ISSUE
Friday, August 15, 2025
Volume 16 . Issue 72
The Indian community’s disappointment and disgust at the sentence handed to the man who attacked senior citizen Jasmatbhai Patel that led to his instant death in a mindless road rage incident on April 7 is completely understandable. The accused has been sentenced to a mere three years of imprisonment in which period the months he has spent in custody since his arrest is included.
It is no surprise either that the larger community has come to share that feeling of helplessness and dismay as well, with the Sensible Sentencing Trust, which has long campaigned for harsher sentencing for serious crimes as a potent deterrent, described the punishment as “pathetic”.
Though the authorities dole out all kinds of statistics from time to time trying to prove that crime is under control, public perception is quite the opposite. And sentences like the one handed in Jasmatbhai’s case only prove to reinforce the community’s justifiable belief that it emboldens potential criminals into committing serious crimes.
Law and order was a major issue, at least in Auckland and particularly among the migrant communities, in the lead up to last year’s elections. Over 10,000 people in Manukau city had joined a march to highlight the plight of ordinary citizens to serious crime following the carjacking of a woman in a mall car park.
The National Party had promised a stricter law and order regime on which it has only partially delivered. It has increased numbers in the police force and while that may go some way in addressing street crime, the question of bringing in greater deterrence by awarding far more stringent sentencing has been neglected so far.
Rather than giving the sentence in the present case a racial colour, as some people in the community are wont to do, it would be far more useful to continue bringing ever increasing pressure on the government until it acts. Migrant groups must join forces with likeminded organisations like the Sensible Sentencing Trust in urging the government to act urgently and decisively.
We share the anguish of the community, particularly of Jasmatbhai’s family, that must come to terms with this travesty that can never ever measure up to their unfathomable sense of loss.
The Indian community’s disappointment and disgust at the sentence handed to the man who attacked senior citizen Jasmatbhai Patel that led to his instant death in a mindless road rage incident on April 7 is completely understandable. The accused has been sentenced to a mere three years of...
The Indian community’s disappointment and disgust at the sentence handed to the man who attacked senior citizen Jasmatbhai Patel that led to his instant death in a mindless road rage incident on April 7 is completely understandable. The accused has been sentenced to a mere three years of imprisonment in which period the months he has spent in custody since his arrest is included.
It is no surprise either that the larger community has come to share that feeling of helplessness and dismay as well, with the Sensible Sentencing Trust, which has long campaigned for harsher sentencing for serious crimes as a potent deterrent, described the punishment as “pathetic”.
Though the authorities dole out all kinds of statistics from time to time trying to prove that crime is under control, public perception is quite the opposite. And sentences like the one handed in Jasmatbhai’s case only prove to reinforce the community’s justifiable belief that it emboldens potential criminals into committing serious crimes.
Law and order was a major issue, at least in Auckland and particularly among the migrant communities, in the lead up to last year’s elections. Over 10,000 people in Manukau city had joined a march to highlight the plight of ordinary citizens to serious crime following the carjacking of a woman in a mall car park.
The National Party had promised a stricter law and order regime on which it has only partially delivered. It has increased numbers in the police force and while that may go some way in addressing street crime, the question of bringing in greater deterrence by awarding far more stringent sentencing has been neglected so far.
Rather than giving the sentence in the present case a racial colour, as some people in the community are wont to do, it would be far more useful to continue bringing ever increasing pressure on the government until it acts. Migrant groups must join forces with likeminded organisations like the Sensible Sentencing Trust in urging the government to act urgently and decisively.
We share the anguish of the community, particularly of Jasmatbhai’s family, that must come to terms with this travesty that can never ever measure up to their unfathomable sense of loss.
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