A schoolgirl has been detained for 15 years for attempting to murder two teachers and a pupil by stabbing them with a blade at a school in south Wales. The girl, who was 13 at the time, attacked Fiona Elias and Liz Hopkin and the pupil during a breaktime at Ysgol Dyffryn Aman in Ammanford, Carmarthenshire. She had admitted three counts of wounding with intent and a further count of possession of a bladed article at a school but denied the attempted murders. However, she was found guilty of the offences by a jury at Swansea crown court.
It doesn't appear to have been a tough decision for the jury...
The girl, who cannot be named, will be eligible for release on licence after serving half of the sentence but the judge, Paul Thomas KC, told her she could be recalled to custody if she behaved badly again once freed.
'Behaved badly'..? She's not been found guilty of playing knock down ginger or scrumping apples, has she?
After the stabbing, the teenager told police officers: “That’s one way to be a celebrity,” adding: “I’m pretty sure this is going to be on the news, so more eyes are going to be looking at me.”
And her rampage didn't stop once she was caught.
Thomas said the girl had made a “serious threat” to someone while being held in custody after the attacks and accepted she would pose a “potential risk” when she was finally released. He said: “A lot depends on how you change and mature and that can’t be predicted at the moment.”
Then why take the chance? Oh, but you aren't, are you? You're going to let the public take it, as always.
Caroline Rees KC, defending, said the girl had difficulty expressing emotions but had expressed remorse. She said she was a “very complicated” child who had suffered “significant adversity” and had “slipped through the net”. But Rees said: “She is so young there is a possibility for change.”
Is there really?
6 comments:
Her period of incarceration will automatically be halved 'for good behaviour as soon as the prison van goes through the gates, though whether she will actually go to prison is in doubt due to her age. A shed load of psychiatrists and social workers will make a fortune analysing why she did what she did and how to stop her re-offending. Unless you have 666 on the back of your head, no child is born evil, so perhaps a look at her parents wouldn't go amiss.
Penseivat
I know nothing about this case, but I'm thinking it may be time to start having some parental responsibility. If you choose to have a child, then raise a little terror who commits crimes, you should also face punishment
Although we don't even expect parents to feed their idiot spawn before sending them off to school, so this is never going to happen
Good point about recruitment, although incidents like this are usually dismissed as being vanishingly rare.
What should be causing immediate concern is the tolerance of ubiquitous low-level disruption and uncouth behaviour which allows pupils like this to slip under the radar until something like this happens - a far cry from the government’s shiny recruitment ads depicting happy, curious and, above all, cooperative pupils hanging on their teachers’ every word.
Ugh, but I'm not at all surprised...
Well, exactly - all of the benefits, no responsibility at all.
The more of them that make the papers, the harder that lie gets to sell...
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