Tag: self-defense

The London Sunday Telegraph Hasn’t Given Up Yet

Here is today’s entry into the Telegraph‘s efforts to alter the law to allow home defenders to use lethal force in defense of themselves and their property:

DPP: We must be able to fight off burglars
By John Steele, Home Affairs Correspondent, and George Jones
(Filed: 09/12/2004)

The right of home-owners to act in self-defence was backed by the Director of Public Prosecutions yesterday. He said people wanted to feel safe in their homes.

Well DUH!

In an exclusive interview with The Telegraph, Ken Macdonald, who is responsible for nearly 3,000 prosecuting lawyers in the Crown Prosecution Service in England and Wales, said that many burglaries took place when people were at home.

Like over half?

Prosecutors must recognise that householders who injured or killed in confrontations with intruders acted instinctively and in fear – and it was the fault of burglars that the owner felt frightened.

Tell that to the prosecutor that brought charges against Brett Osborne.

“If people do not feel safe in their homes, we are all in a very serious situation,” Mr Macdonald said.

“You should feel safe everywhere but you really should feel safe in your own home.”

He made his attempt to reassure the public that prosecutors were on the side of the home-owner, not the burglar, as Tony Blair publicly backed the call for greater self-defence powers for householders.

During heated exchanges in the Commons with Michael Howard, the Conservative leader, the Prime Minister abandoned the Government’s previous stance that a change in the law was not necessary.

Challenged to support a private member’s Bill introduced by a Tory MP to ensure that householders would not face prosecution unless they used “grossly disproportionate” force in self-defence, Mr Blair acknowledged there was public concern over recent violent attacks by burglars.

Pardon me, but who gets to determine what’s “grossly disproportionate”? Tim Lambert indicates that Brett Osborne stabbed Wayne Halling in the back. So? If lethal force is justified, what difference does the entry wound angle matter? Does that make it “grossly disproportionate”? Apparently so. So it would appear to me that the proposed new law is, in effect, no different from the existing law.

One fact seems clear: Parliament isn’t going to pass a “Make My Day” law, but Patrick Mercer, author of the current legislation says Osborne would not have been prosecuted under his bill.

Let me settle that issue now. The term “not grossly disproportionate” will allow home owners a much greater degree of latitude in tackling burglars. They will be able to do whatever they think is necessary to defend themselves when confronted by an intruder. What they will not be entitled to do is chase a burglar down the street and plunge a knife into his back once he is off their property. My Bill is not a licence to commit murder – it is not an English version of the Oklahoma law that indemnifies home-owners from prosecution no matter what they do to an intruder.

Under my Bill, the farmer Tony Martin would still have broken the law – for he shot Fred Barras, one of the two burglars who entered his house, in the back as he was running away. Martin’s use of force was grossly disproportionate. If he had injured or even killed Barras in a struggle to repel him and his partner-in-crime while they were in his home, then Martin’s actions would – under my Bill – have been perfectly legal.

Earlier this year, The Sunday Telegraph highlighted the case of Brett Osborn, who is now in prison because he defended himself against an intruder. Under my legislation, there would be no question of prosecuting a man such as Osborn. He stabbed a blood-covered, drug-crazed intruder who forced his way into a house to molest one of the women staying with him. Mr Osborn confronted and fought with the intruder and in the struggle stabbed him with a kitchen knife.

Osborn is serving a five-year sentence for manslaughter. One of the issues that led to the decision to prosecute him for murder was that he failed to “warn the intruder that he had a knife and might stab him with it if he did not desist”.

This is preposterous – but it is the kind of thing that happens under the present law. Cases such as Osborn’s give the lie to the claim, made so often by government law officers, that “no one has been unjustly convicted” under the existing legislation. Many more people have had to endure the stress and strain of having a prosecution hanging over their heads for months – only for the judge to dismiss the case as “manifestly absurd” once it comes to court. Those people do not end up in prison but they do suffer the protracted torture of the legal process.

Under my Bill, no one will be prosecuted for taking the kind of action Osborn took. We will frame the Bill’s language very carefully to ensure that result.

Pardon me if I take that with a grain of salt. Anyway, continuing with the original Telegraph piece:

He said the Government was looking at whether the law needed to be clarified “so that we send a clear signal to people that we are on the side of the victim not the offender.

I think it’s more than fair to say that, thus far, that signal has been clear as mud.

“Mr Macdonald said it was for Parliament, not the Crown Prosecution Service, to decide whether the law on self-defence against intruders should be changed.

He challenged the public perception that homeowners were being taken to court for tackling burglars. The CPS knew of few such prosecutions beyond the case of Tony Martin, the Norfolk farmer who was jailed for shooting dead a 16-year-old burglar.

But those few have received a LOT of press.

“There have been cases in which burglars have been stabbed or shot and we have not prosecuted,” he said.

And those cases have received very little press. So the public has been convinced that acting in one’s own defense is legally risky, and so have the burglars.

But Mr Macdonald acknowledged that the right of self-defence was a legitimate concern, as so many burglaries took place when people were at home.

He cited the case of a couple who were upstairs in their bedroom, with their children in the next room, when they heard a noise downstairs and were worried that the intruder might be armed.

“Let’s suppose he turns out not to be armed,” Mr Macdonald said. “That does not matter. It is what the householder believes.

