This man is an absolute coward and the very epitome of scum, his name is Hugh ‘Milksop’ Clark. After being saved by a pub landlady from getting a beating from a man, he decided that being no match for men, he’d attack a woman.
Breaking into the house of the man from whom he’d escaped a beating earlier he attacked his wife. Now, just hitting her or beating her would have been bad enough, but no, this craven cur couldn’t take the chance that he might be bested by her, so he took a knife. Catching her by surprise, again no point in taking chances when you’re a weakling, he brutally stabbed the mother of two eight times. When the woman’s nine year old son tried to intervene, he stabbed him in the face. Well I suppose that the namby-pamby piece of shit couldn’t take any chances, the little boy was nine.
Fortunately for the pair, he’s as an inept at killing as anything else that he turns his hand too and they managed to escape to a neighbours. Both are scarred for life; I am sure that the poor boy will never get over it.
As for Hugh ‘The Wuss’ Clark, he has admitted attempted murder and is awaiting sentence. Unfortunately the current justice system does not offer any real justice. The man should be hung. He has no place in society. Any man prepared to attack a defenceless woman and her child with a knife over a perceived slight, is never going to be rehabilitated. He will always be between heinous crimes, until finally and inevitably he robs some poor family of a loved one, for which he will receive a slightly stiffer sentence than usual.
People like Clark have a callous disregard for human life, believing that people live on their say so and whim. For that he should have his life privileges revoked and be hung by the neck until dead.
Hugh Clark was sentenced to a paltry eight and a half years on 12th March 2008. He will probably only serve half that and has already been in custody for nearly six months, meaning that in just three and a half year the decent, law abiding people of Britain will be worse off again.
With any luck he will have his sentenced increased on appeal. It is disgusting that he can stab a little boy in the face, try to murder an innocent woman in her own home and receive such a lenient sentence. The poor boy probably won’t even have reached his teens by the time Clark gets out.
Charlie's Space 
Of course we could all make cases where we might feel the death penalty is ‘justified’ – historically the death sentence was on the books [at least for a time] with the justification that the crime committed couldn’t be ‘punished’ and therefore it was an opt out to ‘Let God Decide’ – now we are just more callous and able to say hmm, the death penalty, interesting.
However, if we had hanging, or whatever, we would also have innocent folk being murdered by the state – how does that sit with the idea of justice?
Yes I think they should bring back hanging. Especially for the recent murder of the soldier in Woolwich. These men have committed treason by killing a service man defending the Queen and our country. They should make an example of them. I doubt if these imbeciles have ever been to work. If they came to my company I certainly would not employ them. Hanging would be a good way of saving the tax payer money to look after them in prison. They should also pay compensation to the family of the soldier and for all the extra security and expense they have caused. If they can’t pay then their relations and family members should. If they cant pay they should all leave the country.
The government should nip this sort of thing in the bud. It’s difficult for the security services to stop this sort of thing due to the random nature of these events. The only way to stop this in our country, would be to put all the Muslims in to concentration camps whilst this terror threat exists. After all, these incidents are caused by Muslim extremist. Whilst we have a large Muslim population in this country the majority who are well behaved and do contribute to our country. I feel sure these people would understand the situation and would willingly comply with the detention orders for their own safety and ours. The security forces would then have an easier job.
I read the article about this on the BBC website and agree that this man and no right to exist. He actually did try to pick a fight with the victims husband, who was restrained by others, and unheard by the husband did threaten to kill her. The fact that he then went on and carried out his threat shows how truely callous he is.
Free to think, free to believe…
I think that innocents being punished for crimes they didn’t commit will always be a problem and the legal process should be altered to ensure that any chance of miscarriage is minimised in cases that carry a death sentence (i.e. only in cases of overwhelming evidence, confession, DNA, retrials etc). However you have to weigh it up, how many people are murdered each year by people who have no place within our society, but are released after serving their time? Too many.
At the end of the day, life is precious, as are those people that go to work everyday, pay their taxes and expect to have kids and grow old. They should reasonably expect that they should be protected from those that will interfere with that. Hugh Clark will probably get 10 years (Max 15), which really means five and if the prisons are over crowded less than that. Do you really think that when he comes out he will be any less of a danger? I am sure that upon his release he will set about making some else’s life a misery. This man and thousands like him only take from society, they offer nothing in return except misery.
For me it is simple, if you intentionally and callously take away someone’s chance of having children, growing old or seeing another dawn, then you too should suffer the same fate. Every breath that a murderer takes, is an affront to their victim, and their victims family.
I like your stuff over here Charlie,, and regarding this little ass nugget, hanging is too good for him, slit his nose, cut off his dick and make him roam the earth like that…
I was sent this by one of my good friends and i must say hats off to ya. You hit the nail on the head there. I am the woman who was stabbed and it wasnt 8 times it was 12. It was a horrific ordeal ,one which i doubt we will ever got over, but id like to thank you all for your comments.
I have to aggree that hanging is to good for him and that he is the type of man that attacks ppl weaker than him because he is a bloody coward. I just feel sorry for his family and his children. HE IS NOTHING BUT A MONSTER AND SHOULD BE PUNISHED .
No matter how long a sentence he gets it wont be long enough for what he has done to my family.
Thanks for the comments. I would certainly think maiming him, or branding him, would be a better punishment than having the taxpayer pay £30,000 a year to keep him, plus paying for him on his release as he won’t be able to find work.
I think that hanging is preferable though, particularly for the family involved. I cannot imagine how they are going to live with the knowledge that one day, that man will be out on the streets again.
thanks charlie and trust me i am dreading the day he is walking the streets again, but one good thing is my son wont be a wee boy then and hopefully comes across him in a dark alley.
he is nothing but scum and deserves 2 die a horrible and lingering death.
charlie can i ask how you came across this story? are you a fifer yourself?
FOR THOSE WHO DONT BELIEVE ME THAT I AM THE WOMAN IN QUESTION, PLEASE ASK ME ANYTHING AND I CAN CONFIRM WHATEVER YOU LIKE ABOUT THE PIECE OF SHIT
I don’t live in Fife, I came across the story on the BBC website, it was one of their top stories.
It angered me so much that I had to post about it.
Whilst I think what this guy has done is terrible, and regret that anyone is attacked in this manner – not everyone who is ‘found guilty’ will in fact be guilty…
Charlie – Are you saying that for £30,000 a year you’d see innocent people murdered by the state? As for him walking the streets – if he is no longer a threat and is employable – and this goes into prison and rehabilitation – Churchill famously said that the way you can judge a civilisation is how it treats the worst of the folk within it…
I remember the father who had lost one of his children in the Omagh Bombing who said that he forgave those involved…. Both attitudes from the victims are valid but show a complete disagreement. Should one person be ‘punished’ more because those they hurt are more vindictive than others?
As difficult as it may seem – the reasons why the punishment/retribution on the guilty is not decided by those whom they have wronged are good reasons. We want ‘Justice’ to be blind so that it catches the guilty but that also means that the punishment must also be decided by ‘Justice’ as well.
Thanks for the comment Free to think, free to believe…
Admittedly there are those who are found guilty of crimes that they didn’t commit, but these are a tiny minority and I am not advocating the death penalty in all circumstances. Where the death penalty is handed out the defendant should be given a whole new trial, rather than an appeal (as they do in France) to ensure that the evidence is double checked and the right decision reached both times. Obviously where there is doubt, say the jury is not unanimous, the death penalty should be waived. Barry George is a good example, even in the original trial there was never enough evidence to warrant the death penalty. Ian Huntley however…
Free to think, free to believe… said:
No, although it could be argued that Gary Newlove and countless other innocents are murdered indirectly by the state through negligence and the states inability to either sufficiently punish or rehabilitate offenders. Those innocents that form a tiny minority of the tiny minority who receive the death sentence through errors, would unfortunately be acceptable losses.
Other than having the death penalty for murderers I personally would also advocate a three strikes policy. Strike one, as now, criminals serve their sentence in prison and are ‘rehabilitated’, should that fail and they re-offend then strike two. Strike two should be the revocation of their rights as a citizen, a legal non entity and property of the state. They will be required to serve a punishment term, e.g. hard labour, time in the army or other such work, away from society. Afterwards the onus will be on them to prove that they are useful to society, until then they remain a non citizen and not entitled to any kind of state benefit or aid. Strike Three, they no longer serve a purpose in society, cannot reintegrate into society and persistently re-offend, so should be executed. Life is too short to have people like that leeching off those simply trying to get on with their lives.
While it may seem harsh, I am sure that they crime rate will plummet. Remember, unlike a hundred years ago, people today aren’t committing crimes because they need to support or feed themselves, it is done through greed. No one is starving in Britain today, the only real excuse for crime, yet crime and particularly violent crime has sky rocketed. It is a case of people wanting things that they cannot afford, and do not wish to work for, so they take them. Certain sections of society stand back and say ‘Ah bless, poor you,’ which of course only emboldens the criminal element and makes them think that decent hard working people are suckers, and indeed they are.
