Compounding errors

There’s been a lot of activity in the press on the subject of convicted rape cop Adam Carruthers in the last few days. On Friday of last week, the Daily Record published a piece about how Carruthers, in a job application, said he left the police force "due to issues out with my control." It seems this man won’t tell the truth and won’t accept that he is a serial sex offender who has serious behavioural problems which eventually, thankfully culminated in his prison sentence and now, sadly, his automatic release from prison under licence.

On Saturday the Daily Record printed an article about this blog. I didn’t see either of these articles in print, but as usual, accessed my news online. It’s the way I get most of my news. Using online news facilities means I don’t have to go out and face the world when I don’t feel up to it, which is most of the time.

Today the Dumfries and Galloway Standard have printed a piece about the blog and the use of tax payers money that Carruthers has at his disposal to fight for his full pension. Such a horrible event for all of his many victims who I think may all come from D&G. Many of them, like me, will be council tax payers.

So compound errors? Carruthers obviously still won’t accept responsibility for his crimes, which continues to leave him as a serious danger and risk to the public and to any community he frequents. The articles in the press state that "I have waived my right to anonymity." Well that is only 'sort of,' in that I allowed my photograph to be taken for articles at the time of the release of Carruthers with strict conditions on their use, or lack of use in the future. I’ve given a name too, but no more than that. Why? I’ve not done anything wrong, I’ve nothing to be ashamed of in what somebody decided to do to me. One important thing I do have to consider is the effect on my family; once again this is a difficult time for them in so many ways.

A rape victim has all control taken from them at the time of an attack. If they report to the police and pursue the attack through the courts, then control is continually lost as the process and the courts dictate procedures .......and so it goes on. Keeping control is a really important issue for most victims of rape and serious sexual assaults. Hence my mixed feelings about the 'balance' in the reporting of some issues I’ve raised in this blog. Journalists, like many writers, might only take edited portions of words said or words printed. Sadly this doesn’t always give the full picture or errors are either compounded by a lack of research or repeating errors previously made.

Why am I feeling slightly aggrieved about this? Because, importantly, the decent people who are tax payers are losers in money dished out by the Legal Aid Board, so are the many victims in the issues raised by Carruthers constant attempts to say “I didn’t do it,” “I want my full pension,” and “I want compensation for having to slop out in prison.” I would argue that when he committed the crimes, he of all people knew what the consequences of getting caught would be.
So far Carruthers has already used over £110,000 of tax payers’ money given from legal aid. Now he has been given up to another £100,000 to fight for his full pension and apparently he’s got yet another application in the pipeline for yet more legal issues he wishes to pursue.

When is the line drawn? It doesn’t seem to be with this man and he’s simply 'playing the system' we have in place. There is just one thick line for the victims with just one chance to give your evidence in court and coping with that was extremely hard with your attacker sitting close by in the dock. Is this constant pursuit against ‘unwelcome decisions’ by a criminal just and respectful for the law abiding citizens, tax payers and council tax payers? How this money could be put to much better use. The rape crisis centres would be extremely grateful for a fraction of this amount of money as they try to work on shoestring budgets and they save lives - the lives of victims like me.

Thankfully many aspects of the investigation and court process are changing from the time when the Carruthers case went to court and there is good news on that front. Forty of the fifty recommendations made in the “Review of the Investigation and Prosecution of Sexual Offences in Scotland,” published by the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service in June 2006 have been implemented.

The use tax payers money for legal aid for criminals chasing the things they lost the right to by committing crimes is something that I urge you to consider carefully and to pursue with your MSP if you also think it is not a fair system when a convicted criminal can’t seem to get the answers he apparently desires, no matter how many times he might try.
Now, where and when is that line going to be drawn?