Kilo's Killer Walks in a Lark but the Joke Is on the Disgraceful English Judicial System

"Laugh, laugh, I thought I'd die.
It seemed so funny to me."
-- Ron Elliott

Sixteen-year-old bete noire Jessica was laughing her silly head off on the morning of February 9th when she boarded the HMS Belfast and tossed unsuspecting Kilo to his death in the Thames. (See photo above.)

She laughed throughout her recent trial before District Judge Sue Green in Camberwell Youth Court. This was in spite of being positively identified as Kilo's killer by security guard Steve Laceby. (See Cat Defender post of November 10, 2008 entitled "London Teenager, Convicted of Killing HMS Belfast's Kilo, Also Is Unmasked as a Remorseless Liar and Drunkard.")

Consequently, it did not come as any surprise that she also was yukking it up at her sentencing on November 14th. As things turned out, she certainly had good reason for her unbridled mirth.

Sentenced only to nine-months of supervision and ordered to pen a letter of apology to the grief-stricken crew of the HMS Belfast, she probably still is splitting her sides at Green's imbecility. "I don't know what to say," she later confessed to the BBC on November 14th. (See "Ship's Cat Girl Told to Apologize.") "I'm sorry for what happened."

Nevertheless, she perhaps should be given some consideration for at least making that much of a concession. After all, it is rather difficult to be contrite while simultaneously parroting the Beau Brummels' Ron Elliott:

"Laugh, laugh, I thought I'd die.
It seemed so funny to me."

Green, who could have done both cats and society a huge favor by locking up the yob for six months and fining her twenty-five-thousand pounds, instead ludicrously recommended that she spend part of her probationary period working on the HMS Belfast and with animals. The only good that possibly could ever come out of such an absurd arrangement would be if one of the crew took matters into his own hands and tossed her overboard into the Thames.

Although Green was totally unwilling to punish Jessica, she laid on the phony-baloney moral indignation with a trowel for the benefit of court watchers and the media. "The offense is one which has caused enormous distress not merely to staff of HMS Belfast but a lot of right-minded members of the public who were upset by your disgraceful behavior," the BBC reported her as lecturing the defendant.

Green's thoroughly disgraceful abdication of her responsibility to enforce the animal cruelty statutes drew the immediate ire of Moggies. "This is an absolute disgrace! So-called British justice has failed miserably to allow this teenager to go free, especially with the contempt she has shown is just not right," the organization stated on its web site.

"The judge should be barred from ever presiding over a court again," it continued. "And why is she (the convict) allowed to be anonymous? She should be named and shamed."

While that definitely would be a step in the right direction, it probably would not have much of an impact upon an individual as far gone as Jessica. What she needs is a good public horsewhipping.

Prosecutor Scott Jarmy was equally perturbed by Green's idiotic ruling. "We were hoping for a brief custodial sentence," he told the BBC in the article cited supra. "She showed contempt for the legal process by laughing during the trial and today (during sentencing) but hopefully she will learn from what happened."

Au contraire, the only thing that she is going to take away from this experience is an abiding belief that crime pays. More to the point, it was not she that made a mockery of the law, but rather Green.

In The Laws, Plato wrote that individuals are conditioned to be good citizens through a system of rewards and punishments. In other words, those who harm society must be punished while those who contribute to the common good should be rewarded.

By that yardstick, most modern societies are miserable perversions. Not only are evildoers seldom punished but those who obey the laws are looked upon as dunces.

Even such latter-day thinkers as Friedrich Nietzsche decried the unwillingness of western societies to punish criminals. Under such aberrant conditions it is not surprising that countries such as England and the United States are falling apart at the seams.

A spokeswoman for Kilo's former haunt, the Battersea Dogs and Cats Home, did the best that she could in order to put a good face on an atrocious ruling. "We are pleased that the culprit was apprehended and convicted in court for this awful act of animal cruelty," she told the BBC.

Although the crew of the HMS Belfast has received letters of condolence from around the world, to date they have not publicly commented on whether they will welcome Jessica back aboard. Hopefully, they will demur because to do so would be an affront to Kilo's memory.

Besides, the crew may have adopted another cat and the last person that they would want anywhere near it would be Jessica.

Photo: HMS Belfast.