The law is an ass, is it not? And, that being the case, it can lead to a travesty of justice. Take the case of Peter Sullivan. In 1986, he was convicted and jailed for the brutal murder of florist Diane Sindall. Peter Sullivan had always maintained his innocence (okay, so do most convicts), but this time it was for real. Because after spending nearly forty years inside, his murder conviction was quashed by the Court of Appeal and on Tuesday 13th May he became a free man. Clearly, there was a miscarriage of justice. You would think, would you not, that after all this time being incarcerated, separated from family and friends, losing your liberty and livelihood, the innocent would be financially compensated. As I have said in previous articles on this subject, some get some compensation, and others get nothing at all.
For Peter Sullivan, now age 68, for all his trials and tribulations, the most he might expect to get from the State is one million pounds. That’s the cap for such a miscarriage of justice payout. You may think that’s a lot of dosh. And indeed, to you and me, it is. But to someone whose life was basically wasted behind bars, it doesn’t amount to much.
Not when you think about people like 36-year-old burglar Steven Wilson, who last September was awarded £5.4 million by the High Court for ‘life changing’ injuries he suffered after he was stabbed while working in the prison canteen in 2018. And that’s not all. Take the case of Ryan St George. A convict. He fell out of an upper bunk bed during a seizure, and he received £4.7 million in damages for his brain injury in 2012.
These are very different circumstances from Peter Sullivan. Peter Sullivan was an innocent man. These two were not. They had every right to be in jail. I am not saying they should not have received compensation at all, or at that level. But the law is an ass if they can award such astronomical amount of money to actual criminals who committed offences to put them in jail in the first place and yet think it’s okay to offer a derisory sum to those who, through no fault of their own, find themselves locked away behind bars. For decades.
It must be said that this is not just about money, as no amount of money can compensate a wrongful conviction, a wasted life, and being branded a murderer. This is about the State recognising the harm they have done.
