badgerx16

Maybe you might be able to understand the concept of somebody being mentally ill. Calling disabled people 'idiot' isn't really helpful.

On the scale of 1 to 100 then, given that 100 is totally without any possibility of doubt, where does the line get drawn, before which you are innocent ? Surely everybody in jail should be 100% guilty ? What if you were 97% guilty, do you still get sent down ?, or 90 % ?, or 85%. Does the jury come back with 'Your Honour, we find the accused 78% guilty as charged", in response to which the Judge give 78% of the standard tarrif jail term. Sean Hodgson was found 100% guilty of the murder of Teresa De Simone, in Southampton. He served 27 years in jail and was only released when a DNA sample was taken from the exhumed body of another man who had confessed to the crime, and the sample matched what was taken at the scene. What percentage of guilt applied to the Birmingham and Guildford pub bombers ? Was Paul Hill only 93% guilty of blowing people up ? ( When in fact he was 100% innocent ! ).

Surely the question that has to be asked is, if the 'protesters' were inciting hatred, or committing treason, or whatever else they might be accused of; why were they not arrested and charged ? There were plenty of Old Bill on hand, and surely some senior officer at the scene should have been able to judge whether their 'freedom of speech' crossed the line ? Notwithstanding that, we all saw the pictures on the TV, and saw the press reports. If any of them committed a crime, arrest them, charge them, and bl00dy well prosecute them using the Law on the land. And the same would go for the EDF mob as well.

Then why come up with "Maybe not in Sussex or Dorset, but try the vast majority of the East End of London, Birmingham and the mill towns of Lancashire and Yorkshire.......". The VAST MAJORITY of those communities are as integrated as any other immigrant groups are. Most of the problems are caused because people tend to be afraid of things they don't properly understand, and that runs both ways. Are you aware of how many different ethnic groups and traditions you are lumping together as 'the muslims' ? Setting aside the sometimes deep rifts between the Sunni and Shi'a fanctions, there are Indonesians, Indians, Pakistanis, Arabs, North Africans, Afghans, Iraqis, Iranians, etc, etc. You might as well refer to 'the Catholics' as a single entity.

Maybe not in Sussex or Dorset, but try the vast majority of the East End of London, Birmingham and the mill towns of Lancashire and Yorkshire....... I have Radio Lancashire on my alarm, it goes off at 6:00 every morning; never heard the call to prayer though. Nor have I ever found an Islamic teashop. Why not complain about the 'Sikh-isation' of parts of So'ton or the west midlands, of the Hinduisation of Leicester, or the cultural isolationism of Chinatown in Manchester ? There are streets in Blackpool where the To Let signs are in Polish - they even have a special Polish foods section in TESCO. If you want to be xenophobic and alarmist, please be consistent.

a) Just what parallel universe did you pop up from ? b) Pure sarcasm, brilliant. Delete as necessary

Let's agree to differ, I do not think I will ever sway you, and personally there is no way I will ever be convinced there can be a 'safe' way of managing state sanctioned murder. ( Mind you, my wife has just suggested a variation on the theme of 'capital punishment'; anybody who fails to use an upper-case presentation for the personal pronoun deserves to be shot :smt036 )

Without completely reprising the entire thread - what if it was a miscarriage of justice ?

Which again brings us around to a measure of human judgement; how can you legally define 'depraved; or 'cold blooded' ? Is your value on such measures the same as mine, or a High Court Recorder's, or the Justice Minister's ? All such descriptions are at one end of a scale of relative values, and you have to be able to mark the point at which the law indicates sufficient 'depravity' to qualify. Cue court room, and appeal court, arguments between defence and prosecution as to how depraved the criminal actually is. For instance, in the case of the Wests, there were a number of bodies under their house and garden, - agreed this indicates a level of inhumanity. But the law deals in absolutes: how many bodies would you need to bury to be judged legally 'depraved' ? If Fred West had stood trial and ultimately been found mentally ill, would that get him off your hook, despite his actions, ( surely no SANE man could do that ) ? Morally the arguments seem quite simple, but when drafting and publishing Rules of Law and Acts of Parliament, the language used is always difficult to set down, and inevitably subject to judicial interpretation reflected in the post-trial assessment of test cases. Perhaps you could introduce a new class of crime, 'Depraved Murder', a bit like the 'Murder 1' & 'Murder 2' distinction used in the States. But then you are risking ending up with the same sort of plea bargaining that they they get; plead guilty to the non-lethal crime to save the cost & trauma of a trial, and thereby escape the noose. There is, sadly, no simple answer.

