London

Just another news day in our great capital.

The elderly commuter fighting for his life after being attacked on a train.

A man was seriously injured when he was attacked by three passengers on a train in south-east London. It is believed the victim, aged 61, was knocked unconscious when he was pushed from the train as it stopped at West Dulwich station at 2140 GMT on Monday.
A doctor treated him at the scene before emergency crews took him to King's College Hospital - he has since been transferred to another hospital. A 19-year-old man from Brixton has been arrested by police.

The woman who crashed her car - and the Bad Samaritans.

Two "Good Samaritans" who went to the "aid" of a dazed woman motorist after she crashed her car stripped her before trying to rape her, police revealed today. Cops were alerted by passing motorists who spotted the distressed 42-year-old woman semi-naked at the side of the road late on Tuesday night.

Police said "It appears at this early stage that the 42-year-old woman had been driving along nearby Carterhatch Lane when she was in collision with a traffic island. It is alleged that two men, driving separate vehicles, had offered to assist the woman before getting her away from her damaged vehicle and sexually assaulting her in Theobolds Park Road, near the entrance to Wildwoods House. Police arrived at the scene and two men, aged 25 and 38 years, were arrested in connection with attempted rape. They remain in custody at north London police stations."

Reminded me of about ten years back when a young woman accepted a lift in London one night. I can't recall, but I think she might have come down from the sticks for a concert. She was raped and dumped in the street in South London at 3 am. She stopped the first people she saw for help. They raped her too.

Apparently not enough people are welfare dependent.

More people are being encouraged to claim state benefits. Lambeth council plans to spend £220,000 of council tax payers’ cash on a campaign to encourage more people to claim welfare.

The seventeen year old who stabbed a mother to death gets ten years. A cautionary tale of the company you find yourself in when you mix business - welfare officer at a centre for excluded children - with pleasure - sleeping with 'a former pupil at the centre'.

But funnily enough it's this one that bothers me most. No dead, just an eighteen year old beaten up in his own bedroom and having his nose broken after someone kicked the front door down.

Joseph Boxall pleaded guilty to inflicting actual bodily harm at Dartford Magistrates' Court on February 12. He also pleaded guilty to using violence to secure entrance to a premises.
Boxall was given 200 hours' community service and ordered to pay £400 to David Alexander for the injuries he suffered. He will also have to pay £150 to Allan Alexander for the damage to the door.

200 hours community service ? It's a good job they're only sending violent people to prison, isn't it ?


UPDATE - I blogged the other day about the Lord Chief 'Justice' and his decision to slash sentences because the jails were full, speculating about the superbly named Trigger Seed's crime.

Glassing the girlfriend, according to the Guardian. Apparently it 'slipped out of his hand'.