Bottomley became the hamlet of horrors and the hamlet from hell."

He said that three neighbours had needed treatment for depression after Ms Wilding arrived in the village, and that she was feuding with 15 different people in the area.

Last August she was fined £250 for pruning back her neighbours' clematis, which was overhanging her driveway.

An interim Asbo already prevented her from contacting her neighbours, Nigel and Penny Pratt and Paul and Nicola Cryer, from dumping rubbish in communal areas of the village and from pointing surveillance cameras at her neighbours' houses.

Ms Wilding says that she is the victim of a witch-hunt because of her dispute with the local council and arguments with villagers.

Her neighbours claim that one element of her aggressive behaviour is the playing of Carl Orff's choral work Carmina Burana. The prosecution argued that she intended to upset her neighbours because the work is about the "rape, pillage, and trashing of villages".

    'Hamlet of horrors' woman gets Asbo, G, 18.5.2006, http://www.guardian.co.uk/crime/article/0,,1778026,00.html

Revealed:

the horror of the 5,000 children under 16

raped every year

Sunday May 14, 2006
The Observer
Denis Campbell, social affairs correspondent


Extraordinary figures showing the extent of the rape of children under 16 are revealed today. They reveal the number of victims is nearly 5,000 a year - yet only 7 per cent of the attackers are convicted.

It is the first time the Home Office has released such statistics because the ages of rape victims were recorded for the first time only in 2004-5. In that period, 974 girls aged under 13 and a further 3,006 under 16 were raped in England and Wales, while 293 boys under 13 and 320 aged under 16 were raped. Only one in 15 assailants - a total of 303 - were found guilty in court. Senior police officers believe actual numbers of rapes may be far higher because many children do not report the crime.

The release of the figures follows news this week that a 15-year-old boy was charged with rape after an 11-year-old girl became pregnant. In law, a child under 13 is deemed incapable of consenting to sex, so any intercourse is classed as rape. The schoolgirl, from West Lothian, who will become Britain's youngest mother when she gives birth next month, fears she will not be allowed to keep her baby. She said to the Scottish Sun: 'I've been told by social workers there's a chance the baby won't come home with me from the hospital. They say our house is too small and needs redecorating. I'm willing to do whatever it takes to keep my baby.'

Last month another 15-year-old boy admitted raping an 11-year-old in a lavatory at a Sainsbury's supermarket. Sentencing was adjourned until next month for psychiatric reports to be prepared.

The Home Office figures show that girls under 16 made up 31 per cent of the 12,867 females who were raped in 2004-5, while boys of the same age comprised 54 per cent of the 1,135 males raped in the same period.

The figures were obtained by the NSPCC, Britain's biggest children's charity, which will launch a campaign tomorrow with the slogan 'Don't Hide It' to urge young people to report sexual abuse to someone they trust rather than suffer in silence. Evidence collected by ChildLine, the 24-hour telephone advice service that recently merged with the NSPCC, shows that of the 8,637 young people who rang in last year about sexual abuse, 4,414 - just over half - said they had been raped. It was the first time that a majority of calls involved rape. Of those, 842 had been raped by their father, 421 by a stranger and 285 by their boyfriend. Almost all of the remainder were raped by someone they knew. Eighty per cent of the 4,414 reports of rape were made by girls, and 91 per cent of the assailants were men or boys.

'A child calls ChildLine on average once every hour to talk about rape and other types of sexual abuse,' said NSPCC chief executive Mary Marsh. 'Children have phoned in to talk in confidence about having been raped in toilets, phone boxes, cars, bedrooms, bushes and parks.' The NSPCC's belief that there were many more young victims beyond the 4,414 who called ChildLine is backed up by the police. Detective Chief Superintendent Peter Spindler, head of child abuse investigations for the Metropolitan Police, said that, although the force investigated 793 rapes of children in 2005-06, 'we are told by academics that 95 per cent of crimes committed against children don't get reported, so the true figure of rapes and sexual offences could be many times higher.'

Spindler and his team of 600 staff across London have seen the number of 'intra-familial rapes' of under-16s by close relatives, carers and professionals - such as teachers and Scout masters - rise from 282 in 2002-03 to 392 in 2005-06, a jump of 35 per cent.

Officers in Operation Sapphire, the Met squad which investigates rapes, have also seen their caseload grow. Detectives are especially concerned about a rise in the number of attacks on girls under 16 involving more than one male assailant, who are sometimes known to the victim.

The NSPCC's latest campaign will urge sexually abused adolescents to seek help from someone they feel be sure of, ring ChildLine or visit its new website, www.donthideit.com. Advertisements depicting face masks to represent the fact that many, if not most, victims keep quiet about attacks are intended to prompt greater reporting of the crime. At a launch at Parliament of Don't Hide It, the charity will call on the government to provide a more comprehensive network of therapeutic services nationwide so that children who have experienced sexual abuse can get help.

'There are feelings of guilt and shame and fear and not wanting to make the situation worse'

Julia Latcham-Smith, 25, of Bridgend, south Wales, left, was sexually abused for five years by her father, Michael Everson, who is now in prison.

My father began abusing me when I was eight. I immediately told my mother, but she said I was being ridiculous and Dad denied it. I didn't mention it again and kept it to myself.

After that it happened regularly. When I was 10 I told a friend, whose mother alerted the social services. I told them everything. Dad was arrested and questioned by police but the next day I retracted my allegations because I just wanted the whole thing to go away. After that, things got worse. I told social services a second time when I was 13, but again I withdrew my claims. I couldn't cope with the guilt I felt about the upset I'd caused.

