North of the Border
| Date | 01 December 1967 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0032258X6704001213 |
| Published date | 01 December 1967 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
were put to the defendants in cross examination and it was held
that they should, before being used in this way, have been pro-
perly proved by the girls who made them.
A small point of interest in sentencing policy arose in R. v.
Skone [1966] 51 Cr. App . R. 165, c.s. The defendant was being
sentenced for three offences of unlawful sexual intercourse with
a girl between 13 and 16. but of bad character. He was sentenced
to six months' imprisonment on each count to run consecutively
and the court, in passing sentence, said it was taking into account
accusations the defendant had made against the police which
clearly had aggravated the crime in the court's view. This con-
sideration was said by the Court of Appeal to be improper, but
it did not feel able to reduce the sentence.
Edited
by
W.
A.
RATCLIFFE
Assistant Chief Constable of Glasgow
The
Criminal Injuries Compensation Board has published its
third report, an examination of which raises some points of in-
terest.
The
number of claims made has shown a steady increase
but still falls far short of the estimated number of criminal in-
juries. In an appendix figures are given for different parts of the
country of the number of "Felonious and malicious woundings
(and comparable crimes in Scotland) during 1966", the number
of claims received from each part, and the percentage of " wound-
ings"
for which claims were received. Of the total number of
"woundings" in Great Britain applications for compensation
were made in respect of only slightly more than 12 per cent.
but
for Scotland the figures were: Glasgow 32.8, Edinburgh 38.5. re-
mainder of Scotland 27.1. Of the regions south of the border only
Newcastle shows the same level with 34.6 per cent.
For
Glasgow the
"woundings"
figure given is 933. which
corresponds with the serious assaults shown in the chief constable's
annual report.
but
experience in dealing with inquiries from the
Board shows that many of the claims arise from robberies. Though
all robberies do not result in injury an ever increasing number do .
The
Glasgow figure
for"
robbery and assault with intent to
rob"
was 817. and if a quarter of these would justify compensation
it
582 December 1967
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