How much of these sentences will actually be served?
Not long enough to be a realistic deterrent.

Sentencing works like this.
1/ Up to 4 years, automaticaly released after half term served. No matter how behaves in custody, prisoner CANNOT serve more than half of sentence.
2/ Over four years, eligible for parole after half, dependent on behaviour and other criteria. Automatic release after two-thirds off sentence. CANNOT serve one day more.
3/HDC (Home Detention Curfew), is now in operation and depends on many and varied issues. There is no set time to serve but there is the guarantee that if the prisoner fits the terms and conditions then he will NOT serve the minimum term, eg half or two-thirds.

what a fine example to set to his son, should lock them up and forget about them

and only 7 years,be out and able to start over again

What a farce, letting the scum-sucking schemies out after only serving half their sentence. Why don't we bring back hard labour, and have the filth breaking rocks on a quarry with a small hammer until the skin is hanging off their flesh? Or horse whip them. I'm of the old school who would hang these dirty, schemie filth, and let the rest of us Edinburgh citizens enjoy peace and quiet.

Throw away the keys and let them rot!!!

from my understanding ive seen the long term damage cicaine can do to people so i 4 one am for there punishment although i agree wi most of yous that its not long enough the justise system need a good looking at it sorry about the spelling im no the best one but i hope yous get the jist of wot im saying ok ya fi wee owenxx

>>Richardson senior's defence advocate John Hamilton told the court how his client had been seriously ill after a brain haemorrhage in March last year, had fallen into debt, and turned to drug trafficking to try to ease his cash problems.

Don't you just love it the way these mouthpieces come up with the same old tired mitigation, and presumably expect it to be believed. Do they learn these lines a law school?

As if something relaxing like being a major narcotics dealer is going to ease his client's heightened blood pressure and let him lead a relaxing life to recoup after the stroke.

Of course, he could have become a rent boy, pimp or people trafficker, but no, he chose charlie. Seeing him licking his top lip in the pic sums it up I think.

go on marky son. youl be making more in there than here style..
watch the jelous ppl start making up there bits...

who wouldnay do 4yr for £500000 and the rest

ha ha ha to the jelous ppl out there

Drug dealers thrive on the misery of other' people's addictions, they are parasites and all should serve lengthy jail sentances.

I adopted a baby who's mother took cocaine all through her pregnancy. I have witnessed first hand the disease that spreads by dealers, not only affecting the drug takers but the innocent victims of their bad choices. My child is developmentally delayed and whilst I applaud the biological mother for voluntary giving up her baby and giving us the pleasure of raising her. The Richardson's need to be rightly punished for their selfishness and be given hard labour.

The should be utterly ashamed of destruction they have brought to people's lives.

Also people of Scotland please do yourselves a favour and write in English. You appear so ignorant to the rest of the world reading your comments. I know many of you will say that it is your right to write/speak in Scottish but Scottish is not a language. By writing in this matter you demean the wonderful country.

go on marky boy
4 year for that ill keep selling itmyself

half a million for for year wed all do it go ma boy

#6 PC McGarry and 11, Boswell are spot on. I have watched the destruction cocaine has inflicted on America for 30 years. Imprisonment is not the total answer to this problem, but I do not understand the lenient sentencing. The last thing Scotland needs at this time in it's history is to emulate the US drug epidemic. If it were up to me I'd deport all of them to Colombia where medical attention for a stroke is almost non exsistant. Casper, get real.

[14] Doreen: they are parasites and all should serve lengthy jail sentances.

Agreed. But I wouldn't consider 4.5 years a long sentence, especially in light of the info above [2] that means the guy could be out in 3 years.

We need American style sentencing here. 99 years on St Kilda or the like.