I decided to pretend it had never happened and so lived in complete denial for several years. It was only after I got married, told my husband and began having kids of my own - I have two daughters - that I decided to do something.

Dad had unexpectedly confessed to me on the phone once, soon after my wedding. A year later, I bought some tape recording equipment, rang him and got him to confess all over again, then handed the tape to the police. He was convicted at Swansea Crown Court last July of 10 counts of indecent assault, attempted rape and gross indecency. He got eight years.

I wish now that I had stuck to my guns when I was 10. That would have prevented the abuse continuing. But it's incredibly hard for a young person who has been abused to speak out. There are feelings of guilt and shame and fear, and not wanting to make the situation worse or lead to the family being broken up.

I desperately wanted the abuse to stop, but it felt easier to keep my mouth shut.

    Revealed: the horror of the 5,000 children under 16 raped every year, O, 14.5.2006, http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1774638,00.html

Nightmare world of suburban sex slaves

· Victims as young as 15 sold by gangs for up to £8,000
· South American women are trade's latest victims

Monday May 8, 2006
Guardian
Paul Lewis

A new market in young women from South America is changing the face of Britain's sex trade, with traffickers being paid as much as £8,000 a victim, according to a report on a government campaign against trafficking published today.

Police across the country have discovered an increasing number of young women being held in suburban houses, trapped behind locked doors as ordinary life goes on outside.

In a disturbing picture of the violence suffered by the women, some of whom are as young as 15, officers have accounts of them being raped, threatened, stripped of passports and forced into underground brothels on arrival in the UK. Many have been tempted to the UK by promises of a lucrative summer job; others have come after trafficking gangs posing as employment agencies insisted their parents sign consent forms to permit them to travel.

But as Operation Pentameter, a multi-agency taskforce launched in February to combat trafficking, comes to its conclusions, some critics are alleging that police have also used their inquiries as an excuse to find and deport illegal immigrants.

Funded by the Home Office, the operation brings together all 55 of Britain's police forces with the Immigration Service and the Serious and Organised Crime Agency. So far 375 brothels and massage parlours have been raided, leading to the seizure of £170,000 and arrest of more than 150 people for trafficking-related offences. In total, 46 sex trafficking victims have been discovered - one aged 15.

The investigation has also shed light on what appear to be the beginnings of a shift in the landscape of the country's slave trade, police say. Trafficked women are increasingly being moved away from brothels and saunas in urban centres to flats and houses in suburban Britain.

Most trafficked women still come from countries such as Albania, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Romania and Lithuania; others are from China, Thailand and some African states. This is the first time police have uncovered gangs trafficking women and girls into Britain from South America.

Three months ago police believed women were being sold for between £3,000 and £4,000. Now, they say, officers have found that trafficked women - particularly virgins - are being sold between trafficking gangs for as much as £8,000.

"The picture now is very different to pre-Pentameter," said Grahame Maxwell, deputy chief constable of South Yorkshire, who is programme director of the operation. "We've realised that younger women and virgins are being sold for twice as much as we thought." He added: "Many women are being held against their will in normal residential streets, and neighbours are completely unaware - we didn't realise the extent of this. There are very few places in Britain, if any, where this is not happening."

But despite uncovering some of Britain's most ruthless trafficking gangs operating in new territories, DCC Maxwell's anti-trafficking drive has not escaped criticism. Human rights groups suggest the operation is as much a campaign to find and deport illegal immigrants, pointing to the fact that half of the women interviewed by officers during visits to brothels transpired not to be the victims of trafficking - and may now be deported.

Karry Mitchell, of the English Collective of Prostitutes, said: "The government is prioritising deportations over protection, and using the so-called anti-trafficking campaign to increase deportations. We understand that many of the brothels they are targeting are being used by women who are actually in the country voluntarily who the Home Office wants to get rid of."

According to Amnesty International, even those women who were brought to the country against their will are being deported if they refuse to assist with police investigations, in spite of the fact that branches of the same criminal networks who brought them into Britain await them in their country of origin.

The Guardian has learned that victims of trafficking are being allowed to remain in Britain only if they prove beneficial to the Crown Prosecution Service.

An unpublicised Home Office directive circulated in February ordered the Immigration Service to allow trafficked sex workers "a period of leave ... until such time as the victim has been able to assist in any prosecution case".

"The reality is that in the eyes of the law victims of trafficking are simply illegal immigrants," said Amnesty International's UK director, Kate Allen. "This has led to some highly vulnerable trafficked women being put into immigration detention, and even being deported."

Profile: Eva, 18, from north London

I was 15 when he first took me from my home [in Africa]. He was a so-called friend of the family. My parents had been killed, so I was staying with a guardian who thought the friend would find me a job. Instead the man took me far from home, where he called other men who began raping me. For a year I was taken around different countries in Africa where I was made to have sex with men.

Then in 2004 - when I was 16 - he just took me to an airport. When we arrived [in London] I had no idea which country we were in. I was taken to a big house with other women trafficked from Africa. During the nights I was driven to houses where I was forced to sleep with men. I had no money, no documents. He never beat me but I was scared of him - worried he would kill me.

One night he left the car door open and I escaped. I started running. The next day I begged. Someone gave me money for a bus, and I travelled to the end of the line. There, a woman found me crying and took me to a women's refuge organisation in Kentish Town.

When I applied for asylum the security guard started shouting questions at me. Where was I staying? Why did I not have any documentation? I just broke down. They didn't believe I was 17, so I was taken to Brozefield prison. My church, Legal Action for Women and the Black Women's Rep Action Project found me legal representation and I was let out, but the Home Office still want to send me back. No-one has pursued the man.

· Names have been changed.

