
20 wks in prison! He's a kid for fucks sake!
oh come on, a slap on the wrist maybe, but fucking up his life over such a trivial matter is insane.
The owner of a firm involved in sending speculative invoices to suspected downloaders is in trouble of his own after being convicted of a brutal assault on an Uber driver outside an exclusive London members-only club. Robert Croucher, MD of consultancy Hatton & Berkeley, wept in the dock after being found guilty of pushing …
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If the joke is meant to be referencing whines over copyright conviction then the law applies to all equally. The age ofg criminal responsibilty starts at age 10. Whether you are 20 or 40 you don't go kicking someone and you don't go ripping off some musician, photog, or film maker either.
Being a director of some company is no excuse, and neither is Aspergers, or Hipsterism.
oh come on, a slap on the wrist maybe, but fucking up his life over such a trivial matter is insane.
Yes, yes, I get it, thank you, but this gent physically assaulted someone for not bowing to "his grace the company owner", and for that said company owner will get some education in jail. There's IMHO only one thing worse than entitled pricks, and that's drunk entitled pricks.
That said, he's at least consistent in his attitude: his company values include We never compromise whilst some may bend: for us compromise is unacceptable. Yes, quite. Moron.
Thumbs up for Raffles staff wearing bodycams.
Too bloody righ6 he got off lightly.
As soon as you kick someone on the ground in the head, it's gone beyond a 'drunken brawl' into psychopathic potential murder. And from readeing the article, he would have continued if it wasn't for the door staf.
Also:
"This will destroy my life, I am the director of a company and everyone would lose their jobs. We have 1,000 clients, we have staff all around the country, and it would die," he protested before being sentenced, the Daily Telegraph reports.
No, if it's true, then you destroyed the company, all by yourself. This shows a total lack of remorse, and taking resposibility for his actions. He's tring to make out he's the victim. Classic psychopathic traits.
Sorry I will ignore the reference (if you had any confidence in your humour you wouldn't have hidden anyway)
He fucked his own life up
Ever had to look after somebody who has only had a couple of kicks in the head, no I thought not.
Land somebody on the ground then kick them in the head is a damn good reason for somebody to go to prison.
To plead mercy because you make money and should be exempt from the law is insane. To consider such a vicious attack "a trivial matter" is insane. What he got was indeed a slap on the wrist. The next time someone beats the crap out of you, I suggest you appeal to the judge to let your attacker off with a written warning if this bothers you.
I only wish that defendants who plead for mercy on the grounds of "it will destroy my life" or "I own businesses and it will cause my employees to lose their jobs" would get a BIGGER sentence because of that instead of often a lighter one.
Basically he was arguing that people on the bottom of society should get harsher punishment for committing the same crime he did because they have less to lose, which is the exact opposite of how it should be. What an utter twat!
To sum up:
Bob here makes a career ruining people's lives with speculative invoices, gets pissed up and risks ruining someone's life by repeatedly kicking them in the head and then whines that a custodial sentence will ruin his life.
Not only is Bob's moral compass completely fucked up his irony meter seems pretty broken too.
He'd better make sure he never drops the soap.
Sadly he'll only do a few nights in proper clink. Because the Home Office don't have enough real jail capacity he'll quickly be classified as a low risk white collar type, and be transferred to an open prison, and he'll be out on day release in about three weeks, and the sentence will be rolled back to release on parole after nine or ten weeks.
Personally I don't think that's much punishment given that he conducted an unprovoked assault with clear potential to be fatal, but the judge doesn't have much leeway because of the HO sentencing guidelines.
I suspect the punishment that will really hurt is being blacklisted from all the upmarket clubs, and I'm sure that has already happened - they all know each other.
I suspect it's also far from certain he'll be able to use another Uber cab - or even a normal black cab. There's a reason they put his picture in the article ..
The fines are also a joke if he's telling truth about owning three properties in Mayfair. He'll find the £615 down the back of his sofa.
I think there is much to be admired in the nordic fine model. Link the charge to earnings, so someone earning the UK average of around £25k may pay £500 but somone making £1 million would pay £20,000 (0.02% of gross salary)
He'll probably do eight weeks in a category B prison, then a month on a tag that monitors his location so he's under a curfew. Crimes against the person means he won't be eligible for an open prison - cat B means almost total lockdown in pretty squalid conditions. (Posting anonymously as I speak from experience).
