"The consistency of your dishonesty is positively breathtaking"
July 13, 2015 1:26 PM   Subscribe

In 2004 Ashley Mote stood as a European Parliament candidate for the anti-EU right-wing UK Independence Party on a platform of opposing corruption. Elected, his standing with UKIP was withdrawn when the party discovered he was being prosecuted for benefit fraud, for which he was later convicted despite attempting to invoke immunity from prosecution. But that offence was dwarfed by the expenses fraud he committed as an MEP. In May this year, Mote was convicted of embezzling nearly half a million pounds, and today he was sentenced to five years in prison. Mr Justice Stuart-Smith did not exactly mince his words when handing down sentence.
posted by Major Clanger (32 comments total) 7 users marked this as a favorite
 
Grifter gonna grift.
posted by NoxAeternum at 1:40 PM on July 13, 2015


The mote doth infect the judge's eye.
posted by a lungful of dragon at 1:54 PM on July 13, 2015 [2 favorites]


Wow... What a piece of work.
posted by dozo at 1:56 PM on July 13, 2015


This is something I've always struggled with, which is the notion that, "no one is ever a villain in their own eyes."

From the PDF:
You knew perfectly well what the rules were for the claiming of expenses; and you also knew perfectly well that what you were doing had nothing to do with funding whistleblowers and everything to do with funding your bridging loan, your mortgage, your legal expenses that were unrelated to your role as an MEP, and your family. ... It was plain for all to see that the monies went into your bank accounts or accounts which you controlled, and did not come out except to fund you and your family.  

And I wonder: Did they? Did they know "perfectly well"? Was it "plain for all to see?"

Or does this criminal really believe their own bullshit?

And if they really believe it -- if there is no deep, dark corner of their mind that feels any guilt, shame or regret -- does it matter what this justice writes?

If, surely, the criminal doesn't believe it, or doesn't care, why is this justice writing it? Does the justice have their own Dunning-Krueger effect going on? Likely not, so what's the point of writing it? Who is the audience? Is it no one, and the justice writes to feel better about themselves? Or is the point to be seen as being tough on crime? To prop up his own career or political future?

Is it Clay Davis's world, and we're all just living in it?
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 1:56 PM on July 13, 2015 [1 favorite]


I like the contemptuous reasosn for the reduction in sentence best.

"If you were a young man, I would make a modest reduction to 6 years 8 months on grounds of totality. But you are not a young man, and I consider that such a sentence would be a crushing blow which, even if justifiable, should be avoided if possible. For that reason, and that reason only, I have come to the conclusion that I can and should make a further reduction because of your age."

Sssnnap!
posted by howfar at 1:58 PM on July 13, 2015 [1 favorite]


If, surely, the criminal doesn't believe it, or doesn't care, why is this justice writing it? Does the justice have their own Dunning-Krueger effect going on? Likely not, so what's the point of writing it? Who is the audience? Is it no one, and the justice writes to feel better about themselves? Or is the point to be seen as being tough on crime? To prop up his own career or political future?

Judges in England and Wales don't have political careers. They're not elected or answerable to the public.
posted by Thing at 2:00 PM on July 13, 2015 [20 favorites]


This is something I've always struggled with, which is the notion that, "no one is ever a villain in their own eyes."
...
And I wonder: Did they? Did they know "perfectly well"? Was it "plain for all to see?"

Or does this criminal really believe their own bullshit?


I think that it's less people thinking "I don't know what's literally happening here because I cannot grasp the basic facts" and more that there are a staggering number of people who truly, honestly, believe, deep inside, "it's okay if I do it."
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 2:00 PM on July 13, 2015 [19 favorites]


there are a staggering number of people who truly, honestly, believe, deep inside, "it's okay if I do it."

There's also a thought-line of "Everyone else does it," if only in some slightly different way (e.g., "That guy over in that safe seat doesn't need to spend any time campaigning, so I deserve compensation for the time I invest in bringing this difficult seat to my party") or even "I know that everyone else does it, and they just haven't been caught yet."
posted by Etrigan at 2:04 PM on July 13, 2015 [6 favorites]


"At a personal level this is an utter tragedy for you and for all affected by your conduct."

I say. My prospects for a successful embezzling career are looking pretty dim now.
posted by Ashenmote at 2:04 PM on July 13, 2015 [4 favorites]


To add on to Mrs Pterodactyl's comment, the logic can also often be:

"Well, those OTHER people get away with [insert reference to benefits scroungers here or other UKIP/right-wing talking point], so I might as well get mine."
posted by chimaera at 2:05 PM on July 13, 2015


Likely not, so what's the point of writing it?