Free to think, free to believe… said:
This is the problem with the parole and probation service. He’ll be released whether he is a threat or not and whether he is employable or not, regardless of the inadequacy of the original sentence. He will have ‘served his time’ afterall. No doubt there will be some kind of inquiry when he re-offends, and no doubt said inquiry will find a lack of inter-agency cooperation, the probation service will point the finger at the police, the police at the probationers and both will cite a lack of man power for being unable to keep an eye on every dangerous criminal released from prison. All whilst some poor family grieves over a loved one.
As for Churchill, I am sure that he’d be staggered that in Britain today, rather than punish criminals, we treat them like little lambs who have lost their way. Believing that with a little encouragement and understanding they’ll be reformed characters, rather than just scum who’ll take simply because they can, and no one appears to have the inclination to stop them.
Laws are laws and should be obeyed by all. I am not suggesting that the law should be lenient to those whose families forgive them, nor harsher on those that aren’t forgiven. The law should be applied fairly in all circumstances.
I agree that justice should be blind, but not ineffectual. Laws should be decided by society, not by fair minded individuals far removed from everyday life. If, like in Britain today, the law abiding citizens feel that justice isn’t being served, then it isn’t.
I think I have three things to say in response to your thoughtful comment. So I’ll just start and ramble on until I think I’ve covered everything…
1. “Those innocents that form a tiny minority of the tiny minority who receive the death sentence through errors, would unfortunately be acceptable losses.” – doesn’t that mean that for £30,000 per year you are prepared to see innocent folk being killed off… And to say these things are ‘mistakes’ is to fail to recognize the problem of a police which is sometimes terrorized by the media and thus fabricates or looses ‘evidence’ – George Barry was not the last to be wrongfully convicted and some of their cases were willfully misrepresented by the police – who supply the evidence for the prosecutors.
We now find that they have also been listening in to inmates and their lawyers – some will be guilty but as they are waiting on trial – isn’t it useful to know how they might mount their defence and what evidence they have?
2.Prison may well be there for punishing the wrong doers But it should also do its best to rehabilitate those inside so that once outside they’ll be better than they were – unfortunately the prison service is not given enough money to do that. There was an experiment Radio 4 documented about diet in prison – the end word was given to the Governor of the prison. He said that when he was approached about this experiment he did not believe it would have any effect, he did however then say that all anti-social behaviour within the prison had gone down through the board. He then added that after the study he would not be able to afford that same diet for his inmates….
And that was only about food. If there were programmes for learning/studying wouldn’t that a) help them getting jobs and thus b) turn them into responsible folk who can then start contributing to the wider good?
If folk are a risk I don’t think they should be released but I don’t think that’s a good enough excuse for leaving them to stew.
3. The stronger case for saying the state is guilty of allowing a society where folk are murdered is that the state has a police force which folk do not believe will catch them. There is a drawing of a hanging of a pick-pocket which shows pick-pockets working the crowd… But what level of state surveillance would we wish for and, more pointedly, what does that do to us?
Making us like children who are always being watched does not make us safer as it will also mean that we, on the whole, are less responsible… Promoting community and, perhaps the beat bobby ie a visual presence, may well be more important in tackling growing crime more than a draconian punishment system – studies have shown that cars will slow down if all they can see is a cut out police car…
4. As for Churchill – he was a prisoner once, in South Africa and one of the things he was strong on was to make sure prisons were fair in how they treated their inmates. I do not know of another country that has independent prison visitors which can hold the prison to account and I’m sure Churchill would be proud of that even if he wasn’t in any way responsible for it…
Is it that we feel justice isn’t being served because the penalties meted out are not served due to overcrowding – that’s a short fall of prison capacity rather than a deficit in what the punishments are? Or are there other problems? Is it because the media go on about highly profile cases?
The sad fact is that the biggest statistic is that if you have a large cohort/group of 17-25yr olds then you get violent crime. These aren’t career criminals – true some may become career criminals but if you have a badly run judicial system it can sure help them along that path.
Thanks again Free to think, free to believe…
Admittedly there are problems with the Justice system, however if it were not so ineffectual and poorly respected then there would not be such pressure on the police to deliver miracles. Mistakes happen, innocents get convicted and likely some would be executed as well, however that doesn’t mean the system would be wrong, just imperfect.
Whilst I agree that the police should have listened in on an MP and his client (a suspected terrorist who won’t be tried in this country anyway), I can’t see any reason why the police would need listen in on prisoners and their lawyers as a matter of course. I understand that this would not be admissible in court, however as you say, it does give an unfair advantage, but hasn’t the case already been handed to the CPS by that point anyway?
As for the study that you mention, surely the change is just as likely down to the Hawthorne Effect? As for food, I think that Sheriff Joe Arpaio has the right idea (about a lot of things), he manages to fed inmates on just 30 cents each a day! Such a saving would provide more money for educations resources.
However I do not believe that the prisons are lacking in funds, they have enough money for Satellite television, games consoles, TVs and other things to entertain the prisoners not to mention doctors, nurses and dentists on site – all at considerable expense. Prisoners should be given books and newspapers alone to keep them occupied. It is unlikely that the majority would wish to, nor be able to do anything for the common good. 60-70% re-offend within a few years, another 20% probably after that. However, I do agree that those that wish to learn should be given the opportunity to do so. I also believe that the justice system should err on the side of caution, if there is any doubt the criminal should remain locked away (like the Krays were), better that than have innocent people suffer.
There is no indication that hanging would affect the crime rate, but it would certainly make victims and the rest of society feel better and more importantly, safer. I also don’t believe in CCTV, it is another example of ‘after the fact’ policing. As Victor Bates said after his wife was shot, the police today are like the fire brigade, sat in police stations and only going out to solve crimes after they have happened.
Free to think, free to believe… said:
My suggestion of three strikes is a little drastic perhaps but a sure way of cutting crime quickly and we are in the middle of a violent crime epidemic. I certainly do not think that it is a long-term solution. As you say the problem lies with today’s youth, they know what they can get away with from a young age, and press this farther and farther as they mature. We should be far stricter than we are, again the problem lies with trying to understand and mollify rather than punish. Persistent child offenders (and some have 50 or 60 convictions) should be stripped of their citizenship and enlisted into the army. Being drilled every day, forced to work and study and of course good old fashioned physical punishment, will no doubt turn them into reformed characters and if caught early enough, useful members of society. The problem is that the youth of today complain that they have nothing to do, but the truth is they feel like they have nothing to belong to, and wish to be a part of something.
Free to think, free to believe… said:
I agree with your suggestion of promoting community and a more active police presence. It still astonishes me that despite a loud, aggressive and prolonged attack on Mr. Newlove; not one of his neighbours went out to help him. Time was, a community looked out for their own. Only the youth of today seem to have that attitude. Communities should look out for each and be more responsible for their own affairs and have the right to confront trouble makers and defend their community.
Although most areas have a ‘local police officer,’ it is merely a title designed to make people believe that things are as they were and as they should be. Truth is, beat bobbies are rare. But I agree, I don’t think anything could cut crime more dramatically and make people feel safer than having police officers patrolling the streets again and having real local police officers, as it was 20-30 years ago. With the communication mediums that are available today, a local bobby could be an approachable and active member of the community. As it is, people today have no idea who their local bobby is or how to contact them and this only makes them feel more neglected and helpless.
As for it being media hype, perhaps it seems that way to some people, in some areas. Not to me. This past fortnight alone, along my route to work (after I get off the bus), a woman has been stabbed and a man kicked to death, but it has been a slow month.
I’m not quite sure where to begin… You’ve managed to raise more points than I did!
To start by ‘defending’ a more enlightened approach to prisons benefits the inmates and thus us – the study was conducted with more than one prison being part of the ‘survey’ but not all having the change of diet… so there was a control group. The other thing, since we are getting into it – one of the things the governor stated is that uptake for educational courses (which I think is fairly important to be voluntary – otherwise you’ll have a mess of a classroom and lumping inmates who want to change with those who don’t) went up after the improved diet started. 0.30$ A day is not enough – impressive though it may be.
At the moment the prisons are underfunded and overcrowded and rate of recidivism is high – could that be linked?