“If you put yourself in that individual’s position, that is what we as prosecutors ask ourselves. What is excessive in that situation?

“What could be more frightening than going downstairs and finding some man in a balaclava in your kitchen?”

Mr Macdonald said it was the right of a person to use legal force to defend himself, or another person, to defend property or to prevent crime.

Note that: “LEGAL” force, not “LETHAL” force.

The law recognised that people who were being attacked were frightened and it needed to recognise that people who were being attacked could not judge precisely their response

“When people are frightened, they behave in ways they would not behave if they were not. Frankly, it is the burglar’s fault that the person is frightened.

“We are not saying that if someone is burgling your house, you had better stop and think really hard, because the law does not expect that and we are not calling for that.” Mr Macdonald said the police had to conduct an investigation when they arrived at premises and found a body.

But, as a prosecutor, he would look for clear evidence of “very excessive force” before considering a prosecution.

But, unstated, is the idea that lethal force is, by definition, “very excessive.”

“If it is not excessive, it is reasonable,” he said. Chasing an intruder down the street, for example, and stabbing him could not fall into the category of self-defence.

Now when did the citizen lose his power to apprehend a criminal fleeing from the scene of a crime? When did that become the exclusive power of the Police? When was Sir Robert Peel’s Seventh Principle invalidated?

Police, at all times, should maintain a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and the public are the police; the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.

Isn’t capture of a fleeing criminal a net societal good? Is that not a duty incumbent on the citizen? And if that fleeing criminal resists arrest, and dies in that resistance, why is that not a case of self-defense? Tim Lambert provided some pages from a law text a while back that stated:

So where a policeman shot dead a man who was unarmed and had already surrendered he was still entitled to claim his action was in self-defence if he honestly believed this to be the situation. The test is whether his action was reasonable in the situation as he perceived it, rather than it actually was.

It appears, then, that there is a double-standard for police and for regular citizens. (Aside from the fact that regular citizens are pretty much prohibited from using firearms in self defense.)

Mr Blair’s clash with Mr Howard over the need to give householders greater rights of self-defence occurred during Prime Minister’s Questions.

Mr Blair said the Government would now consult chief police officers, the Crown Prosecution Service and the Attorney General on whether the law should be changed.

He said he shared the “general comments” of Sir John Stevens, the outgoing Metropolitan Police commissioner, who told The Telegraph that householders should be able to use whatever force was necessary to defend their homes.

“I understand the concern on this issue,” Mr Blair said. “So if we get the right response back from those people, then of course we will support a change in the law.”
The Government has put law and order and the fight against terrorism at the heart of its legislative programme for what is expected to be the last session of Parliament before the election.

But Mr Blair is worried that the Tories have exposed Labour’s flank by demanding greater rights for householder protection.

Sir John welcomed Mr Blair’s backing of a review of householders’ rights to tackle burglars.

He said last night that the law needed to be changed. Since the Martin case, people had found it difficult to know what they could do.

“I have not come out with this comment off the top of my head. It is as a result of listening to what people say.”

Tim Lambert has finally weighed in on the topic, calling the Telegraph‘s campaign “cynical and dishonest.” Color me surprised. The funny part?

The truly disgraceful thing about their scare campaign is that it could convince people that self-defence is unlawful and frighten them out of defending themselves against an attacker, resulting in injury or even death of a crime victim. I am disgusted.

Note to Tim: They’re already so convinced. They’re already dying. And it’s you who will not recognize this fact, and I’m disgusted by that.

Perhaps Tim didn’t see the report on the home-invasion assaults on 89 year-old Annie Hendrick and 81 year-old Sally Skidmore. That report stated:

(A) survey conducted by The Sunday Telegraph showed overwhelming public support for a change in the law to give people new powers to fight back against intruders.

The poll, conducted by ICM, revealed that 72 per cent of people believe that the current law, allowing householders to use only “reasonable force” against intruders, is “inadequate and ill-defined”.

A similar proportion, 71 per cent, say that householders should have an unqualified right to use force, if necessary deadly force, against people breaking into their homes.

More than half (51 per cent) do not believe that the police can protect householders against intruders; 70 per cent believe the government could do more to reduce the risk of burglaries; and an overwhelming 81 per cent say burglars should not have any rights to to sue householders if they, the intruders, suffer any injuries during the break-in.

I guess that 72% are all just “gullible gunners.”

And I’d appreciate it if Tim could tell me how these two old ladies were supposed to defend themselves against multiple young male attackers? After all,

Consider two scenarios:

1. Attacker has a gun. Defender does not.

2. Attacker does not have a gun. Defender doesn’t either.

Self defence is possible in the second scenario while it isn’t in the first one. Is that clear now?

Right, Tim. Neither the attackers nor the defenders in these two cases had guns (that we know of). So the old ladies had every opportunity to defend themselves, right?

And I suppose Tim didn’t see the story about the home-invasion murder of an 85 year-old grandmother, who dialed 999 to report a burglary in progress. Nor did he read the stories of previous victims the Telegraph reported. One was Eric Butler, the gentleman mentioned in Dave Kopel’s All the Way Down the Slippery Slope who said:

“The concept of reasonable force is nonsense. I should know: when I defended myself, I had the book thrown at me.”

