Much has been said recently, by the media, by campaigners, and by the Prime Minister, about how far too many women are locked up, sometimes with babies in prison with them too. In truth, I agree. There are indeed far too many women locked up, especially for minor offences. I also agree that it is heart wrenching to think of a baby in prison, no matter what the circumstances. However, this all comes down to choices, and I’d like to lay out a few.
I can personally attest to the fact that women often get sentence far more harshly than men for similar crimes. I got 7 yrs for fraud for under £100K non victim first time offence (even though actual fraud was substantially less). Man (ex cop no less) commits 10 million in VAT fraud and gets less time. Men sentenced for defrauding OAP’s etc out of hundreds of thousands got less time than I did. Judge at sentencing made it VERY plain that he was giving me hefty sentence because I’d offended his idea of how a woman should behave. Apparently I should have been at home barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen not out engaging in crime. I basically got punished for offending him and his Nazi ideal of womanhood
This raises an interesting point which I have heard in other cases before but failed to address in my original post. I agree that judges like the one who sentenced you are dinosaurs. The moral expectation of women should be no different to those of men. I’m not sure I’d describe it as Nazi, but it is certainly antiquated and there should be no place for it in society. The truth is, if I had to generalise one way or another, I think women generally have it more together than men. In my view most sexism comes from a subconscious feeling of inferiority on the part of men. I can only apologise on behalf of my truly idiotic gender that you suffered as a result of that.
Agree,look at vilification of female criminals.
Yesterday, there was a Prison discussion on Women’s Hour.