I’m sure that the CPS has the files for those awaiting trial but since how they might choose to prosecute the case not be – information gleaned from how the defence is going to proceed must be nice to know…
About the MP and the ‘suspected terrorist’ – from reading last Sunday’s Times and Telegraph that the reason the police wanted the prison service to listen in was mostly to block the MP from attending security councils. It’s always good to be able to fix these things so they aren’t going to be criticized… And as for the ‘suspected terrorist’ – the USofA has provided no evidence against him to the british authorities. So on the face of it – the only difference between you and me from him is that a law enforcement agency in another country hasn’t picked our names out of a hat. To send someone that has no apparent case to answer to a country that will stick him in a room and let him sweat for a while before the guy with a serious face goes in and says, ‘If you co-operate and make this easy, we’ll take the death penalty off the table and maybe, just maybe get you a reduced sentence…’ Where ‘co-operate’ means to plead guilty – the game being are you prepared to die for the sake of proving your innocence? And isn’t that the presumption – innocent until…
As to youth – I’m somewhere between the arguments that the parents are so scared that they don’t let their kids out – thereby excluding a section from socialising from others and thus, potentially balancing the backgrounds out – your point of belonging is pointed and given the change of law re being found carrying a gun over 16 (I think it’s 16) has had the consequence that the criminal society started to use youngsters to carry their guns from A to B for them – and Surprise Surprise – we have a gun-toting-youth-problem…
Your Three Strikes would not deal with the underlying cause of that – the gun-toters would just be another fresh crop… The current bunch in power argued that they would attack ‘the causes of crime’ as well as crime – but instead of previous legislatures who would have one criminal bill – a great big hefty thing – in a decade and then try to make it work – they have had one criminal bill – those great big hefty things – per year!
There was a huge outcry and tons of research after a young woman was repeatedly attacked and eventually killed on the steps to her own apartment block in New York decades ago – the conclusions were startling but the most crucial was that as there were so many folk who could have interceded (at one point someone shouted at the attacker due to the screaming – and the attacker ran off, only to return to finish the job) thought that somebody else was more responsible. Courses have been run where folk are told that if they think somebody should do something – they should because chances are nobody else will. My point is that if folk got those course and realised how important it is to be an active member of the society then apart from the fact that someone may have intervened in Mr Newlove’s tragic demise, then we may generally feel more empowered to interact and talk to each other… I think the growth of the government into the public sphere has been at the cost of folk thinking that they are responsible agencies in their own right.
Crime rates and the media… Whilst it’s perfectly possible that we have ‘black spots’ which are terrible things in themselves – as you no doubt know more than me – overall crime is falling. Media does not generally give that ‘Watchdog’ byword that crime is rare you should feel safe from the lips of Nick Ross… and it does go for high profile cases think of the pressure that the police must have felt catch the murderer of all those prostitutes… [and it looks like they’ve carried out their work well despite that – so hats off in this case] it it these cases that sometimes provokes ‘desperate’ policing and ‘making sure’ they have ‘the right man’… which is where we differ. There would be cases where there are mistakes but my point is to do with ‘stitch-ups’ where the police may well believe that they have the perpetrator and then make sure that the case against them is, how shall we say this… more watertight than it would otherwise be – which means that I accept your ‘mistakes’ but say that some miscarriages of justice would be much more than a ‘mistake’ and then you wind up with a murderous state of affairs…
So I would argue that an imperfect system is a wrong system – I grant the point that no system would be perfect and so would thus argue that the ‘ultimate sanction’ should not be condoned as that means the cost is so much higher – a falsely imprisoned fellow, even if it is never possible to prove – will be able to walk away at some point – and if it is possible to prove then they can get released and be compensated.
Picture the cruel reality of a graveyard where relatives are gathered round as the interred coffin is lifted to the surface and the state stooge reads a public document pronouncing the deceased ‘innocent’…
String um up, I dont believe the innocent will hang, alot of guilty people walk free even though most know they are guilty, and most of the people who are sent for questioning are considered able of doing these crimes and are known to the police, they wouldnt have had to been questioned if they would of swung from the rope years ago, the law is on the culprits side and not the victim, so when we are sure ,open up the trap door so innocent people like this lady and her family dont have to live in fear just because of the human rights of this scum
That’s just plain nonsense – think for a moment that if we did have the evil ‘National DNA Database’ – with so many on it there will be false positives – ie more than one will be highlighted as ‘owning’ the dna in question (we have already sent innocent folk to prison because of this… and that’s without the database…)
The criminal may have an alibi (on the grounds that he knew he might need one) and the innocent – not (sat at home on my own watching TV) – what do you think the police would do?
The answer is – It depends… and that’s true now – if the guilty are walking away then you are left with the hard fact that hanging a few will only make folk feel that their cry of outrage, hurt and vengeance has been satisfied – not that they are actually any safer in reality the day after the hanging than they were the day before…
To think that the justice system is perfect and never gets it wrong is to overlook that the cogs in that machine are human and once within that power they can change…
thanks for that derry,i totaly agree with you bring back the death penalty..
the little boy in question turned 10 3 days ago and although we tried to make it a special day for him it just wasnt the same. he is still plagued with vision of that night and what he witnessed.
we have branded him a hero because that was he is,he saved my life even though he has a disability. the thought of someone hurting his mum was enough to make him do such a brave act.
we know that one day the scum bag will be released and no doubt come looking for us again and that is the frightening bit. we will be constantly looking over our shoulders for the rest of our lives because of what he has put us through but as a family we have to be strong for each other and live our lives as best we can.
What you went through was truly terrible and you and your boy will be traumatized for a length of time. And that is horrible and you have my sympathy.
In this case you may have the satisfaction of knowing that they have the right guy but would you like to take some body else’s son/daughter by a wrong full conviction? which is what having the death penalty would mean.
I don’t believe your attacker should be let out if still a risk – as with any violent attacker.
I’m sorry, Charlie, if I sound like s stuck record but I do think this is an important issue.
Free to think, free to believe… I actually don’t agree with our current extradition treaty with the US (have they even passed their end yet?) The fact that they can just ask for someone, without providing any evidence, and have them arrested and extradited is just shocking and means that we are all pretty much under US jurisdiction.
The youth problem is a complicated one, but in an age where children can’t be physically disciplined by an adult, not even their own parents, many just try and get away with whatever they can, simply because they can. A promise of harsh punishments will at least control those that misbehave because they can and have never been truly disciplined for wrong doing.
Your point about young people being used to transport guns is an interesting one and not something that I had realised until recently when a local gangland boss was sent down for murder and it transpired that he was doing just that. But again I think that sterner discipline from an early age will help prevent youngsters getting into situations like that. I agree though, Labour have made a lot of noise about cracking down on crime, but in reality both gun and knife crime has sky rocketed during their tenure.
I don’t think that people not realising that they should intervene is the problem, but rather the fear of the consequences of intervention. At worst they themselves will likely be injured or even killed. At best they’ll end up in court, or even in prison for assault. Take the case of Tony Singh, he was attacked by a knife wielding maniac and in a life or death situation killed his attacker. Obviously a case of self defence, however Mr Singh has only discovered today, after ten days of waiting, that he will not be facing charges for having the temerity to defend himself. These kinds of mixed signals mean that would be ‘have a go heroes’ literally have nothing to gain by aiding another in distress, and in fact have everything to lose.
Thanks for the comment Derry. I agree, the law does appear to favour the criminal rather than the victim. We spend too much time protecting the human rights of people who, by their actions have no regard for the rights of others.
I think that if they can’t live by the rules of society, then they shouldn’t live at all.
No – they haven’t passed their end yet either. The US government said that it would be unconstitutional or something like that and buried it firmly but because we signed it they assume UK co-operation under it (and within the treaty it did say in small print that it wouldn’t be legal until BOTH parties ratified it – but the UK doesn’t seem to mind) When folk are arguing against ‘parallel’ systems of law because of Rowan Williams brave ‘have a go about law’ speech just think – the European Law runs behind our own if you can either pay for it or receive financial aid and then you also have the USofA…
Who can hoover anybody up anywhere and take them anywhere – under their Patriot act… nevermind them using this new-fangled extradition treaty….
You may be surprised (and gently warmed) by my stance that in the white light of an attack – I think that what the defender or an interested person does to the assailant should be considered a private matter. What the assailant is committing should be of interest to the state ie find and try… After the attack I believe that the state system, or cooler heads, should take over.
The idea of intervention could even be to phone the police or throw stones at a distance… In the case of the woman in New York – nobody phoned the police despite her screams and somebody ‘chasing the attacker’ off once by shouting down at him but then doing nothing more… Some of those ‘civilians’ around the 7.7 travesty have gone on record as thinking they are an embarrassment to the government – which as it’s a Labour Gov is probably true – folk should rely on the state to help them… not to be stand out of the crowd individuals… James Caan and Rollerball comes back to mind – just how far have they gone and will continue to go to try to break every individual to promote the ‘No I in TEAM!’ mentality…
Despite black spots were crime may be rising – on the whole the stats show less people are being hit by bullets – of course if you are within a black spot it is probably bloody terrifying. Young folk and discipline – I don’t know, I think this government despite over a decade ago saying it would be ‘tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime’ in the end it’s been tough on things that weren’t crimes but now are and has actually increased the ’causes of crime’… having a hoodie listed as criminal apparatus doesn’t help – my wife has one although I’m too old fashioned…
Whatever happens this ‘youth’ problem doesn’t help by criminalising being a youth – note those ‘Mosquitoes’ – and whatever solution anybody comes up with is going to take time to solve the problem unless you go for something radical like the policing in Chile at one time where the state operated death squads to wipe out youngsters on the streets after ‘the curfew’…
I’m not surprised that the US hasn’t ratified their end, and it makes me wonder whether the British Government knew that the US never would but continued anyway to give the appearance of ‘mutual co-operation’.
