What should we do with adults who murder children? ‘Nothing good’ is a perfectly understandable response. Child killers occupy a unique position on the destitute outer fringes of humanity. Bogeymen made real, they are in fact often pathetic, hideously damaged individuals driven to satisfy appetites we can only guess at.
The Conservatives have announced that adults over 21 who murder children under 16 will never be released from custody. It has made for a good Sun newspaper op-ed; justice secretary Robert Buckland is pushing against an open door with the electorate.
It’s not just Tory voters who never want these aberrant individuals to see the light of day again. Ask any parent and wait for the sound of sharpened pitchforks. In prison, where hierarchies exist as much as in the free world, child killers and paedophiles are at the bottom of the pile.
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