In 1987, Mr Butler’s plight provoked an outcry. He was attacked on a London Underground train by a man who kicked him in the face, grabbed him by the throat and began banging his head against the carriage.

Only Mr Butler knew that the walking stick he carried concealed a four-inch ornamental blade. As the grip around his neck tightened and he felt his consciousness fade, Mr Butler unsheathed the blade and fought back.

The attacker was taken to hospital with abdominal wounds and later received an 18-month prison sentence. Mr Butler was convicted of carrying an offensive weapon, fined £200 and given a 28-day suspended prison sentence. On appeal the sentence was quashed but the fine raised to £300.

How dare he carry a weapon with which to defend himself! He should have just allowed his attacker to choke him to death like any good prole!

Or what about Mark Mercer:

“At long last someone is coming out against the asinine law that protects burglars’ rights.”

In January Mr Mercer, who owns a security camera company, held a burglar at bay with his pocket knife while his wife, Mary, telephoned the police. A second intruder escaped.

“As we waited for the police our burglar, who had a small injury that did not require so much as a sticking plaster, sat on our sofa and announced, ‘I am going to sue you for this.’

“These men entered our house noisily, presumably confident that we would not dare to disturb them.

“What really gets me is that they felt secure in their belief that if action was taken against them they could probably do better out of the compensation than they could out of the burglary.”

But the Telegraph‘s campaign is going to frighten the public and prevent them from defending themselves?

Then we have Simon Jones, former police officer and apparently a victim of the Telegraph‘s disgusting propaganda:

“If the definition of reasonable force was cleared up, there wouldn’t be the problem of criminals suing for compensation. Everyone would know where they stood.”

Mr Jones confronted armed burglars in his home last year, outside a room where his wife and two-year-old daughter were cowering. When they pulled out a 7in knife and threatened to cut his head off, Mr Jones gave them the keys to the Volvo and the Mercedes on his drive. The men were never caught. “I would like to know, for future reference: is the golf club by my bed a weapon or not?”

If a former police officer doesn’t know, how the is the rest of the public supposed to? I’d also like to know how England’s knife laws managed to disarm the attacker with the 7″ blade, and how Mr. Jones was supposed to defend himself and his family from multiple burglars with his golf club.

No, I guess Tim must have missed those pieces. Read the rest of those stories, if you haven’t already.

In related news, Lord Goldsmith, the government’s attorney-general, protested that a change in the law would infringe on a burglar’s right to protection from violence! And to that my response is, SO? Read that whole piece, and think of the mantra repeated by the anti-gun forces when CCW is considered: “Wild-west,” “blood in the streets,” “road-rage shootouts over fender-benders.” It’s precisely the same psychology: Don’t trust your fellow citizens.

Then there’s this piece that discusses Tim’s position:

Some people say the present law works just fine for householders — these people would disagree
By Karyn Miller
(Filed: 12/12/2004)

Jon Pritchett threw off the bedcovers, reached for his 12-bore shotgun and ran out into the garden where the shrill sound of his burglar alarm was piercing through the chilled darkness. Instinctively, he fired four warning shots into the air. Or, at least they were intended as warning shots.

There were two burglars that night at the property in Borough Green, Kent, but unknown to Mr Pritchett, 60, one was crouched on the roof of his barn. Until then, the burglars’ evening had been going well. They had been raiding the barn’s store of wine made from the grapes on Mr Pritchett’s small vineyard. As the bullets went whizzing by, one of the burglars was hit in the arm, while the other fled for dear life.

With his heart still pounding wildly, Mr Pritchett telephoned the police for help. They arrived 45 minutes later – and promptly arrested him.

The two burglars, both drug addicts with a string of convictions between them, were found guilty but walked free on probation for two years. When one of the men was asked if the incident had put him off burglary, he said: “It shook me up, certainly.”

Their victim was also shaken up, but his real ordeal was just beginning. It highlights why The Sunday Telegraph launched the “Right to Fight Back” campaign to allow people to protect their homes and families from violent intruders without fear of prosecution or claims for compensation from burglars injured while breaking the law.
Last week Tony Blair, Michael Howard, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner and the Director of Public Prosecutions, among others, lined up to voice their support for the campaign. However, some critics argue that a change in the law is unnecessary because any householders who are arrested and charged invariably end up being acquitted. Such opponents have clearly never been in the same position as that of Mr Pritchett.

The 60-year-old businessman was stripped naked before being made to wear only a paper boiler suit for his overnight stay in a filthy police cell. Ten years on, the memory of the ordeal causes his voice to crack and falter and he struggles to get the words out.

“My wife and I don’t talk about what happened, because it is still upsetting and Margaret doesn’t like it,” Mr Pritchett said. “This is the first time I have talked about it for a long time,” he said.

“On the night it happened and I was taken away, Margaret was left in the house. Naturally, she was distraught. She didn’t sleep for the rest of that night. She was left on her own – no one was with her.”

When the police attempted to interview Mr Pritchett the next morning, he opened his mouth to explain what happened and nothing came out. He had developed a severe stammer overnight. “It was partly due to the stress of what had happened,” he said. “I really thought I had killed someone. And it was partly due to being shut in a dirty cell, not knowing what would happen next. They had to call the police surgeon for me. He said it was shock.”