Regarding the firearms, I can see why you’d say that, after all the Home Office website actually says:
Also giving several other facts showing that firearms offences are in decline. Yet in one of the publications that it references, Homicides, Firearms Offences and Intimate Violence it appears to say the opposite:
Which by my reckoning is a 17% increase in people being shot to death in just one year. Furthermore firearms accounted for 8% of all murders in 2006/7, compared to just 6% in 2005/6.
Despite the Government massaging the figures, death by bullets is on the up, and already up again compared to this time last year.
I agree that in tackling the youth problem the Government has gone in completely the wrong direction. Mosquitoes are a waste of time and money and are basically there so that members of the public and police for that matter won’t have to confront gangs of youths. As for ASBO’s and the like, again a waste of time. Just a paper exercise to give the appearance of punishment, when in reality nothing is being done. I genuinely believe that tough punishments and strong discipline is the answer. I am sure that the coward above wouldn’t have been smiling when arriving at court had the possible sentences included execution.
So what you’re saying is that there are less gun crimes but that the criminals are now better shots?
Although terrible for the folk involved 49 out of approximately 66,000,000 does show that most of us may well get through the next few years.
Historically those who knew they were going to be hanged looked on it as their 15 minutes of fame and such quotes as ‘Mother said I was too good for hanging!’ were made – so much for gallows humour…
As for the extradition treaty – this was one of Blair’s ‘achievements’ – a concrete example of how the two countries would work closer together. And his government has fought off the attempts of the ‘Natwest 4’ and Conrad Whathisname? – Black maybe – to not be extradited under this treaty and our ‘terrorist suspect’ does not have the resources to even fend the american grip off.
Even if he’s completely and utterly innocent he may well plead guilty to some charges to be sure he is not going to be fried and/or tortured – how long would we last if someone said they’d drop the death penalty in exchange for a confession for smaller offences and out and alive in just a few short years – or maybe you want to risk the needle or the electric chair…
Going back to belfast for a moment – when the ‘peace’ broke out in 94 everyone said they wanted to build bridges and to get to know ‘the other side as humans’ – funding went up in community centres and work on community projects started to have some affect. These are folk who know what ‘hard punishment’ means – I worked with someone who lived near a bridge in a nationalist area -in just one night 17 people were knee capped. There were still ‘youth’ problems… but a lot of those were solved by the ‘youth’ being actively recruited into, erm, interesting ‘clubs’… so those few that were left were joy-riders and suicides.
Community projects and workers has not been genuinely tried – I know some youth workers from the state turned up somewhere collected signatures to ‘prove’ they’d done their work and then buggered off… leaving church/christian youth workers who were already out there looking discredited and stupid… where it’s been done properly it gets results and then funding cuts because the community obviously doesn’t need it anymore…
Darn it – got the numbers mixed up!!!
49/59…. well it is still approximately 66million…
darn
There was an interesting spot on ‘This Week’ – news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/this_week/default.stm
which had a look at this issue of death penalty…
Michael Portillo made the rather strange and interesting point that the some of the media fuels this debate in an irresponsible manner as within the EU – it wouldn’t be enforceable anyway.
Which may be slightly off the point of should we/shouldn’t we – but you might find it interesting to have a look…
To be honest I am not altogether convinced that gun crime is down, just that the Government is adept at sorting statistics to give that impression.
The figures are just for England and Wales, so about 54 million but I agree for that vast majority of people, not a daily concern. Unless you happen to live in Nottingham, London, Birmingham or Manchester of course. But it’s not the numbers that is the main concern, but the rate of increase.
Take the recent indecent in Northumberland where a gang of youths kicked to death a disabled man. Although the incident is of course a rarity, research by the Judge shows that murders in Northumberland committed by people under 21 had doubled in the last five years. Moreover murders committed by those under 17 in Northumberland had tripled in five years.
Thinking that it won’t happen to you is all well and good, I am sure that Marion Bates thought the same thing when she opened her Jewellery shop that morning, but what about your children, or grandchildren? At this rate the streets will be more dangerous for our grandchildren than they were in the Georgian era.
I disagree about the youth projects and ensuring that they feel valued etc. Our Grandfathers did not have any such projects, yet they weren’t sucked into the world of crime, violence and intoxication. Pandering to their every whim and need so that we can feel safe is just plain wrong in my view. It is just replacing the need for traditional good parenting with surrogate parenting by the state.
Having said that I would feel a tad hypocritical not to note that the playing fields, youth clubs, wastelands and recreation areas of my youth are gone. So the often used ‘There’s nothing round here for us to do…‘ does sometimes hold some truth. Today it does seem that if young people wish to have fun, then they must pay for it.
The stats are recorded ‘independently’ so I figure they are correct in the sense that shots fired that missed – I remember reading an article saying if/when faced by a gunman [and I quote] ‘run away’… as the policeman then argues that most so called gunmen are so inaccurate that you’ll get away – but enough of this blather – the point is only if someone reports the shooting will it be included and in some estates I grant that they might feel its a waste of time reporting it if, in the aftermath no-ones been physically harmed… or the ‘gangsta’ has to go to an interesting doctor so he doesn’t get reported from a hospital…
That said – Our Grandfathers would have been sucked up into the world of work… The state has already stepped in as parent/nanny in many ways… Good youth work will reinforce good behaviour and seek to exterminate the bad behaviour… I remember reading a story about a church where as an outreach the newly arrived vicar asked the kids if they wanted to have a fire thinking of marshmallows and such – what she got was a bonfire of bibles as the ‘little tykes’ decided that they would burn. After coming to terms with the challenge she eventually found ways to reach out to them… Later when the reporters got there all those bible burners were happily colouring pictures… It can work and parents should be there, but if they aren’t we need as a society to figure out what to do…
Luckily enough – I do not as yet have to worry about ‘my children’ and if I don’t get a move on I suppose that could be permanent. But here’s hoping…
Thank you for the link Free to think, free to believe…,
Well worth watching. I agree wholeheartedly with the Sun man, I think he summed up the position quite well…
I think that, as has been the case for decades, the vast majority of people in the UK are for the death penalty, with conservative estimates putting it around 60%, but like on many issues the ‘political elite’ have just arbitrarily decided that Britain will never again have the death penalty. This is unfortunately what is wrong with British politics; in the information age the general populace are as far removed from political discourse and political policy as they have ever been.
Democracy quite literally means ‘Rule by the People’, therefore majority rule. Unfortunately the death penalty, like many issues, is just one area where a vocal minority decide what is best for the majority. In the 21st Century it should not be a Government’s role to decide what is best for the populace but to implement what the public has decided to be best.
Do we even need a Parliament or even MPs with such an educated and well informed populace who have the facilities and the cognitive ability to vote for themselves on any issue concerning them?
Diane Abbott is one of those people that infuriate me, she assumes that her position is correct therefore it overrides the views of anyone else, no matter how many people oppose her view. I agree again with the Sun man, it is arrogant and patronising. It is like she is telling children, no that is just impractical and wouldn’t be fair. What she doesn’t seem to realise, or perhaps care about, is that these ‘children’ pay her wages and if she did her job properly, are whose views she is meant to represent, not her own. It is not up to her to decide what is best for us, but to implement our wishes.
I would be perfectly happy to live in a society that does not have the death penalty, were that the majority decision. What annoys me is living in a society that wants the death penalty, but that a minority has decided isn’t right for us.
As for Europe, they can either change the rules, or we leave and take our billions a year in taxes with us.
Free to think, free to believe… said:
Another good point. Should we really be allowing children to leave school without GCSEs or with any chance of getting a job? In my view, any child that leaves school at 16, with no apprenticeship or college space lined up, should automatically be drafted into the army or some community based project. Ideally the army, as many people that I went to school with and who left with nothing but a bad reputation, now have HNDs and BSc’s to their name courtesy of the British Army. If nothing else it may provide poorer families with a route to Higher Education as Labour has made it increasingly difficult for them to afford it any other way.
Leaving school at 16 with nothing and being unable to claim benefits till 18 leads many into crime or a life out of work.
