LIST OF CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
1. The murders committed by Stone caused
very real alarm and raised very difficult questions as to the
reconciliation of two powerful forces—the need to protect
the civil liberties of those who have not committed an offence;
and the need to protect society from the offence that they may
commit.
2. It would appear that the cumulative
effect of both recent legislation and recent court rulings will
be that an increasing number of dangerous people with severe personality
disorder will serve life sentences rather than fixed terms of
imprisonment.
3. There are obvious attractions in a
court order following conviction which sends the offender first
to prison for a number of years and then for treatment in a secure
clinical facility.
4. We conclude that substantial initial
expenditure will be needed for the future management of dangerous
people with severe personality disorder, irrespective of what
other changes are made in the law affecting them or the way the
facilities are organised. This is a
cost which, in the interests of public safety, we believe to be
justified.
5. The experience of the Netherlands,
in our opinion, supports the proposals in option B for managing
dangerous people in the UK.
6. We recommend that the Home Office
should publish the cost benefit analysis underlying its consideration
of the options proposed, including the implications of adopting
a TBS-type arrangement in the UK.
7. There are differing views and approaches
among medical professionals about treatment of dangerous people
with severe personality disorder.
8. We recommend that the Home Office,
the Department of Health and the Department for Education and
Employment should examine the costs and benefits of identifying
in early adolescence individuals who may develop a severe personality
disorder and become dangerous. It may well be that intervention
before the personality disorder becomes settled in the late teenage
years would have long-term benefits both for the individual and
for public protection.
9. We agree that a high standard of proof
should be required, but the phrase "beyond reasonable doubt"
cannot be meaningfully applied to diagnosis or prognosis in the
way it can to fact. It is never unreasonable to
doubt a prediction or a judgment. For this reason only, we do
not believe that it is a useful test.
10. We conclude that among the safeguards
which ought to be introduced is a regular opportunity for Parliament
to review the operation of any legislation to implement these
proposals.
11. We recommend that any legislation should
be subject to annual report to Parliament by a Commissioner and
annual renewal of the legislation by means of an order subject
to the affirmative procedure in each House.
12. We welcome the attention the Home Office
is paying to bringing victims of crime closer to the heart of
the criminal justice system. We endorse the suggestion that victims
or their next of kin should be able to make statements about the
effect a crime has had on them and for such a statement to be
attached to the case papers. We also believe that the arrangements
for informing and consulting victim's families under the Victim's
Charter should apply to individuals detained under the Mental
Health Act 1983 where appropriate.
13. We recommend that the proposals should
be applied to individuals only when an assessment predicts it
is almost certain that they will commit a very serious criminal
offence.
14. We recommend that continued detention
should be subject to regular review by a judicial body at stated
intervals—on the basis of multi-disciplinary assessment
and subject to independent medical opinion.
15. On balance we recommend that a separate
service as set out in option B is most likely to protect the public,
meet the needs of the individuals concerned and satisfy the requirements
of the European Convention on Human Rights.
16. We recommend that new powers to detain
dangerous people with a severe personality disorder should be
accompanied by the most stringent safeguards in order to satisfy
the requirements of the Europan Convention on Human Rights, as
well as the liberties traditionally protected by Parliament.
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