Citation

Pettigrew M. Int. J. Comp. Appl. Crim. Justice 2016; 40(3): 263-273.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2016, American Society of Criminology's Division of International Criminology, Publisher Informa - Taylor and Francis)

DOI

10.1080/01924036.2016.1184173

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Since the abolition of the death penalty, life imprisonment in England and Wales has had a literal meaning with exceptional rarity. Now though, in the rejection of perceived interference by the European Court of Human Rights in domestic sentencing, the politics of whole of life imprisonment have become exposed, specifically, in the widening applicability of the tariff to those who kill police officers or prison guards. Borrowing from the politics of capital punishment in the United States, in both "acting out" after a particular crime, and the prioritising of victim groups, the most severe penalty in England and Wales is increasingly beginning to mirror how the most severe punishment across the Atlantic is used, represented, and politicised.

Language: en