    Nightmare world of suburban sex slaves, G, 8.5.2006, http://www.guardian.co.uk/crime/article/0,,1769962,00.html

Evidence-gathering in rape cases in crisis,

doctors warn

· Poor examinations a factor in low conviction rate
· Gap in standards leads to risk of DNA contamination

Monday May 8, 2006
Guardian
Clare Dyer, legal editor

Doctors have warned the government that the system for evidence-gathering in rape and sexual assault cases is in crisis and could drive the record low conviction rate for rape even lower.

The solicitor general, Mike O'Brien, was bombarded with the medics' concerns at a conference on forensic gynaecology last week. The warnings follow a report just published in the Journal of Clinical Forensic Medicine, which surveyed almost all the facilities carrying out examinations on sexual assault victims in the UK.

The study found a large gap in standards between the 14 NHS-based specialist sexual assault referral centres (Sarcs) in London and other cities, and services in most of the country, where complainants are seen in victim examination suites attached to police stations.

Only 6% of reported rapes result in a conviction, an attrition rate the government has pledged to redress. Yet doctors say flawed medical investigations are one of the main factors behind the low conviction rate.

The report says that the gap between the good and bad services is widening and "doctors performing forensic examinations in the less well provided areas have become increasingly uncomfortable with the level of service".

Many doctors surveyed, particularly those operating outside Sarcs, expressed fears about the risk of contamination of DNA samples, for instance where complainants could pick up fibres in waiting rooms before being examined.

Doctors in Sarcs estimated that the likelihood of DNA contamination was low, apart from one centre where the risk was put at medium. But among the 53 non-Sarcs answering the question, 11 felt the contamination risk in their facility was high and 20 put it at medium.

Many parts of the country, particularly rural areas, had too few doctors to provide a round-the-clock service, leading to delays in examining complainants.

The report reveals an acute shortage countrywide of doctors to carry out immediate examinations of child sex assault victims, who may have to wait days, although research has shown that more than 90% of positive forensic evidence findings in children are found in those seen within 24 hours of the assault.

Doctors fear the picture will worsen further as many areas outsource the work traditionally done by forensic medical examiners, mainly GPs with long experience of the job, to healthcare companies. They say that companies may employ foreign doctors with little experience of the work who might have left the country by the time the case comes to court.

Last year a prosecution lawyer, Simon di Rollo QC, complained about the lack of experience and communication skills of a Croatian doctor from the healthcare company Medacs in an Inverness rape case. Medacs later said the doctor, who could not be contacted by the crown because he had returned overseas, had been sacked.

In Swindon, where GP forensic examiners have pulled out of the work and the Sarc has been moved from a health centre to the grounds of the police station, a healthcare company, Veritas, will take over forensic services from May 15.

In the interim period over Easter an orthopaedic locum registrar from Leeds was called to examine sex assault victims in Swindon, the solicitor general was told.

Julie Dowson, managing director of Veritas, said the majority of doctors recruited by the company to do forensic examination had been in the UK for less than five years. They came from a variety of specialties but would receive training in forensic gynaecology and paediatrics.

John Yates, deputy assistant commissioner at the Met, who leads on sexual offences for the Association of Chief Police Officers, said: "We now have 14 Sarcs across the country which offer first class professional forensic medical support to victims. There are however some parts of the country where this comprehensive service does not exist and we are working closely with government to amend this."

Sarcs

The first Sarc was set up in 1986 at St Mary's hospital in Manchester. There are now three in London and a total of 14 around the country. The idea of locating them in healthcare facilities rather than police stations is to encourage more victims of rape and sexual assault to come forward, with no obligation to report the case to police. They can have their health needs addressed and forensic samples taken under one roof. The samples can be deep-frozen, pending a decision on whether to make a complaint to police. Sarc services are generally better staffed than police examination suites, with more doctors available on a rota.

    Evidence-gathering in rape cases in crisis, doctors warn, G, 8.5.2006, http://www.guardian.co.uk/law/story/0,,1769910,00.html

The Asbo kids

How Blair's 'respect' agenda
is turning society against our children

Published: 23 April 2006
The Independent on Sunday
By Sophie Goodchild, Chief Reporter

A generation of British children is being "demonised" because of misplaced hysteria over teenage crime, according to the Government's youth justice tsar.

Professor Rod Morgan, the Government's chief adviser on youth crime, today issues a warning that children as young as 10 are being labelled with "the mark of Cain on their foreheads" because of the furore over anti-social behaviour.

Calling for a radical rethink in how we deal with unruly teenagers, Professor Morgan says that discretion should be exercised in cases where children are being sent to court for offences that would once have been dealt with by a slap on the wrist. His comments - in an exclusive interview with The Independent on Sunday - will alarm ministers who have trumpeted the success of their anti-yob policies, claiming that they are ridding areas of teenage gangsas well as bringing respect back to communities.

Since their introduction in 1999, more than 2,000 anti-social behaviour orders (Asbos) have been issued across the country against children in an effort to tackle offending. However, in some cases, young children are given Asbos lasting up to 10 years, covering the whole of their teenage years.

Figures also show that record numbers of children are being sent to court, although the actual level of youth offending has remained the same over the past decade. Ten years ago about a third of the 200,000 children in the criminal justice system every year went to court. Today the figure is closer to half.

Professor Morgan, who is the chairman of the Youth Justice Board, said: "There are adverse consequences of fixing a mark of Cain to a child's forehead. We should not forget the lessons of the 1960s and 70s of the labelling effect. The argument is that if you give a dog a bad name then the dog may live up to the name."

