Doofus Of The Day #373

Today's award goes to the police and the Crown Prosecution Service in Northamptonshire, England.

A judge attacked police and prosecutors for incompetence that 'really takes the biscuit' after they failed to bring a self-confessed thief to court for four years.

Nicholas Greenhood, 32, was arrested in 2006 for stealing £160,000 of electrical goods from his workplace to fund his drug addiction.

But despite making a full confession four years ago, he heard nothing from police until they arrested him at his home in Milton Keynes, Bucks., in January this year.

Bungling officials from Northamptonshire Police and the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) had failed to issue the summons to bring the case to court.

Greenhood was living at his registered address paying tax and National Insurance, and was never 'on the run', Northampton Crown Court heard.

District Judge Richard Bray, sentencing Greenhood to 14 months imprisonment, labeled the handling of the case by police and CPS as a 'disgrace'.

He said: 'All this took place in 2006, what on earth's been going on for the past four years?

'I'm quite used to incompetence but this really takes the biscuit. I don't take this in a light-hearted spirit, this is a disgrace.

'Nothing surprises me now about the lapses and incompetence of prosecutions.'

There's more at the link.

If I'd been the judge, I'd have sentenced those responsible for the screw-up to serve the same jail sentence, in cells adjoining Mr. Greenhood's!

Bureaucrats! Grrr!





Peter