Mr Pritchett was bailed and sent home but six months later he was charged with three counts of intent to cause grievous bodily harm. Another six months after that – a period he describes as one of “stomach-churning fear” – the case finally came to court. “Can you just imagine: sitting there for six months, not knowing what would happen to you? It was horrendous.

“When it came to the preliminary hearing, the counsel for the Crown said in my presence – which I found quite astounding – that he didn’t know why the Director of Public Prosecutions was pursuing this case because the Crown hadn’t a hope in hell of winning it. Why they did [pursue it], I still don’t know.”

Mr Pritchett was tried before a judge and jury, cleared of all charges and left to pick up the pieces of his life with nothing but an award of £10 compensation for the damage done to his property during the burglary. He sleeps through the night now but still suffers from a stammer and surfaces “like a machine-gun” whenever he is anxious or upset. “You have to get on, but life is never the same,” he says, sadly.

Four years ago, in attempt to leave the experience behind them, Mr Pritchett, now 69, and his wife Margaret, 71, emigrated to Western Australia. At about the same time, in the summer of 2000, Lee Gapper, a 20-year-old builder from Peterborough, interrupted a burglar in his home.

He fought the man off with a baseball bat while his lodger, George Goodayle, also 20, tackled the burglar with his fists. The blows had the desired effect and the man, a local heroin addict, fled empty handed. Mr Gapper immediately telephoned the police to tell them what had happened – only to find himself handcuffed, bundled into the back of a police van and charged, by a grinning constable, with attempted manslaughter.

“Two police officers came,” he recalled. “One shook my hand and said, `Good on you.’ The other officer, who was younger, threw the book at me. Someone radioed through to say that they had found the burglar at his mum’s house, bleeding. The younger policeman said that it wasn’t looking good for me. He said that I had used `unreasonable force’. They asked us to stay in my house. I was petrified.

“At dinner time, two more officers came to the house and arrested us both. One of them was smirking. I felt so sick. I had called them and I had been truthful about what happened. I expected that they would take me to the station, maybe interview me in the waiting room, to find out what I had done and why. That would have been fair enough. I didn’t expect to be handcuffed.

“I did use a lot of force. But you have such an adrenaline rush and your heart beats so fast, when you find a burglar. When you don’t know what to expect, the first thing you do is lash out with whatever you have to hand.”

The burglar, who was taken to hospital with a broken wrist, fractured elbow, cracked ribs and a fractured skull, was later sent to prison for one year. Meanwhile, the attempted manslaughter charge against Mr Gapper, which carries a maximum sentence of life imprisonment, was never formally dropped.

“The worst thing was living in fear and worrying,” he said, though he adds that the death threats, the bricks coming through the window at night and the children taunting and spitting at him on the street rank highly. “I don’t think you can recover from that. I don’t think I ever will. Being in that police cell was a more distressing experience than confronting the burglar, if I’m honest.”

There are others, many others, who can attest to this. In 1995, Nick Baungartner fought to the death with an armed burglar at his home in Ockbrook, Derbyshire. Armed with a shovel, Robert Ingham, 22, ambushed Mr Baungartner, a tennis court builder from Hungary who was 53 at the time of the attack. The struggle lasted for 20 minutes and Mr Baungartner broke bones in both his hands. The burglar died of a neck injury, which had cut the blood supply to his brain and caused heart failure.

Mr Baungartner had to wait three weeks while the Crown Prosecution Service deliberated over his case, before he was told that he would not be charged. “My life is shattered,” he told a reporter at the time.

A year later, an inquest concluded that Ingham’s death was accidental. But even five years on Mr Baungartner was reported to have said: “I have not been able to work since. I still have pain in my wrist and in my face where I was kicked and punched.”

In the same Derbyshire village in August this year, Kenneth Faulkner, a 72-year-old farmer, was being burgled for the third time. On this, the latest occasion, he fired a shotgun at an intruder who was trying to gain access to a garage at his home. The 22-year-old man, who was wounded in the leg. Mr Faulkner was arrested after he dialled 999 to report what had happened, but in October a sympathetic judge declared that his actions “could not be criticised”.

“I just want to get on with my life now,” was all Mr Faulkner would say outside the courtroom. “It’s something I want to forget.”

The same month, Arlindo Caeiro, 33, a Portuguese-born bar supervisor living in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, was arrested on suspicion of assault after he stabbed an intruder in his family home with a breadknife. The man had attacked him with an iron bar. The case was dropped in September, but Mr Caeiro sent his 14-month-old daughter back to Portugal with a view to following her. “I have been through agony,” he said. “The solicitor at the police station said my case was like Tony Martin’s.”

Despite such well-documented cases, Ken MacDonald, the Director of Public Prosecutions who earlier this week backed the rights of householders to defend their homes against intruders, challenged the idea that people who did so were prosecuted. Mr MacDonald said that he knew of few such cases beyond that of Tony Martin, the Norfolk farmer who was jailed for shooting dead a 16-year-old burglar.

Yesterday, from his home in Australia with his wife at his side, an upset Jon Pritchett took issue with the comments. “That’s a load of tripe,” he said angrily.

“We went through a whole year of hell. If The Sunday Telegraph’s campaign gives other people the right to defend their homes against those who wish to destroy their lives, I hope it succeeds.”

Right, Tim. The law works perfectly, and it’s just us “gullible gunners” who think it needs to be changed.