16) While I applaud your selfless act of adopting a drug damaged baby, I deplore your attitude in teaching your granma to suck eggs. This is a website of a Scottish newspaper, where anyone can post their opinions in any language. To say that Scottish is not a language
is gramatically correct, but Scots and it's many dialects is. Lallan, Doric, being just two, Scots Gaelic being a third, they are all still in use and people use them to communicate with each other, that makes them a language, it is not a question of right it is a question of usage. How can you complain about english usage when you a member of a nation which
has done more than any other to bastardise it.
To state that the use of our dialects in communication makes us look ignorant is sheer snoberry.
I would, however point out that there is in fact no use of any Scots dialect on this message board you are in error.
5) Is making a poor attempt at English, his spelling and grammar are deplorable.
10) I suspect is either dyslexic, or educationally challenged. and is using some textspeak.
12) Is making an attempt at irony and is probably on something.
13) Is me taking the mickey out of 12) I don't post in that manner usually.
There is no Scots usage in any of these examples.
please get your facts right before criticising.

in thailand and indonesia, they execute you for dealing or smuggling drugs. yet the fools still keep at it. australians seem to have a particular penchant for testing the system. then the media whine when they are caught and done away with. seems to be a modern affliction. " it wisnae ma fault, ah cannae help being an addict"

#20--Arthur---"to state that the use of our dialects in communication makes us look ignorant is sheer snoberry"........i absolutely agree with you & am ashamed of #16's post. thank you......

#8---brilliant...........

Is our government the real drug dealers?
Are the people at the top of out legal system the real drug dealers?
A very big shake up is needed here.
Either that or all the descent people in our society will move elsewhere!

keep the heads down boys. time will fly in. open prison in 2yrs,ching ching.then you can go walkabouts .he he

I know why don't you educate those poor souls, ( not the one's who get bullied and intimidated into doing the dirty work for the low life scum bags).. Jail them.
Educate the low life scum bag,who are already clever enough to manipulate the system and everyone around them, build his/her confidence and teach them all the tricks of the trade they maybe didn't know but they will be able use to there full advantage.
I forgot, that what you are doing already.
I must say... It is working...NOT!
It looks good for you stats though!!!!!!!

i think going as far as saying a life sentance kicks the a*s* out of it . they need to give more of them to beasts.

In Singapore they would face execution.

who would drug dealers or beasts

#16 "foo-foo" - Pog Mo Thoin, Rasaiche! Gaidhlig not a language, indeed. It's older than Latin.

I agree with Lord Lucan, I'd have them both horse-whipped...if I had a horse.

Foo Foo - Get To France.

#16 Foo Foo. You don't seem to understand. The gentle readers of this enlightened froum are not uneducated at all..on the contrary, they are all highly intelligent that's why they read The Scotsman in the first place and what may appear as ignorance or not speaking English properly or well enough is called in other parts, places and planets..
HUMOR...or HUMOUR as you like to spell it in the U.S.A.
{ how cum Yoos folk canny spelll rite?}
Don't take it too seriously or you'll get your blood pressure up and it could cause a brain hemorhage and next thing we know you'll be selling drugs..God Forbid! P.S.there are hidden and cryptic messages in all Scotsman articels but only for those of us[Scots] in the know.

Do they look remorseful? not a hope!
They are attacking the foundations of our country, our youth.
Drug dealing should be a treasonable offence then maybe we could hang a few.

38......his cards well marked now pal, come doon aff o' that cloud o' coke dust yer floatin aboot oan! Probably get bitch slapped in the jail and develop a taste for that instead. We'l be seein him as a star act in some downmarket drag club somewhere when he gets oot, wearing buckets o' make-up and a very tasteless frock.

I think we should take a number of the people who have posted and give them a life sentence at school, the teachers that allowed kids to leave school with such a poor education should be prosecuted and given longer sentences than the dealers.

These 'Numpties' should stop making Scotland ashamed of them and learn to speak and write with a Modicum of Intelligence.

The only way out of these 'no future' lifestyles is through education & knowledge, the people using the stupid abreviated corruptions of our language will end up as sad old men sitting in stench ridden pubs with only enough for a pint in their pockets or bank account.

As for the dealers from the Inch, they were serving a demand by the type of people who have no other future than their next fix, they have been caught, prosecuted, sentenced and should be left to serve the sentence passed by the court.

It is a shame that a young lad of 19 got himself into such mess. I guess the system failed him. He should be in fulltime education at this time.

I bet, he is gonna come out worse than he was at the time of sentence cos jail though met to be a correctional facility, breeds the worse set of criminals now.

