new thread
Sorry this is kind of off-topic.
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/22032006/140/ponytail-chopper-s-sentencing-abh.html
That's awesome. :D I totally agree with the court - doing anything to anyone's body without their consent is an attack on them and should be punished to the full extent of the law. She was totally right to press charges. So, if anyone dares to touch your hair, go to the police and have them locked away.
No, not off topic at all. Infact very relevant and interesting.
"removing someone's hair without an individual's consent amounted to bodily harm."
This line just sums it up. It is a criminal offence to cut off someone's hair without their consent and it can be regarded as a form of bodily harm.
I heard this on the radio earlier and was going to post it. Looks like you beat me to it.
And... if this happened to a man's ponytail then.. I doubt it will be the same. A guy who just got his ponytail hacked off without his consent would probably not get the same justice as the girl in that news story im my opinion.
NO means the same thing over here in the UK !!! As they cant not do that or its know as Sexed ! Its know as equal rights >
Peace Axel
I have to agree with you and think the situation would be different it was a man.
John.B
Except that the common law works by precedent, so by having a case with a girl (that the court would be more sympathetic to) it has set a precedent for a male victim
I agree with Elektros, who wrote that last paragraph. Courts tend to follow precedents, and making distinctions on the basis of sex is not now in vogue with the judiciary. There are some cases where a court would be very sympathetic to a male victim - for example if it happened to a well-known performer whose hair was part of his trademark and was featured prominently in his act. We are talking criminal liability here, not civil. In civil trials, courts are more apt to look at how damaging an act was to the victim, than they are in criminal trials. In a criminal trial the violent act itself is a crime against the peace and tranquility of the state - of the society - and in theory you get just as much time for killing a pauper as you get for killing a prince. We know it doesn't work that way completely, but the disparity in being dealt with is not as great as you might see in a civil trial (where the victim is suing the perpetrator for monetary damages).
Most mayhem or bodily harm offenses deal with damaging the victim's "body". The issue is not whether the victim is male or female, but whether hair is part of one's body. The permanent nature of the injury can be an element to the offense; in the realm of permanence, damage to a long hair style is more permanent than damage to a short hair style, and we may actually get more protection. An example of this would be a scratch on the face that healed in a week, versus one that left a scar that did not disappear for four years. Most courts would not see a one-week scratch as disfiguring but one visible for four years they would. Having someone lop off hair that would take four years to regrow could be seen as just as disfiguring.
There have not been a lot of cases on this topic because the act is actually quite rare. Unlike most crimes, there's no money to be made by the perpetrator of such a crime, so there's little motive to risk jail time for an act that would provide no gain. The dearth of cases of course is what causes this area of the law to be somewhat unclear.
Bill
