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I can’t join in the screams by sections of the media calling for the present identity of Jon Venables to be revealed.
Venables and Robert Thompson, who were then both aged ten, became Britain’s youngest murderers after abducting the two-year-old, James Bulger, in 1993 from a shopping centre in Bootle. Both were given life sentences, but released in 2001 with new identities under certain licence conditions. A court order prevents details being published which could reveal their present names or whereabouts.
It has been disclosed that Venables has recently been returned to prison after having breached his license conditions by allegedly committing a serious offence. The Justice Secretary has refused to give any further details and has made the point that, ‘a premature disclosure of information would undermine the integrity of the criminal justice process’.
The emotional aspects of the original crime and any views on the subsequent treatment of the two boys, now men, must be put aside. Doubtless, if Venables is proved to have committed a serious crime, he will be appropriately punished for it.
It is correct that the justice process must be followed, and Venables’ current name really doesn’t have much to do with it. In any event, it seems to have been forgotten that the man is now safely behind bars!
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I can’t join in the screams by sections of the media calling for the present identity of Jon Venables to be revealed.
Venables and Robert Thompson, who were then both aged ten, became Britain’s youngest murderers after abducting the two-year-old, James Bulger, in 1993 from a shopping centre in Bootle. Both were given life sentences, but released in 2001 with new identities under certain licence conditions. A court order prevents details being published which could reveal their present names or whereabouts.
It has been disclosed that Venables has recently been returned to prison after having breached his license conditions by allegedly committing a serious offence. The Justice Secretary has refused to give any further details and has made the point that, ‘a premature disclosure of information would undermine the integrity of the criminal justice process’.
The emotional aspects of the original crime and any views on the subsequent treatment of the two boys, now men, must be put aside. Doubtless, if Venables is proved to have committed a serious crime, he will be appropriately punished for it.
It is correct that the justice process must be followed, and Venables’ current name really doesn’t have much to do with it. In any event, it seems to have been forgotten that the man is now safely behind bars!
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