It was with some amusement but sadness that I read of a pilot programme for community care in the UK (see [2003] Gazette, 29 August, 20).

As an American, as a law professor in the US, and as an admitted solicitor in England and Wales, I am concerned.

If you like the results of our American criminal justice system (six times your incarceration rate, eight times your murder rate), you will definitely wish to emulate our methods of dealing with crime.

But if your country prides itself on not having two million people behind bars and 21,597 murders a year, perhaps you will think twice before following in our failing footsteps.

M R Franks, solicitor, Baton Rouge, Louisiana, US