Police in a southern Finnish town have admitted that they were not particularly concerned when a woman, found guilty of two brutal murders, escaped from a prison in the area.
Terhi Tervashonka failed to return to the open prison after a day of work at a park in Hameenlinna, southern Finland, two weeks ago, but has now been found in the nearby community of Palkane.
The 30 year-old was sentenced to eight-and-a-half years in jail in 1999 for her involvement in the Hyvinkaa landfill killings, in which the victim was dismembered. Being a first-time offender, she was released in 2003, but was found guilty of killing a man with a billhook knife in 2008. As more than three years had pass since her parole, Tervashonka was considered a first time offender again under Finnish law, and therefore only has to serve half of her ten-year sentence.
Tervashonka failed to return to the minimum security prison, which she was moved to at the beginning of this year to serve the rest of her term, on 21st July. Tuula Asikainen, the director general of the Criminal Sanctions Agency, said the convict was allowed to transfer as she had behaved impeccably at the maximum security prison in Vanaja, explaining that incarceration is affected by conduct on the inside, rather than the nature of the crime.
“The so-called gradual release is the safest option for everyone,” Asikainen said in a Helsingin Sanomat report. “Naturally the prisoner needs to meet certain criteria in behaviour and sobriety, for instance, before transfer to a minimum security prison.”
Despite the violent nature of her crimes, Lieutenant Pekka Kiiski of Kanta-Hame police admitted that apprehending the murderer was not a high priority. “No matter how gruesome her criminal history may be, if behaviour in prison has been good, then there is no reason for this,” Kiiski said.
Asikainen added that the attempted escape will not affect Tervashonka’s parole. “Serving a prison sentence is determined in the law, and it cannot be evaluated on a case-by-case basis,” she told HS.
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So in Finland, and perhaps elsewhere in today’s fairy tale Europe, as a “first time offender” you serve only 4 years for murder. Then you can murder again, and again be sentenced to half prison term because you had regained your “first time offender” virginity in just 3 years. And if you behave well in prison, you don’t actually serve even that half term, because you will be promoted to an open prison. If you canæt like even that, you are welcome to escape and nobody will care much of apprehending you, and it will have no impact on your parole. You are only advised to wait a few more years before your next “first time” killing.
Do supporters of this mild ways realize, that too bland a criminal justice is dangerous to the very foundations of the legal state? The social contract between citizens and state where citizens refrain from taking justice in their own hands and instead appoint the public authority to prosecute offenders breaks down at some point when prosecution becomes laughable.
Come on, how much crime do they have in Palkane for an escaped double murderer to be low priority, unless they are willingly looking the other way?
This complacent attitude toward crime and criminals, where one’s deeds don’t really matter, is all what it takes to breed the kind of society and youth recently on display in the UK riots.