Because it is necessary to provide a rationale for sentencing. Justice must not only be done, it must also be seen to be done. Culpability is one element among many in the sentencing guidelines. Judges don't want their sentencing overturned on appeal, so they express their views as clearly as possible.
posted by howfar at 2:06 PM on July 13, 2015 [22 favorites]


> "no one is ever a villain in their own eyes."

You have led a sheltered life (which in this case is a good thing).

Plenty of people do evil things and know exactly what they are doing. I've met people who have described all sorts of evil, immoral behavior and basically justified it with, "I could get away with it, so I did."

Now, most people are the heroes in their own movie - they feel justified in committing crimes and hurting others because they are the hero and the other people just bit players. But there are plenty of evil people who hate themselves, too and just feel compelled to do bad things.
posted by lupus_yonderboy at 2:08 PM on July 13, 2015 [15 favorites]


Judges in England and Wales don't have political careers. They're not elected or answerable to the public.

Thank you for the clarification.

There are many instances, though, of electable judges going yard with rants from the bench against criminals. Here's but one example of a "blistering takedown," whatever that means. (This judge was initially appointed, but ran unopposed in a subsequent election to retain her role on the bench.)
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 2:15 PM on July 13, 2015


Another great quote from the judge's sentencing remarks:

"On one point you were absolutely correct. Dishonesty on the part of those involved in the European Parliament is disgraceful and damaging to the institution and its democratic credibility. The destruction of public confidence in democratic institutions by expenses scandals both here and in Europe cannot be valued in monetary terms; but it is real and the impact will not dissipate rapidly. While I am prepared to sentence you on the basis that the victim impact in this case is medium, it is towards the top of that category, if not at the very top."
posted by Triplanetary at 2:16 PM on July 13, 2015 [4 favorites]


By the way, that's a perfect example of The Sparber Law of Internet Pedantry: "Anytime someone reflexively corrects you online, that correction will also be wrong, or at least incomplete."
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 2:16 PM on July 13, 2015 [6 favorites]


does this criminal really believe their own bullshit?

Apparently yes. Anyone intrigued by this case should have a look at his long rambling self-defence. It's a comic and pathetic document, but also a revealing glimpse inside the mind of a compulsive liar and fraudster.
posted by verstegan at 2:35 PM on July 13, 2015 [4 favorites]


There are many instances, though, of electable judges going yard with rants from the bench against criminals.

Yeah, but in the U.S. that's because our judges are often elected and thus have political careers alongside their actual work, and also because we still have a really terrible, preachy and moralizing aspect to our culture that some judges just love to leverage their position to indulge. That behavior has much less to do with being a judge and much more to do with being a moralizing asshole.

This judgment I found fascinating to read, because it was so devastatingly well-expressed, and especially because while it strongly condemns the man's behavior, it doesn't moralize about what sort of person he is or should be. This is a critical distinction, because it's the difference between explaining a judgment based upon the law and a defendant's actual actions, and ranting at someone about what a bad person they are. One is objective and dispassionate while clearly rendering a judgment about the behavior at issue; the other is just someone preaching at you about how you suck and should be a better person.

It seems there might be something telling here about our larger culture, that Americans tend to focus on intent, on what kind of person one is, rather than one's actual and specific words and deeds. I imagine it comes from the whole Protestant/Evangelical 'forgiveness through grace' thing ('I may have done a bad thing, but I'm a good person, Lord, and I mean well, so please forgive me').
posted by LooseFilter at 2:54 PM on July 13, 2015 [6 favorites]


From verstegan's link, I love his description of how the jury weren't good enough for him, once the trial had been set to take place in Portsmouth:

The move from Winchester to Portsmouth meant there was no possibility of my being tried by a jury of 12 of my peers, as required by law. I am over 70 and spent half a lifetime in international business. Portsmouth failed to produce a jury of such people. Half looked like students and others well under 30, none wore suits or ties, three were practical looking housewives and one older man appeared to have spent most of his life in a pub.

It speaks volumes.
posted by penguin pie at 3:02 PM on July 13, 2015 [17 favorites]


Its not just UKIP, it's all of them, including Labour:

Guardian: "The Daily Telegraph reported in 2012 that [Sir Kevin] Barron had rented Trickett's home in Barnes, south-west London, after he sold his flat, which had been subsidised by parliamentary expenses, for a profit of £500,000 following the expenses scandal."
posted by marienbad at 3:10 PM on July 13, 2015 [1 favorite]


George Eliot sums up this type quite nicely: "There may be coarse hypocrites, who consciously affect beliefs and emotions for the sake of gulling the world, but Bulstrode was not one of them. He was simply a man whose desires had been stronger than his theoretic beliefs, and who had gradually explained the gratification of his desires into satisfactory agreement with those beliefs." (Middlemarch)
posted by thomas j wise at 3:19 PM on July 13, 2015 [5 favorites]


