Leave Gary Hart Alone!!!!!!!

[METALMICKY]

No not St Oh Gary of Stansted, but the one involved in the Selby train crash!

Am i the only person who thinks the OTT persecution of him is unfair? He's hit the news again because he's being released 2.5 years into his 5 year sentence.

Essentially he did cause the numerous deaths but the actual toll was due to an extremely unlucky chain reaction. How unlucky was he to crash at that specific point, at that specific time and ended up on the track when the trains were coming?

It could happen to anyone? How many people on here have dozed off for a seconf whilst on a long motorway journey? What if you drifted off for 2 seconds and in that time you just happened to nudge the car in front which then crossed the reservation causeing an accident that resulted in a school bus overturning and killing 30 kids.

I don't doubt the pain of the relatives of the deceased but their vengeance achieves nothing. And i also don't doubt that the memory of his carelessness will live on long in the mind of Mr Hart.

 

[Safeway]

This should be intersting.....

 

[¤DãŃn¥ §êãGüLL¤]

[sic]

 

[Faldo]

You're right - why punish a man who caused numerous deaths through negligence.

Wait a second.........

Stupidity is not a defence.

 

[Marc]

Agree in someway MM, thing is people blinded by the papers and press see him directly as a murderer not as someone who was involved in an accident which resulted in the loss of a lot of lives.

I agree he should'nt by lynced as such, what angers me more is yet another Prisoner has been set free with a substantial amount of Time left to do....but thats another argument entirely!

 

[Faldo]

To adjust my statement slightly - yes the guy shouldnt be a hate figure, or have a lynch mob after him. But, he should still be paying his debt to society.

 

[METALMICKY]

To adjust my statement slightly - yes the guy shouldnt be a hate figure, or have a lynch mob after him. But, he should still be paying his debt to society.

Absolutely. He should be punished but the attitude of many is as if he personaly held a gun to each of the victims heads.

There are far many more uninsured drunk boy racers who have killed (albeit lesser numbers) who have received lesser sentences and not been so nationally vilified.

 

[Wardy]

He did wrong. One thing i hate about British law is that when you are given a 5 year jail sentance it does not mean 5 years. If you get 5 years you should serve 5 years, if you get life then you should die in prison

 

[John Dorian]

i think that it was a tragic accident, but one that he only has himself to blame. his punishment was just, he's made a mistake that caused a lot of of deaths but now the press should just let it go.

 

[Safeway]

i think that it was a tragic accident, but one that he only has himself to blame. his punishment was just, he's made a mistake that caused a lot of of deaths but now the press should just let it go.

I agree. Of course he shouldn't have fallen asleep at the wheel, that IS negligence, especially after he was allegedly chatting on the internet all night before (ring any bells with anyone on here?).

However, can you just imagine what the whole episode has done to him inside? He's got to carry on for the rest of his life knowing he's killed five people. That must be utter torment. To be honest I wouldn't be surprised if he ended up topping himself.

Yes he should have been punished, and he has, but at the end of the day how long he spends in prison isn't going to make any difference to the people he's killed or their families.

 

[Albion Rob]

I think the issue isn't how lenient the law has been on Gary Hart but how lenient is with uninsured and unsafe drivrs. Gary Hart was a fool and the families have lost someone precious to them but to a degree he didn't know what he was doing.

A car is a lethal weapon. No doubt about it. There was a case at the start of the year of a man who knocked over and killed an eight-year-old boy. Because he wasn't drunk or driving fast he wasn't charged with any serious offences, just failing to stop at the scene of an accident, failing to report an accident and driving document offences. He was given a total of four months for these offences. He took the life of a child having never taken a test or been insured.

This is happening week on week. People are having their cars smashed up and people are being paralysed and killd but people are not being held to account well enough.

ANYONE caught driving without insurance or without a licence should get two years in jail. End of story. It is a dispicible act. It is pre-meditated and when you get in that car you know exactly what you're doing.


Nb: The guy who killed the youngster was also an illegal immigrant who got time on top of the driving offences for having a false passport. I didn't want to put that in earlier as I thought it might cloud things.

 

[Marc]

... long he spends in prison isn't going to make any difference to the people he's killed or their families.

disagree about the families bit, they will see the person whos responsible for the death of their loved one wandering around years before he's supposed to be aloud too. That will cause rage and anger against the supposed Law & Order system, for argument sake lets say he delibertaley murdered them and he was released halfway through his sentence....imagine what that would say to the families and indeed your own, People Can Get Away With Murder...basically.

In this case though yeah it will haunt him forever more, I'm arguing against the whole point of having a sentance when convicts never see them out because they are released early....wheres the justice in that?

 

[Incredigull]

At least we can rely on our justice system to put down a paedophile ex judge or two, can't we

 

[METALMICKY]

I would totally agree that too many sentences are not fully served. In this particular case though i though the sentence was steep and the witch hunt by the press was despicable. I also find curious the Parole Board statement which said "he no longer respresents a danger to the public". Funny i don't recall the prosecution suggesting he was a 'serial negligent driver' DOH!

I would totally agree with Albion Rob's comments on those without licences and insurance. Lock them up!

 

[trueblue]

He did wrong. One thing i hate about British law is that when you are given a 5 year jail sentance it does not mean 5 years. If you get 5 years you should serve 5 years, if you get life then you should die in prison

There's a practical reason people usually only stay in jail for about 2/3 of their full sentence. It gives the prison leverage to keep the inmates under control; if they misbehave, they will not be released early. It's amazing there's this fuss every time someone is released "early", when that is how the system works. Whether the initial sentence should be longer is is another matter...

 

[saltash seagull]

yes he did wrong but it was intentional it was accidential and could happen to anyone! i'v nearly fallen asleep on long journeys and have a certain amount of sympathy for the guy

 

[Albion Rob]

With all things like this there can be no real closure for any party. It's not like a murderer who kills and is then sentenced to do a very long time and the family of the victim can look at it and say "Well, at least he was caged for a long period", which must bring some relief.

In the Gary Hart case, all you've got is a man who stayed up late talking to a bird on the internet and thought he was ok to drive, which legally, I suppose he was because thre's no test for tiredness. He did something I would guess hundreds if not thousands do every day and ended up being directly responsible for the deaths of 10 people.

But where does the line lie? You can't lock the guy away forever because he had no intention of hurting a soul. But at the same time it must be impossibly hard to take for families who have lost someone they care about because Mr Hart was acting like a prat.

There is no middle ground on this one. No party can be in any way satisfied with any outcome in my opinion.

 

[Biscuit]

and 'dont dis dick knight...'

 

[graz126]

how many people on here have got up in a morning after a night out, and jumped into a car, slightly hung over?
that would be much worse, gary hart didnt even do that. he got up early for a job interview. to make things worse, i bet he never even got the job.
ok so somebody has to pay for killing those people. and it had to be him. but he has served his time. so he should be left alone.
i have fallen asleep at the wheel before. luckily enough nobody was injured. not even me. although there was nothing left of my car or the lampost i drove through, or the farmers fence i wrecked.
i had been doing 12hour shifts at work then had to travel 35 miles to get home. it was a boiling hot day. bang, the next thing i knew i staring down a lampost. very easily done and i can sympathise with gary hart. but i can only sympathise with the familys of lost loved ones even more.

 

[dougdeep]

He started out having had hardly any sleep in the previous 24 hours,he was an accident waiting to happen, he had total disregard for anyone else on the road.
As someone who drives for a living I wouldn't dream of starting a long journey without at least 7 hours sleep.