"Because the Home Office don't have enough real jail capacity he'll quickly be classified as a low risk white collar type"
This is ABH. He's not going to be classified as low risk anytime soon - and if the entitled wanker gets out early you can guarantee he'll feel that it gives him free rein to do it again.
Much as I'd like to see him go in for longer, it's a first offence and sentencing guidelines don't allow it unless he caused permanent injuries. On the other hand _next_ time he won't be let off so easily - and there _will_ be a next time (may have been previous times, but CCTV not around to capture it).
"Even scum don't deserve jokes about male rape."
I have to agree. This unpleasant trend seems to have come from the US where a vengeful attitude to criminal justice is common.
The late Auberon Waugh had a much better idea; send violent criminals to a remote Scottish island where they would have to live on a diet of organic brown rice and vegetables and learn Buddhism and meditation.
'The late Auberon Waugh had a much better idea; send violent criminals to a remote Scottish island where they would have to live on a diet of organic brown rice and vegetables and learn Buddhism and meditation.'
And live with the consequences of near-terminal communal flatulence? Sounds like a fitting punishment.
"send [them] to a remote Scottish island where they would have to live on a diet of organic brown rice and vegetables and learn Buddhism and meditation."
I'm a vegetarian and like to spend holidays on Scottish islands. Sounds like fun to me!
"DUI is less reprehensible than assault,"
Speaking as a person who has lost a friend to a drunk driver... I find that kind of statement utterly ignorant.
Driving under the influence is far worse, because if you hit some one it's basically assault with a deadly 2 ton weapon which is far more likely to result in death. Deciding to drive drunk is intentionally going out equipped with a deadly weapon which should be classed as premeditated.
Sentences for those types of scum are ridiculously low, that texting truck driver who was jailed for 7yrs last week for killing some one got of light in my book.
Meanwhile my friend had to suffer being burnt to death as her car exploded on impact and the scumbag who killed her got 2yrs. 20 weeks for assault simply isn't close to being good enough.
I have zero tolerance for the kinds of people who think drinking/texting whilst driving is acceptable.. they're all scum in my book.
Go through it again, slowly. The light may yet dawn. All the magistrate really said, the sentence was already handed down, was, in effect, "tough." She might very well have been pissed off, but all she told the whining little *&^% was that she was not going to change her mind. He clearly had not learned to grovel properly. If he is equally stupid inside, he may have a really different life when he leaves.
A human being (yes a magistrate is still a human being) is perfectly entitled to have feelings and express their views. As this was after sentencing this comment was entirely appropriate. It's if they say it before hearing all of the evidence you should be worried. She was damn right too.
""Get used to life being different" sounds like the magistrate was pissed off."
Well.. Given we only get to see the little snippet, we have no idea how obnoxious the little toad was during his trial.
"Yes, many will be pissed off hearing how the jerk acted... but: A magistrate should remain impartial (the blind justice and all)... emotive statements like that worry me."
And you assume that being less than detached when responding to the reaction to his sentence, somehow indicated a lack of impartiality?
People can compartmentalise. Get used to people being capable of complex behaviour.
" we have no idea how obnoxious the little toad was during his trial."
I've only ever seen judges make comments like this when the answer is "extremely".
That said she complied with sentencing guidelines so he's going to have no grounds for appeal to lighten the length of it and if he keeps that attitude up he won't get early release.
Zero fucks given here about his future.
If you have a bit of time on your hands you could amuse yourself by browsing his company website. I've rarely seen such a pile of flannel in a slick wrapper (if you ignore the jarring grammatical errors and the occasional missing link).
The 'Our History' page is particularly cloying. A load of nothing about nothing.
Saying as I'm one of these sad individuals that reads the small print, have a look at the bottom of the page: "The Company is limited by guarantee and does not provide services to clients"
The company was incorporated on 25th April 2016, so I'm not sure how the history section manages to include a "rebranding" in 2015.
He has been a director of various other companies in the past, but they all seem to be either dormant companies, or companies that were dissolved before the first set of accounts were filed.
This will destroy my life, I am the director of a company and everyone would lose their jobs. We have 1,000 clients, we have staff all around the country, and it would die
"We had 1000 clients" might turn out to be more accurate. If they have an integrity they will dissociate themselves from this hooligan before his first week of incarceration is over.
We can hope so, anyway...
If the business folds it might be hard on the other employees but they can always claim constructive dismissal, if having an arsehole for an MD is an allowable criterion.
"We had 1000 clients" might turn out to be more accurate. If they have an integrity they will dissociate themselves from this hooligan before his first week of incarceration is over.