Sweet Jeebus’s Bleeding Hemorrhoids…

Hear about this one? The 42 year-old Australian security guard who was brutally assaulted by a thief wearing brass knuckles who was after the pub receipts she was carrying? She picked herself up, drew her concealed weapon, approached, and then shot the sumbitch. She’s been charged with murder! Here’s one version of the story:

Guard set for murder charge

A SYDNEY security guard tonight became a fugitive after refusing to submit herself to police for questioning over the shooting death of a thief during a bungled robbery.

Bungled my ass. She properly intervened.

If Karen Brown cannot be found she will be charged in her absence tomorrow morning.

Police had given Ms Brown until 6pm (AEST) today to present herself at Liverpool police station in south-west Sydney for an interview over her shooting of William Aquilina last Monday.

The 42-year-old Rooty Hill woman did not show and it was unclear whether she had been aware of the ultimatum.

Liverpool police Superintendent Terry Jacobsen said police tried to contact Ms Brown through her lawyers with phone calls and text messages throughout the day.

Her lawyers could not be reached by AAP.

Ms Brown allegedly shot and killed Aquilina moments after he attacked her with a knuckleduster and stole a bag of cash she was carrying out of the Moorebank Hotel.

She was originally scheduled to speak with officers on Tuesday, saying she was too unwell to talk before then.

But she raised the ire of police when it emerged she had given two media interviews, one of which was understood to have netted her a six figure payment.

“We have given her that opportunity but she has elected to go to the media, and that’s not appropriate,” Supt Jacobsen said.

He said Ms Brown’s non-attendance meant police would charge her with murder either tonight or tomorrow morning.

“We have sufficient evidence in my view of a prima facie case of murder,” he said.

Commencing criminal proceedings could make the airing of Ms Brown’s exclusive interview on tomorrow evening’s edition of Today Tonight in contempt of court.

“It will be sub judice and Today Tonight will publish any material at their peril,” Supt Jacobsen warned.

The officer condemned Ms Brown’s decision to tell the media her story instead of police.”

Channel Seven spokesman Simon Francis said the network still planned to air the program.
“Regardless of what happens we will be telling her story tomorrow night,” he said.

Mr Francis refused to confirm Seven had paid Ms Brown $100,000 for the interview but said the amount was substantially less than an offer by rival Channel Nine.

Mr Aquilina’s grandfather Frank Rasmussen accused Ms Brown of profiteering from his grandson’s death.

“She’s getting blood money, that’s all I can say,” he told Channel Nine.

Ms Brown said in an interview with today’s Sunday Telegraph that she was sorry for Mr Aquilina’s family.

“I really feel sorry for his family, it must be awful,” she said.

She said she feared for her life but after the attack had no recollection of events.

“I was so scared,” she said.

“I did not know where I was or exactly what had happened to me. All I knew was that blood was pouring into my eyes and my head was throbbing.”

Sounds bad, right? However:

TV payout will go towards legal defence

A SYDNEY security guard who shot and killed a robber last week was not trying to profit from the tragedy, her mother said today.Karen Brown shot William Aquilina, 25, after he assaulted her and robbed her of a bag of money outside the Moorebank Hotel in Sydney’s south-west last Monday.

Her mother, Beverley Brown, said she believed her daughter would be paid $100,000 by Channel 7’s Today Tonight program for an interview to be broadcast tonight.
“To my knowledge it is that amount of money ($100,000). I haven’t actually seen a cheque or anything like that.”

Beverley Brown said the money would be used to fund her daughter’s defence.

Damned good idea, IMHO.

And then there’s this version:

Bashed guard has skull fractured in attack

By Evelyn Yamine
July 30, 2004

THE security guard who shot and killed a man during a bungled armed robbery could not be interviewed by police yesterday because her injuries had worsened.

Karen Brown was kept in hospital after tests revealed that her skull and nose were fractured and she had trouble seeing out of one eye.

Ms Brown was supposed to give a statement to police about Monday’s armed robbery outside the Moorebank Hotel, Monday, where Ms Brown shot William Aquilina in the head.

Ms Brown was hit in the head with a knuckle-duster during the attack.

She was seen by an orthopedic and eye specialist yesterday and underwent a brain scan.

“She’s got a fractured skull and a fractured nose and there have been some other medical issues,” Mr Busuttil said.

There are suspicions she may have some fractured bones in her body.”

She may now need to remain in hospital for further tests.

Detective Chief Inspector Nick Bingham said Ms Brown’s statement was imperative to the investigation.

“We would like to speak to her sooner rather than later but we’re mindful of the fact she did receive fairly serious injuries,” he said.

Ms Brown is expected to meet with police some time next week.

A post mortem examination conducted on Wednesday showed Aquilina died from blood loss due to a bullet in the face. The bullet was found still lodged in his head.

Police are waiting on toxicology reports. “It may be a factor in relation to his actions but that’s probably still six weeks away,” Insp Bingham said.

Aquilina’s parents, Anne and Michael, last night apologised to Ms Brown for the assault. They told A Current Affair their son was not one to hold a grudge and have decided to be the same.
“I’ve got no hard feelings,” Mr Aquilina said. “Maybe there could have been another way of doing it but I don’t know.

“If I knew what he was doing I would have stopped him.”

Mrs Aquilina added: “I’m sorry for what he did, I am really, really sorry, that’s all I want to say. He would not be cranky, he was so forgiving.”

Aquilina’s grandfather, ex-policeman Frank Rasmussen, said Ms Brown had been in no danger and should be charged with manslaughter or murder.

“She’s done the wrong thing … we’ve all done the wrong thing, but she’s done worse, she took a person’s life,” he said.

Mr. Rasmussen can go suck dead dog farts for all I care. Here’s another story on it:

Why I killed the robber

THE security guard who shot and killed a robber who bashed her has spoken about her ordeal for the first time.

Shaking and crying, a traumatised Karen Brown, 42, said yesterday she had feared for her life as she was punched in the head several times by William Aquilina, who was armed with a knuckle duster.

“I was so scared,” she said of the ambush and shooting outside a hotel in Sydney’s southwest last Monday morning.

Ms Brown suffered a fractured skull, a fractured eye socket, a fractured nose, a fractured left hand and possible brain damage when the 25-year-old grabbed her hair, king-hit her and then battered her to the ground.

The convicted criminal then dragged her across the bitumen towards a stolen getaway car before she could release a bag containing between $30,000 and $50,000 in hotel takings. Moments later, a bleeding Ms Brown, who was dressed in casual clothes and whose gun had been concealed, shot Aquilina as he sat in the car.

Surrounded by her family, Ms Brown tried to recall the incident that left her covered in blood in the hotel car park.

“I looked up through a bloody haze,” Ms Brown said. “I did not know where I was or exactly what had happened to me. All I knew was that blood was pouring into my eyes and my head was throbbing.”

Despite her injuries, which also include severe concussion and a floating bone fragment behind her eyeball, Ms Brown said she felt sympathy for Aquilina’s family and expressed remorse for what had occurred.

“I really feel sorry for his family,” said Ms Brown, who has been a security guard for four years.

“It must be awful. I just wish this had never happened. It’s been a terrible week.”

Ms Brown had been collecting and banking the pub’s takings for the past five months.
“Nothing like this has ever happened before and nothing prepares you for this,” she said.
Ms Brown’s sister, Katrina, said the incident had been devastating.

“It has completely wrecked her life,” she said at the Sydney home Ms Brown shares with her de facto, George Muratore. “She’s a complete mental and physical wreck. This is the worst thing that’s ever happened in her life. She has never hurt anybody or anything before and it’s completely crushed her.”

Mr Muratore’s father, Vic, 73, said he believed Ms Brown should not be punished.

“She should not be charged — I would have done the same thing,” he said. “If you pay me to protect, I have to protect. Everybody reckons she’s a champion.

“We have known her for seven years and she is a very decent person — she is a good person.

“I say sorry for the other people, but you deserve what you get when you do something like that.”

But Aquilina’s grandfather, retired policeman Frank Rasmussen, has said Ms Brown should be charged.

Right. Only the police should have the power to shoot criminals?

“He was murdered,” Mr Rasmussen said. “That woman should have torn into that hotel as soon as she alleges she was hit and she should have asked for help. Instead, she advanced on my grandson and shot him in cold blood.

No, she was severely injured – by your grandson – and probably disoriented, and still did her job, which was to prevent his escaping with the loot, you prick.

“She’s just a bitch. Sorry.”

No, you’re an asshole. And I’m NOT sorry.

Mr Rasmussen said he was upset by how his grandson — who has convictions for drugs and robbery — had been portrayed.

“They’re saying he’s a rotten dangerous criminal and he’s not. He’s lovable,” he said. “We still don’t believe he’s done this on his own — he’s too good a person.

Yes, I’m sure he was just a lovable fuzzball as he punched Ms. Brown in the head multiple times. Don’t make me puke. He was a perfect fucking ANGEL I bet. But now he’s DEAD.

“He’s never been involved in anything like this in almost 26 years that we’ve known him. It’s not in his nature.”

Guess the brass knuckles weren’t his, either?

One thing’s for damned sure. He won’t be “involved in anything like this” again.

Ms Brown underwent further medical tests on Thursday. Detectives are not expecting to speak to her until tomorrow.

For a nation founded by cast-off convicts from Mother England, they sure seem to be sucking from the same teat of nanny-state enforced pacifism. For example, try this (unrelated) story:

Good Samaritans set upon by gang

A NIGHT out in inner-city Brisbane ended in violence for a family of good Samaritans who tried to intervene in a vicious gang attack.

The Jackson siblings of Sunnybank found themselves fighting for their lives after standing up to a bunch of “cowardly” youths who brutally kicked a man while he was on the ground at the corner of Edward and Charlotte streets.

Dr Peter Jackson, 28, was king-hit and knocked unconscious after running to help the man – who himself ran off and left the Jacksons to face the gang.

Brother John, 24, jumped into the fray to help his older sibling, but was overwhelmed by a swarm of angry youths aged 16 to 19 as he desperately tried to reach his stricken brother.

Enter sisters Elizabeth, 21, and Bridgette, 19. Trying to avoid blows from the gang of youths, the sisters pulled the attackers off Peter, who was unconscious for more than five minutes.

John later expressed disgust that a gathering crowd did not raise a finger to help.

“It was really un-Australian to see, but then again that has become the Australian way,” he said. “The gutless people watching them in the background couldn’t even help two girls.”

The family had been out to farewell John, who is off to Europe tomorrow, when they saw the gang attack a man by himself.

“(Peter) said, ‘Get away, get away.’ They just started walking away and then one of them took a step towards him and that just launched the rest of them on to Pete,” Elizabeth said.

“A guy came up and punched him in the back of the head and I think that was when he was knocked out. He went to ground and the guys didn’t leave him alone.”

John said his brother had half the attackers on him and “I had the other half”.

“Four or five of them cornered me and this massive hit came from somewhere,” he said. “I was just getting swamped.”

Elizabeth said there were “so many people around” who would not help.

“So Bridgette and I just went in and literally started grabbing these guys by their hoods and their jumpers,” she said.

“We were trying to pull them off one by one. One of them took a swing at Bridgette but it missed.

“(Afterwards) some bouncers came over after Pete had been on the ground for five minutes.
“They just said, ‘Oh, he’s all right, call the cops,’ and just walked across the road.”

The Jackson clan had no regrets yesterday, and appealed for public assistance to identify the attackers.

“I would do it again, definitely,” Peter said. “Some of the horrendous brain injuries you are unfortunate enough to see (in medicine) – you just don’t wish that on your worst enemy. They are vegetables (and) one or two more kicks and that guy could have been in massive trouble.”

Police sources told The Courier-Mail the force was 49 staff short in Brisbane City, but due to get 20 first-year constables soon.

They said it was a busy night on Saturday.

No word on how long it took for the police to show up, assuming they did.

Good thing none of the attackers had a weapon, isn’t it? Like, say, brass knuckles? Or a knife? Or even *gasp!* a gun?

From ThisisLondon.com

Steaming gang’s terror reign

A “steaming” gang has been convicted of preying on passengers in a four-month rampage on trains and buses.

The gang, sometimes more than 20 strong, attacked up to 80 victims on public transport.

Is that “80 victims at a time” or “80 victims in total”?

In an eight-week trial, Harrow Crown Court heard how the mob, aged between 13 and 23, came together from all over London and met at the Trocadero in Piccadilly Circus.

They concentrated on late-night buses in central London and early-morning commuter trains from Gravesend, St Albans and Brighton.

They would surround victims, holding passengers captive and systematically robbing them. As the reign of terror went on, the violence increased.

One man had his cheekbone shattered in an attack on a late-night bus and required surgery to reconstruct his face.

Days earlier, an off-duty woman police officer had been surrounded on a train, covered in spit and threatened with rape.

The mob were caught in a police operation involving more than 250 officers who targeted 20 addresses across London. The last of 15 identified members was convicted yesterday. They will be sentenced next month.Now, if ONE victim had a handgun, do you think this group would have dispersed and thought long and hard about attacking anyone else?

One phrase comes to my mind when I read this: “No, Ace. Just you.”

Outside court, Detective Chief Inspector Philip Kent, the officer in charge of the case, said: “The railways, streets and buses are a safer place as a result of this trial.

Bullshit. There’s not a damned thing to stop another group from doing exactly the same thing. THIS group got away with it for MONTHS. And criminals never think they’ll get caught.

“It is an excellent outcome and the result of a lot of very hard work by the British Transport Police, the prosecution team and Met police officers.

Except for the guy who needs his face reconstructed, that is. Oh, and the eighty-odd other victims. I’m sure they’re just thrilled at the outcome.

“The levels of violence in these attacks were increasing and it is important now that they are sentenced appropriately as a warning to others.”

The court heard how the gang used street names, such as Evil, Havoc and Boxer, and carried knives, metal pipes and an imitation handgun. They were convicted on 25 counts of robbery and conspiracy to rob between September and December 2002, although police believe they may have targeted up to 80 victims.

I seem to recall someone defending England’s weapons laws by saying,

I liked Sarah’s version of it better:

One against twenty? And the only weapon available to the victim is foul language? But they’ve got knives, blunt instruments, and an imitation handgun. According to reports I’ve read, getting your hands on a REAL handgun isn’t all that difficult in London. You just have to be a criminal with a little cash.

That you could get from, say, mugging some people on a bus.

Twelve members of the gang pleaded guilty at two connected hearings – Joseph Gbonda, 18, from Herne Hill, Ashraf Ali, 18, from Peckham, Richard Tavenier, 18, from Mitcham, Philip Fahie, 21, from Edmonton, Jarrell Edwin, 22, from Peckham, Malik Jones, 19, from Acton, Faisal Navaid, 20, from Wandsworth, Foday Dumbuya, 18, from Mitcham and two 17-year-old boys and a 16-year-old boy and girl who cannot be named because of their age.

Chelsea Waldron, 18, from Hayes, David Moroney, 18, from Islington, and a 13-year-old boy who cannot be named were found guilty by the jury of conspiracy to rob.

Half the gang were under 16 at the time of the attacks – and yet among them they had 35 previous convictions for offences including robbery and grievous bodily harm.

LOVELY set of thugs they’re growing over there, eh? They don’t fear anything because, quite frankly, there’s not much to fear.

Violent and predatory.

There is no more violent but defensive.

One senior police source said: “They are opportunist thugs. Their crime was not sophisticated, but they became embroiled in a gang culture.

“They were in it for the kicks and to finance a life based around underground clubs and girls.”

