Black Widow
06-10-2010, 11:48 AM
A JUDGE'S decision to slash the jail term of Sarah Payne's killer was yesterday blasted by the little girl's mother and her fellow child protection campaigners.
Sara Payne, Shy Keenan and Fiona Crook from sex offender victims' rights group Phoenix Chief Advocates said the ruling sent a signal to paedophiles that their crimes are not serious.
Writing for The Sun, they said: "If you want to know why the UK is so riddled with paedophiles, this tells you everything you need to know.
"By slashing Roy Whiting's sentence by a huge ten years, the judiciary has sent out a clear signal to all child murderers and paedophiles everywhere that their crimes are just not that serious.
"The judicial system in this country is so leniently weighted in favour of attackers.
"They get taxpayers' cash to endlessly appeal their sentences and tariffs, get released early, get re-housed and helped to get a new job and a new life, whilst the innocent victims - some tiny children - and their families are left to fall to pieces.
"While Whiting or any other paedophile is living and breathing, they have the capability to re-offend and ruin more lives.
"That is why offenders like him should never, ever be released. The only way to stop this kind of offender is to ensure they are locked up for life, meaning the rest of their natural lives.
"We want the judicial system to stop calling these sentences 'life' as they clearly are not.
"The only ones really serving life sentences are the victims and their families."
To contact Phoenix Chief Advocates go to www.tpcauk.com
An Insult To Sarah
By VIRGINIA WHEELER
THE angry mother of murdered Sarah Payne yesterday insisted there was NO reason to cut the sentence of the little girl's evil killer.
Campaigning Sara Payne said: "Sex offenders who kill should be imprisoned for the rest of their lives."
The mum hit out after attending a High Court hearing in London at which unrepentant paedophile Roy Whiting won a six-year battle to have his minimum tariff slashed. It was reduced from 50 years to 40.
Sara, leaning heavily on a walking stick after suffering a stroke last year, said Whiting would "remain a danger to children as long as he lives and breathes".
She added: "All the time it was 50 years my family and I could relax. There was no way he could be near any children and hurt them.
"Right now, of course, we are reeling. This is about Sarah, not about Roy Whiting. Let's get it back to the little girl."
Sarah's father Michael, 41, branded the ruling by Mr Justice Sir Peregrine Simon "outrageous".
Michael, who split from Sara in the pain-racked aftermath of the murder, added: "He doesn't deserve a reduction."
Whiting, 51, who has never shown any remorse for abducting and killing eight-year-old Sarah in July 2000, will now be considered for parole when he is 82.
He is currently being held in Wakefield Prison, West Yorks - dubbed Monster Mansion because of its murderous inmates.
His court challenge, costing an estimated £500,000, was funded by taxpayers through legal aid.
Mum-of-five Sara, 41, said that rubbed salt into the wound.
Flanked by children Lee, 23, Luke, 21, and Charlotte, 15 - all wearing the "For Sarah" badges of her campaign - she added: "It makes me really mad."
Whiting was originally given a tariff of 28 years following his conviction in 2001. Lord Chief Justice Lord Woolf ruled the crime was not serious enough to warrant a full life term.
Amid public outrage, the then Home Secretary David Blunkett increased the tariff to 50 years in 2002.
But since then the law has been changed so maximum life sentences are set by judges - allowing lifers to appeal against tariffs set by a Home Secretary.
Yesterday Mr Justice Simon appeared to steer a course between both sentences handed to Whiting.
He said he had taken into account submissions from the beast's lawyers Irwin Mitchell that the original 28-year term should apply.
But he also considered the Crown Prosecution Service's argument that had Whiting committed his crime today, it would have warranted a full life stretch.
The judge acknowledged that Whiting's carefully planned crime - which involved concealing Sarah's body and followed a previous sex kidnap of a young girl - was "exceptionally serious".
But he called the 40-year tariff the "appropriate" period Whiting, of Crawley, West Sussex, must spend behind bars.
He stressed the killer would be detained "unless and until the Parole Board is satisfied that he no longer presents a risk to the public".
The reduction came just a month before the tenth anniversary of the murder.
And Mr Justice Simon said: "I invite everyone present in court to pause and for a moment remember Sarah Payne, who would now be 18 if she had not been murdered, and to reflect on the grave loss her death has caused to her family and others who loved her."
He added he had received a victim impact statement from Sara "in which the devastating effect on her family of Sarah's abduction and murder is movingly described".
Whiting snatched Sarah from a Sussex cornfield as she played hide-and-seek with her brothers and sister. A huge search was launched but it was 16 days before her naked body was found in a shallow roadside grave.
Sara launched the For Sarah campaign - aimed at giving parents controlled access to information about paedophiles living among them - to save herself from falling into a black hole of grief.
She was awarded an MBE for services to child protection in 2008.
Yesterday she vowed to continue to fight for "a safer Britain for children" despite her stroke, which has left the left side of her body limp.
