“He killed his partner Rachel in front of her three children and today Mark Stephen Pringle walks free after just five years behind bars.
Now, Rachel’s grieving family are terrified he could come after them.”
This was the headline story of A Current Affair (ACA) last night. In the segment ACA presented the story of Rachel, a woman who was killed by her husband, Mark Pringle five years ago. Pringle was yesterday released on bail. The team interviewed Rachel’s sister and brother-in-law who were outraged that he had been released so early and were now ‘fearful’ for their lives.
The language in the story was telling. The killer was a monster. He committed a vicious crime. Even if he got twenty years in jail it wouldn’t have been enough.
We hear it a lot. The family who is upset and terrified at the conviction given to someone who has murdered or hurt one of their kin. The emotional parent, sibling or friend standing on the steps of a court decrying a judge for going too light on a criminal. The community ‘demanding’ more justice for someone who has committed a crime.
Now, I’m not here to comment on this particular case. I don’t know enough about the crime, nor the reasoning for the sentence given. I’m also not here to criticise Rachel’s family or any other family for having their say. I can understand why they are upset at Pringle’s release. I can only imagine what they have gone through and what they are feeling at this point of time.
But this ongoing media outrage about our justice system – whether from the over the top sort of shows at A Current Affair, or even just the headline stories from the good old trusted ABC, has got to stop.
If you were to watch the constant stream of stories in our media about the justice system you would be under the impression that to punish and to punish heavily is the only point of our courts. An eye for an eye – make anyone who commits a crime pay as much as possible – put anybody and everybody in jail for as long as possible. This is an extremely dangerous way of treating our system. Our system is about much more than punishment. Punishment is clearly an element, but there is a lot more to take into account. There is a need for rehabilitation as well, and an element of using the system to reduce crime. And in doing so judges and parole boards need to take into account many different elements when sentencing a criminal – their mental state, the level of the crime, their level of remorse, their chance to re-enter our society without threats to others etc etc. It is these complex elements that we must take in to account to achieve the outcomes we desire.
Do they always get it right? Probably not. But this sort of coverage hurts any chance to deal with these very complex issues. It captures people in vulnerable positions – people who are rightfully upset at the circumstances – and hauls them up to speak to the media at times when they often should be left alone. And in doing so it breeds fear and terror about crimes and criminals that is often unfounded. It creates a story of criminals who are never able to be rehabilitated and should never be given the opportunity – something that is not just bad for criminals, but is bad for a community that should want to reduce prison rates and crime itself.
And in doing so this coverage jeopardises one of the fundamental bases of our democratic system; the independent judiciary. We have developed a judiciary in the way we have on purpose – to ensure fair trial and conviction of those who have conducted crimes and to allow for all the goals of the justice system, whether they be punitive or rehabilitory to be played out. But when we play into fear of criminals we jeopardise this – pressuring judges and politicians to focus solely on punishment – something that is good for no one.
There are very good reasons we do not let those associated with crimes to play the role of judge or jury in their conviction. People who are closely involved in these crimes are obviously emotionally caught up in what happened. They are caught up in the loss of a loved one, emotionally wrapped in the trauma they have experienced. And in doing so they are understandably unable to disconnect themself from the crime, see it with outside eyes and lay a judgement that takes into a account the sort of factors we should be thinking about when sentencing a criminal.
And whilst we may think it is important to tell the story and viewpoint of those who have lost someone to a crime, when it comes to hauling them up around sentencing and the treatment of a criminal it just does more harm than good. It not only captures people in extremely vulnerable positions, potentially harming them in the long run, but it also puts our judiciary on trial. This can lead to pressure on politicians to intervene when they shouldn’t, or more importantly the harassing of judges and courts who are doing what they should be doing – taking into account a range of factors to decide on how criminals should be punished for their crime.
There is a time and a place for those who have lost loved ones to publicly tell their story about the crime and the trauma they have gone through. That time and place is largely in the courtroom. Trial by media however helps no one. It captures people in extremely vulnerable positions and puts our judiciary on trial in ways that are dangerous for our society.