French-speaking law centres dealt with 6,590 community service orders in 2015. The daily Sudpresse newspaper group are reporting this today (Thursday). This is a record with no less than 1,109 such cases handled in Brussels.
The law centres in the capital, Liège and Charleroi are responsible for more than half of cases, whilst ten other law centres are sharing the balance. Numerous judges consider community service orders are a concessionary sentence. Although it is penalty in its own right, it is still normally accompanied by a subsidiary penalty, to act as a sufficient deterrent.
The Brussels Times