The system need to do more to help these lost souls

we'll soon stop worrying about cocaine when crystal meth hits edinburgh

it's coming

then we'll have problems

These people are not lowlife scum.Get in the real world ya teapots

44....What are they then Cumbie Boy, perhaps you'd like to enlighten us?

calm down calm down 54

Don't you just hate it when that happens? Puts the street price right up.

58 who was that comment to

54....Can I suggest you go and do the same thing as you are obviously rather frustrated this evening...maybe something to do with being an 'incher' perhaps...or having penis envy as Freud would say. Or maybe its cos yer mates banged up and aw that luvvly coke's in the hauns o' the polis noo eh?...Hiv a look under the sink ya bawbag ye mite find sum Vim waitin fir ye noo babeeee!

56.....you are obviously an expert on the subject and I will say no more...look forward to reading your next posts from the Priory. Bit o' luck ye'l be sharing wae yon Kate Moss lassie eh?

It wasn't directed at anybody, just an observation.

65 why say it after 57 commented?

#67. Because 58 comes after 57. I just took my turn. What's your point?

66,+doreen,why spend your spare time doing this???

#69. Why spend your spare time doing this?

well i came on this to read the newsreport wen i noticed all the saddows of the day gettin their doggies.why spend all day commenting all this??? that is beasty!!

I just came on to read the local news and, I thought I'd add my tuppence worth.

to all you that comment on my location there isen't anything wrong with niddrie there is worse places than niddrie. where do all you people that think of your place as snobby come fi

73^^^

76,yeh ur rite m8.iraq is a wee bit worse..YIC

are you 1 of the saddows cause im far from that 75

78 you only live up the road worse than here if you want to start.

If you two (Wee one & Cumbie) have messenger you'll be able to slag each other off directly. It'll be much quicker.

57 your better when your quiet idiot

shut up ya fandingo

who rattled your cage 81 im not slagging anyone just telling a few home truths.

who was that to 83

where you from 81 niddrie to

First off i would just like to say that people who deal in drugs are killers, they are also parasites living of the misery of poor and destitute people who cant control their addictions, as for the Cocaine Kingpin and his father the prison terms handed out by the courts are a disgrace, as one reader stated , wait until you get chrystal meth over there, then your drug problem has only started, its time the courts took back the laws of the country from the crooked lawyers and dealers, and handed out realistic sentences for drug dealing the better,,,,,,,,,,,,,, im just a wee laddie from Niddrie Mains Terrace, who left a long time ago,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

On second thoughts, dont you hiv any mer..its obviously eaten what little brain you had and given you delusions of grandeur...eh is that Columbia Cumbie then?....and these giants of the coke cartels are going to do what.....wipe us all out via the internet...send a sneaky wee coke virus doon the line that'l zap us and keep us up all nite eh?. Nah dont dae that, hivin trouble enough sleepin is it is, any chance o' another insult pal...ahm bored.

20

my sentiments exactly, thank you.

To all those who say we should lock them up and throw away the key:-
(1) 10 out of 10 for originality.
(2) Maybe we should lock you lot up in a place which teaches common sense and throw away the key.

One small point; they were selling drugs which are addicitve and physically harmful to people who voluntarily bought them. That's a coincidence, i'm sure I just saw that happen last night. Ah yes, it was the asian shopkeeper down the end of my street selling cigarettes. Right, i'm off to lynch the guy, lock him up and throw away the key.

Jock h # 91, Quote "people who deal in drugs are killers, they are also parasites living of the misery of poor and destitute people who cant control their addictions"
I take it by those people you include tobacconists. And the government, although not dealing in drugs, fits the second part of your definition when they rake in taxation from the drugs alcohol and tobacco.

Invasion of the Niddroids

Mark Junior had been at this for years, it was most likely him that got his dad involved. Shame the rest of them did not get done with it as well. Get all the cardboard gangsters of the street.

If you take the claim on face value, it is quite disturbing how someone should get into debt for suffering after suffering a brain hemorhage.
But with banks and creditors - from gas companies to parking fines to council tax - as aggressive as they are, and consumer debt at an all time high - primarily compunded by interest rates - is it not any wonder more people aren't turning to drug dealing?