Law Change Between Action And Conviction

[susanxx]

Please someone enlighten me or simply explain the principles of law?
Have seen on the local news the terrible item of the 79yo who was attacked and killed by a dog. The dogs 2 female owners have been charged and sentenced over cruelty to the dog and have been detained for 12 months. The law has since changed and now this offence could have been punishable by 14 years in jail. No justice for the man or his family, but this is not my query.
In 1965 the death penalty was abolished but the crimes for which the Moors Murderers were sentenced to life, although convicted after this time period, meant they were not executed.
Why is it that the dog story has a sentence that was the maximum at the time of the incident but the Moors Murders were sentenced under the changed law?

[Peter Pedant]

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I think it is clearly explained here : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_(Abolition_of_Death_Penalty)_Act_1965

short answer is in the wording of the act - whnever the change was mooted the people in the pipeline were included. The big year apparently was 1957 when it was realised we were hanging er the wrong people.....

making retrospective laws is OK in UK law - well it may well not be now under the Human Rights Act but is unpopular - The war crimes bill was forced thro the Lords having been rejected on the advice of erm the Law Lords....

The list of retrospective laws isnt exactly a parade of honour - Burma Oil Act 1964, War Crimes Act 1994 and so on.

You may say that this is not retrospective law making but retrospective sentencing -yeah but....