CHAPTER 77
I left it for a couple of days as the trial wound down, but I made sure I was there when the last of the witnesses was finally dismissed and the summing up was given by Her Honour Justice Wetherby. It was neat, it was simple, and it was brutal.
There were three crimes to consider, in essence, being the organising and managing of a theft ring, combined with handling stolen goods and faginism. Then there was perversion of the course of justice, attempted perversion of the course of justice and conspiracy to pervert it. Finally, finally, there was rape, unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor, sexual assault of a minor, assault occasioning actual bodily harm of several minors; that particular list went on for rather a long while. Eric was with me, his hand on mine, and I noticed several of the jurors look directly at me as we sat in the public gallery. One of them gave just the very slightest of nods to me, and then looked back at the judge.
Eric took me down the Porter and Sorter after they had retired, and I sank a pint in a very short while. The CPS lady had promised to text me when the jury were due to return.
“Steady, love. Still early and all, this is where you need some strength”
“Eric, is it wrong to want them all dead?”
He thought for a while, looking into his own pint as if the answer lay in drink. “No, it isn’t, it is perfectly natural. To do it, though, to kill someone coldly, that would be wrong. Would make you no better than them. Wish them dead, by all means, but leave it to the court and the prisons”
“Yeah, but when will that little girl ever be free, aye? I thought I had it bad, but, fuck, how can she ever sleep again?”
“You do. Darren does. Somehow, some day, she will find her own way. Or someone like Naomi and Albert will step in. She is young, love, and she showed some strength there. Richard was saying how she was almost catatonic when they first got to her, so someone somewhere is helping her. If she can come this far this quickly…well, the kid has guts Come on, there’s a tapas bar round the corner, if you stay here you will get pissed, and then you’ll get me pissed”
So we moved on, and had a lunch that would have been superb if I had been able to swallow past the lump in my chest. Just as we took coffee, my phone beeped urgently. The text from the Crown Prosecution Service read “Jury back in at one thirty lunch first”
I showed it to Eric, and he nodded and took my hands in his across the table.
“Partners, remember? We do things together, makes them easier. Finish up, and I ‘ll walk you to the court”
I looked across at him, taking in the lines of his face, the crinkly bits round his eyes, the softness of his smile.
“How do you do it, love? How do you put things like this behind you? I ‘m the one who is supposed to be case-hardened, thick-skinned, aye?”
“It’s because of you, Annie, you need me, and so it is easier for me to be strong. I have to be for you, so it is easier to hang on, yeah?”
“Aye, I suppose…look, I have a sort of plan for the weekend, so we shall have some time for fun, yeah, or at least for clearing our heads. Drink up and let’s get back, aye? The press is going to be all over this one, so let’s make sure we have some decent seats”
The place was packed, but the usher knew who I was, and two seats were miraculously saved for us. The three were brought in, and their expressions were so different from each other’s, but all having one thing in common: fear. I understood immediately that they knew, in their hearts, that they were damned in so many different ways. I almost wished there were a real God to make that damnation eternal. The jury filed in, to do their best in his place.
“All rise”
Petherick looked as if he had been crying, peering round at the gallery as if seeking his mother, to ask her to take him home and keep him safe from all these nasty people, and for a short moment I almost felt sorry for him. Harton, by contrast, was like a trapped animal, but Ma…Ma was still trying to show what a hard bitch she was, and I received her glare full on. I gave it straight back, sending my thoughts down my stare. Die, you bitch, die painfully, and soon.
The drama unfolded in the prescribed way. Yes, they had elected a foreman, yes they had reached verdicts, and yes, those were the verdicts of them all. I noticed the looks on the jurors’ faces, the contempt, the hatred, and only one of them looked away from the dock as the long string of ‘guilty’ verdicts was delivered. Judge Wetherby listened quietly as the nails went into three coffins, and then lifted her head.
“Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, this court thanks you for the great service you have given it, in the face of truly appalling revelations. I thank you, personally, for staying the course so well.”
She turned to the dock. “It is normal in such cases to express the sentiment that such evil has never come before the court’s eyes before. That would not be true, as I have presided over worse cases of abuse. Those cases resulted in the deaths of the children concerned, and I am properly grateful to Providence that such has not been the case here. Be aware, however, Charity Pickstock, Timothy Petherick and Peter Harton, that I do not consider that to have been in your gift. Nor do I consider it in any way to lower the level of depravity and evil in which all three of you conspired. Does learned counsel have any mitigation that he wishes to offer before sentence?”
Whybrow simply bobbed up, said “I have none, your Honour”
“Very well. I must confess that I would have been astonished if any mitigation would be possible, let alone offered, for such crimes. Stand, all of you.
They rose, Harton's eyes looking everywhere but at the judge, and I suddenly realised a woman nearby, weeping silently, was his wife.
“Harton, firstly I have been presented with information served under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, and accordingly I have ordered the freezing of your assets, including houses and cars, until such time as the legitimacy of their origin be determined. For the various counts of theft and handling stolen goods I sentence you to ten years imprisonment. Petherick, for the same crimes, ten years. Pickstock, for the same crimes, ten years. Those sentences to be served concurrently with the other terms I am shortly to deliver.
