Locking up so many not the key
One in ten prisoners released early to relieve pressure on our overcrowded jails have been dragged back to their cells after re-offending.
This will be seized on by opponents as evidence that the SNP government has flooded Scotland with criminals who should have remained behind bars.
However, there is a wider issue that needs to be addressed. That is Scotland’s long record for locking up more people per head of population than other European countries. There have been some reforms to the system and some welcome changes.
For example, under-18s who commit crime are no longer routinely locked up in Polmont. Sentencing guidelines for young adults have also been amended with a degree of success. And yet, the country’s prison population is still at an unsustainable level. One reason is there has been a renewed focus among police and the prosecutors to solve historic cases.
While that work should be applauded, the grim reality is too many are being kept inside on remand awaiting trial.
Too many Scots are being jailed for minor offences. There remains a huge backlog in cases as a result of the pandemic, which closed courts, and an underfunding of the wider system.
An almost Victorian desire to slam shut as many prison doors as possible still permeates through our justice system. The end result is prisons become so overcrowded that emergency release programmes need to be enacted.
That in turn, inevitably, leads to some prisoners being let out who really should have been kept behind bars.
Such failures only damage public faith in the justice system ever further.
Chilling Iceman
Seeing Jamie “Iceman” Stevenson jailed for 20 years will bring a smile to the faces of those detectives who have been chasing him for decades.
His incarceration should also be a cause for celebration for anyone who cares about Scotland’s young people.
One of Stevenson’s main money-making schemes was flooding Scotland with cheap “street valium” – which has been responsible for countless deaths.
Amid Scotland’s spiralling drug crisis, the Daily Record has had to report on far too many funerals where “vallies” have played a part.
There may be some who see the likes of Stevenson as Robin Hood figures sticking up two fingers to the powers-that-be. This could not be further from the truth. He has profited from causing misery and death across Scotland’s housing schemes.
For that, 20 years in prison seems like the very least he deserves.
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