Father of 3, found guilty of shooting and killing a burglar

[levon]

http://www.surreycomet.co.uk/news/wandsworth/9339811.Father_of_three_found_guilty_of_killing_bu rglar/

[smartguy911]

This makes no sense to me. They were breaking in and he has full right to protect him. I guess not in UK.

[bluesc]

This makes no sense to me. They were breaking in and he has full right to protect him. I guess not in UK.

The sentence was probably motivated by the drug war.

Then again, someone was on the roof of someone's house trying to break in, fell through a window, and sued the owner for 6 digits.

The UK is backwards.

[Pericles]

I suspect this is the real issue:

"Parliament banned all handguns and there is now a mandatory five-year jail sentence for possession."

[Matthew5]

Saw .uk and that's all I needed to know. :p

[eduardo89]

This makes no sense to me. They were breaking in and he has full right to protect him. I guess not in UK.

They've changed this. It's not allowed to kill an intruder if "reasonable force" is used. So if the guy has a knife, you can shoot him with a shotgun. If he has a bat, you can stab him or beat him to death. You can't shoot him if he's running away, you can go after them and beat them to death, etc.

This is probably why he was convicted of manslaughter:

He told the court: “I walked down the corridor to the storage room, went to the cupboard, got the gun and got it ready.

Along with the fact he had an "illegal" weapon and was growing pot.

[AFPVet]

Gotta love the ignorance of those Brits lol. I am ashamed that my relatives came here from England. On a cool note, they were knights :) They criminalize self defense and expect people to rely on the system to protect them. The UK is an excellent example of what can happen when people are not allowed to defend themselves. Curious... could someone pull up the criminal stats for the UK i.e. rapes, murders...?

[bluesc]

Gotta love the ignorance of those Brits lol. I am ashamed that my relatives came here from England. On a cool note, they were knights :) They criminalize self defense and expect people to rely on the system to protect them. The UK is an excellent example of what can happen when people are not allowed to defend themselves. Curious... could someone pull up the criminal stats for the UK i.e. rapes, murders...?

Homicide rate per 100,000 people (2008):
US: 5.22
UK: 1.57
Saudi Arabia: 0.85
Libya: 2.95 (those damn dictators!)

Rape cases per 100,000 (2009; extremely hard to measure for obvious reasons)
UK: 24.1
US: 28.6
Switzerland: 8.1
Philippines: 2.9

[youngbuck]

I suspect this is the real issue:

"Parliament banned all handguns and there is now a mandatory five-year jail sentence for possession."

Yea, you're really at a disadvantage trying to justify a killing when an illegal firearm was used. And of course the evil marijuana he was growing further scars the juror's judgement.

[eduardo89]

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2009/07/02/article-1196941-05900DF7000005DC-677_468x636.jpg http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1196941/The-violent-country-Europe-Britain-worse-South-Africa-U-S.html


The UK has one the highest violent crime rate in the Western world. Higher than the US. Higher even than South Afrika.

One of the main reasons the homicide rate is so low is that manslaughter is not included, and most cases that old typically be considered murder in the US are tried as manslaughter in the UK.

[phill4paul]

and was growing pot.

The HORRORS! :eek:

[eduardo89]

The HORRORS! :eek:

Pot is in the same schedule of controlled substances as speed and PCP in England.

[phill4paul]

Pot is in the same schedule of controlled substances as speed and PCP in England.

Yup, England is the social experiment that is soon coming to America.

[bluesc]

Yup, England is the social experiment that is soon coming to America.

They can make it Class A (heroin, cocaine) and it still wont stop it. The US is worse, there aren't many aren't agents shooting marines 32 times because he is suspected of having drugs in his house in the UK, then again, there is no right to bear arms. At least in the UK warrants are still needed.

Come on dude, everyone is screwed no matter where they live. Just being screwed different ways.

[low preference guy]

Yup, England is the social experiment that is soon coming to America.

no. it's not coming. support for gun rights in america is at an all-time high today. plus, the structure of the country is much more susceptible to disintegration as centralization grows. the u.s. will never become what England is today, where the right to self-defense has been eliminated.

[phill4paul]

Come on dude, everyone is screwed no matter where they live. Just being screwed different ways.

I do not dispute this.



no. it's not coming. support for gun rights in america is at an all-time high today. plus, the structure of the country is much more susceptible to disintegration as centralization grows. the u.s. will never become what England is today, where the right to self-defense has been eliminated.

It damn sure ain't what it use to be. I've lived long enough to know.

[low preference guy]

It damn sure ain't what it use to be. I've lived long enough to know.

sure, but becoming what England is today is a very different story

[Anti Federalist]

Yup, England is the social experiment that is soon coming to America.

Count on it.

Especially the surveillance state.

[CaptainAmerica]

The words that I wish to say here would be considered illegal. The government is wrong.

[GuerrillaXXI]

no. it's not coming. support for gun rights in america is at an all-time high today. plus, the structure of the country is much more susceptible to disintegration as centralization grows. the u.s. will never become what England is today, where the right to self-defense has been eliminated.While it's nice that popular support for gun rights is high now, it's not enough for people to merely own guns. They have to be willing to use them if pushed beyond a certain limit. Unfortunately, I see little indication of such mental preparedness in the US today.

Most gun owners in the US have already been mentally disarmed. They worship authority and are terrified of breaking the smallest and most ridiculous laws, even if they have essentially no chance of being caught doing so. It's hard to see any point in such people owning guns except as toys or, at most, as defense against common street hoodlums. Hell, I think most US gun owners would rather give a cop or soldier oral pleasure than shoot one who was confiscating guns or otherwise enforcing tyranny.

Groups like the NRA reinforce this slave mentality by constantly blathering about "law-abiding gun owners," even though the very people who produced the Second Amendment were anything but law-abiding. Of course gun owners (and everyone else) should follow the laws that prohibit senseless murder, rape, armed robbery, etc. But some laws simply cannot be followed without lowering oneself to the level of cattle. I wish more of our fellow Americans, gun owners especially, would realize this.