Criminal justice system is close to breaking down

IT BEGGARS belief that a serial rapist was released on bail seven times in the course of a three-year reign of terror, despite being matched to two attacks by DNA tests and being caught on high-quality CCTV.

What were the police and magistrates thinking? Even after they finally realised Carl Hartley was a serial rapist, he was allowed out on bail again, a decision that allowed him to commit yet another attack. In an era in which the police seem obsessed with allegations of decades-old sex offences, the vast majority of which turn out to be baseless, it seems extraordinary that they allowed such a man to go about ruining people’s lives.

But then it’s difficult to feel a great deal of confidence in the police at times, given the appalling failure rate we report on today to solve vehicle thefts, burglary and shoplifting crimes. Something has gone seriously wrong in our criminal justice system if matters have come to this.

No one could blame victims of crimes for having little confidence in the police while they fail to make any arrests or investigations, allowing criminals to run amok. They seem far more obsessed with “hate crimes”, which generally tends to mean someone saying something childish on Twitter, than with events that can have a catastrophic effect on the victim.

This really cannot go on.