I agree with your comments re Abbot – but if she feels that strongly… and people still vote for her…
One of the things I didn’t like about the ‘guy from the sun’ was that he said he was tired of the historical examples of innocents hanged… Well the truth is we still have folk being found wrongly guilty – but they get to live and be released so there’s not so much of an outcry… I am unhappy about the ever growth of the EU into the member states – if folk want to join a partnership – fine n dandy but the nature of that has changed…
I think one of the reasons why we presently have such an imbalance about views on this is that we aren’t given a full and informed debate – we have the media foaming at the mouth over this one or that one with the knowledge that the ‘ultimate’ punishment is not on the cards – and they may be exactly the same if we did, but I doubt we’d have the same level of that froth – for the journalists would probably not know the ‘guilty’… You may have guessed that I’m not for the death penalty, but I do take this debate seriously as I hope my comments show (But let me know if they don’t)…
Thatcher, famously, dismantled not only apprenticeships but later her government (can’t remember exactly when) dismantled the polytechnics which also provided a practical side of training for those who wished to be educated… and we are still suffering from not having a practical side left as the Labour Gov seeks to make ‘schooling’ ever more compulsory…
Shoving conscripts out to war zones is not the way to win wars… and some times folk need more time to get their act together… and your last comment might show why so many youngster seek a part in the darker side of our society…
On an earlier not it has just been revealed that £2 per day is spent on feeding inmates in prison.
the piece of scum is being sentenced on wednesday 12th march, lets hope he gets what he deserves.
look in the papers on thursday
Thanks I was wondering when he’d be sentenced. With any luck he’ll get the maximum sentence but not live to serve it. Prison can be a dangerous place for cowards.
Free to think, free to believe said:
Therein lies the problem with our democracy. People like Abbot, and most MPs for that matter, don’t get the majority vote. They get the majority vote from those few that believe voting makes a difference; that believe the candidates actually intend to serve the interests of their constituents, rather than their own interests. The other 60% of the electorate don’t even bother to vote.
I think that too much is made of this innocence issue. Of course it is lamentable when innocents are convicted or executed. But with a robust criminal justice system and the correct safe guards in place wrongful conviction rates could be even lower than they are today. For instance an execution could need three things, irrefutable DNA evidence, lie detector tests and witness statements/confession before being handed out. In those cases where their is doubt or strong enough evidence for a conviction but not for an execution then a life sentence would be served instead.
I also believe that anyone sentenced to execution should be given any possible legal help to clear their name, if they are unable to do so, well….
Take Karl Taylor for instance, there can be no doubt that he killed Kate Beagley, there were no other suspects, he drove around in her car, with her corpse in the boot, was the last person to her alive, admitted killing her etc. Such a callous killer will never reintegrate into society, and is a prime example of someone that in my view should be hung.
But I agree there should be debate, but this again is the problem, voters are so far removed from the decision making process that all debate is seen as pointless. Pro Capital Punishment campaigners cannot vote for the reintroduction of the death penalty. No party will even consider it. A debate on the subject with a serious look at the pros, cons and practicalities and then a referendum will settle the issue once and for all, or at least for another generation.
I agree about conscripts, I certainly wouldn’t want to see 16 or 17 year olds in war zones, or even on peacekeeping duties. But I think that if handled properly some form of conscription would be very beneficial. A year of hard training and discipline will give those that are unsure what they want from life time to figure it out. Year two could be specialised training, where the conscripts choose an field that they wish to be trained in. After which they’ll be able to leave as fully qualified and experienced as any graduate, or stay in the army if they wish. Either way I am sure that just being part of something, something that their parents and wider society can be proud of and actually being able to serve purpose, will correct those former would be miscreants. Certainly better than the current slap in the face of being unemployed but unable to claim benefits.
£2 a day, shocking. Far too much, especially considering that when the Government introduced Student Loans, they expected students to live on just £2.50 a day and made them ineligible for any benefits, even out of term time. Prisoners have their washing, rent, heating, leisure facilities, educational needs, dental care and medical costs already provided for them, then £2 a day for food as well!
The Government currently spends more on prisoners than the average worker in Britain can spend on themselves.
thanx charlie will let u know the outcome as soon as im told…i cant face going 2 court 2 c him and the smug look on his face so some1 is going 2 represent us
well the bastard only got 8 1/2 yrs so he will be out in 4yrs and back to try it again.
believe me this piece of scum will b back to try it again and next time i aint gonna b so lucky.
due to this we have lodged an appeal,but we have no choice but to move home in the hope he will never find us.
Shocking, I thought that he’d at least get 12-16 years.
Really he should have got life, especially after stabbing a little boy in the face.
I hope they increase his sentence on appeal.
I’d be surprised that if the sentencing goes to appeal the sentence is not lengthened. However you have written earlier that prison for ‘his type’ is hardly and easy ride – more so because of not only who he picked on but also how. It would be a surprise if he’s not broken in more ways than one before he does get out. However long he’s in for.
But does this mean that we assume the brutalization of prison and thereby prisoners on other prisoners is part of the justice system?
If we spent £4 per day per prisoner on food and managed by this to reduce reoffending by a third – would it save money? Or to put it another way – is it worth taking that chance? And it would be possible to select one prison for a ‘test’ but it would have to over a prolonged period of time rather than the short test founded for the university’s research…
£2.50 for a student is bad but lets not say that because some folk are treated badly we should victimize others even further – rather should we not say that that’s irresponsible to think of students living on so little… Another little mine field is the fact that if someone works and is paid the national minimum wage – they are being paid below the poverty line the government has deemed appropriate…
“….would be former miscreants…” I think the fact that we’ve come to the point where we assume the worst of children as they grow shows how far the problems come. It’s come to the point where some schools are saying that due to quick food in their homes their children are having to be taught how to use cutlery in school. I think this shows that parenting has gone loopy in some cases and the problem is how to address that – only a long term solution will be effective and in the meantime we have the state wanting their souls rather than try to prepare them for the world… and for that conscription may ‘fix’ the problem for some but what about those who decide to ‘conscientiously object’? We’d start dividing them ever further.
Good Vocational courses and Good Academic courses running alongside each other with no (even though it’ll be run by teachers and they may find it dificult) prejudice as to either as better or worse than the other is I think the best way forward. Then folk can acquire skills and knowledge that they can see the point of and from that grow self value before they even hit 16!
we released the pics of nathan as u will have seen and we were pleased 2 hear about the bravery award because he deserves it and alec salmond agrees
I am heartened that Nathan has been awarded for his bravery.
I hope that you can get on with your life as best as possible even though this whole incident must have been terrible for you and yours.
Free to think, free to believe…
I do hope he is broken, although in all likelihood that will make him even more of a bully and a coward. With any luck he’ll do the honourable thing in prison and hang himself.
I don’t really believe that prisoners should be abused by other prisoners, however it is a fact of life. Criminals by their very nature prey on the weak and the helpless or the naive. In prison they are surrounded by like minded individuals and many will end up on the receiving end of the violence, theft and sexual assaults that they meted out to others.
Free to think, free to believe… said:
I would support such a trial, I’d be pretty sure it would have no effect and we could also trial spending just 15p a day. I honestly would be very interested to see which returns the better results. Hopefully the latter as otherwise the leniency could be taken further and further to gain a few more percent. At the end of the day prison has to be seen as tough, if only to convince the general public that the criminals are being punished.
I honestly believe that rehabilitation is too late for most criminals, they have gotten away with it, and gotten used to it. My only concern is if approx 70% reoffend within two years, when do the rest re-offend? Knowing that another offence would mean execution would surely improve the willpower of todays career criminals.
The problem is that children will always push the boundaries of what they can get away, didn’t you as a child? I am sure that you knew where the line was and also knew what you could get away with and what wasn’t worth the risk. Today those lines are extremely blurred. All children are not criminals, but a life without boundaries and discipline will lead to a career in crime.
I agree that parenting is to blame for a large part of the problems with todays youth. I remember talking to a woman whose daughter was going clubbing and sleeping with bouncers aged just 14. When I asked why she allowed her daughter to behave this way she simply said “What can I do? I can’t stop her.” Needless to say her daughter became pregnant before leaving school. Many of todays ‘parents’ are unable to look after themselves, let alone their offpsring.
As for conscription, I believe that for many it will be the family and authoritative figures that they never truly had at home and could well be the happiest days of their lives. Of course there will be those that just aren’t cut out for fighting, there always are and there are other positions in the army other than being on the frontline but that doesn’t stop them carrying out the training.
That said I agree that the ideal solution would be a better education and leaving school with good prospects and as positive members of society. However for those that can’t or won’t knuckle down, they can serve their country.
i have seenthat scum once in the pub he was put out of he looks as evil as the crime n injury he substained to u n nathan hope someone gets hold of him in jail n gets what he deserves hes nothing but acoward
Bring Back hanging, absolutely but it’s important that the death penalty is not used as a blunt instrument. I stand to be corrected but as I understand it the law works on probability, people can be found guilty ‘beyond reasonable doubt’.
Clearly you cannot hang anyone in this case no matter how abhorrent the crime, DNA proven or otherwise, you just can’t take the chance that an innocent will be hanged. However what is the problem with hanging where the case is proven beyond any doubt?
E.g. 20 people sitting in a club, someone comes in and as seems to be the chosen method in the UK starts to kick and stamp someone to death in full view of everyone. The perpertrator should be hung. I don’t give a damn about ‘background’ reports etc. I’m more concerned in protecting society. I think that the spectacle of grinning youths and their ‘parents’ in court showing not an ounce of remorse for their unwarranted actions is a modern phenomena which has grown since the abolition of the death penalty. These days, after all ‘life’ actually means 7 years or so, big deal when you are a youth, when you come out you will still have your life to live.
