Parole Board congratulated on locking school girl killer away for a further 5 years

8th April 2016

The Parole Board has been congratulated for imposing a 5 year postponement order on the man who raped and murdered six-year-old Teresa Cormack.

Sensible Sentencing Founder, Garth McVicar said the murder of Teresa Cormack was one of the cases that motivated him to establish the Trust in 2001.

“I had followed a number of similar cases and was appalled at the pathetic sentences these killers were being given. Anyone who kills a child or murders an innocent person should be locked away for life but killers like Mikus were getting trivial sentences of ten years. That was not Justice in any shape or form and was incredibly cruel to the victims’ family!”

“I have four daughters and if anyone hurt one of my girls I would expect the perpetrator to be locked away for life, the law around the Teresa Cormack type situations was an absolute ass and needed to change.”

“The first thing SST did was push for longer sentences for murder; once that was achieved the next target was 3 year parole postponements. The latest push has been for 5 year postponement orders which have now been achieved and we congratulate the Parole Board for giving Mikus the harshest penalty they could give. At least this is a semblance of justice for Teresa’s family. Fantastic!”

McVicar said past and present members of Parliament should be hanging their heads in shame. “To have endorsed a criminal centred, offender friendly system that simply recycled offenders and regurgitated the hurt for victims’ families was incredibly cruel.”

“Nothing can bring Teresa back but a caring and compassionate society should ensure we give these families an opportunity to recover without the fear of annual parole hearings.”

“The Parole Board has done that today and SST sincerely thanks them.”

“Our thoughts are with Teresa’s family.”

ENDS

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