From what I've heard, I would think there are some MALE lawyers who would claim discrimination that they don't also get a lingerie allowance

I the thought the increase in national debt was generated by the Government bailing out the failed Casino Capitalists in the international banks :cool:

No, it does, however, have some members who are capable of independent thought, who refuse to act like a posse of redneck vigilantes. The definition of 'beyond a reasonable doubt', coupled with the investigative and evidential powers of the Police, the prosecuting capabilities of the CPS, and the direction of the trial judges, have been demonstrated to be fallable in too many cases; cases that at the time had been proven to the complete satisfaction of the jury, the press, public opinion, and quite often the Government of the day. Cases where the appeal system had to be taken to the third or even fourth iteration before the truth was revealed. Any system involving human judgement is capable of failure or error, and therefore, the problem is how is it ever possible to totally, 100% guarantee, EVERY TIME, completely without any chance of error, that the case has ZERO DOUBT whatsoever. By all means lock the b@stards up and throw away the key; 23 hours a day solitary confinement, etc, etc. Let them suffer for the rest of their lives, the longer the better in my opinion. But we can never allow the State to take lives in this manner.

Aren't you a Government employee TDD ?

Of course I understand. The issue for me is that today's 'overwhelming evidence' can become tomorrow's disproved theory. I can see the argument as regards Huntley or the Wests, they are / were monsters, I have no problem in stating that. But as I have said before on this thread, where do you draw the line ? How flexible can the 'Death Judges' be in their assessment ? Who controls or verifies their decisions ? Do you allow a right of appeal against them ? Do you allow the Minister of Justice to sway their considerations ? What is the influence of the 'popular' press ? Such a system will prove almost impossible to define, let alone control to the extent you can guarantee it is always 100% correct.

So, if I kill somebody, and put their head in your fridge ?.........

But what if the person on trial for the crime had not done it ?

Because, at the time each of the cases I quote were viewed as being 'beyond doubt'. The point is how to define something as being such a certainty that you can be willing to kill somebody.

What if part of the prosecution case is a confession ? Does that remove doubt ? Sean Hodgson had a mental condition which led him to confess to a murder he could not have carried out, yet it took 27 years to clear him. What about cases where scientific advances come about years later, which cast 'incontrovertible' evidence in a new light ?

Bring two !!!

Stephan Kisko, Anne Maguire, Paul Hill........ It becomes a circular argument. If somebody can be in jail for 27 years before being cleared of a murder they never, in fact, committed, can we afford a cut-off point for determining that their 'guilt' is actually not in doubt and it is safe to assume they can be disposed of ?

Is that not the over-riding principle in ALL criminal cases anyway ? Who, in your opinion, decides whether the guilt is actually 'beyond doubt' if it is not the Jury at the trial ? The Police ? The presiding Judge ? The CPS ? The appeal Courts ? The House of Lords ? The European Court of Justice ? Or maybe we should just leave it to the baying, rabid, tabloid press, or we could have a Big Brother style telephone vote after having some 'B' list celeb presenting edited highlights of the trial on prime-time TV ?

Would the allegations against Kisko qualify ? The abduction, sexual assault, and murder of an 11 year old girl.

At the time the Maguires, etc were found guilty of being IRA bombers, blowing their innocent victims to pieces without warning. I think the problem with trying to draw a defining line in such circumstances is that it is only ever drawn in sand, it can never be legally and morally fixed.

Regarding the 'only when there is overwhelming evidence' line... The Guildford Four, the Maguire Seven, and the Birmingham Six, along with individuals such as Stephan Kisko and Sean Hodgson, all had jury trials, were convicted according to the laws of the land of pre-meditated murder 'beyond a reasonable doubt', ( in Kisko's case the rape & murder of a young girl ), and after many, many, years in jail, were proved entirely blameless. Add to these Sally Clark, Sheila Bowler, Patrick Nichols, and Kevin Callan, who were all convicted of murders when in fact the deaths of the 'victims' were natural or accidental. The Police and prosecutors can make mistakes, or can even deliberately slew the system. Legalised murder is never the answer.

"Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord." Romans 12:19 (King James Version)