That quote penguin pie gives is utterly odious and shows the character of the man as much as anything. I'll take a jury of twelve of any of those groups any day of the week. What's he got against practical housewives and who exactly would he expect to get in a Winchester-drawn jury, King bloody Alfred?!? Just glad/surprised there was no slur on immigrants in there.

one older man appeared to have spent most of his life in a pub.
First thought that crossed my mind was that it would be a conflict of interest to have Nigel Farage serve on the jury.
posted by comealongpole at 3:34 PM on July 13, 2015 [9 favorites]


It seems likely to me that the guy is like the Better Call Saul character Mrs. Kettleman, living in a constructed alternate reality where nothing he has done is wrong, even though he has every chance to know better. It appears to be the depth and quantity of misrepresentations necessary to maintain such a worldview which the judge found breathtaking.
posted by Bringer Tom at 3:38 PM on July 13, 2015 [1 favorite]


Orthogonal, and I'll step away in a moment as my dander is up, but it's worth remembering that in George Osborne's favourite vile, obfuscatory and false construct the people who took time out of their lives to do their civic duty here are identified with "skivers" and the gentleman who took half a million pounds but got only five years in prison is classed as a "striver".
posted by comealongpole at 3:51 PM on July 13, 2015 [5 favorites]


If, surely, the criminal doesn't believe it, or doesn't care, why is this justice writing it? Does the justice have their own Dunning-Krueger effect going on? Likely not, so what's the point of writing it? Who is the audience? Is it no one, and the justice writes to feel better about themselves? Or is the point to be seen as being tough on crime? To prop up his own career or political future?

Because he is called "Mr Justice".

MR

JUSTICE
posted by Sebmojo at 4:06 PM on July 13, 2015 [4 favorites]


The mote doth infect the judge's eye.

What the hell is that supposed to mean, a lungful of dragon? Because I'm reading it that you're saying the judge is (inherently, inevitably) corrupt. Could you clarify, so I don't insult you unreasonably?
posted by wilful at 4:11 PM on July 13, 2015


MR

JUSTICE


The Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales is Igor Judge, Baron Judge.

THE LORD JUDGE.

In younger days he was just "Judge Judge", which caused everyone no end of amusement I can tell you.
posted by howfar at 4:16 PM on July 13, 2015 [11 favorites]


What the hell is that supposed to mean

That Mr Mote is fuck ugly?
posted by howfar at 4:17 PM on July 13, 2015 [1 favorite]


I am amused that he campaigned to clean up sleaze in Brussels. He appeared to spill quite a bit of his own.
posted by scruss at 5:04 PM on July 13, 2015


There is a class of people who have .. urges. They don't care for these urges, have guilt, and campaign loudly and vigorously against them, all the while losing their private battle with the urges; probably in part because they are kept secret, undiagnosed and without help. We see it with all sorts of clergy, politicians, etc.
posted by Bovine Love at 8:06 PM on July 13, 2015 [1 favorite]


Meanwhile here in Australia... our Treasurer, Joe Hockey, rents his Canberra house from his wife, and claims the rent as a work expense. This is completely legal and many MPs do it.

:(
posted by joz at 8:20 PM on July 13, 2015


Judges in England and Wales don't have political careers. They're not elected or answerable to the public.

As opposed to MEPs in England and Wales, who are elected by a largely disengaged sliver of voters and are somehow also not answerable to the public.

To spell it out: European Parliament elections in the UK generally have a pitiful turnout, use a party list system where individual candidates are not prominent, and have become a way for anti-EU types and general xenophobes to send likeminded bigots to Brussels and Strasbourg, who then prove to be workshy fops at best, and shameless fiddlers at worst. For some UKIP supporters, this is hilarious and sticking one up the continentals. Mote blazed a trail.
posted by holgate at 9:52 PM on July 13, 2015 [2 favorites]


You can see the basis for some self-justification in penguin pie's quote: Obviously, this is how international businessmen - well-respected international businessmen! - operate, therefore I should be allowed to operate the same way, and judged by those international businessmen and their standards.

The sad bit is that I don't doubt that many international businessmen do operate exactly this way. For all the complaining about corruption in government, you don't have to look too far into public corporation books to see examples of executives voting themselves ridiculous bonuses on the basis of... well, the same sort of "I deserve it, and I'd like to have it" reasoning.
posted by clawsoon at 7:13 AM on July 14, 2015


« Older the cool, the hard, the distant   |   Mirror Touch Synesthesia Newer »


This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments