Jon Venables remains the devil incarnate… he must never, ever be allowed out of prison
GENERALLY speaking, monsters don’t have sweet, unbroken little voices and wide-eyed baby faces.
Except in the case of Jon Venables and Robert Thompson.
Next month, the former, has a parole hearing in a fresh attempt to be released from prison.
The child killer, who brutally murdered toddler James Bulger in 1993, must never, ever be allowed out. If anyone should rot in jail, it’s him.
His partner in crime is now free, living with a new identity (at great cost to the taxpayer), because he has, in as far as is possible, been rehabilitated.
As far as we know, he has not reoffended — unlike his one-time best mate.
This pair were just ten when they committed their atrocities. I am the same age as the two brutes, now 41.
And I remember, quite distinctly, poring over every newspaper word, before school, in absolute horror that a child of my age could do such unspeakable things.
Quite simply, it is utterly inconceivable that, in the final year of junior school, you don’t know right from wrong.
Absolutely no child of right mind would, at that age, abduct and kill a two-year-old, a loving little boy with his whole life to live.
Lest we forget, the boys kidnapped James from Merseyside’s Bootle Strand shopping centre and tortured him.
Throwing paint in his eye, pelting him with stones and bricks and dropping an iron bar on his head before leaving his poor, broken little body on a railway line in a twisted bid to conceal their crimes.
As heartbroken James’ dad, Ralph, told TalkTV’s Jeremy Kyle and Nicola Thorp yesterday, “every child is at risk” if the “ticking timebomb” killer is ever allowed to walk free.
Because let’s be clear: Venables remains the devil incarnate.
And anyone who thinks otherwise, that he’s served his time, is surely just blind-sided by that eternal image of a schoolboy killer, looking up and to the right, a wry smile on his face in his police mugshot. For ever etched in our minds, he is a child.
Unadulterated horror
But he’s not. This is a “man” who repeatedly reoffended when let out previously, apparently showing not an ounce of remorse for his crimes.
He is a sex offender. A paedophile. A dangerous, unhinged brute.
In 2008 he was arrested on suspicion of affray after engaging in a drunken fight and, in a separate, subsequent offence, charged with cocaine possession.
He was then found to be in possession of indecent images of children, discovered by a probation officer to be deleting files and attempting to remove his hard drive with a tin opener.
He was charged with downloading 57 indecent images of children, including some as young as two.
He was then caught distributing and sharing vile, images of children.
He had adopted the persona of a 35-year-old mother, named Dawn, who was willing to sell her eight-year-old daughter.
It’s a litany of unadulterated horror.
He has twice been re-imprisoned. He must never be allowed to test our already overstretched police force ever again.
A worldwide ban remains in place, preventing the media from identifying either Venables or Thompson by their new identities. For which, frankly, Venables should be eternally grateful.
This is the only leniency he deserves.
MULTI-MILLIONAIRE Taylor Swift’s new boyfriend is a well-built lad called Travis Kelce, an American footballer.
He is a “tight end”.
And no, this doesn’t mean he’s not paying for her Nando’s.
According to Google, it is a “hybrid offensive position” on the pitch.
So that’s OK.
KEEP IT NICE N’ SHORT
ANYONE, like me, bored with three-hour films (I’m looking at you, Oppenheimer), and lacking motivation to invest 12 hours in a new series must give The Wonderful Story Of Henry Sugar a whirl on Netflix.
The 39-minute, Wes Anderson-directed film starring Benedict Cumberbatch (based on the book by Roald Dahl) is a wonderful antidote to our obsession with testing televisual endurance.
DON’T BE SO STINGY
THERE is absolutely, categorically, nothing more unattractive than tightness.
But a new poll has revealed the average polite Brit loses more than £400 a year splitting the bill evenly.
Apparently “polite diners” – who haven’t eaten or drunk as much as their comrades – lose out around £36 a meal by divvying things up evenly.
Sorry, but this is how things should be.
I’d rather drink a tap water and have salad with no dressing but pay for the full experience of being with friends, than be that person with my phone calculator out at the end of every course.
Nothing sours a sticky toffee pudding quicker than meanness with money.
Let ‘Robber’ Williams be, he’s giving us all a laugh
ONCE upon a time we prided ourselves on our sense of humour.
In the face of rubbish weather, war with the Germans or queuing, poking fun at ourselves was as much of a pastime as, say, the pub, Sunday roasts or, again, queuing.
Until Robbie Williams made a gag about shoplifting last week, and people lost their tiny little minds.
The singer tweeted to his 2.4million followers: “Thinking of getting into shoplifting. Anyone got any tips?” Funny, right?
I mean, no one with a scintilla of common sense seriously thinks multi-millionaire Robbie is planning on raiding aisle 12 of Lidl and plucking a few tinnies off the shelf. (Not least because he’s been sober 20 years).
It. Was. A. Joke.
But commentators, and various retail bosses, called for his head.
“Disgraceful!” blasted Prof Joshua Bamfield, director of the Centre for Retail Research.
Luke Johnson, CEO of Gail’s Bakery, piously added: “A vastly rich ex-pop star mocking a serious social and economic problem shows a celebrity truly lost in showbiz.”
Ex pop-star? Ouch.
Obviously thefts, at an all-time high with one happening every two seconds, are no laughing matter.
But someone trying to bring levity to something depressing is, quite simply, the British way.
Can we all please lighten up.
SHIRTS AN OWN GOAL
ONE step forward, two back . . .
Just as we are getting some sort of parity in women’s sport, Aston Villa chiefs decide to make the WSL team wear the club’s new “wet-look” shirts.
The kit, which has been already blasted for making the men look like they’ve played in a tropical rainstorm, clings in all the wrong places.
Women – exemplified by the brilliant, talented, hard-working Lionesses – have fought tirelessly to get respect on the pitch.
After years of mockery and being patronised, finally they have it.
Making women look like they’re competing in a wet T-shirt competition is, at best, ill-thought out. At worst, it’s demeaning.
EVEN GYM IS TOO PC
A TRIP to the gym on Friday proved far more challenging than any of my squats or single-leg deadlifts.
A notice informed users that the men’s and women’s changing rooms had swapped round for the day.
Showering post-workout, I emerged naked and gently shivering only to be confronted by a giant, burly, dreadlocked chap, neatly unfolding his gym kit.
I froze. Was this, indeed, a big man in the wrong room . . . or a bloke identifying as a woman called Angela?
Two other women continued to dry their hair saying nothing. We were all too polite and embarrassed.
Happily, as he clocked me, he realised his mistake and couldn’t have been more horrified – or apologetic. And scuttled out faster than you can say “pre-op”.
Still, it sums up where we are in politically correct 2023.