A man who raped a 13-year-old schoolgirl has avoided jail following the introduction of SNP-backed justice reforms.
Sean Hogg, 21, was on Monday given just 270 hours of community service for attacking the child on various occasions between March and June 2018 at Dalkeith Country Park in Midlothian.
The judge in the case, Lord Lake, said that had Hogg been aged 25 or over when the offence was committed he would have been jailed for between four and five years.
However, new sentencing guidelines introduced last year state that offenders aged up to 24 should be dealt with more leniently by the Scottish courts, with prison sentences only to be given out as a last resort.
Lord Lake claimed that jailing Hogg, who was 17 at the time that he raped the school girl, was not “appropriate” due to his age and because he felt it would not “contribute to [his] rehabilitation”.
‘Total insult’
The Scottish Tories, who opposed the introduction of the new sentencing regime, claimed the ruling was a “total insult” to the girl raped by Hogg and that the interests of sexual predators were being prioritised over their victims.
Campaigners against violence against women and girls also hit out at the “worryingly lenient” sentence, which prosecutors are entitled to appeal.
The High Court in Glasgow heard how Hogg, of Hamilton in South Lanarkshire, threatened his child victim and pulled down her lower clothing in the park. He seized her by the wrists and caused the girl to carry out a sex act on him. He went on to push his victim’s head down and raped her, court documents state.
“The lack of a prison sentence is a total insult to the young teenage victim in this case,” Jamie Greene, justice spokesman for the Scottish Tories, said. “It once again reaffirms how misguided the SNP’s sentencing guidelines are in reality and how judges hands are tied as a result.”
Hogg was found guilty by a jury and was crying when he appeared in the dock for sentencing, only to be spared a jail term. New guidelines introduced in Jan 2022 state that offenders aged under 25 on the day that they either pleaded guilty or were found guilty should not be treated as harshly as older criminals.
It is claimed that this is because younger people will “generally have a lower level of maturity, and a greater capacity for change and rehabilitation”. The guidelines also point to research which concluded that the brain did not fully develop until as late as age 30.
They were developed by the Scottish Sentencing Council, a body set up by SNP ministers in 2015. They were approved by the High Court in November 2021.
Whole-hearted backing
While the council is independent, then justice secretary Keith Brown last year offered his whole-hearted backing to the new rules, saying they complimented the SNP’s “vision for youth justice”.
He rejected claims that they amounted to “soft justice”, instead describing the overhaul as “smart” and promising Scottish government help to “make sure it is adopted”.
Lord Lake told Hogg that rape was “one of the most serious crimes” with his actions aggravated by his victim’s “age and vulnerabilities”. However, he claimed that he also had an obligation to consider Hogg’s “age as a factor.”
Sandy Brindley, chief executive of Rape Crisis Scotland, said that her charity was ready to support victims.
“This is an extremely serious case and we are shocked this perpetrator has not received a custodial sentence,” she said. “Given the gravity of this crime and the fact it was tried at the High Court, this sentence appears to us to be worryingly lenient.
A Scottish government spokesman said: “Decisions on sentencing in individual cases are taken by the independent court within the legal framework where they consider all the facts and circumstances and the Scottish government does not comment on nor intervene in individual cases.
“Sentencing guidelines are the responsibility of the independent Sentencing Council, the establishment of which was backed by all parties in parliament.”
[ad_2]
Source link
