By NAOMI LARKIN
Longer sentences and more preventive detention are not the cure-all for violent crime, say lawyers.
Their comments follow the outcry by family of murdered journalist Kylie Jones over the sentencing of Taffy Hotene. They believe Hotene should have been given a longer sentence.
Hotene, aged 30, was sentenced to a minimum non-parole of 18 years for murdering Ms Jones on June 6.
He was also sentenced to preventive detention for raping Ms Jones, 12 years' jail for kidnapping her and nine years for aggravated robbery.
Hotene had been freed from jail two months before after serving eight years of a 12-year sentence for rape.
After the sentencing, the Minister of Corrections, Matt Robson, said the Government was addressing the need to detain serious violent criminals like Hotene through its Sentencing Reform Project.
This aimed to strengthen sentencing and parole rules and "keep dangerous inmates imprisoned until they are no longer a threat to the community."
But the president of the Barristers' Association, Auckland QC Stuart Grieve, said yesterday that while longer prison terms satisfied the public's desire for retribution, they were not the answer.
"It does provide a short-term solution because it keeps violent and serious offenders in custody for longer. But what benefit that has for rehabilitation, one would have to question."
More resources needed to be put into the primary services, such as education and health, he said. "You have to improve the lot of people from those sections of the community who are minded to commit crime."
Auckland criminal barrister Barry Hart said cases like Hotene's always revived a public call for harsher sentences, but the Parole Board was best suited to determine whether violent offenders should be released.
Criminal barrister Marie Dyhrberg said the law did not need to be tinkered with as the standard release after serving two-thirds of a sentence was an incentive for offenders to behave well in prison.
Justice Minister Phil Goff said the proposed legislation would provide courts with greater ability to keep those who posed a serious risk of reoffending "away for longer."
Hotene was released this year because he had served two-thirds of his sentence for attacks on three Wanganui women in 1992.
Mr Goff said the review would produce a new sentencing act, which he expected to be a draft bill by early next year.
Mr Robson, the Minister of Police, George Hawkins, and law commissioner Timothy Brewer are part of the review committee.
Lawyers question longer sentences
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