Professor Morgan said that children are being sent to court for trivial offences such as swearing in the playground or breaking windows. He says teachers and parents should instead be reprimanding children, rather than police arresting them, and that more use should be made of early prevention schemes such as dedicated police officers in schools.

Professor Morgan, who took up his post two years ago, also says there is a danger that serious youth offenders who do need targeting will slip through the net. "If we are dragging into the system kids who can be dealt with outside then we are overloading it and that means it's likely we will not do as good a job as the public expects with higher-risk cases."

Children's charities are warning that police are also seeing children as "soft targets" to up their conviction rates. They also blame the increasing gulf between adults and children for the fact young people are now feared rather than cherished.

Liberty, the human rights group, is now threatening to expose the Government's poor record on how children are treated in Britain when it reports to the UN next year. Shami Chakrabati, its director, said that criminalising children had become a national "obsession".

She said: "I get more hate mail for sticking up for kids than for terror suspects. We are alienating the workforce of tomorrow and creating a generation who will have little respect for the law and even less respect for us."

Nacro, the crime reduction charity, is calling for youth workers to patrol the streets in an effort to stop children from going to jail. "There's this myth that the criminal justice system will solve all of our problems," said Chris Stanley, a spokesman on youth crime for the charity. "Once [the offenders] get to court, that can often be the slippery slope down to more offences."

    How Blair's 'respect' agenda is turning society against our children, IoS, 23.4.2006, http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/crime/article359637.ece

Demonised: We lock them up.

We give them Asbos.

But is our fear of kids

making them worse?

Ordinary children are being labelled as criminals unfairly because the crackdown on yob culture has gone too far.
Who says so? Astonishingly, it's the Government's own youth justice tsar. Sophie Goodchild reports

Published: 23 April 2006
The Independent on Sunday

The noise of breaking glass - a sound familiar to generations of families as children play with balls in the street - alerted the neighbour to the fate that had just befallen his greenhouse.

Understandably furious, he sought out the miscreant who had smashed the glass. It turned out to be his neighbour's son. The boy apologised after confessing to his parents, who told him his pocket money would be docked until he had made good the damage. Satisfied that justice had been done, the neighbour was happy to accept the apology and the money to replace the glass.

Yet what happened next vividly underscores the crisis in policing, justice and the way we deal with unruly children. Alerted to the offence before the neighbours had sorted out the dispute, the police arrived. Under existing law, they were obliged to arrest the child and take him to court. He faced a fine or the prospect of an anti-social behaviour order (Asbo) banning him for playing with a ball in his garden. In short, the boy was guaranteed a criminal record.

It is cases such as this that deeply trouble Professor Rod Morgan, the government-appointed youth justice "tsar" responsible for problem children. In an exclusive interview with The Independent on Sunday, Professor Morgan says he believes these measures are responsible for "demonising" a whole section of British youth.

He knows all about out-of-control youths and badly behaved teenagers. There were times in his childhood when his parents would have been justified in marching him to the local police station for a ticking-off.

Over the past decade, the number of children labelled "anti-social" and dealt with by the criminal justice system has stayed constant at around 200,000 a year, despite reports that youth crime is on the rise.

But there has been a dramatic increase in the proportion of those who end up in court - from a third to around a half. And nearly half of Asbos - the scheme introduced in 1999 as part of Tony Blair's respect agenda - handed out are given to children, although ministers' original pledge was that they should only be used in exceptional circumstances for under-18s.

There is no time limit on an Asbo, although the average is four years. In some cases, children as young as 13 are given 10-year Asbos, which Professor Morgan says they are likely to breach. The Home Office has agreed to review the orders after a year, but the youth crime adviser wants this to happen after six months.

Professor Morgan says there are several reasons for this worrying "demonisation" of children and teenagers who are acting no differently from those throughout history. He believes schoolteachers feel disempowered and fear the reaction of parents if they discipline pupils. Child arrests have also risen because police no longer have the discretion just to hand out a warning if a crime has been committed.

In their defence, police argue that they are increasingly getting called out to homes by parents who want them to deal with out-of-control children with a slap on the wrist, not realising the police may have to make an arrest.

"We are sucking into the criminal justice system behaviour which should be capable, and used to be capable, of being dealt with by informal, non-criminal means," the professor says.

The Government's chief adviser on youth crime is eager to point out that he is by no means "soft" on the issue of children making the lives of law-abiding people a misery. But after two years as chairman of the Youth Justice Board (YJB), where his job involves finding new ways of tackling youth crime, he knows that just because an 11-year-old hangs out on a street corner in a hooded top, it does not mean they are out to rob you. "There are adverse consequences of fixing a mark of Cain to a child's forehead," explains Professor Morgan, who was formerly Chief Inspector of Probation. "We should not forget the lessons of the 1960s and 70s of the labelling effect. The argument is that if you give a dog a bad name then the dog may live up to the bad name."

He does not object to the use of measures such as curfews and Asbos. What he does object to is the lack of common sense.

Child-welfare experts and children's charities agree with Professor Morgan that society has become "obsessed" with criminalising young people.

Martin Narey, chief executive of Barnardo's, says he is dismayed that increasing numbers of young offenders are ending up in court despite evidence that early cautions and warnings are more effective. "The teenagers we 'despair' of today will, in due course despair of the children being born in future decades," says Mr Narey, the former head of the Prison Service. "The difference is that we have over-reacted and we hear children routinely referred to as 'yobs' or being 'feral'."

For the first time, magistrates say they are having to deal with young offenders whose low level "crimes" have been committed in the home, a trend which they blame on parents over-reacting and calling the police, who are then forced to arrest.

