Crowborough Stalker's Sentence - is it Enough?

40 year old Greg Downing of Beacon Road West harassed Katherine quarmby with constant texts and phone calls.  They had met over the internet on a dating site and the stalking started when she dumped him.   She became scared for her life when she found his blog describing how he was going to wait outside her house armed with an axe,  rape her in front of her children and murder her.  He has been jailed for six months and served with a restraining order.

How long he will actually serve?  Everyone knows criminals get time off for good behaviour and on occasion do not have to go to jail at all if they've already been on remand. 

It has been well-documented that stalking can be a pre-cursor to grimmer criminal behaviour.  Greg Downing was clearly fantasising about committing murder and was angry enough to harass this woman.  He has now not only been caught and but has been proven to be guilty. In a country where 50% or rape cases are not prosecuted by the CPS due to lack of evidence, this is an opportunity for the authorities to step in and prevent him from re-offending and fulfilling his murderous potential. As it is, he will be released in a matter of weeks and as long as he stays away from Ms Quarmby, he is free to find his next target.  With stalking the lines can be blurred between being a disgruntled ex-lover finding it difficult to move on and being an out and out lunatic so by the time his next victim becomes aware of his sinister leanings it may be too late.   

What do you think can be done to stop him and people like him from re-offending?  With crimes such as burglary and theft it is easier to understand the motivation - need or greed; but with stalking there is clearly some kind of mental illness or personality disorder that is not solved by punishment alone but  requires rehabilitation too. What do you think?