And yet this poor little kid, 18 year old, so gay and effeminate, with his young partner in the gallery who suddenly developed quite a close relationship with the father of the accused" you just know he could never survive more than a day in prison. He would either commit suicide or be killed. Bullies in prison are no joke, they do kill you if you're effeminate, and very likely the guilty party will walk free. They're already in prison for a start, what worst fate could await them, they're not worried.
He did find himself in detention for a few days before, he was quickly hit really bad and spent all his time in the hospital ward afraid for his life. What a nice sentence, traumatised for the rest of his life, and yet, it did not stop him from stealing again. He got a suspended sentence in the end, he knows next time it is prison for sure. I'm not sure if it will deter him. I felt that ultimately this is death that he truly wishes for, because he is gay and this is where society pushed him, over the edge, but he could never gather the courage to commit suicide.
Despite all that he failed to get a psychiatrist's report stating that he was not all there, because he is a very clever kid, he saw through it all and tried to manipulate it all, but failed miserably. It was devastating for me to see the state his father was in, and the boyfriend. Well, if it was his goal to get attention, he certainly got it, even from me, as I found myself fraternising with him hoping he would avoid detention, but I was powerless.
In the end perhaps it would have been better for me to tell him that he deserved prison, that he will get just what he deserves, and be gone with him. Next case please! I still have 15 sentences to go through before the end of this very day. Sometimes it does not work that way though.
However, these cases are nothing compared with something like over 100 sentences I had to suffer recently, a few Fridays in a row, with one Judge who truly likes me, and yet I'm not sure if I could like him now, after he sent so many kids between the age of 16 and 22 either in detention or prison for 3 to 6 years each. And yet, I fully understand that it was not his decision, those sentencing guidelines came from above, the government feels that deterrent sentences are necessary when it comes to demonstrations that go a bit wild. So he is still my favourite judge to this day, for many reasons that I will not explain here. In the end he truly was a human being, he could see it all just like I do. It killed him just as much as it killed me.
It was over the Gaza unprovoked attack by Israel, it got Muslims in every country completely out of their mind. They went for a peaceful demonstration, but somehow I blame the organisers for not making it clearer that it should have been peaceful. So before you knew it fences were flying around, a few policemen received plastic bottles of water over their shields, and a Starbucks was raided. Dear me, what would we be as a society if we were to ever let a Starbucks being raided like this at such a critical time when innocent people are dying on the other side of the planet.
The police was filming everything of course, with 26 cameras, and it is with face recognition software in the end that they got most of those kids in the dock. Pretty amazing, I must clearly state here. That alone got me worried more than anything else. I just could not believe my eyes, so sophisticated it has all become, that you could never possibly hope to get away with anything anymore. Might as well lock yourself up in your own apartment and never get out of it ever again to denounce anything. There is no such right anymore to demonstrate, even peacefully, as you will quickly understand below.
As His Honour Judge repeated many times, it does not matter in these cases if the defendants are studying to become doctors, dentists or engineers. It is clear now that their life is totally wrecked and they will never be any of those things. In fact, they will never be able to find a job again. All employers have gone completely crazy now, they all request full disclosure of any offence and a full criminal background check. They'll never hire any of them.
It really broke my heart, sent me off the wall as I was writing the paperwork to send them to prison for so many years, even for just throwing a plastic bottle of water to a police officer or just participating in what was happening. Because now, conveniently, you no longer need to commit a crime to be convicted and sent to prison, you only need to be there when a crowd goes crazy, and you are deemed as guilty as what the worst offender does (the very one who is likely to get away with it).
The right to demonstrate in this country, as His Honour Judge said many times, is the mark of a great democracy. But if it goes beyond the peaceful demonstration, it leads straight to prison for a very long time. So you can easily find yourself with a sentence higher than any real criminal will ever get, because these are deterrent sentences, the sign of a great democracy. So the message is clear, don't demonstrate, because any demonstrator is as guilty as the worst offender in the crowd, and the prosecutor will go to any length to get all of them convicted. And this is how the war in Gaza continues right here on our soil.
The worst case was a 16 year old Somali. What was he doing there in the dock? As his mother rightly said so when she spoke to the Judge. After a genocide in Somalia where he lost a few brothers and sisters, what need did he have to go and defend the Palestinians? They are all Muslims, and it appears sometimes that it is enough, religion has no frontier, that was a very sad case. He went to detention and training for years. He'll never be a dentist now.
And yes, all those kids were truly clever, intelligent, educated, and most important of all, they were not religious freaks, not the kind of Muslims we picture in our head as suicide bombers. But after that, I'm sure they will be ready to blow themselves up for whatever cause they might be influenced or brainwashed into believing.
The riot continued in the Court room, would you believe. A young Palestinian journalist was doing everything he could to get arrested, alienating the usher to the point were they were shouting at each other in opened court until I calmed them down. Apparently he photographed the main officer in the case in order to get some sort of identification for others. It turned into a circus, with the most packed court rooms I have ever seen in four years, half of it journalists of all creeds.
It was an ordeal for me. Because I still had to defend the freedom of speech that is deep in my heart. That young journalist only wanted to take notes in Court, the usher refused because he could not provide a valid journalist ID. In the end I said I would ask the Judge and he would grant his request, and he did. So we avoided another riot in Court that would have led to more imprisonment. Contempt of Court is not to be toyed with.
I was on their side all the way, but I could not appear to be. But I put my foot down when the officer in the case asked me the name and address of that Palestinian journalist. I said no, I would not play a part in more of those sentences that I feel are outrageous. I told him to go and arrest him if he felt he had enough evidence for an arrest. Which I knew he did not, and in the end he had a chat with him and he did not arrest him. That day I was not on the prosecution side, and I made it clear. It might have been a mistake, for a minute there I thought I would lose my job, but I wouldn't mind to lose my job for doing what I feel is right.
Don't push me, because you will find that I can push back with a much stronger force.
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