Have Kids - Avoid Prison

First topic message reminder :

13th January 2014

Well that's only if you're a chav who commits crime of course.

I'm reading this more and more - Judges giving non-custodial sentences because it may affect the criminal's family.

Please discuss.


A kitchen designer cheated the benefits system out of more than £39,000 while owning two houses and having almost a maximum holding of premium bonds.

Kevin Meredith, 44, failed to tell those granting him income support and paying his council tax as a lone parent, that he was getting £600-a-month rent from tenants and had £27,000 entered each month for the ERNIE draw which could have won him £1m.

For five years Meredith, the father of four sons – three of them grown up – committed a fraud on taxpayers, receiving £34,835 in income support and £3,126 in council tax, prosecutor Gareth Evans told Cardiff Crown Court.

When the authorities eventually caught up with him, he told them “Usually I’m ethical but this started and I couldn’t see a way out of it. I couldn’t think of a way of stopping it and putting things right”.

He also said he feared a conviction could affect his position as a foster father.

Mr Evans said Meredith’s claims had been fraudulent from the outset.

He did not admit that he owned and rented out a property in Thomas Street, Cardiff which had been occupied by his parents or say he had savings of £27,000 put into premium bonds.


Part-time judge, Recorder Jeremy Jenkins said Meredith’s cheating richly deserved an 18-month prison sentence but for the sake of his young son and his elderly parents it would be suspended for two years.

He also ordered him to carry out 180 hours unpaid community work and gave him six months to pay the £1,740 cost of his prosecution.


Recorder Jenkins told him: “The benefit system is there for those in need not for people to abuse.

“Taxpayers justifiably feel cheated when they realise their hard-earned taxes are being stolen from them.”


http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/benefits-cheat-avoids-jail-after-6496581

Ben_Reilly wrote:I think Britain should just do what every other country seems to do with their military spending and find a way for the U.S. to foot the bill

 ::sexbnan: ::sexbnan: ::sexbnan: ::sexbnan: ::sexbnan: 

That's what happening anyway. The US is being vacuumed in to being everybody's big daddy. Eleven super-carrier fleets? Eleven more small-carrier task forces? The F-35 Lightning II at a takeaway cost of $89-million per? Who needs all of that?

Obviously, the best austerity is a little diplomacy. Stay outta wars and save money.

Original Quill wrote:

Ben_Reilly wrote:I think Britain should just do what every other country seems to do with their military spending and find a way for the U.S. to foot the bill

 ::sexbnan: ::sexbnan: ::sexbnan: ::sexbnan: ::sexbnan: 

That's what happening anyway.  The US is being vacuumed in to being everybody's big daddy.  Eleven super-carrier fleets?  Eleven more small-carrier task forces?  The F-35 Lightning II at a takeaway cost of $89-million per?  Who needs all of that?

Obviously, the best austerity is a little diplomacy.  Stay outta wars and save money.

But America wants to be the worlds policeman and that takes money

I disagree, Nems.  For most of America's history, she has eschewed the role of policeman.  We only concerned ourselves with the Americas under the Monroe Doctrine.  During WWII we even passed a law--the Neutrality Act--that prohibited America entering Europe's war.

The only time we got our heads turned was during the Cold War, when it was perceived we were fighting "World Communism."  Only then did we go international.  Now that's behind us, and the sentiment in America today is leave the rest of the world to its own devices.  You see that France and other European nations are having to pick up the pieces, cause we are no longer interested.

Original Quill wrote:

Ben_Reilly wrote:I think Britain should just do what every other country seems to do with their military spending and find a way for the U.S. to foot the bill

 ::sexbnan: ::sexbnan: ::sexbnan: ::sexbnan: ::sexbnan: 

That's what happening anyway.  The US is being vacuumed in to being everybody's big daddy.  Eleven super-carrier fleets?  Eleven more small-carrier task forces?  The F-35 Lightning II at a takeaway cost of $89-million per?  Who needs all of that?

Obviously, the best austerity is a little diplomacy.  Stay outta wars and save money.

I think you should have fifteen carrier fleets.

Sorry - super-carrier fleets  :D 

And please keep one in the English Channel.

Oh, and off the coast of The Falkland Islands.

BigAndy9 wrote:

Original Quill wrote:

That's what happening anyway.  The US is being vacuumed in to being everybody's big daddy.  Eleven super-carrier fleets?  Eleven more small-carrier task forces?  The F-35 Lightning II at a takeaway cost of $89-million per?  Who needs all of that?

Obviously, the best austerity is a little diplomacy.  Stay outta wars and save money.

I think you should have fifteen carrier fleets.

Sorry - super-carrier fleets   :D 

And please keep one in the English Channel.

Oh, and off the coast of The Falkland Islands.

We've already got you guys covered. Haha...what do you think NATO is...the US Navy, fcs.

