What does the law say?
Honour crimes are prosecuted according to the individual offence in question and there is no specific legislation to punish the honour element itself.
Aggravating factor
However, judges do now consider the motive of honour as an aggravating factor, whereas at some cases in the past it was actually considered as a form of mitigation.
The Forced Marriage Act 2007 which came in to force in November 2008, is the piece of legislation that aims to prevent honour based violence by providing protection to people in danger of being forced to marry. But has the Forced Marriage Act had the required effect or is criminal legislation the answer?
More harm than good?
Some officers within the Metropolitan police have suggested that the Forced Marriage Act has actually done more harm than good. But others think they have made a positive difference.
Forced Marriage Unit Joint Head Olaf Henricson-Bell said: ""As of April 2010 there have been 141 Forced Marriage Protection Orders, here in our case work we've seen the real impact they can have."
Furthermore, they believe that a soft approach to forced marriage has much more serious moral implications. One senior detective said: “In every case of forced marriage, there is rape and repeated rape it’s logical that one follows the other. We rightly have a robust approach to rape in this country, so why don’t we take a similarly robust approach to forced marriages that lead to repeated rape?"
Already criminal
Chief Crown Prosecutor Nazir Afzal argues that all the criminal legislation needed to prosecute perpetrators of honour based violence already exists, he said: “Rape carries a maximum sentence of life imprisonment, so does false imprisonment. These crimes are already on the statute book, our job is to recognise them and prosecute robustly. Forced marriage may well be what’s happening, but underneath that there’ll be a series of criminal offences.
The Act is actually a civil protection bill, a piece of legislation that allows victims or concerned third parties to take out an injunction called a Forced Marriage Protection Order against someone who is trying to carry out a forced marriage. Anyone who breaks the terms of an order will be in contempt of court and could face a sentence of up to two years in prison. But it doesn’t explicitly criminalise forced marriage.
Those who drafted the Act argue that criminalising forced marriage would criminalise an entire culture, but some believe that it allows police officers to avoid tackling a difficult and sensitive problem.