John Fassenfel, chair of the Magistrates' Association youth courts committee, also warns that more children than ever are being prosecuted. One case that he had to deal with recently was that of a 14-year-old girl who broke a window frame in a care home. Staff had locked her in a room and the girl, who suffers from an attention disorder, panicked.

"I've talked to child psychologists about this and the problem is it makes them feel wanted if they get even negative attention, and this can make their behaviour worse," says Mr Fassenfel. "We definitely prosecute more readily than we used to. I think we are a more punitive society. If people trip over a flagstone it goes to court."

Bob Reitemeier, chief executive of the Children's Society, says the huge gap in understanding between adults and children has led to a greatly increased fear of young people, and to many being wrongly labelled as criminals.

"Older people especially are very fearful of youths and it's something we have to address as a society. We are quite happy to point out all the failures of children and when there are problem behaviours we are quite happy to condemn them."

As a part-time resident of London, Professor Morgan reveals that even he finds gangs of children intimidating. But what concerns him is that the hysteria over "yobs" and "feral children" has led to record numbers of children being targeted by the police for behaviour which in the past would have just earned them a reprimand.

"When I was a kid there were other authority figures around in uniform - ticket collectors, park keepers - [who] told you off, and the problem today is there are not people who are prepared to exercise authority - and some reluctance even in schools."

In one case this month, a judge criticised prosecutors for bringing charges against a 10-year-old who used racist taunts against a fellow pupil in the playground. Professor Morgan says children calling each other offensive names is a "serious" matter but it could be dealt with by teachers. "We shouldn't move back to the bad old days where all you get is a bit of fingerwagging ... but that may be all that is necessary if you are a child [with] caring parents who are anxious to maintain control."

In his view, the racist taunt case at Salford Youth Court, which was eventually sent back to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) by Judge Jonathan Finestein, was the "tip of the iceberg".

The YJB was heavily rapped over its handling of the case of Peter Williams, the teenager who murdered jeweller Marian Bates in Nottingham in 2003 during an armed robbery. Williams was supposed to have been monitored at the time when he committed the crime.

But Professor Morgan warns that cases like this may happen again as youth workers are bogged down with dealing with children who break windows or who are unruly in the playground.

"If we are dragging into the system kids who can be dealt with outside then we are overloading it and that means it's likely we will not do as good a job as the public expects with higher-risk cases."

He wants more schemes where dedicated police officers are used in schools to tackle anti-social behaviour. There are only 400 schemes in schools across the country, although these have been successful in reducing the number of children excluded from school and therefore reducing the possibility of such children committing a crime. The professor points out that this country comes out "pretty badly" in how it treats young people and that rising divorce rates and long working hours are all factors in child neglect and young people dropping out of school.

"I don't know a bigger turn-off for children than having supine adults in their household sitting watching a box all the time," he says. "We should be thinking seriously about how we view children - I think we demonise them. It strikes me that when you go to a Mediterranean country you see adults with not just adolescent children but very young children sitting in restaurants all eating family meals together, which you scarcely see in this country."

Greater controls on alcohol advertising are also necessary, he warns, to curb anti-social behaviour, and he is critical of the fact that licences were handed out like "confetti" in the late 1990s.

"If you look at advertising in this country, the targets are young people. We have liberalised things yet simultaneously adopted a much more punitive attitude to those who, in this freer climate, can't exercise self-control ... Once you've opened Pandora's box, trying to reverse the process is extremely difficult.

"I remember when my son was 16 he wasn't going to a pub in Bath because it was full of teenyboppers. Bath is awash with pubs with little control over who is using them."

The YJB is determined to reduce the number of children in custody by 10 per cent by 2008 but is frustrated when its attention is brought to cases where children are being locked up for breaking windows.

Chris Wright, the director of services at the youth support charity Rainer, says that more children need to be involved in schemes that will help reform their behaviour.

"There is a very thin line between adolescent mischief making and low-level crime," he says. "We need to ask ourselves - what is adolescence and what is actual criminal activity?"

Additional reporting by Megan Waitkoff and Jonathan Owen

Zach, 13: The child who was gagged

Zach was banned from using the word "grass" anywhere in England and Wales until 2010 after threatening other children for reporting him to the authorities.

He is also not allowed to use the main road in Moston, east Manchester, where he lives with his mother. His father, who is Asian, is separated from his mother. Zach, although the subject of racial abuse at school and often called a Paki, has also been banned from using this word. Expelled for cutting someone's legs, he has been described as a thug, but a psychologist said he finds it hard to concentrate due to a short attention span.

Dean, 15: The child who is ball mad

Dean, who is football-mad, was given an Asbo forbidding him from playing with his ball in the street.

Police applied for the order after confiscating 12 balls from him in two weeks. Durham magistrates were told he regularly used the local bus stop as a goal and would practise his skills in the middle of the road.

The teenager, from Pelton near Chester-le-Street, was given a map showing the areas where he cannot kick his football. He is also prohibited from going within 100 yards of the local community college, damaging property or congregating outside a number of takeaways.

Joseph, 4: The child whose toy hit a car

Joseph was threatened with an anti-social behaviour order after he threw his toy at the car of a council worker visiting his family's home.

His mother claimed that two days after the visit the official returned and said that she wanted to give the child an Asbo. Tower Hamlets council said that it did not intend to proceed with the threat against the tot, but would have been powerless to act anyway as the minimum age for a recipient is 10. Critics of Asbos said the case highlighted the dramatic rise in the number of orders being issued and illustrated why 97 per cent of applications are unsuccessful.

Mark, 15: The child who stole £1

Mark was given an Asbo and spent a night in the cells after snatching two 50p pieces from a bus driver's change tray.