“For the various crimes involving the perversion of the course of justice, each of you will serve ten years imprisonment”
She dropped her head, and took off her glasses to rub her eyes.
“Peter Harton, for multiple offences of rape and other crimes of assault and bodily harm, against a child under ten, life imprisonment. Minimum term to be served before review, twenty-five years. Your name to be entered on the sexual offenders register in perpetuity.
“Timothy Petherick, for those same offences, life imprisonment, minimum term twenty-five years, and entry on the sexual offenders register in perpetuity.
“Pickstock, for conspiracy to commit rape on a child under ten years of age, procuring the indecent assault, actual bodily harm and rape of a child under ten years, life imprisonment, minimum term twenty-five years, your name also to be on the sexual offenders register in perpetuity”
“Why me? I didn’t rape nobody!”
“Be silent. Why you? Because, Pickstock, you took your own grandchild, you offered her to the fire for money. You destroyed the innocence of a child, a member of your family, your own flesh, for financial gain, and it is clear that you have no remorse whatsoever. Well, all three of you now have at least twenty-five years to consider your sins. Your granddaughter, as well as all of the other children beaten and abused by you, and Harber, and these others who demean the concept of humanity, those children now have to live with the memories of how you defiled their souls as well as their bodies. Take them down, and out of my sight.”
She rose, and I noticed that even though her voice had stayed level, she was trembling slightly, and we stood, and Mrs Harton went past me sobbing as I felt no sympathy whatsoever. It was done.
I was astonished to see Ewan Whybrow talking to our man David Ballantyne, the latter with an arm over Whybrow’s shoulder. I walked over to them, Eric in tow. Whybrow held out his hand.
“Sergeant Price, it is now over, thank God. Please understand I have no malice in this, I am merely required to represent the interests of my client as best I can. I will be honest with you, I nearly withdrew, on the grounds of professional embarrassment, but that would merely have passed a very shitty stick to another poor soul”
He looked at Ballantyne. “Withnail? I think we owe it to ourselves”
I gave a puzzled look back, and Ballantyne smiled.
“It is a tradition, after such a case, to watch the film ‘Withnail and I’ “
I was still puzzled. “And that helps?”
Whybrow suddenly grinned. “It does when you try and match them drink for drink!”
We left them to their planned debauch, and went out through the court’s front doors. The first flashes went off in my face as we did so, and the shouting started.
“Adam! Over here! Can we have some cleavage!”
That wasn’t actually what was said, but it was what they meant. Suddenly, the whole purpose of the trial had collapsed into ‘man in dress’, and as we struggled past the crowd of reporters I heard a shout of “Is he gay too?”
Eric turned on them, and just before the Super appeared to make the ritual announcement of the result, Eric called out in a disgusted voice “Neither me nor my fiancée is gay!”
Comments
Now That's A Judge
Who understands that there are some things that really deserve punishment.
Too many of them are divorced from the real world.
Aargh! Poor Annie's met the British gutter press. I hope she and Eric can face the arseholes down,
Joanne
Take them down,
ALISON
'and out of my sight', one very angry judge and rightly so.Just brilliant!!
ALISON
It's a pity
there's no death penalty over your way anymore, those three don't deserve the tax dollars to be spent on them.
Bailey Summers
I disagree.
Eric had it right. It's OK to wish them dead but actually to kill someone in cold blood brings you down to their level. The death penalty is barbaric and unworthy of any civilised country. And that's without taking into account the number of mistaken verdicts which of themselves make the death penalty unacceptable.
Nicely done, Steph. You've successfully managed both to show how the miscreants have met there just ends and shown how profoundly their crimes have affected their victims and those charged with bringing the criminals to justice.
Robi
Dumbstruck
Took me a few minutes to come up with a word, most were unprintable. After all that horrific shit all the press wants is Adams tits. Damn, it probably shouldn't strike me as surprising but I guess my naivety is showing. There are times a few well placed 'thugs' with baseball bats could make a difference. Disgusting in and out with threads of real humanity holding the breech. Sometimes I wonder, but I still think that good mostly has the upper hand, not always obvious at all though. At the least justice and legal met somewhere in the middle there, if only briefly. I'm cringing at the thought of the next bit, button it Eric, just pull the machine gun. Yeah, resort to fantasy when reality becomes a surreal nightmare. Shit. Deep breath.....
Kris
Good!
Job done!
Job well done!! I'f I'd been the judge I'd have set the sentences to run consecutively.
Some small requittal for some but that's the vital first step!
Good luck Chantelle. Where will you be in ten years time, I must wonder and afear for you. As for so many who have gone before you.
Bev.
Growing old disgracefully.
Consecutive or Concurrent?
Although this is fiction, and our author has admitted cutting some corners, I suspect that there are sentencing guidelines here that had to be followed. Better comply and reduce the risk of an appeal against the sentence...
