Prison warning for Internet law-breakers

We are all publishers in the Internet age and, just like newspapers and broadcasters, if we break the law on Twitter or Facebook we face going to prison.

That was the message proclaimed loud and clear last week by contempt of court convictions and jail terms passed on Neil Harkins of East Yorkshire and Dean Liddle of Sunderland.

Prosecutors at the High Court said the two men uploaded photographs on social media said to show Jon Venables and Robert Thompson, killers in 1993 of James Bulger.

The two were 10 years old when they abducted James, aged two, in Bootle, Merseyside, tortured and killed him.

Venables and Thompson drew life sentences but were released in 2001 and given new identities. A court order banned the publication of anything that could reveal their identities. The prosecutors said the posted photos were of the men as adults today.

The court was told that there was a very real risk of physical harm or death to anyone who might be identified, correctly or incorrectly, as Venables or Thompson.
Harkins and Liddle were each sentenced to nine months in prison, suspended for 15 months.

They said they knew what they did was wrong but had not realised how serious it was. Numerous people had posted photos and information about the two killers online at the 20th anniversary of the boy’s murder.

Legal experts said the prosecution signalled the determination of the chief government law officer, the Attorney-General, to enforce the law against contempt of court in the Internet age. The public were being educated that this law applied not only to the media but to all those who blog, tweet or use Facebook.

Warned the BBC’s Clive Coleman, “Conversations that once would only have taken place in the pub or street have moved online. The spoken word has become the published word. Anything tapped into a PC or a mobile can rapidly go viral and cause real damage to the administration of justice.”

The Attorney-General is currently considering whether to prosecute other individuals who published information on Venables and Thompson.

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Crime in England and Wales, including violence against the person, robberies and sexual offences, fell last year by eight per cent, continuing a five-year downward trend.
Could one of the reasons be the Big Brother Is Watching You syndrome?

Researchers at Newcastle University decided to test the theory that people behave better when they think they are being watched. Above three bicycle racks on the campus they placed posters which showed a pair of glaring eyes and the words: “Cycle Thieves, We Are Watching You.”

Thefts of bikes from those racks dropped 62 per cent. At racks without the posters, thefts rose by 60 per cent.

The project was prompted by research that found putting staring human faces on a café walls made people more likely to tidy up, while contributions to an honesty box in a tea room rose threefold if the staring face was in sight.

A variation of the eyes deterrent is being used in some supermarkets. A life-size cardboard cut-out of a policeman in uniform is placed in the aisles with the intention of cutting down on shoplifting.

I have seen no results for this experiment but I can guarantee that turning a corner and finding what you think is a policeman right in front of you is quite a shock.

But maybe not for everybody.

A TV documentary recently followed the workings of an anti-shoplifting team of store detectives and police. The regular offenders were well known to the security teams and tracked on CCTV whenever they entered a store.

It doesn’t always work. The cameras lost sight of one well-known thief but then picked him up striding down the street outside. Under his arm was the store’s life-size cardboard policeman.

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It seems I owe readers an apology: Last week’s joke about the cup final was a rerun. I confess to a vague feeling of déjà vu when I wrote it but l hear jokes all the time and just assumed I had encountered it somewhere earlier.

However I can guarantee the following merry quips are entirely fresh. At least to me.

— Ex-boxer goes to his doctor complaining of insomnia. Doctor says, “Try counting sheep.” Ex-boxer: “That’s no good. Every time I get to nine, I stand up.”

— A patient goes to see a world-renowned specialist. “Who did you see before coming to me?” the great man asks.

“My family doctor,” says the patient.
“Family doctor, that old fool!” scoffs the medical genius. “And what sort of useless advice did he give you?”

“He recommended I come to see you.”

— Patient: “Doctor, I keep stealing things. Can you give me something for it?”

Doctor: “Try these pills. If they don’t work, bring me a new TV set.”

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