He got off the bus as police arrived and set a dog on him. He was bitten twice before being arrested for attempted theft and put into a cell for the night, despite his family being at the scene. The Independent Police Complaints Commission is investigating his complaint at how he was treated. He is regarded as a persistent young offender and has spent time at Feltham Young Offenders' Institution, but says that the case has stolen part of his childhood.

Nathan, 16: The child who got a tattoo

Nathan was forbidden from showing his tattoos, wearing a single golf glove or a balaclava anywhere in the country.

If he breaches the Asbo - which also bans him from congregating in public with groups of more than three people - he could be jailed for up to five years. The order was imposed by magistrates in Manchester where he is part of Longsight's L$$$ gang. Mark Watling, a lawyer, described the golf glove, which signifies gang membership, as "a tight-fitting glove often used to discharge firearms".

The names in these case studies have been changed

    Demonised: We lock them up. We give them Asbos. But is our fear of kids making them worse?, IoS, 23.4.2006, http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/crime/article359638.ece

Domestic attackers escaping with a fine

· Figures show a million victims of home attacks
· Only 4% of special court cases end with jail term

Saturday April 15, 2006
Guardian
Alan Travis, home affairs editor


As few as 4% of men convicted of domestic violence are sent to prison while a clear majority escape with a fine, according to new Home Office figures published this week.

The official breakdown of sentences passed by specialist domestic violence courts show that there are more than one million victims of domestic violence - as much as five times higher than previously recognised.

The disclosure comes as ministers consider draft proposals from the Sentencing Guidelines Council which suggest that while domestic violence should be treated as seriously as any other violent offence, those men who are genuinely sorry for their domestic violence should have the chance of avoiding being sent to jail.

The courts may be urged to send offenders on an intensive domestic abuse programme run by the probation service, which consists of classes over 36 weeks, instead of going to jail.

The latest figures based on a small sample of cases in five specialist courts show that 29% of those convicted are sent on such programmes. Fifty-nine per cent are fined or ordered to pay compensation, 30% given a conditional discharge, 10% a community punishment order, and only 4% jailed.

A study of cases in a west London magistrates court showed a slightly different picture, with 43% of those convicted being fined, 12% given a conditional discharge, 32% on community rehabilitation orders, 6% on community punishment orders and 14% sent to jail.

A Home Office spokeswoman said the government had legislated to ensure that serious violent or sexual offenders were securely and properly dealt with. "In some cases this will mean that such offenders will spend longer in prison and in some cases be detained indefinitely. We are crystal clear that there will always be a prison space for serious and dangerous offenders." She added that domestic violence covered a wide range of offences, from murder to common assault, and the key issue was having a range of sentences which were appropriate to the crime.

One reason why so few perpetrators of domestic violence go to prison is that the courts cannot pass sentence on the basis that the violence has happened frequently where the other incidents were not reported or charged or have not been proved or admitted.

Home Office research shows that on average a woman endures 35 incidents of domestic abuse before making a complaint to the police.

Criminologists say that some victims see it as a private family matter to be kept within the home, or they fear that police involvement will make the situation worse. The Home Office is running an advertising campaign aimed at family and friends as well as victims in an attempt to encourage earlier reporting of domestic violence cases.

The 2003 Criminal Justice Act also provided a greater opportunity for the prosecution to draw attention to previous unreported violent incidents as evidence of the defendant's character. But it has yet to be seen how widely this will be used in the courts.

Criminologists say the most accurate estimate of the extent of domestic violence comes from a British Crime Survey self-completion study of the issue involving a nationally representative sample of 22,463 people. It defined domestic violence as abuse, threats or force of a non-sexual form, and shows that 26% of women and 17% of men have experienced at least one incident of domestic violence since they were 16.

The annual BCS estimate says that there were about 401,000 incidents of domestic abuse in 2004-05. However, the special BCS study points at more than a million victims each year, with 15.4m incidents involving threats or force happening each year in England and Wales. Researchers say the number would be even greater if the many sexual assaults that take place within the home were also included.

Although the special study used a different method of calculation which makes comparisons inappropriate, the researchers estimate that the underlying rate of domestic violence is at least five times higher than that disclosed by the annual BCS survey.

It found that 15% of women say they have suffered being pushed, held down or slapped.

A wide range of behaviour is now officially recognised as domestic violence, including non-physical forms such as criticism, pressure tactics, belittling, breaking trust, oppressive control of finances and harassment.

Violent domestic incidents can lead to death, with half of all female murder victims being killed by their partners or ex-partners.

Unlike other forms of violence, domestic violence is rarely a one-off incident. Those who suffered domestic violence told the BCS study that they faced an average of 20 incidents a year, 16 of them involving force being used. In a third of cases the violence started during pregnancy, and if the man had already been abusive, the pregnancy often escalated the violence involved.

    Domestic attackers escaping with a fine, G, 15.4.2006, http://society.guardian.co.uk/crimeandpunishment/story/0,,1754464,00.html

Case study

'I was terrified all the time'

Samantha is 25 and lives in London.

She has a six-year-old daughter.

Here she tells of the abuse she suffered

Saturday April 15, 2006
Guardian
Riazat Butt

"I met my boyfriend when I was 15. The relationship started off really well. He kept saying 'I'm going to marry this girl.' Although he was five years older than me my parents weren't worried because they thought he could look after me. I had just come out of foster care so things with my parents were strained.

"I was with him for three and a half years and the abuse started after six months. He started to separate me from friends and family. He got a flat on the other side of town, my parents could never have afforded to live there. The violence started with a little slap and he'd apologise afterwards. Then he'd want to rape me after every bit of abuse. When I was almost 17 I came home late from a work do. I crept in, got undressed and got into bed. He started beating me up. I didn't know I was pregnant at the time.

