Tv Raid Copycat

A masked schoolboy held up a Chinese takeaway to copy raiders on television’s Crimewatch UK, a court heard yesterday. ‘I just wanted to be chased like the villains (злодеи) on the telly (телик),’ said the 13 –year-old.

Nicholas Gareth Jones, prosecuting, said the youngster (юнец) terrified the takeaway staff with a fake gun. The boy, of Rumney, South Glamorgan, was found guilty of attempted robbery by a juvenile court.

Yesterday he appealed against the conviction at Cardiff Crown Court. ‘I told the woman it was just a toy gun,’ he said. ‘I wouldn’t have taken any money.’ But Judge John Rutter increased his sentence from 12 to 24 hours at an attendance center.

1. A copycat crime is one where the criminal copies another crime. In this case, the boy copied a crime he had seen on Crimewatch UK, a TV program that shows crimes re-enacted by actors and asks witnesses to the real crimes to give information about them to the police. ‘Villain’ is an informal word for … and ‘telly’ is an informal word for … .

2. Which two words indicate that the gun used in the robbery was not real?

3. From the boy’s point of view, what were the extenuating circumstances?

4. – Did the judge sq… the conviction? – …, he d… the appeal and increased the sentence, perhaps because he thought the original sentence was too l … .

Capital punishment

death sentence, death penalty, capital penalty, execution. condemn to death,

death row, show/grant clemency, commute, put to death, execute.

Punishment for certain crimes in some places is the death sentence, also known as the death penalty, capital penalty or execution.

Prisoners who have been condemned to death and are waiting for the penalty to be carried out are on death row. They may appeal on a court or someone in authority to show or grant clemency and commute their sentence: to change it to one of life imprisonment.

If appeals for clemency are rejected, the prisoner is put to death or executed.

1. Debating the death penalty. This report about a vote in the British House of Commons on restoring or reintroducing the death penalty (in Britain traditionally by hanging) comes from the BBC. Answer the questions as you read.

Hanging Vote

The last judicial hanging in Britain was back in 1964. But every two years or so, supporters of capital punishment make an attempt to persuade the Commons (представители Палаты общин) to bring back the death penalty. The latest, on Monday, saw the most emphatic (категорический) rejection yet of the arguments for bringing back the hangman. The Common voted by a ratio of two to one that courts should not be able to sentence convicted murderers to death. Such a decisive vote will settle the matter for some years.

1. Which two words in the instruction above the article mean the same as ‘bring back’ in the context?

2. Is an emphatic rejection a) a strong rejection, or b) a weak rejection? What two-word expression in this paragraph confirms this? What two-word expression in the last paragraph below also refers to the strength or weakness of the rejection?

But inevitably, sooner or later the hanging lobby will make another attempt to amend the law.

3. If the House of Commons amends the law, does it a) change it, or b) confirm it?

For while MPs have turned their backs on the biblical doctrine of ‘an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth’, among the general public there’s strong support for the death penalty. This was one of the main arguments used by supporters of the death penalty during the Commons debate. Not only would the return of the rope reflect public opinion, it was argued, it would also act as a deterrent to criminals and cut down on the number of murders.

4. Two expressions have been used since the beginning of the report meaning the reintroduction of hanging. Neither of them use the word ‘hanging’. What are the two expressions?

5. If you deter someone from doing something, do you a) encourage them to do it, or b) discourage them from doing it?

The anti-hanging lobby argues on practical grounds – that there’s no evidence that the death penalty functions as a deterrent – and on moral grounds, that the state has no right to deprive its citizens of the right to live.

6. Does a deterrent dissuade people from doing something?

The arguments have been well rehearsed (rehearse повторять) over the years. But the most compelling argument (убедительный аргумент), and the one which most contributed to the enormous majority against hanging in Monday’s vote, is the possibility of a miscarriage of justice (судебная ошибка). The ‘Guildford Four’ – jailed in the mid-seventies for IRA bombings it later transpired they did not commit – might well have been hanged if the death penalty had still been in force.

7. What can be rehearsed, apart from an argument?

8. If an argument is compelling, is it a) a very strong one, or b) a very weak one?

9. If there is a miscarriage of justice, are the people who are punished guilty?

Here are some legal verbs. Learn them and do the exercise after it.

to abrogate a law/treaty to bring a law/treaty to an official end

to bend the law/rules to break the law/rules in a way that is considered not to be harmful

to contravene a law to break a law

to impeach a president/governor to make a formal statement saying that a person in public office has committed a serious offence

to infringe someone’s rights to prevent a person doing what they are legally allowed to do

to lodge an appeal to make an official appeal

to uphold/overturn a verdict to say that a previous decision was correct/incorrect

to pervert the course of justice to put obstacles in the way of justice being done

to quash a decision/conviction to change a previous official decision/conviction

to set a precedent to establish a decision which must, in English law, be taken into account in future decisions

to award/grant custody to to give one parent or adult the main responsibility for a child, especially after separation or divorce

to annul a marriage/agreement/law to declare that it lo longer exists and never existed.