Naming and shaming
The Serious Organised Crime Agency (Soca) is, as its name implies, an organisation set up to deal with serious organised crime. The sort of people that it is supposed to be dealing with, drug gangs people traffickers and the like. These are the lowest of the low who require serious pursuit given that convicting them is so much more difficult than in the case of ordinary criminals. One of the steps which the agency wanted to take was to name and shame those serious criminals who were convicted. This was not purely a modern equivalent of the stocks whereby people are humiliated in public. The idea was that this would form some way of alerting the public and making it more difficult for criminals to operate effectively in future.
However, much to the apparent frustration of Stephen Lander, leader of Soca, has apparently been advised by its lawyers that naming and shaming the criminals could infringe their human rights, and in particular Article 8 of the Human Rights Convention, which protects the right to a family and private life. This notwithstanding that the convictions have been handed down in open court.
I will not attempt in this article to deal with the question of whether the view taken by the lawyers acting for Soca is correct. They have attained a particular view of a 2003 case involving Essex Police. However the issue should not be whether that is in fact what the law provides for. It should be whether the law should ever contemplate such a restriction on criminal agencies.
One of the serious defects of the Human Rights Act (whilst accepting that there are certain fundamental rights which need protecting) is the defensive way that institutions operate by reference to potential claims under the statute. In the age of "compensation culture" it is always likely to be the case that fear of litigation will mean that supposed rights mould responses in a way beyond that originally envisaged by the grant of the rights.
Whatever the cause, it is plainly unacceptable that there can be any fetter on criminals being exposed by government agencies. The right of people to be properly warned about the activities of such persons, and the right to avoid their own lives being adversely affected by their misdeeds, must trump any policy or family rights of the criminals concerned. Organised criminals and their gangs are the hardest of all to crack. They are also amongst the most despicable of criminals. Such criminals are also those from whom the public need the greatest protection possible. The idea that such criminals can hide behind some form of cloak of anonymity based upon their own rights or those of their families it is frankly ludicrous.
There is an unfortunate tendency for such rights to be seen in their fullest expression when invoked on behalf of the criminal rather than the ordinary member of the public. For human rights to prosper, such an impression must cease forthwith. Whether by specific and principled derogation from the statute (to the extent that it is necessary) or otherwise, it is important that naming and shaming and other relevant steps are taken necessary to protect the public against the depredations of criminals. Human rights are not the preserve of the wrongdoer. Properly expressed, they should be used to protect the law abiding majority. Whilst criminals have human rights too, theirs should never extend to preventing identification of them and their crimes, still less in favour of organised crime and criminals.