"I begged him to let me go to the toilet and he said I wasn't to lock the door. I did and he started kicking the door in. My only way out was the window. All I had on were my knickers. It was December, it was freezing and it was raining. I was running, I could hear my partner behind me. A neighbour called the police. Suddenly this man grabbed me and I screamed. It was a policeman. He put his jacket over me. My partner was arrested. He wasn't charged, even though he had previous. I didn't press charges. But the CPS [Crown Prosecution Service] were really keen to have him sent down.

"He locked me in a room for four days when I was five months pregnant and threw me down the stairs at six months. I got up to run away but he blocked the door. I was so scared I wet myself.

"I went into hospital 20 times because of the abuse. Sometimes he was loving, so hospital staff weren't suspicious. But it got to the point where the police were hanging around all the time. But it's up to the individual to report it and I was too scared to do anything.

"We ended up in a hostel because he stopped paying rent on the flat but he got thrown out for beating me up. We were on the ground floor and my daughter's cot - she was four months - was beneath the window. He punched the glass and it shattered all over her. I was terrified the whole time I was with him. I used to lie in bed thinking of how I could kill him and get away with it.

"That's when I called Women's Aid. I was so worried for my daughter. She was nine months when I decided to leave him. A refuge worker put me in a shelter. He wrote me letters, saying he couldn't stop the anger. He's got a girlfriend now, she's pregnant and the same thing is happening to her."

    'I was terrified all the time', G, 15.4.2006, http://society.guardian.co.uk/crimeandpunishment/story/0,,1754465,00.html

5.45pm update

Outcry at rise in rape cautions

Monday April 10, 2006
Guardian Unlimited
Staff and agencies

Support groups reacted angrily today to reports that the number of rapists being cautioned rather than jailed has more than doubled over the past decade.

The revelation that 40 rapists had been cautioned in 2004 compared with 19 in 1994 left one group "shocked", while another women's organisation described cautioning offenders as a "slap on the wrist".

The figures come at a time when the conviction rate for rape has fallen sharply.

Crown Prosecution Service guidelines say a cautioned individual must admit the offence and there must be a realistic prospect of conviction. The advice adds that indictable offences such as rape can only result in a caution in "rare circumstances".

The head of Rape Crisis, Nicole Westmarland, said rape was a crime that had a serious impact on its victims for years or even decades.

"It is completely unacceptable that rapists are able to continue living their day-to-day lives or even be free to rape again," she said.

"Rape is an offence that carries a maximum of life imprisonment and we shouldn't be cautioning for these types of offences," said Sandra Horley, the chief executive of the national domestic violence charity Refuge.

"Rape is one of the most serious offences in the land and Refuge has real concerns that cautioning is dangerous and in cases where consent is clearly never given introducing cautioning places women in grave danger.

"We need to send out a strong public message that rape and domestic violence are serious crimes and should be treated as such."

Ruth Hall of Women Against Rape told BBC Radio 4's Today Programme that most men would take a caution as "a slap on the wrist".

"Most men who rape don't do it just once, they are serial offenders and women have tried and tried to get the criminal justice system to take it seriously. "Women have been coming forward in record numbers only to have the door slammed in our faces," she said.

The Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman, Nick Clegg, said there were circumstances in which cautions were appropriate, such as when rape victims did not want to go through a trial.

But he added: "We really do need to know more. I think public confidence in the way in which we deal with rape cases is already under serious strain.

"Now this disclosure that cautions are being issued in circumstances which we don't know about seems to me doesn't help rebuild that confidence."

The CPS today gave two examples of cautions for rape being given.

In one case last year a pensioner accepted a caution for raping his sister when they were both children, 50 years ago. In another case a 13-year-old boy was given the equivalent of a caution for raping a young child. A youth offending team, including police and social services, worked with him to show him that his behaviour was wrong.

It said cautions were only used in "very extreme" circumstances.

"There would need to be evidence and a clear admission of guilt, whilst age, welfare and mental well-being of the victim would also be factors," said the deputy assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan police, John Yates, who speaks for the Association of Chief Police Officers on rape issues.

He said those cautioned would have to comply with the provisions of the sex offenders register.

A Home Office spokesman said the government was committed to bringing more rapists to justice and increasing the poor conviction rate.

On Saturday, the department published a consultation paper intended to address the current low conviction rate. Fewer than 6% of rape cases reported to the police result in a conviction.

Although the number of rape convictions has remained stable, the number of cases reported to police is increasing year on year, meaning the proportion ending in conviction has declined from around one in three in 1977 to one in 20 in 2004.

"Rape is an appalling crime - it devastates the lives of victims and their families. However, rape will always be a difficult offence to prosecute," he said.

"The use of cautions in individual cases is a matter for the police and the CPS, who will only use such sanctions under the most exceptional circumstances."

The Times reported that in 2004, cautions for rape had been given to nine boys aged between 12 and 15, 11 boys aged between 15 and 18, 19 men aged 18 and over and one female who admitted raping another woman.

In the same year, a further 751 people were convicted of rape - only 5.29% of the rapes reported to police.

There were 190,000 incidents of serious sexual assault against women aged between 16 and 59 in England and Wales in 2001. The offences included an estimated 80,000 incidents of rape or attempted rape.

    Outcry at rise in rape cautions, G, 10.4.2006, http://www.guardian.co.uk/crime/article/0,,1750840,00.html

Rape

More cases but fewer convictions

Friday March 31, 2006
Leader
The Guardian

Three decades ago one out of three rape attacks reported to the police ended in conviction; today it is just one in 20. Worse still, the variation between police force areas is huge. Some 14% of reported rapes in Northamptonshire end in conviction; fewer than 1% in Gloucestershire. Even Margaret Thatcher, no fan of equality, believed there should be equality before the law, but in England there is a fourteenfold variation in the chances of conviction.

