Elderly activist to spend Christmas in prison because tag does not fit

What was her criminal offence?

She was sentenced, as much as I recall, for causing mild inconvenience to the masses.

Didn't burn anything down, didn't blow anything up, didn't attack anyone, just conspired to obstruct traffic - and maybe actually obstructed some traffic.

That's some great big criminal offense, IMHO. And having laws like that on book - allows any government to crack down on any demonstration planned in secret - because "look, a conspiracy to cause public nuisance".

As much as I recall, conspiring was the big deal, and they dragged out some law intended for the mafia, which was quite ridiculous. Conspiring to do anything - even conspiring to ruin the climate for future generations by recklessly burning lots of fuel - sure seemed to be a great big criminal offense under that law, but I could be absent-minded because fuel company bosses aren't in prison.

Side note: in China, they have a similar crime - a crime that you can stick to almost anyone, named "picking quarrels and provoking trouble". [1] In my opinion, even from a boring old statist viewpoint, having a legal system with stick-to-anyone crimes is a bad idea.

Back when it happened, I think I commented something to the tune of -> if a cunning protester had overturned a truck and trailer on the same stretch of road - strictly outside the presence of other cars - pretending to be a hapless trucker who lost control - the road would have been twice as closed, and the stealth protester would have walked home in the evening, with only high insurance bills waiting in the future.

(This is not intended as legal or tactical advise, and overturning a car without extensive practise can have permanent negative health impacts. It might be safer to stop a "damaged" tractor and pretend to be a hapless farmer whose trailer with a load of bullcrap almost broke off the vehicle, or maybe the bullcrap hatch accidentally opened and it's on the road now. Strictly by accident.)

I think I also estimated that if someone had cut power to a big intersection's traffic lights without saying a word, obstruction would have been just as great, but chances of getting caught really small. (This is not intended as advise either.)

I agree. There seems to be some underlying attitude from the guardian that people should be outraged because she is old or ill?

The curfew scheme is a way to try and reduce the prison population due to costs, not soenthing that she was specifically sentenced to nor some entitlement. She was sentenced to jail, she was eligible for the curfew scheme but she cannot wear the monitoring tag, so - like other people - she has to serve her sentence.

Ultimately she commited a crime and was convicted and sentenced. She pleaded guilty to the crime.

People are also trying to make out that it's wrong to imprison people for peaceful protest. They're being imprisoned for public nuisance - that sounds like nothing but they attempted to block the M25 motorway and create gridlock in southern England. They're lucky they didn't get charged with more - public nusience charges IS the lenient treatment.

Blocking the m25 is not just "a few delays" as some of the press have decided to report it, that's potential chaos on an unprecedented scale. It is not just a slight inconvenience - motorways are major routes for the emergency services as well as the public, and the people who may have got stuck in serious jams may have included sick and vulnerable people. Would we be sympathetic if they'd succeeded and someone died in their car from a heart attack, or a pregnant lady was forced to give birth on the M25, or a diabetic had a crisis and couldn't be reached by emergency services? And all that's before we even consider the economic impact of they'd succeeded.

We need to be clear the plan was not just a small traffic jam - it was gridlock of the major motorways which was to last days. So people may have been stuck in their cars for days on the M25 and other roads as the emergency services tried to sort the chaos.

They're lucky they only got charged with public nusience and not under the anti-terror legislation. Would we be expected to be sympathetic to attempts to shut the M25 if it had been done by Jihadists? I don't think it'd be called "peaceful protest" then.