Why the Oxford stabbing student really is too talented for jail | Simon Jenkins

The scandal is not that Lavinia Woodwarde could be spared prison for stabbing her boyfriend. It is that so many others are denied the same understanding

The way to stay out of prison in today’s Britain is to go to Oxford University. Christ Church college undergraduate Lavinia Woodward, 24, dosed on drugs, punched her boyfriend in the face, stabbed him with a bread knife, hurled a laptop at him, then followed up with a glass and a jam jar. They do nothing by halves at Christ Church.

Her defence...