Robbery in a gas station
One day two young unemployed men, who were heavy smokers, used to visit pubs every day and who didn’t have enough money for their expenses, decided to assault a middle-aged woman, who worked as a shop assistant in a remote gas station on the outskirts of a regional town and to rob money from there.
In the late evening they parked their car nearby. One of them stayed minding in a car with running engine, the other man entered the station wearing a face mask, holding a gun in his hand and asked a woman, who was there alone, to give him all the money. He repeatedly threatened her that he would shot her if she wouldn’t give him money.
His gun was fake, but it looked like a real weapon. This woman was terrified and handed all the money from the cash register over to him.
The robber gave money into a plastic bag and returned to the car and both men immediately went away.
The police managed to capture them soon. Both men were accused of the robbery, which belonged among the most dangerous crimes in my country. Perpetrators may be sent to prison for 10 years, so they had to have a barrister during the whole proceeding. The investigation was run by the regional police and both men were taken into custody. They pleaded not guilty at first, but later the man who was in a gas station, confessed to the robbery and helped to convict the other man, who completely denied his accusation and declared, that he hadn’t taken part of the robbery at all.
After the investigation was over, the prosecutor sent both men in front of the court. The trial lasted nearly the whole day and at the end of it both men were found guilty and imprisoned. The man, who pleaded guilty was sent to prison for 4 years. His punishment was accepted both the man and the prosecutor. The other man, who didn’t plead guilty even in front of the court, was sentenced to 5 years’ imprisonment. His appeal was later rejected by the court of the 2nd instance.
I have to add, that there weren’t lots of evidence against them. Apart of confession of the first man, there was a gun, which was found in their car, clothes, which they were wearing during robbery and which they later threw into a litter bin and after the crime they started to pay a great amounts of money in a pub, which was unusual, surprising and striking as some witnesses told during trial. The weight of all these evidence was however strong enough for their conviction.
The punishment wasn’t too strict, because it was their first crime, they commited it at the age of 20 and the victim from a gas station wasn’t furtunately injured. I thing that the punishment of both robbers was adequate.
I’m curious what other people thing about their punishment. Was it strict or indulgent?