However I'm pleased that it was a female judge (and that the case touched her humanity, but hopefully not to the level of triggering an appeal). I can't help
thinkinghoping that her appointment to hear the case put the sentences at the higher end of the guidelines.As Eric noted, Chantelle has made some progress and in Steph's Crawley at least there are a number of real human beings who might help further. Let's hope for some sort of positive outcome.
Xi
Excuse me, but ...
... your prejudice is showing.
Do you truly believe a man could not be moved in the same way by what happened to those children? Do you really think that a male judge would have let them off with a nod and a wink? I
hopeknow that half the population isn't composed of heartless bastards or rapists just waiting for an opportunity.Sorry, R, but men have souls, too. All the men that surround Annie in her life prove that in every chapter, over and over again.
Randalynn
No "excuse me" needed ...
... since the prejudice was intended to show. I too would like to think that half the population "isn't composed of heartless bastards or rapists" and that men also have souls. But in answer to "Do you really think that a male judge would have let them off?" the answer is "No", because that is not the inference I was making.
We are not dealing with 50% of the population here, but the judiciary, which is a tiny sub-set of the population (a few hundred), which is overwhelmingly male, and has real 'form' in this area. We have some superb judges, and the handful of them that my friend (a Magistrate) has met in person have all impressed him, and he is the cynic's cynic.
Against that, although the tale is fiction, this (from Chapter 76) is real solid fact:
The judge referred to there was a man. And there have been other (male) judges returning equally perverse judgments, but AFAIK no female judges have gone that route.
That was my point: I rest my case.
Xi
Incidentally, my Magistrate friend says that female magistrates (on his Bench at least) tend to be harder-nosed than the men when the cases themselves, and the absence of remorse, are both clear-cut. However they are more likely than the men to sympathise with victims of circumstance. I have to be careful here (the singular of "statistics" is "anecdote"), but it seems to me that he too is similarly 'prejudiced'.
(BTW Lay Magistrates sit in threes, discus the case in private and come to a combined decision both of verdict and sentence. So he is talking about cases where he has heard exactly the same evidence as his two colleagues, and discussed it with them, and agreed the outcome. That is close to a fair comparison, I think.)
Prejudice is ...
... prejudice, and usually stems from making statements (judgments) about groups of individuals from a statistically questionable premise about a group defined by a characteristic not necessarily linked to their behavior or performance. *deep breath -- that WAS a mouthful*
I might as well proclaim that all brown-haired women are insane because one of them cut me off in a parking lot and then decided that I was somehow to blame for her lack of driving skill and started screaming at me like a maniac.
Saying it's more likely for male judges to be heartless because they're male (and because a few male judges in the past displayed a lack of good sense) is pre-judging marginally-related individuals by the actions of others. That's prejudice.
But you already admitted you wanted your prejudice to show.
I rest my case. *grin*
Randalynn
Ladies...
I have explained below why I chose a female judge for this. I am honoured that a real discussion has arisen from my fiction, so all I will do is repeat what I wrote below: I chose a woman purely for the counterpoint of a mother versus someone who pimped her own granddaughter. I have based that part of the story on a real case I am aware of, but it was HH Wetherby's reactions I was trying to bring out. I could have written a man into the role, but the visceral impact would have been less. No other reason behind my choice.
Excellent sentence
Those three got what they deserved. I suspect all three of them will never see the outside of prision ever again.
Typical 5th Estate. I have never liked what passes for modern news reporting.
justice
or as much as the courts can produce. And the press at the end? Are they really that bad? Of course they are ....
Dorothycolleen
I agree, but....
I agree with ll of the above sentiments, but what about Eric's implied proposal? Is Annie going to say 'YES!'?
Finally
Someone spotted that....
Oops
Okay fair cop. I'll admit that one slipped by in my anger at the...err, 'press'? Might work on the timing Eric old son, but nicely affirming none the less. Neatly played Steph.
Kris
"Neither me nor my fiancee' is gay...!
...or as Seinfeld might say, "Not that there's anything wrong with that." Eric makes a very strong and hard-to-misunderstand statement that will take wings and go all the way around the world; "my fiancee'" Simply wonderful to read.
I'm relieved to see a judge with good judgment. I agree with Bev in that their sentences should have been consecutive, but there are those pesky sentencing guidelines. I'm not sure if any of the laws still exist, but way back when, as they say, in some States here, kidnapping and rape were considered capital crimes, subject to execution even if the victim didn't die. And I agree with Randalynn; compassion and caring isn't relegated solely to one gender, t- or otherwise. As she noted, Annie's mates are great examples of compassion and caring.
This story was one of the hardest things to read that I've ever known, but as I've said, I'm a better person for the experience. Thank you, Stephanie!
Dio vi benedica tutti
Con grande amore e di affetto
Andrea Lena
Love, Andrea Lena
Female judge
Randalynn and Drea are of course right, that a male judge would have just as hard a time dealing with this, but I wanted to use the female judge purely for dramatic effect; the reaction of a mother to somebody who could prostitute their own granddaughter is a powerful device.
Ride On 77
This trial has defiled the Judge, Attorneys, and Jurors. May they all NEVER have to face such excrement, again. And as for the press, what dolt asked such a question?
May Your Light Forever Shine
May Your Light Forever Shine