This is a postcode lottery just as serious as the one over medical treatment. Thanks to the Fawcett Commission on Women and Criminal Justice, which produced its annual audit of its justice and equality proposals yesterday, the shocking statistic is getting better known.

Why has the conviction rate dropped so dramatically? It is a convoluted story, made more complicated by improvements that have been made in both police and court procedure. Some police forces have introduced special rape teams, take rape training seriously and made available suites where victims can be interviewed. Judges are less likely to allow intrusive or over-aggressive questions by defence teams. There are more rape crisis centres, sexual assault referral centres, witness care units. The law has been tightened, yet the conviction rate has continued to drop remorselessly. In the latest statistics, only four out of 42 forces had rape conviction rates of more than 10%.

There has been a large increase in reported rapes - from 4,900 in 1995 to 14,100 in 2004. But even with this number, the British Crime Survey suggests another 85% go unreported. Yet of the 15% that are reported, some two-thirds never get to court - one-third because victims decide they do not want to go ahead with what they regard as a traumatic process; and one-third because the prosecution believes the case will not stand up. Even then only 28% of those that go to trial end in conviction. One reason for the latter result could be prejudices of juries. A survey by Amnesty International, carried out late last year as part of its Stop Violence Against Women campaign, found one third of British people believed a women was partially or completely responsible for being raped if she had behaved flirtatiously. As the director of public prosecutions, Ken Macdonald, noted, this was "shocking".

What the latest Fawcett report shows is that until now reforms within the different arms of the criminal-justice system have been too piecemeal. Only 10 of the 42 police forces in England and Wales had dedicated rape investigation teams. The number of sexual assault referral centres, where victims can receive counselling, medical examination and not be forced to report their attack to the police, has only risen from three to 14 in the last three years. But there are signs that momentum is picking up. Ministers are exploring whether to provide more protection to women who are raped when drunk. One-third of rape attacks on women happen after they have been drinking. Currently the law only presumes there has been no consent when a woman is asleep, unconscious or her drink has been spiked. A consultation document in 2000 proposed it should include women who were drunk, but this was vetoed by David Blunkett. It is now being revived. So is the idea of expert witnesses, used in Australia and Canada, who can explain to juries the different responses women have to rape and why some delay reporting attacks.

What is missing is the sense of urgency. Under a 1999 act, courts could have been using the videos of interviews given by rape victims when they first go to the police, so that the jury can see how traumatised the victim was and have a better understanding of the enormity of the allegations. But the section has not been introduced because of a shortage of transcribers. Courts need transcripts. The plan was refloated this week as though it was a new idea. It is not. What it needs is implementation.

More cases but fewer convictions, G, 31.3.2006, http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/story/0,,1743631,00.html

Postcode lottery in rape convictions

· 1% to 14% of complaints end in guilty verdict
· Ministers aim to reverse declining trend

Thursday March 30, 2006
Guardian
Clare Dyer, legal editor

The number of rapes reported to police that end in a conviction depends on a "postcode lottery" which sees convictions fluctuating between 1% and 14% depending on where you live.

The Home Office figures for 2004 were released yesterday as ministers put forward a package of reforms aimed at boosting the plummeting conviction rate for rape, now at an all-time low of 5.29% of crimes reported in England and Wales.

The figures show that just 0.86% of rapes reported to police in Gloucestershire end in a conviction, compared with 13.8% in Northamptonshire.

As part of the reforms, videotaped interviews by police with rape victims - possibly conducted within hours of the offence - will routinely be shown to juries in an attempt to secure more convictions. At present videotapes of interviews with child sex assault victims can be shown in court as a substitute for the child's evidence-in-chief - questioning by the prosecution counsel. But, while the law was changed in 1999 to allow the same treatment for adult rape victims, implementation has been held up by a shortage of resources for transcribing the tapes.

Ministers said they hoped to bring the measure into operation within 12 months.

The reforms would also allow expert witnesses such as psychologists to testify, to dispel myths about how "genuine" victims behave after rape. This would include explanations about why victims often delay reporting a rape, blame themselves and have incomplete or inconsistent memories of the event.

Another proposal is for new legislation to define when someone is capable of consenting to sex, to clarify when drunkenness makes a person incapable. This follows a case at Swansea crown court which was dropped by the prosecution midway through on the basis that "drunken consent is still consent".

Ministers argue that a decision on whether a woman is too drunk to be capable of consenting should be left to the jury.

Mike O'Brien, the solicitor general, said he hoped the reforms would help to reverse an "unacceptable" drop in conviction rates which now sees only one in every 20 rapes reported to police ending in a conviction. Rape conviction rates have dropped steadily from 33% of reported cases in 1977 to only 5.29% in 2004. The percentage of rapists brought to justice is much lower, because only about 15% of rapes are thought to come to the attention of the police.

Mr O'Brien said: "The key problem on conviction of rape cases is that the prosecution must prove its case beyond reasonable doubt. We do not intend to change that. What we can do is improve the way the prosecution get the best evidence before the jury."

The Fawcett Society's commission on women and the criminal justice system will launch a report today calling on the government to adopt an integrated strategy to tackle all forms of violence against women. It highlights the rape postcode lottery and unequal access around the country to rape crisis centres, sexual assault referral centres and specialist domestic violence courts.

Postcode lottery in rape convictions, G, 30.4.2006, http://www.guardian.co.uk/crime/article/0,,1742641,00.html