charter
In rejecting the mandatory minimum, recently brought in by the Tories, Judge Joseph Galati said it amounts to cruel and unusual punishment for a large group of offenders.
The court decision is just the latest example of the Conservatives' ideology on crime coming up against reality.
Under the Tories' new laws - motivated by a vote-getting desire to show how the government is cracking down on evildoers - anyone convicted of drug trafficking more than once in 10 years gets a minimum one-year jail sentence.
That, of course, likely applies to the majority of those involved in drugs. Because many low-level dealers are also addicts.
Addicts tend not to be deterred by potential consequences of their actions.
All they want is a fix.
In fact, mandatory minimum sentences rarely affect crime rates. All they do is fill overcrowded jails.
Judges don't like mandatory minimum sentences either, because they take away their ability to make a sentence fit the circumstances of a particular offender, supposedly an important part of our justice system.
The challenge to this law - and others like it - was predictable. The decision will be appealed, like other "get tough" laws that have been struck down by the courts.
None of which matters to the Conservatives, whose only interest lies in proving they're 'against' the bad guys.
Meanwhile, it's up to courts, once again, to step in and sort out the cynical lawmakers' expensive mess.
