A UK man who sexually assaulted 11 women and children in a two-week period in April and May after being released from jail by mistake faces life imprisonment after he was found guilty of all 37 counts in a court on Friday
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 06th December, 2019) A UK man who sexually assaulted 11 women and children in a two-week period in April and May after being released from jail by mistake faces life imprisonment after he was found guilty of all 37 counts in a court on Friday, media reported, further sparking a debate regarding the effectiveness of the UK probation service, after it was revealed that last week's London Bridge attacker was also released early from jail.Joseph McCann was convicted at the Old Bailey in London of a litany of crimes, including 10 counts of false imprisonment, seven counts of rape and one count of raping a child, The Guardian newspaper reported.
McCann was captured by police on May 6, after being released from jail for serving half of a three and a half-year sentence for burglary and theft.
However, the UK Ministry of Justice admitted that McCann should have never been released in the first place, as his burglary conviction also violated probation conditions related to a 2008 conviction for aggregated burglary, the newspaper stated.
Former officials within the probation officers' union, Napo, blamed McCann's release on significant budget cuts that have taken place during ten years of Conservative government, media reported.
"The background to this is that the budgets of both the probation service and prisons have systematically been cut over the last decade, so there is less staff and those that do remain have bigger caseloads," Harry Fletcher, former assistant general secretary of Napo, stated as quoted by the media outlet.
This latest conviction raises further questions regarding the state of the United Kingdom's probation service, after it was revealed that last week's London Bridge attacker, Usman Khan, was released early from prison after being convicted of terror offenses. Prime Minister Boris Johnson used the terror attack as justification for his calls to dish out tougher prison sentences for terror offenses, although critics such as UK Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn have pledged not to politicize the terror attack, and called for a wider review of the UK probation system.
