Sad scene involving Net being withdrawn as punishment (8)
I believe the answer is:
sentence
'punishment' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'sad scene involving net being withdrawn' is the wordplay.
'sad' indicates anagramming the letters.
'involving' indicates putting letters inside.
'being withdrawn' is a reversal indicator.
'net' in reverse letter order is 'ten'.
'scene' with letters rearranged gives 'sence'.
'sence' placed around 'ten' is 'SENTENCE'.
'as' is the link.
(Other definitions for sentence that I've seen before include "Condemn" , "Court's punishment" , "Period of imprisonment" , "Bird, possibly" , "Judicial penalty" .)