Sara said the upcoming anniversary of the murder would be "awful".
v.wheeler@the-sun.co.uk
The Sun
Sara Payne, Shy Keenan and Fiona Crook from sex offender victims' rights group Phoenix Chief Advocates said the ruling sent a signal to paedophiles that their crimes are not serious.
Writing for The Sun, they said: "If you want to know why the UK is so riddled with paedophiles, this tells you everything you need to know.
"By slashing Roy Whiting's sentence by a huge ten years, the judiciary has sent out a clear signal to all child murderers and paedophiles everywhere that their crimes are just not that serious.
"The judicial system in this country is so leniently weighted in favour of attackers.
"They get taxpayers' cash to endlessly appeal their sentences and tariffs, get released early, get re-housed and helped to get a new job and a new life, whilst the innocent victims - some tiny children - and their families are left to fall to pieces.
"While Whiting or any other paedophile is living and breathing, they have the capability to re-offend and ruin more lives.
"That is why offenders like him should never, ever be released. The only way to stop this kind of offender is to ensure they are locked up for life, meaning the rest of their natural lives.
"We want the judicial system to stop calling these sentences 'life' as they clearly are not.
"The only ones really serving life sentences are the victims and their families."
To contact Phoenix Chief Advocates go to www.tpcauk.com
An Insult To Sarah
By VIRGINIA WHEELER
THE angry mother of murdered Sarah Payne yesterday insisted there was NO reason to cut the sentence of the little girl's evil killer.
Campaigning Sara Payne said: "Sex offenders who kill should be imprisoned for the rest of their lives."
The mum hit out after attending a High Court hearing in London at which unrepentant paedophile Roy Whiting won a six-year battle to have his minimum tariff slashed. It was reduced from 50 years to 40.
Sara, leaning heavily on a walking stick after suffering a stroke last year, said Whiting would "remain a danger to children as long as he lives and breathes".
She added: "All the time it was 50 years my family and I could relax. There was no way he could be near any children and hurt them.
"Right now, of course, we are reeling. This is about Sarah, not about Roy Whiting. Let's get it back to the little girl."
Sarah's father Michael, 41, branded the ruling by Mr Justice Sir Peregrine Simon "outrageous".
Michael, who split from Sara in the pain-racked aftermath of the murder, added: "He doesn't deserve a reduction."
Whiting, 51, who has never shown any remorse for abducting and killing eight-year-old Sarah in July 2000, will now be considered for parole when he is 82.
He is currently being held in Wakefield Prison, West Yorks - dubbed Monster Mansion because of its murderous inmates.
His court challenge, costing an estimated £500,000, was funded by taxpayers through legal aid.
Mum-of-five Sara, 41, said that rubbed salt into the wound.
Flanked by children Lee, 23, Luke, 21, and Charlotte, 15 - all wearing the "For Sarah" badges of her campaign - she added: "It makes me really mad."
Whiting was originally given a tariff of 28 years following his conviction in 2001. Lord Chief Justice Lord Woolf ruled the crime was not serious enough to warrant a full life term.
Amid public outrage, the then Home Secretary David Blunkett increased the tariff to 50 years in 2002.
But since then the law has been changed so maximum life sentences are set by judges - allowing lifers to appeal against tariffs set by a Home Secretary.
Yesterday Mr Justice Simon appeared to steer a course between both sentences handed to Whiting.
He said he had taken into account submissions from the beast's lawyers Irwin Mitchell that the original 28-year term should apply.
But he also considered the Crown Prosecution Service's argument that had Whiting committed his crime today, it would have warranted a full life stretch.
The judge acknowledged that Whiting's carefully planned crime - which involved concealing Sarah's body and followed a previous sex kidnap of a young girl - was "exceptionally serious".
But he called the 40-year tariff the "appropriate" period Whiting, of Crawley, West Sussex, must spend behind bars.
He stressed the killer would be detained "unless and until the Parole Board is satisfied that he no longer presents a risk to the public".
The reduction came just a month before the tenth anniversary of the murder.
And Mr Justice Simon said: "I invite everyone present in court to pause and for a moment remember Sarah Payne, who would now be 18 if she had not been murdered, and to reflect on the grave loss her death has caused to her family and others who loved her."
He added he had received a victim impact statement from Sara "in which the devastating effect on her family of Sarah's abduction and murder is movingly described".
Whiting snatched Sarah from a Sussex cornfield as she played hide-and-seek with her brothers and sister. A huge search was launched but it was 16 days before her naked body was found in a shallow roadside grave.
Sara launched the For Sarah campaign - aimed at giving parents controlled access to information about paedophiles living among them - to save herself from falling into a black hole of grief.
She was awarded an MBE for services to child protection in 2008.
Yesterday she vowed to continue to fight for "a safer Britain for children" despite her stroke, which has left the left side of her body limp.
Sara said the upcoming anniversary of the murder would be "awful".
v.wheeler@the-sun.co.uk
The Sun