Laura Young - Potter Derby Solicitors

Prisoners in England and Wales could earn early release under Texas-style shake up

Leave a Comment / Criminal Law, HMP / Laura Young

The government is considering a major overhaul of the prison system, where prisoners may need to earn their freedom through “good behaviour credits” rather than being automatically released after a set period. This approach follows a similar scheme in Texas, where prisoners can reduce the length of their sentences by earning credits for good behaviour […]

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Watchdog says police unprepared for scale of riots

Leave a Comment / Court, Criminal Law / Laura Young

Police were unprepared for the scale of disorder that broke out in part of the UK following the Southport knife attacks, a police watchdog has found. Police intelligence did not predict the “rising tide of violent disorder well enough”, according to the review of their response to the worst UK unrest in more than a

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Keir Announces Plans For ‘New’ Crime of Drink Spiking

Leave a Comment / Criminal Law / Laura Young

In a very recent post to the social media account, the under fire Prime Minister Mr Keir Starmer announced “Spiking will be made a criminal offence. My Government was elected to take back our streets. Central to this mission is making sure woman and girls can feel safe at night. Perpetrators of spoking will feel

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Crown Court Backlog could hit 100,000 cases without radical overhaul

Leave a Comment / Court, Criminal Law / Laura Young

The backlog of cases in crown courts in England and Wales could hit 100,000 unless radical action is taken to overhaul the criminal justice system, a watchdog has said. Anthony Rogers, the chief inspector of the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) and Serious Fraud Office (SFO), said prosecutors’ caseloads were already beyond what had been seen before and he feared

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Magistrates sentencing powers to double again

Leave a Comment / Criminal Law, HMP / Laura Young

The lord chancellor has announced that magistrates will have their sentencing powers increased, after a previous abandoned attempt by the last government Shabana Mahmood MP confirmed the plans to allow magistrates to issue custodial sentences for up to 12 months for a single offence – a doubling of their current powers. The government claims the

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Magistrates could give longer sentences under new proposals

Leave a Comment / Court, Criminal Law / Laura Young

Magistrates in England and Wales could be given powers to hand down longer custodial sentences under proposals to help reduce the backlog in crown courts and prisons. The move could allow magistrates to try more serious crimes, and double the maximum punishments handed out for an offence from six to 12 months, helping a system

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Is There to be a Reversal in the Trend of Huge Sentence Increases?

Leave a Comment / Court, Criminal Law / Laura Young

It cannot have gone unnoticed, that sentence lengths in the Crown Court have increased exponentially in recent years. Sentences of over 30 years for drug convictions were, only five years ago, almost unheard of. Not so now. Figures released in 2024 show that there has been an average sentence length increase from 14.5 months to

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Prison Population hits record high in England and Wales

Leave a Comment / Criminal Law, HMP / Laura Young

The prison population of England and Wales has hit a record high after rising by nearly 1,000 in four weeks. Labour has also activated Operation Early Dawn in parts of England and Wales where defendants will be summoned to a magistrates court only when a space in prison is available. The sharp increase is believed to have been driven

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Potter Derby Solicitors awarded Family Legal Aid Contract

Leave a Comment / Uncategorized / Laura Young

Potter Derby Solicitors are delighted to announce that we have been awarded a legal aid contract to undertake family law work. We will be taking family law instructions from 1 September 2024. Further information will follow in due course.

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Labour Government Civil Unrest Announcement – Defence Lawyers Response

Leave a Comment / Criminal Law / Laura Young

On Thursday 01 August, and Sunday 04 August, during addresses to the nation, the Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced he was establishing a ‘National Capability’ force to deal with those involved in the violent protests engulfing England and Northern Ireland. This would include extra police officers, courts running 24 hours a day, and prison spaces

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