Recent mob violence/riots

[mr friendly guy]

delete post. Meant to post this in the London riots thread.

[Zaune]

An illuminating article on the conseqences of acquiring a criminal record in Britain.

[Eulogy]

An illuminating article on the conseqences of acquiring a criminal record in Britain.

So because of the system, unemployment will be even worse and make said problems ergo worse. It's a vicious cycle that will end in destruction and tears until and unless the system changes for the better and everybody else mans the fuck up regarding convictions.

[Broomstick]

Does the UK have a distinction like the US does between misdemeanors and felonies?

If anyone is unclear on the distinction - in the US a felony is any crime that carries a penalty of more than a year in jail (generally - I'm sure there are exceptions somewhere, but go with that). Exactly one year or less in jail is a misdemeanor. When applying for a job in the US employers are generally concerned with felonies, not misdemeanors. And the reason I ask is that some of what these UK people are being charged with sound like misdemeanor level by US standards.

Of course, US standards need not apply to the UK, who are certainly the arbiters of law in their own nation. The US got the misdemeanor/felony distinction from English Common Law, I guess I'm interested if the English retained it or not to the present day.

[Zaune]

In a word? No. Sentences of less than about two years count as "spent" after only four years, not ten, but that's about it.

Oh, and the Enhanced Criminal Records Bureau check -alluded to where that article mentions professions where convictions are never spent- also includes accusations, cautions and probably even that time a cop lectured you for having your music too loud. The rest of the article probably illustrates quite well how much of a sense of proportion employers have about this sort of thing.

And people wonder why I carry have trouble walking out of the front door without a knife in my pocket...

[Broomstick]

I'm not quite clear what is meant by a conviction being "spent". Could you please enlighten me?

[madd0ct0r]

A spent conviction no longer appears when they do a Criminal records check.

So say I was caught shoplifting when I was 18, and I received a 2 weeks sentence. By the time I'm 22/23, it will no longer appear on my criminal record.
I am considered to have done my time, paid the price and suffered limited opportunities for long enough.

[Broomstick]

I see. We have something somewhat like that, but don't call it by that term.