Coltishall. loved it
I don't know the chap, but to go to crown court with a chance of going down for 2 years? Now that is very wrong.
I assume the Magistrates Court concluded that the case should be dealt by a Judge in the Crown Court where the maximum penalty is 2 years imprisonment and/or a fine. (The relevant legislation allows Magistrates Courts to deal with an offence of this nature but not to impose a prison sentence.)
I don't know if my assumption is correct nor, if it is, why the Magistrates Court came to that conclusion.
I don’t know the answer to said gentleman’s punishment but insist a possible 2 years inside is way over the top.
That is the
maximum term of imprisonment which can be imposed but, to date, never has been.
Penalties have included fines, suspended sentences and immediate imprisonment. I haven't checked recently but, to the best of my recollection, the longest immediate prison sentence imposed in the UK to date is nine months.
The posters who are disagreeing with me…..what do you think the appropriate is then?
Good question.
I can readily understand why opinions differ about whether an immediate prison sentence is appropriate where a pilot was not way over the limit, has a long unblemished history, admitted his guilt at the earliest opportunity etc.
I agree with you about the frequently misleading, and sometimes absurdly inaccurate 'drunk pilot', headlines. However, attention-grabbing headlines and melodramatic stories sell newspapers so the practice is very unlikely to change.