Stolen mobile phones were the gang’s trophies and plundered cash funded designer clothing and gold jewellery, but the spoils of crime were only part of it. Success fuelled their egos and they began to enjoy the ritual humiliation of their prey.

Victims recalled the laughter as blows rained down upon them.

Damon Murphy, a strapping 30-year-old taking a bus home after a night out in the West End, was so badly beaten he required surgery to reconstruct his face.

The attack only lasted five or six seconds, but the force of the blows shattered his cheekbone. He could not eat for two weeks and feared permanent damage to his sight. Last month, two years after his ordeal, he broke down in court while giving evidence from behind a protective screen. “I am still not over it,” he admitted.

Excluded from schools and torn between parents, the gang slipped easily into a life of petty crime on council estates and the streets. The uncle of one of the 17-year-old boys, who had been expelled from school, said: “I do not know how he could do these things. It is very sad and distressing.”

Hmm… Could it be because NO ONE PARENTED THE KID??? No discipline, no guidance, no parenting?

Joseph Gbonda, who became known as Flamer after scarring himself playing with fire as a child, took to the streets after his father Joseph, an accountant from Sierra Leone, split from his mother Juliet.

Even when he was locked in his room under a 7pm to 7am curfew, Gbonda would escape through the window. A cousin claimed he preferred the streets to being torn between his mother and father. Youths from estates in Peckham and Mitcham joined with those from Edmonton and Hayes to form a loose-knit group of 15 that could swell to more than 20.

The obligatory “society is at fault” spin.

IT DOESN’T MATTER.

These kids are DESTROYED. They have NO FUTURE as anything but thugs. Their society does not have the resources necessary to retrieve them and make them productive citizens. No society does. IT’S TOO LATE. When they get out, they’ll do something similar (probably several dozen somethings similiar – or worse) and finally get caught and go right back in. Except this time they might actually kill someone.

The Trocadero’s frenzied music, noisy arcades and flashing neon lights have long attracted groups of youths.

It became the mob’s favourite haunt as they waited for numbers to accumulate and the late-night stragglers to start making their way home.

Dressed in bright coloured hoods, baseball caps, beanies and baggy jeans, they greeted each other with a casual press of their fists.

There was no ringleader, but there was always a plan of attack.

The gang would take it in turns to make the first approach, with the youngest member often chosen as a test of his bravery and to add to the humiliation for the victim.

A 13-year-old boy, who cannot be named for legal reasons, became a specialist. A small child, his angelic face belied his vast experience on the streets. He has two previous convictions for common assault and two for theft.

The boy’s mother had abandoned her flat on a squalid council estate in Streatham to live with her boyfriend. But during the day the boy and his friends would use the derelict house as a den.

They ravaged the house, breaking all the windows. Neighbours said the boy never went to school and roamed the streets. In the attacks, while he made conversation with victims, the others filed into seats in front and behind the target and some hovered in the aisles. They taunted the victim, watching their fear turn into panic. Then they struck.

The passenger would be engulfed in a flurry of fists and boots.

Hands rummaged through pockets and bags looking for wallets and mobile phones.

Sometimes victims managed to push the emergency stop button on trains, and the gang would flee along the tracks. On buses they burst through the doors and split up, escaping to all parts of London.

Jarrell Edwin, also known as Evil, would return to the flat he shares with his mother in one of Pe ckham’s mo s t abject council estates. Gbonda lives nearby, as does Ashraf Ali. Ali, a quiet and shy child from a large Bangladeshi family, developed into an impossible adolescent after falling in with gangs on his street.

His meek mother barely speaks a word of English. His father, who suffers from a long-term illness, is intimidated by Ash and unable to control him.

Richard Tavenier lives in Mitcham and is king of his estate, threatening anyone who confronts him and even breaking into his neighbours’ cars parked near his house.

His mother, Beverley, a devoted Christian from Jamaica, does not dare chastise him.

When Tavenier’s stepfather, Randolph Nevins, tried to assert himself, it only made things worse.

He is already out of prison after serving half of his two-year sentence. One of his neighbours whose son has been threatened by him said she fears for her boy’s life and is trying to move out of the area.

The first trial – which convicted eight members of the gang who had pleaded guilty – served only two prison sentences.

But even as they faced jail, the gang’s casual disregard for the law remained unchecked.

In the dock they were noisy and arrogant – swearing, laughing and sneering their way through an eight-week trial.

Police said many broke their conditions of bail and have been reoffending on an almost daily basis.

Even relatives of the mob agree it is a depressing cycle of violence and crime.

“I cannot defend my cousin or any of them,” said one relation. “It is a service to society that these kids should be named and their crimes exposed. But I only wish it would impact on the way they act.

Named and exposed. Oh my.

Probation. Oh dear.

And they wonder why this happens?

“Sadly, I fear it will not make any difference.”

It won’t. You can see it RIGHT NOW.

Because the philosophy says protection of the citizenry is the responsibility of the government, not the people themselves. And the government can’t do the job.

Not won’t – CAN’T. And everybody knows it.

Everybody.

Some just won’t accept what that means. So they do the same things some more, only harder, and never wonder why it never helps. They just pat themselves on the back over the “very hard work” that results in “excellent outcomes”.

Outcomes like those described at the bottom of the article.