The letter writing his company was involved in suggests that quite a number of those clients won't be too bothered about his incarceration on account of being on the shady side themselves. As a matter of fact, it may badge him as "one of us" to those clients and open doors at the likes of MPAA and all.
Trouble is, that kind of pleading often works, e.g. the the texting driver who eventually killed someone (mentioned in an earlier post) was let off seven times and allowed to keep his licence because he claimed he would lose his job if he was banned.
My response to such BS would be "Hard luck matey, you should've thought of that before you did what you did."
"e.g. the the texting driver who eventually killed someone (mentioned in an earlier post) was let off seven times and allowed to keep his licence because he claimed he would lose his job if he was banned."
I've always thought that if you were driving for a living the expected standards to which you're held should be higher, simply because you're presenting yourself as being a professional and also, of course, because you spend more time driving and the risk you present to the public is directly proportional to that time.
A comparison would be along the lines of someone complaining of a headache and his mate advising a couple of aspirin - unless the mate is a medic who should be aware of possible serious causes of the headache.
A google shows over 100 companies registered at no. 43 so it appears to be an accommodation address.
Co.s House shows nearly a dozen with Mr. Crouch as a current/former Director.
What caught my eye was a change of directors name for one of them, Robert Edwin Crouch became Robert Crouch, there may be a very good reason for this but it seemed a bit odd.
Google appears to be sanitised, for a bunch of people (Meet the Team) in the media business they sure have a light footprint.
'Co.s House shows nearly a dozen with Mr. Crouch as a current/former Director.
What caught my eye was a change of directors name for one of them, Robert Edwin Crouch became Robert Crouch, there may be a very good reason for this but it seemed a bit odd.'
:%s/Crouch/Croucher/g
My model M seems to have a build up of pastry crumbs under the keys (again)
I side with those aghast at the light sentence. Kicking someone in the head while they are at your mercy is ATTEMPTED HOMICIDE; probably attempted murder, considering this low-life initiated violence in response to an innocuous situation.
Only in cartoons can you kick people in the head or slug them on the crown with the butt of a handgun and assume the result is going to be only a headache. In real life these are actions with likely lethal or maiming (fractured neck) results.
Too bad the court didn't use copyright arithmetic...
If it had, it would have been 20 weeks for every kick multiplied by the number reporters using a downloaded video... and the result multiplied by the potential downloads of the video...
I think that comes out to something around 100 years...
So just to be clear on the consequences of violent assault:
My stepdaughter's 16 year old boyfriend was beaten up and kicked in the head. Several days in hospital and a head like a watermelon.
At 18 he started to have motor problems and was diagnosed as having neurological damage.
At 20 he has MS, 'probably brought on by the trauma of the blows to the head'.
At 22 he's permanently in a wheelchair and unable to fully function.
And did I mention he was a very bright student with a good career ahead of him?
So that's effectively someone's life taken for a kick in the head.
20 weeks?
This is absolutely outrageous. We had someone try to join our company last year who had a conviction for assault. We considered him reformed and he would have been an asset to the department but we were told we couldn't employ him because the company had a duty of care to protect the other employees and they would be considered negligent if they employed him with a history of violent crime and he later assaulted someone.
I just looked at the Government site for what would disqualify a person as a company director. It's all financial and record keeping stuff. Unless I missed something, someone could have committed the murder of a co-worker, get out of prison today and go straight out and become the director of a company. It really is "one rule for them and another for us."
There's nothing preventing you from being director of your own company, and given you've seen how it can be tricky for someone with a previous conviction to get a job, forming their own company and working for themselves might be the only option they have. The restrictions on directorship are to prevent people using their company (in particular, the limited liability bit) to defraud.
There's no "us and them" here at all: owning a small company is nothing special, I'm on my seventh I think, and three of those never did a thing. Half the people posting here will have at least one.
"forming their own company and working for themselves might be the only option they have"
You know you can be a sole trader - no need to form a limited company (unless you intend to siphon off assets and wind it up with big debts...not that anybody would be so naughty.)
According to official statistics around 70% of self employed are sole traders or partnerships, under 30% were limited companies needing directors.
"This will destroy my life, I am the director of a company and everyone would lose their jobs. We have 1,000 clients, we have staff all around the country, and it would die," he protested before being sentenced, the Daily Telegraph reports.
You are the director of a company, so what. What does that have to do with kicking someone in the head?
If the company goes under you did it to yourself and all your staff.
You should and take responsibility for your actions.