The opposite side will come in and say that the death penalty is the sign of an uncivilised society and call us stupid but never come up with any workable solutions – any one can criticise. Actually, the sign of a civilised society is one which protects innocent men, women and children allowing them the right to peaceful and productive lives and not allowing anyone to kill them, at least not for fun. They need to understand that just as there are inherently good people, there are also inherently evil people who will not respond to any types of rehabilitation.
Also, why does the media etc. refer to these criminals as animals? Surely animals only kill for food and not for fun. Sub -humans would be a more accurate description as they certainly don’t fit any definintion of a human being as most of us recognise.
Hello Alan, thank you for the excellent comment.
You hit the nail on the head there. This is what our society is failing to do because we are treating these types of criminals like little lost lambs, rather than the mangy, rabid dogs that they are.
I am sick to death of reading about abhorrent violent and murderous crimes commited almost every week in this country. The fact is that scum such as this ‘Hugh’ character for example, will never be rehabillitated and even if they were perceived as so it is not the answer because it does not ensure that they will do it again.
Further, those convicted of murder and I mean where there is more than enough compelling evidence for mindless acts of violence do not have in my eyes a ‘Right to Life’ … period because ‘Scum’ that commit such crimes do not understand nor care about the feelings of their victims and the aftermath faced by their families
I have thought long and hard about this and feel that the problem is now so very serious in the UK it is not going to be addressed until we start removing the ‘Scum Cancers’ from our society.
I believe the only way to bring it to the fore and to gain public support which I think is there anyway, is to have ALL the victim families who want the restoration of hanging and I’m sure there must be an awful lot now in this country to get together and form a pressure group. If neccessary march through London and every other major city until one of the parties signs up to the cause.
I would have thought that now is a good time with a general election just around the corner it will sharpen the minds of those who ‘Crave’ for power and the only way I can think off for ensuring that the public are given a valid choice is to press for a refererundum/ vote on the issue.
We have to force the politicians to give us a ‘Chance to put it to the People’ and let them decide not the politicians who after all are supposed to act on our behalf.
I truly believe that ‘Hanging or its equivalent’ will have an impact despite what the ‘ Rehabillitators try and force upon us because so far they are not winning the argument in my view.
“is to have ALL the victim families who want the restoration of hanging … I’m sure there must be an awful lot now …”
I’m more against the ‘Right to kill’ – folk who’ve been around states and watched when they passed the death sentence watched the level of violence in crimes increase… well if the state can kill, why not the criminal…
But what about the victim families/friends who are opposed to the death penalty despite the grief and horror that’s been inflicted upon them –
“I don’t feel anger, just sorrow for the parents of our son’s killer.” by Margaret Mizen, mother of the killed Jimmy Mizen… and she’s not alone there are other cases…
There have been studies showing that at remembering things the human mind can be quite terrible – if you have an interesting police officer he could, quite literally influence folks memory and steer them in a certain direction and DNA does last and at various levels – I shake hands with someone and then they shake hands with somebody else and then they lean on a receptive surface (cushion/whatever) then my DNA would be in that mix… and of course if you’ve hugged someone or shed some hair somewhere then that would be seen as a good source of DNA – but again it could be carried…
Unfortunately – Jimmy being the 13th teenager this year to be killed, a blunt appraisal, if I remember the figures correctly, means that the number of killings has gone done – unless of course we have a spree around Christmas… Christmas having so many tensions and preconceptions due to society’s madness rather than the christian tradition… So, as the numbers are falling it shows that introducing the death penalty may not be needed to get this under control.
Hello again Free to think, free to believe… thank you for commenting.
Everyone always seem to use the US as an example of the murder rate increasing despite the death penalty, or even because of it, and I think that it is a flawed argument. For example the murder rate in Britain has increased since the abolition of the death penalty, demonstrating that not having the death penalty increases the number of murders. In Britain is it possible to go even further with that, for example in 1960 the murder rate was 6.2 homicides per million, by 1970 and after the death penalty was abolished in 1965, that had risen to 8.1 homicides per million.
The murder rate in the UK has more than doubled since the abolition of the death penalty, and today is a staggering 13.7 homicides per million. Clearly the abolition of the death penalty has cost lives.
Victims families tend to be opposed to the death penalty, normally as they are decent people and having lost a loved one are loath to inflict this on others. This forgiving attitude, in my opinion, perpetuates the problem as it shows the culprit that there are no real consequences to their actions, at least no irreversible consequences to their irreversible actions, it also shows that their life has a higher value than their victims.
As for DNA, I don’t believe that the court or the police should rely on DNA evidence alone, after all it isn’t infallible but it can place people at a scene. There are also different types of DNA and I think any jury would put differing levels of importance of different types of DNA. For example in a rape-murder investigation a few skin cells wouldn’t necessarily prove a crime, or even a presence at the crime scene, however lots of skin cells from the suspect on the victims breasts, inner clothing and genitals would be pretty unlikely to have come from a second person that the suspect had contact with.
Then of course there are pretty conclusive DNA samples from things like semen, it is pretty hard to explain that away.
I am not sure that I share your optimism about the deaths of teenagers, the very fact that we are counting the deaths, and in double figures, shows that the death penalty is required, after all it was far lower in 1960 than today.
Since the rise has been from 6.2 per million in 1960 to 13.7 per million today – never mind the death penalty – the rise in population may have been a factor in itself…
There are, of course, different forms of DNA evidence but my point was that some DNA ‘evidence’ may place you somewhere you were not… and taking the jangled case in Italy [the murdered student and the strange triangle] where all sorts of stuff was ‘normal’ for them – how do you separate criminal evidence from evidence of their ‘normality’?
Talking about the death penalty as a deterrent ignores the prints showing pickpockets working a crowd who had gathered to watch a pickpocket being hung… And to leave the states behind – Japan proved that the best way of preventing crime was a darn good detection rate. True the ‘punishment’ should always outway the benefit but if you can [a good long time in jail and loss of any moneys you may have inherited from the ‘death’ of another would outway the benefit] prove that that’s a nigh on certainty – the percieved benefit of crime would disappear…
It might not stop all crime but it may well give it a fair dent.
I’m not sure that the rise in population had anything to do with the rise in murders, after all the population was 52 million in 1960, it is only 60 million today, a rise of just 14%, compared to a rise of 120% in the number of murders. Besides the murder rate is measured in homicides per million to take into account population sizes. For example Jamaica has one of the highest murder rates in the world – 320 homicides per million but a population of just 2.5 million.
Incidentally, the USA has a murder rate of 56 per million, way back in 1960 it was 51 per million, proving that the death penalty can keep the murder rate under control. During the same period in Britain the murder rate has doubled without the death penalty to keep it in check.
I was going to mention the Meredith Kercher case myself regarding the DNA issue. Rudy Guede’s semen was found inside Meredith, but that of course only proves that he had sex with her, it apparently cannot be proven whether or not it was consensual nor even realistically where the sex took place, so I do understand your point about the DNA, it is rarely conclusive evidence.
Of course Rudy also left other DNA that did place him at the scene of the crime, he left a turd in the toilet. This does place him at the crime scene and coupled with the other DNA evidence means that if he didn’t murder her, he was somehow involved.
The Judge and Jury should also look at the whole picture and not just one piece of evidence, such as Guede fleeing the crime scene, his pathetic explanation of events and his stupidity.
You’re referring to an artists interpretation of an event as fact, even if the event did occur it only shows that the pickpockets were not deterred by the hanging of a peer, but hanging isn’t meant to be a magic bullet against all crime. Some people won’t be swayed by any punishment, which is all the more reason to hang them.
Besides those pick pockets were not stealing for fun, they were likely doing so in order to eat, therefore it was a stark choice, certain death by starvation or the chance of a death by hanging.
Taking money from criminals will never work, they have proven unwilling to work for money already, putting them in a worse position and then expecting them to work even harder to get back on an even footing will only backfire. After all they know how to get money quickly and easily, and increasing the need and temptation will only harm the ordinary hard working people of Britain.
I’ll admit to being ignorant of the actual stats here –
Behaviour seems to change in steps due to population density and the UK cities seem to be getting larger whilst the rural population is hard pressed to maintain itself – Jon Wagner who wrote some Judge Dredd did work on population and behaviour of rats [yes, I know] which are social critters – and the findings as he related them in an interview (of bygone years) showed strange differences in accordance with stages of population density.
Even if pickpockets didn’t strike whilst a crowd gathered to watch a pickpocket being hung – they still worked…
13.7 per million is not what I would call ‘huge’ true 0 per million would be the ideal but if you think that capital punishment is not a ‘magic bullet’ do we not have to then figure out what kind of society we want rather than merely wanting death by state to try to engineer a difference…
‘Taking money from criminals…’ may not work but I went further than that. If folk believe they are going to be better off then it will continue to happen – the crucial issue is the confidence they feel in getting away with it and therein lies the importance of the detection rate…
If we had/or fall to the social conditions in Jamaica with its ghettos of tin shacks that don’t have water we may also have/fall to that level of homicide per million.