We'll flush the Falklands however, if it comes to that. We've got some common sense.   

Original Quill wrote:

BigAndy9 wrote:

I think you should have fifteen carrier fleets.

Sorry - super-carrier fleets   :D 

And please keep one in the English Channel.

Oh, and off the coast of The Falkland Islands.

We've already got you guys covered.  Haha...what do you think NATO is...the US Navy, fcs.  

We'll flush the Falklands however, if it comes to that.  We've got some common sense.    

Mmmmm there is talk of oil in the Falklands  

Original Quill wrote:

BigAndy9 wrote:

I think you should have fifteen carrier fleets.

Sorry - super-carrier fleets   :D 

And please keep one in the English Channel.

Oh, and off the coast of The Falkland Islands.

We've already got you guys covered.  Haha...what do you think NATO is...the US Navy, fcs.  

We'll flush the Falklands however, if it comes to that.  We've got some common sense.    

Good boy.

NemsAgain wrote:

Original Quill wrote:

We've already got you guys covered.  Haha...what do you think NATO is...the US Navy, fcs.  

We'll flush the Falklands however, if it comes to that.  We've got some common sense.    

Mmmmm there is talk of oil in the Falklands  

Let's save it until all the rest has ran out  :D 

Meh...We don't need oil.  We are self-sufficient.  It's a much higher priority on your lists than ours.

Our for-profit oil companies need oil to sell to others, true.  But we'll leave them to their own devices.

I think oil is really on the way out.  The emphasis today is on renewable and clean energy.

Shouldn't you be having lots of kids then Andy?

Well that's only if you're a chav who commits crime of course.

I'm reading this more and more - Judges giving non-custodial sentences because it may affect the criminal's family.

Please discuss.


A kitchen designer cheated the benefits system out of more than £39,000 while owning two houses and having almost a maximum holding of premium bonds.

Kevin Meredith, 44, failed to tell those granting him income support and paying his council tax as a lone parent, that he was getting £600-a-month rent from tenants and had £27,000 entered each month for the ERNIE draw which could have won him £1m.

For five years Meredith, the father of four sons – three of them grown up – committed a fraud on taxpayers, receiving £34,835 in income support and £3,126 in council tax, prosecutor Gareth Evans told Cardiff Crown Court.

When the authorities eventually caught up with him, he told them “Usually I’m ethical but this started and I couldn’t see a way out of it. I couldn’t think of a way of stopping it and putting things right”.

He also said he feared a conviction could affect his position as a foster father.

Mr Evans said Meredith’s claims had been fraudulent from the outset.

He did not admit that he owned and rented out a property in Thomas Street, Cardiff which had been occupied by his parents or say he had savings of £27,000 put into premium bonds.


Part-time judge, Recorder Jeremy Jenkins said Meredith’s cheating richly deserved an 18-month prison sentence but for the sake of his young son and his elderly parents it would be suspended for two years.

He also ordered him to carry out 180 hours unpaid community work and gave him six months to pay the £1,740 cost of his prosecution.


Recorder Jenkins told him: “The benefit system is there for those in need not for people to abuse.

“Taxpayers justifiably feel cheated when they realise their hard-earned taxes are being stolen from them.”


http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/benefits-cheat-avoids-jail-after-6496581

But there would be no pint in breaking families up Andy, for serious crime like murder...that's totally different and a custodial sentence must apply to the like of that.

Joy Division wrote:But there would be no pint in breaking families up Andy, for serious crime like murder...that's totally different and a custodial sentence must apply to the like of that.

What about if you add all the money up which has been written off due to benefit fraud JD?

You, like many others here (hang on, I think this has been said before) are posting about austerity and the country cutting back on this and that - then you want benefit fraud to be a non-crime.

There are no victimless crimes JD - an old person may die because of somebody else's benefit fraud.

@quill
And Lithium (even green energy will need batteries)
found in high concentrations in ...... Afghanistan

BigAndy9 wrote:

Joy Division wrote:But there would be no pint in breaking families up Andy, for serious crime like murder...that's totally different and a custodial sentence must apply to the like of that.

What about if you add all the money up which has been written off due to benefit fraud JD?

It's negligible, andy.  Someone once posted on SF that the cost of policing benefit fraud exceeds the losses from the fraud itself.

andy wrote:You, like many others here (hang on, I think this has been said before) are posting about austerity and the country cutting back on this and that - then you want benefit fraud to be a non-crime.

There are no victimless crimes JD - an old person may die because of somebody else's benefit fraud.

The problem with your position andy, is that you lack facts.  You're reading from your own script, which exists in your mind.  Perhaps, instead of thoughtlessly subscribing to an ideology first, if you withheld judgment until knew something about the subject you would be more persuasive.

Nothing personal, mind you. I'm just reading your post, and sharing my concerns.