10
Thursday, January 25, 1973
THE VALUE OF THE PROBATION SERVICE
Chief Justice Says Probation Does Significant Work
E
When there is a chance that probation, and not a prison sentence,
will help to reform a young offender, "it is surely the best way of
trying to save potential victims from being wronged in the future."
This, said Sir Ivo Rigby, the Chief Justice, was "even more
important than helping the offender himself."
He was speaking today at the first joint Open Day of the Social
Welfare Department's probation service and correctional institutions in
the Begonia Road Boys' Home.
Sir Ivo said the occasion gave him the opportunity to make some
"general observations on punishment and sentencing" as he saw it.
He had no doubt the public was understandably concerned over the
increase in crimes of violence by young persons, and he supported heavy
prison sentences in appropriate cases, even when offenders were young
and doing wrong for the first time.
"Manslaughter, robbery with violence, and in particular, repeated
and successive acts of rape of a young girl by a gang of hooligans,
offences that require severe and exemplary punishment," he said.
are all
"It is a fact, even though the public may not be aware of it, that
heavy sentences are no rarity in the courts."
In his view, sentences should protect the public, show disapproval
to the offender, deter him from offending again, deter others, reform the
offender and ensure that crime did not pay. But many of the problems of
sentencing were insoluble.
There were