You’ve heard about the Joshua Robinson case, where the convicted sex predator was sentenced to a four-year jail term. There’s been a huge public outcry over the sentence, which many declared to be too lenient for the American MMA instructor whose stash of 5,902 obscene films (including 321 films of child pornography) was discovered upon a police raid of his apartment.
So much so that an online Change.org petition for a harsher sentence that was launched on Sunday (Mar 5) has already gained 17,440 supporters as of writing, and the numbers are rapidly increasing by the day.
Yesterday, speaking on the sidelines of a fundraising event, Minister for Law and Home Affairs K Shanmugam acknowledged the ‘public disquiet’ over Robinson’s four-year jail sentence, noting that people, especially parents, were ‘naturally upset’.
‘The decisions on which charges to proceed is a matter within AGC’s (Attorney-General’s Chambers) discretion. AGC makes the decisions based on precedents, and what kind of sentence is meted out depends on previous cases,’ he said. ‘Having said that, my understanding is that AGC is looking into this.’
He ended with a statement that he should personally refrain from commenting on the case, as the time for appeal has not ended.
