Charlie Gilmour was released from prison under curfew today after four months jailed for violent disorder. This video from last December shows him reading Lord Byron’s ‘Lines On Hearing that Lady Byron Was Ill’ to police in the midst of last December’s student protests.
Charlie Gilmour released from prison
November 15, 2011/
I can’t say I’m surprised that he got released early but in this case, I don’t think it was a “Rich Dad” job. If that were the case, he’d’ve been out much sooner than he was.
When you look at his actual crimes, they probably don’t merit a lengthy prison sentence and people are released early for far worse crimes than smashing a window and stealing the leg off a mannequin. And, however disgusting his behaviour at the Cenotaph was, it’s not a criminal offence. It should be but it isn’t.
The really galling thing is that it’s the idiotic behaviour of the Charlie Gilmours and Edward Woollards of this world that makes the headlines. No matter how many of those students protested peacefully, it’ll be pictures of the Cenotaph being defiled and a fire extinguisher tumbling from Millbank Tower that people remember. And it didn’t create any more graduate jobs. It didn’t stop the fees being hiked. And it certainly didn’t make the public look upon the protests with a sympathetic eye.