Prolific graffiti artist jailed for 21 months

A graffiti artist who admitted 22 different counts of criminal damage has been jailed for 21 months and given a five year ASBO preventing him from carrying paint or going onto non-public areas of the railways.

Lewis Shillingford from Lewisham had been arrested previously in 2002 for spraying railway property with his tag “chewz”. When the tag  recently began to appear again detectives arrested Shillingford who then skipped bail in August.

According to London SE1 Detective Sergeant Jeremy Walley said “The costs of graffiti are substantial for the railway industry in terms of repairs and clean-up, and can leave permanent scars on the infrastructure.

“Trains are taken out of service for cleaning, sometimes for days at a time, causing disruption and delays for passengers. Graffiti also involves serious risks to those who go onto the tracks, who often don’t know when a train will come or if the tracks are live.”

Here at Big Smoke we’re torn. We love graffiti, and not just that bloke Banksy. However, random tagging seems a bit more like dogs peeing to mark their territory than urban art.

We also winced at the 21 month sentence but he’s not really helped himself has he? In particular if you are a convicted graffiti artist who wants to start up again why choose the same tag so the cops can just come round your house? He didn’t exactly make them earn their wages. But you probably can’t lock people up for being stupid.

It’s probably a naive hope that Mr Shilligford spends his time in jail productively, perhaps taking art lessons, as our criminal justice system seems better at degrading prisoners than rehabilitating them into responsible citizens. Many would regard the ‘chewz’ tag simple vandalism, and we’d find it hard to disagree, but let’s try to find more productive outlets for people’s artistic talents.