When two students were recently sentenced to 100 hours community service for cheating in this year's CAPE examinations, there was public outrage as many believe the penalty was too lenient for the offence. Sharon Joseph, mother of one of the students, says it was "only fair". Reporter Rohandra John talks to the experts on the effectiveness of this form of punishment.

Sharon Joseph was relieved that her son was not carted off to prison after he admitted to cheating in the Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examinations (CAPE) in May.

Her son, 18-year-old Scott Joseph, a student of the St Augustine Community College, was one of several pupils who were charged with having the Communication Studies paper before the examinations and brought before the Court to answer to the charge.

Scott and his classmate, Nyron Toney, were sentenced to 100 hours community service when they appeared in the Tunapuna Magistrate Court in August. They were the first two students to be sentenced following the discovery of fraud in the CAPE exams. A number of other pupils attending various schools across the country, have been charged with the same offence, and are awaiting sentencing.

In addition to the sentence of community service, Magistrate Adrain Darmanie also ordered that Scott and Toney be put under one year supervised probation.

The ruling effectively saved the teenagers, both 18-years-old, from a maximum penalty of $1,000 and six months in prison under the CXC Act which was used to charge them.

Following the ruling, Toney and Scott, left the Magistrate Court with their parents who made every effort to shield them from the glaring eyes of the public and members of the media.

But while their parents were breathing a sigh of relief that their children were spared imprisonment, the magistrate's ruling did not sit well with the dozens of people who stood outside the Court that day eagerly awaiting the outcome of the case. They expressed outrage at the sentencing and expressed the view that it was much "too lenient" and tantamount to a simple "slap on the wrist".

In a later interview with the Sunday Express however, Scott's mother said that she thought the ruling was "only fair" and added that even before her son was sentenced he was already being punished given that he was subjected to public ridicule and shame. She insisted that her son was being used as the "scapegoat in all this.

The police never caught the real culprit who gave these pupils the papers and he is out there somewhere and will go on to do more crimes. There were also many other students who saw the papers but were not caught."

Joseph however said that she was making no excuses for her son. She acknowledged that he "did something wrong" having admitted to having the Communication papers before the exams. My son will have to live down this shame for rest of his life and that to me is the real punishment."