Ranty rant rant rant rant rant
After the boys were caught with our bikes the Police warned us that it would be very unlikley that they would ever be brought to trial let alone convicted. However, the wheels of justice actually did kick into motion. Charges were made of burglary (serious but difficult to prove) and theft (less serious but more likely to prove as they were caught bang to rights).
A Magistrates hearing was listed for January and Mr. BK was asked to attend as a witness - to pinpoint the burglary to a specific 24 hours (”Your Honour, I can confirm that the cycles in question were in the shed on the Thursday morning and gone on the Friday”). He really wasn’t looking forward to this, but the Police impressed him that if he didn’t turn up the trial would collapse automatically.
Two days beforehand he got a phone call saying the trial would ahve to be postponed because the police witness (the one who caught the boys) was working nights and couldn’t attend duing the day.
So it was relisted for this morning.
On Friday, he got another phone call saying that the policeman is this time on essential firearms training and cannot attend. And this means that the case has to fold, as you cannot reschedule a court appearance more than once. Apparantly they cannot rearrange his training as our police force is in danger falling below the minimum number of firearms-trained officers and he has been told to make this a priority.
So what kind of a message is that going to send to these boys then? Plead not guilty to everything and with any luck you’ll get off scot free because the Police have got better things to do than turn up and give evidence? What’s really annoying is how all this has happened after they spent quite some time impressing on Mr. BK how often cases collapse bacause civilian witnesses never show.
According to the Performance Tables of the Criminal Justice System, my county has a target this year of ensuring that the rate of ineffective trials (i.e. unable to proceed on the day they were scheduled to start and re-listed to start another day) should not exceed 19.5%. That’s one in five! And if they achieve that, they’ll get a pat on the back!