13.7 per million is not huge, but still a large increase since hanging was abolished, especially as the murder rate has remained the same in US, despite their increase in population. I am not suggesting that hanging is the be all and end all, but I think it is important to show the criminals as well as the law abiding citizens that society has a line of tolerance and if crossed there are no more chances.
I agree that the vast majority of criminals engage in their activity not because they need to, but because they really believe that they can get away with it. Sadly society is leaning more and more toward this view point with each generation. The youth of today see situations to their advantage and do not take into account the other person. Take for instance the woman who recently had an epileptic fit outside her home, a passer-by, rather than aid her, helped himself to her mobile telephone, purse etc. A generation ago the passer by would have done everything he could to aid, today he no doubt saw the situation as his good fortune.
Hanging, admittedly will do little stop this decline in values, however it is a good place to start as it is going to take a generation to reverse the trend and we haven’t even started yet.
I am sorry but I don’t agree about detection. Police are not meant to detect crime, they are meant to prevent it. The very definition of the word police is:
A fact that our politicians seem to have lost sight of. All our police officers today now seem to be used as detectives which makes them about as useful as CCTV cameras. Completely pointless for the people getting robbed, assaulted, raped, or murdered but there’s always a possibility that the crime will be cleared up afterwards. Small comfort to the victims.
A good detection rate doesn’t deter criminals, but police officers patrolling the streets does.
Whilst walking back from town I was talking to an elderly lady was is also an epileptic and she recounted two instances where her stuff [handbag/keys…] was collected and kept for her – one time at the cafe she had her fit outside of and another when someone, rather unnervingly, took it home only to phone up and hand everything over later (change intact) – these stories don’t get into the press but if you want to turn things around then maybe they should – it would provide a more positive bench mark for behaviour and show that anyone can step up to ‘that plate’ as such…
By empowering folk to defend themselves and others we could all be allowed to prevent crime but nowadays the state may well step in and charge a passerby for assault for stopping an attacker… If we could all defend ourselves and those around us – wouldn’t that be even better than a beat cop?
Hanging reinforces violent values and how would that make society better?
Did those acts of kindness with the elderly lady happen recently or was she recounting incidents from years ago? Either way it is good to hear that there are still those who put others before themselves. That said such behaviour isn’t meant to be extraordinary but ordinary.
I agree, years ago people used to stick together, hence why criminals would avoid crowded places, today though people are not a deterrent to crime. In a large part because the violence that the criminal is willing to use is alien to a great many people and they are terrified of it, but also because the Government has removed many of the safeguards to protect members of the public and replaced them with legislation that could place them in court should they intervene.
As a boy I used to hear a lot about a Citizens Arrest, yet I cannot remember the last time I heard that phrase, let alone remember the last time it was mentioned in the press having being used.
It isn’t just arresting people for committing crimes though that we seem to have lost but virtually all aspects of good behaviour and good manners. A friend told me recently of an incident in a town centre car park, there was a minor shunt between two cars. The drivers, a middle aged man and a young girl exited their vehicles and the man immediately launched into a verbal assault on the terrified young girl. This altercation continued for several minutes with the man becoming more and more aggressive and although the young girl was clearly distressed, not one of the hundreds of passers by interjected on her behalf and even when she appeared to ask for help, she was ignored. In the end the young girl handed over some cash and got back into her car in tears. I was amazed when I heard this, believing that it is the gentlemanly thing to do help a lady in such a situation, yet even though there were plenty of men walking past, they all kept their heads down. Sad really. as this poor girl shouldn’t have to travel with her father or boyfriend, just to be safe. So although I do believe that soceity should be tackling crime and such itself, I don’t believe that it should be their job, the police get paid to police, it is their job with help from society.
Life is violent. Having a general population for whom violence is completely alien is just making them victims to those who are prepared to use violence to get what they want. Violence has a place in society, the problems occur when the only ones able or willing to use it are the ones who are unaccountable or have no morals.
I think, from how she told the tale – in the last few years…
If I think of something else when I’ve the time I might come back on the rest of that comment.
Two months on from this comment and the figure now stands at 21 deaths. I am not sure what the tally was for last year, but I think it was around 25. With five months left of this year, it looks like it will go up, not down.
Well – and why are we so interested in knife crime now?
The question may seem callous and it could well be but I’ve read some analysis that says that as far as the stats go – the total crimes and deaths by knife is normal compared to last year – this year though and the statistical anomaly is London so we’ll all know about it…
I remember Ian Paisley ranting about the injustice of so many pages devoted to Diane when she hit a tunnel wall but there was only a mention in the local paper in Belfast that had died tragically… Whatever you think about Paisley – the point remains that the press have their own agenda in thinking about what will sell and at the moment knife crime has come to their capital and so to the rest of us – what about the stabbings in Glasgow? This year.
It’s tragic but think of the silence of everyone about knife crime when it was roughly the same across the UK last year… So we can have complete indifference until it comes to our doorstep and then we can demand all sorts of interesting measures? And be satisfied that we are only asking for justice? or is that mob rule?
I agree that it does seem very London centric. Recently there was a news report of three stabbings in one day, one in Nottingham, another Bolton (if I remember rightly) and one in London.
Naturally the Nottingham and Bolton stabbings were mentioned briefly, just to highlight how bad things are, before moving into a ten minute report on the London stabbing.
I think that this is a problem with news in general though, it is always very London biased. Glasgow has a far higher rate of knife crime than London, but I have never seen one report on this in the news.
According to the stats, knife crime hasn’t really changed very much, but that isn’t the full picture. Under 16s aren’t represented in those stats, and as it becoming clear, victim’s and perpetrators are getting increasingly younger.
Take Northumberland that I mentioned earlier, although the murder rate is roughly the same research by the Judge shows that murders in Northumberland committed by people under 21 had doubled in the last five years and murders committed by those under 17 in Northumberland had tripled in five years. So it is clear that we aren’t getting the full picture from the stats.
I agree that (if) this is such a problem, why hasn’t it been tackled before, but like gun crime it only seems to matter when it is in London. Nottingham has a far higher rate of gun crime than London (per 100,000) but it is rarely mentioned.
Whilst knife crime isn’t the sudden epidemic it is made out to be, it is still a rising problem that needs tackling, especially among the youths of today.
How would Jill Dando’s murderer have escaped the noose as Barry George successfully demonised in his trial…
Of course now he’s a sad innocent who’s spent almost a decade in prison…
Am reading an article on how the criminal ‘fraternity’ is using children to deliver their drugs at ever younger ages – the youngest being 9yrs old – I cannot escape this stream of thought – these children are being horrendously let down by a whole swathe of society and are probably the ones who are must likely to wield a knife – who should we blame them for carrying and using it or ourselves for letting children get sucked into a culture wherein they are taught that might be normal?
In Africa there is a recognition of the work that is needed to rehabilitate the children who are forced into an army or militia – should we not begin to think about our children caught up in this way over here in a similar fashion?
Maybe he shouldn’t have.
I too was feeling a little sympathy toward him, but the papers today are full of stories about the sexual deviant, the man who has been convicted several times of sexual assault and rape.
The fact that he is back on the streets is not good news for women, and as for the compensation, he may not have committed that crime (and I am not 100% convinced of that), but he is certainly guilty of many others, probably a few that he has never been caught for, so he should just cut his losses.
He is very far from innocent.
You seem to place the blame on wider society for this prevalence of knives amongst youngsters, personally I think the answer lies closer to home, with the parents.
If Mrs Smith down the round is allowing her teenage son to mix in drugs and knifes, that is Mrs Smith problem, not mine or anyone else’s on this street, and it is something that Mrs Smith should be made accountable for.
I believe this lazy parenting is the root of many problems in Britain today. The Government is loathe to take children into care these days, even if they have abusive fathers, drug taking, alcoholic, prostitute mothers, the children are still usually allowed to stay with their birth mother, as that is what is deemed to be best for the child. Naturally the child becomes a delinquent or dead.
Parents seem to be able to get away with not providing any kind of quality care or upbringing for their progeny. Blaming the schools for not disciplining them, or educating them about morals, manners and decent behaviour, whilst allowing their children to be out at all hours, drink, smoke and take drugs. Perhaps if we started locking up parents for the crimes of their children they would take more of an interest in their child’s upbringing.
‘Maybe he shouldn’t have.’ re the escape of noose by George Barry – where are all those safeguards you wanted to use to only get the ‘really guilty’?
Mr Barry is not the most pleasant fool nor well balanced – his rather dubious claim of stalking someone else is either true and distasteful or untrue and a worrying jibe at the rest of society which went along with the police plot, in a manner which is best described as distasteful.
