Depends how far through his sentence he was.

Quick google search shows that Zakaria Mohammed was arrested on 26th March 2018 and sentenced on 4th October 2018. In Birmingham Crown Court he pleaded guilty to all charges.

His period of imprisonment would have counted as starting from his arrest as he was held in custody pending trial and the 14 years would be reduced to 7 in custody ('automatic release', with the remainder being served on licence) given his pleading guilty and presumably 'good behavior' whilst imprisoned. He has therefore served approximately four and a half years thus far. He would have been assessed and seen by a Parole Board before being moved to 'category D' (Open Prison in popular language) and have been considered no risk to the public and a low risk of absconding. He would have been serving his sentence under category D as a 'half-way house' in preparation for release and with the object of rehabilitation.

When recaptured he will now serve the full term of his sentence in secure prison.

& Martin beat me to it!!!

Phil

Edited By Weary on 18/11/2022 16:13:03

A relative of mine was in an open prison

He had a job and was allowed a car to get to work.

The world is a strange place!

Jim

Is there any evidence that it works?

| Or you could just put them all in Max security and raise the income tax rate by 5%.

Why is it assumed that something new always implies new taxes? Why not re-prioritise the existing tax base?

Edited By Peter Greene 🇨🇦 on 18/11/2022 18:58:02

Only that few abscond from open prisons and the reoffending rate currently stands at 31.8%

regards Martin

Worked with a Guy arrested for Drunk driving, recieved a light sentence of working weekends at the Sherriffs Dept for around 2-3 years. They let Him go to work during the week. He recieved the job of washing the Sherriffs cars. They knew He was an alcoholic and let Him keep a beer nearby while washing cars.

A friend had a Pinto hatch back, He got stopped for driving too slow. When He got out several empty beer cans fell out of the car. The police asked if they were His, He said yes but He drank them at lunch at work. The hatch back was full of cans up to the top of the seats. Next day at work He got a wheel barrow and emptied 3 loads out.

Another coworker had 5 driving under impaired,kept on driving with no license.

I hope it has changed by now.

I suppose it depends on whether your political ideology considers the purpose of prison is to punish the offenders, to provide a deterrent to potential offenders or to protect the rest of the population from the incarcerated. 'Political ideology' rather than 'the evidence suggests' because the law-makers seem uninterested in rational arguments based on evidence.

Well said, Hopper!

There is, I feel a real , disconnect between the public perception of the justice system and the aims and practice of the justice system perpetuated largely by the popular press.

Prisons are not as some think there to punish, loss of liberty is the punishment. With proper funding prisons should be primarily about reform. With lack of money however their function becomes largely one of containment.

When a sentence is handed down the expectation is that a certain proportion must be served before consideration of early release based on behaviour and acknowledgment of wrongdoing, in other words signs of reform. Failure to demonstrate this results in longer incarceration, a system that provides reward for progress and a stick which enables prisons to keep discipline. Without the hope of earlier release prisons would be largely unmanageable without the use of large scale use of force and segregation which would further alienate inmates from society.
regards Martin

Great danger in comparing statistics in criminology( and other spheres) between countries. Sweden and Norway have vastly different social structure to USA. Per capita income, social support, drugs and educational standards, almost defy comparison.

Contrary to some assertions there is good evidence that increasing sentencing reduces crime. The problem is that the payback of expensive incarceration is very poor and non linear. So 10% increase in sentence may produce but a 2-4% reduction in overall crime.

We all conflate the feckless and socially inept criminal who make up the majority with the small number of nasty and socially unacceptable bad @@@@ards.

The former should be offered every support to encourage rehabilitation. Currently they may leave prison on a Friday evening with uncertain digs and no money. The system has done its job. Are we surprised that they nick a car or gravitate to the known source of money viz drugs?

The smaller group of bad bad people should not be given such consideration as I believe that, say with paedophiles, that the leopard does not change its spots.

There is good evidence that the certainty of being caught and punished is a much better deterrent than the length of incarceration. The criminal never thinks he will be caught.

So I would advise governments to improve detection rates , be more realistic in who poses a real threat to society and to recognise that rehabilitation does not stop at the prison gate.

What I mean is the loss of liberty is the punishment, we have abandoned hard labour, the crank, the birch etc. It’s not about revenge even if “make them pay” is a very human response. Restorative justice can be very effective too in bringing offenders face to face with the results of their actions. It helps the victims too as does victim statements to n court.

regards Martin