SICK WITH DISGUST
THE newspapers report the reaction of Mrs Vera Roberts and her 14-year-old son Jonathan to the four-year sentence on the man who killed Mrs Roberts's husband by drunken driving. Mrs Roberts said the sentence made her 'sick • with disgust'. Jonathan Roberts told Today, 'I would like to do something nasty to him. . . . I want him to suffer for the rest of his life like we're going to. When you murder someone then you deserve to be hated.' Today's front page headline was, 'Boy's hatred of drunk PC who mowed down father', and it was accompanied by a photograph of Jonathan Roberts with his arms around the cross on his father's grave. It would be unkind to attack the Robertses for every- thing that is wrong with what they have said: their suffering is great; but it is right to harry newspapers who print these and, recently, similar stories. Are we supposed to applaud the quoted remarks? Are we supposed to believe that victims or the relations of victims of crime should be the judges of the appropriate sentence? Are we invited to approve the association of a message of hatred with the Cross?
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