Whatever the truth – it is clear he needs help, and needed help, to be able to rejoin society properly and here we can get back to the parenting issues…
Until the british ‘care’ system does not produce folk who are so institutionalized that prison is a ‘breeze’ to them – then we have to be careful about how we interact with parents… Whilst still seeing them as responsible for how the child comes out – but then doesn’t the government take any blame for legislation they undertook that then meant that criminals started to move guns around by child post? is this drug dealing thing not stem or has been increased by this move and greater familiarity between gun toting criminals and children?
Perhaps the word ‘distasteful’ re Barry doesn’t show the right level of repugnance…
If he was stalking someone in a criminal fashion – then they have a confession. But whatever Barry George is – he’s not the killer the police painted him to be.
Miscarriages of Justice work both ways, he may have gotten off from a crime that he did commit.
I’m not convinced that a rapist, stalker isn’t capable of murder. It wasn’t some elaborate plan, it was walk behind and pull the trigger. He didn’t dispose of the body, and as it was months before he was arrested, who knows how well he got rid of the other evidence.
Remember that this was the man caught outside Kensington Palace with some rope and a hunting knife. Maybe it was perfectly innocent, maybe not.
You believe it was some sort of police plot? I do remember reading in the papers about a shrine to Dando being found in his flat, this later turned out to be completely untrue, but it must have come from somewhere.
I also don’t believe his remark that he had never heard of Jill Dando, even though he stalked women for a hobby and he lived just a few streets away from her.
I disagree. He started raping 25 years ago, who knows how many women he’s raped since then. Rapists tend to become more and more violent, the more crimes they commit and sooner or later they start to murder. It isn’t a stretch to believe that someone who is capable of raping a woman, is capable of murder.
Barry George doesn’t need help, women need to be protected from him. If he is unable to function as a member of society, then he has no business in society, he should be locked up, somewhere.
I don’t think that you can blame the Government for criminals using children to move drugs and guns around, the blame there lies squarely with the parents and the drug dealers. All the Government can do is treat minors the same as adults regarding guns and drugs, which isn’t fair on the children, or relax the laws on gun carrying, which isn’t fair on everyone else.
If a parent of a nine year old is unaware that their child is being used as a gun/drug courier, then they are unfit to be parents.
The killer the police painted was a demonised version of Barry George – he may be capable of killing someone – but then I think we all are given the right conditions for each of us – think what the average person would do to protect those they love…
So, I don’t think he was who they painted him to be. Being incorrectly incarcerated and institutionalized [probably after his 8/9 years] – shouldn’t he be helped. The crime of the death of Jill Dando just seems to be of a different order to the complexity of George – a rope and a knife do not a gun make, whatever else they might.
If a child of nine was found drug dealing what then the punishment – take the parents away – what then for the nine year old – other relatives that may or may not be better or care which turns out adults that like prison regimes because they are so damaged by ‘care’ itself…
Until we can figure out something else the whole thing is a complete mess and no answers are good ones.
I took some time out to really go through these replies and analyse them. Try it yourself. Check out the spelling and grammar, giving some idea of mental age and education, and what you’ll find is that 95% of the replies screaming for capital punishment are rather challenged both mentally and educationally.
But Derek we don’t live in an Noocracy, we live in a democracy, so their views count regardless of their intellectual ability.
I think you are placing too much emphasis on education anyway, are you saying that someone with say degrees in psychology, philosophy or criminal law will somehow be better placed to know right from wrong than some illiterate labourer?
An ability to present a well structured and cogent argument does not make someone right, just look at the politicians.
As someone who is only slightly dyslexic I found it problematic as I transcribed someone’s thoughts from the tv… as a youngster I managed to fail [quite dramatically] my English ‘O’ Lvl… Under other circumstances than the ones I had that would have been the end of my education.
Do you, Derek, think I would have a less valuable opinion then?
True, some of those arguing for hanging don’t make like Charles Dickens – but so what? Most of their comments are from a point of very real suffering and if I were in their shoes I’m sure my feet would feel uncomfortable with my standing against the death penalty.
The question is not whether someone has a better education or a bigger brain – the question is a completely moral one and we should see that everyone has a valid point of view whatever their background – as one of the foremost moral teachers was a carpenter {Jesus – if you hadn’t guessed} and another gave up his legal career to spin and weave {Gandhi}…
Charlie – in my time of industrial temping I can say that I’ve known folk who were much brighter than I and so your comment re illiterate labourer does remind me of some bright sparks I’ve known in my time.
I have just one thing to say on this whole subject Hang All that are guilty, if we make a mistake so fucking what, What about all the innocent victims that have been killed and the murderers have gone free. If they are found guilty by 12 good men and true hang the Bastards!
I agree, better to sacrifice a few innocent people in error, rather than many more in complacency.
‘Hang All that are guilty’
but if we make a mistake rather than saying so fucking what the reality is that we become the murderers that get off for killing innocents if theirs a mistake.
You could of course make it the responsibility of the 12 good men and true and that if they should have known better do they become liable? What would that do for Justice?
Charlie your point of sacrificing a few for the sake of the many has been around for a long time and was the kind of thinking Caiaphas (I may have spelt that wrong) used to justify getting Jesus killed to the Sanhedrin before going off to see Pilate…
After all this time have we not learnt anything from the history of state killing it’s own folk off?
Thanks for the comment Free to think, free to believe…
But surely the State is obligated to kill off some of its own folk to save others? Isn’t that what Government is for, to protect its citizens from enemies both foreign and domestic?
Or should they release murderers in the full knowledge that some innocent person somewhere will suffer for it?
With a re-offending rate of about 60%-70%, it is clear that law abiding members of society are at risk from murderers. Yet you advocate releasing them anyway and hoping for the best?
Of course it is always sad when an innocent is convicted of a crime that they did not commit, even more so if they are executed. But I don’t understand the argument that somehow not doing anything for fear of making a mistake is better than saving lives and perhaps one day making an error.
There was this recently:
Prisoners freed early have ‘committed three murders’ | Mail Online
There are no official figures for the re-offending rate for murderers, and I can’t help but wonder why. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that re-offenders tend to commit worse crimes.
But since the death penalty was abolished the murder rate in the UK has doubled. Over the same period in the US, it has largely remained the same.
I think the most important thing to remember here is that dead criminals don’t re-offend.
I was informed of a petition on the death penalty recently and as I went to sign it I saw that the Government had responded.
No chance of debate, no discussion and no decision by the people. So much for democracy. The elite have decided they know what is best for us and we have to put up with it.
Needless to say I didn’t bother signing, but this issue won’t go away. The only political party that supports capital punishment is the BNP, so by ignoring this issue and stifling debate on it, the ‘Elite’ are just playing right into the hands of the far right.
Very interesting thread. For the post topic I’d say the death penalty wouldn’t be applicable;however, the light sentence is entirely unacceptable.
Coming from the States as I am I’d offer that capital punishment serves many purposes but with the appeal system that exists and that convicted individuals get “free” legal services there is a point where plain old incarceration is ultimately cheaper.
Capital punishment rates have to be pretty high to serve as a deterrent. Scumbags will be what they are.
Thanks for the comment Alfie.
I have never really understood the distinction between attempted murder and murder. For me, attempted means the culprit went with the intention to kill, but changed their minds, i.e. intentionally missed with the firearm, ceased their attack and called an ambulance or something along those lines.
Stabbing someone eight times and then legging it is murder. Sure, the woman was fortunate and lived, but not because her attacker was an expert knifeman and missed her major organs, but through sheer luck and the bravery of her little lad.
Her attacker didn’t change his actions one bit. It is only through the woman’s sheer will to live that he faced a maximum sentence of 15 years, rather than life in prison, nothing else.
An innocent person shouldn’t have to die for us to realise that someone is a murderer. I am not talking minority report here but anyone who is capable of what he did, and be out in three years, is going to do it again at the next perceived insult, next time though the victim may not be so lucky.
For me actions like this are the same as murder, stabbing someone with a knife longer than 2in just once is enough to kill them so once someone starts plunging a knife into someone, they’re dead and only God can save them.
I think that they should be very high, serial rapists, child molesters and callous killers should all be for the short walk and long drop.
Add to that a strict program of corporal punishment in schools, bring back the stocks and birching and the current crop of scum bags will either be whipped into shape or dead.
The youth of today have no idea of hardship, pain or suffering, so I think that capital and corporal punishment will be far better deterrents than even the most optimistic of us realise.
I agree with you Charlie, and I think you’ve made a very convincing argument.
Even Churchill supported executions during the Nuremberg trials. I don’t see how today’s serial killers and serial rapists are any better that the captured Nazis.
I think there’s a real problem in the whole EU as politicians in the main parties lack a backbone. They are also very willing to ignore the wishes of the population. In the UK, 42mn people use Internet and it has never been easier to consult the public on whatever issue, so why does it never happen? That’s not my idea of democracy.