I would pay his fine, so cruel when he is emotionally fragile. Why not a caution, what he did was entirely understandable, a criminal record totally wrong.
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If everyone took the law into their own hands, life in general would be unbearable.
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I agree, mitigating circumstances in this case were not taken into consideration. Who wouldn’t have reacted like that, a smashed window, compared to what happened to his daughter is nothing.
Who pressed charges?
But we as a nation cannot have people going around taking the law into their own hands. If that were me, I would have instructed my lawyer to appeal against the sentence on the grounds of unwarranted leniency. The punishment should always fit the crime without exception.
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Article does not say, but being a small community on the Isle of Bute he would have been recognised.
Ditto, but plenty do just that.
27 years is not enough.
What happens on the release of Aaron Campbell, he should not be allowed back, just asking for trouble.
If the law was harsher with stiffer penalties then the urge to take the law into ones own hands would not happen . Today my son rang to say he had an attempted breakin in his home . If they were caught it would just be a sentence of '" norty boy don’t do it again", when it should be 20 years in a single cell in prison on bread and water
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And how much of the 27 years he will serve ? This happened very close to me and hope he is not allowed anywhere near the poor family when done his sentence
Not enough, imo his life sentence should be doubled.
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The laws a joke.
A life sentence is for life.
Aaron Campbell was given a Life Sentence - 27 years was the period the Judge specified as the minimum term he must serve before he could even apply for parole.
On Appeal, his minimum term was reduced to 24 years, in view of his extreme youth (16 years old)
That means Campbell will serve at least 24 years before being considered for release on licence - it does not mean he will be released after 24 years - it depends on the parole board’s decision at the time as to whether they think he still poses a risk to anybody.
As for Robert McPhail’s criminal damage of property belonging to Campbell’s family - I think the Judge showed compassion and his grief was taken into account as a mitigating factor and gave him a more lenient sentence than such a crime would normally have earned.
I would feel sorry for any parent who suffered the pain of losing their child in such a way but I can’t feel too sorry that Robert McPhail has acquired a criminal record and I think he deserved it.
He vandalised the car of an innocent person, just because they were related to the boy who was already in prison for killing his daughter.
If McPhail did not already have a criminal record before this, I am surprised and I think he should have been brought to justice before this.
McPhail had been selling illegal drugs to children, including selling drugs to the young lad, Aaron Campbell, who went on to murder McPhail’s daughter.
Although McPhail cannot be blamed for what Campbell did, McPhail’s own drug-dealing and drug-taking lifestyle and his habit of selling drugs to teenagers to fund his own habit put his own daughter at risk.
If everyone was allowed to go around attacking the property of people who are related to criminals who destroy our children’s lives, then there was probably quite a few parents who had cause to blame Robert McPhail for supplying their kids with drugs.
Months before the murder of Alesha, Aaron Campbell’s Mum had already had words with McPhail about supplying her teenage son with drugs and told him to stop.
It was she who reported her son to the police and helped to bring him to justice for the murder of Alesha McPhail, yet it was her car that Robert McPhail vandalised.
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@brokenvows, they wanted to make an example of a vulnerable father, who admitted smashing the window in a spontaneous moment. Nobody can imagine how he must feel, his daughter snatched from her home, and murdered.
Aaron Campbell, then aged 16, snatched Alesha MacPhail from her bed before raping and murdering her, leaving her with 117 injuries, in the grounds of a derelict hotel.
Good post Boot, was Campbell high on drugs when he killed this 6 year old. If there was evidence that her father supplied Campbell, then his anguish must be immeasurable and the effect of the grotesque way Alesha died something he may never come to terms with.
From what I have read of the original trial, I believe McPhail had previously supplied drugs to the boy Campbell - two things made him stop supplying him, one was that Campbell’s Mother had sent McPhail a verbal message, via his girlfriend, that she knew he was supplying drugs to her son and he must stop. The 2nd thing was that McPhail had argued with the boy over a disputed £10 debt.
At the time Campbell murdered Alesha, McPhail hadn’t supplied him with drugs but Campbell had contacted McPhail to ask for drugs and when he received no reply, he went to the house, planning to try to steal drugs from him. When he let himself into the house, it was with the intent to steal drugs but then he found Alesha in the house and decided to take her and kill her instead.
A truly horrific crime and the evidence suggested the boy had psychopathic personality traits, so he may never be considered safe to release even after his minimum term is served.
The person I feel most sorry for in all this is little Alesha - she didn’t get much of a chance in the chaotic world she was born into and it ended in the most horrific way imaginable. Poor child.
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That`s disgusting Cinderella,he did what any parent would imo.
I think i would be waiting for the murdering cretin when he gets out.
“Grief does not diminish, but you can manage the intensity and learn to live with it.”
Kevin Wells father of Jessica.
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To catch criminals, first there has to be a visit to the scene and forensics taken. There are far too many crimes simply registered without a visitand then a crime number issued 
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I suppose bad people grieve too and he just wanted to hit out at someone, anyone, connected to the murderer
It’s not logical or right, but I can understand the feeling
Being a drug dealer, he’s harmed a lot of other families and their children, and that’s how he brought this murderer into his circle. And although the murderer wasn’t high on drugs he’d sold him when he killed, who’s to say how much the previous drug use addled his brain?
So he’s going to have massive guilt and be wanting to blame someone else
He’s living a tragedy and if some of it is if his own creation, that makes it worse, and I’m sure he did it in anger and despair
But no one should be allowed to get away with breaking the law and revenge, supposing he attacked a person next time?
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