So from this I take it that you are a fan of the death penalty for serial burglary but not a fan of trial by jury. Fair enough, I am sure Mr Martin was a great judge of appropriate retribution

Although his legal team apparently did not think so, this from the appeal:

Tony Martin, the farmer who was jailed for shooting dead a teenage burglar at his remote Norfolk home, was suffering from a paranoid personality disorder and a depressive illness at the time, the appeal court was told yesterday.

Sexual abuse suffered as a child may have led Martin to believe he was at risk of being "violated" by the burglars and his mental state could have made him react more violently than the average person, Martin's appeal team argued.

I don't recognise the "case" you attribute to me. Perhaps you are confusing me with someone else. I don't believe in vilifying anyone. Putting things in their context as the world moves forward, and our understanding evolves, yes. We must do that constantly.

I don't believe in shooting anyone, unless there is an immediate threat to life. I have not expressed an opinion on "nicking homosexuals", only that when homosexual acts were illegal, any that were prosecuted and found guilty were on the wrong side of the law.

No, of course people shouldn't be free to shoot burglars. Stop and think what the consequences of that would be. Not every burglar is in their right mind. Many do it to feed a drug habit. Some because of depression and hunger. Serial burglars need to be detected and punished. If they thought they were likely to be shot, I have no doubt many more would go armed, and the results would not just be dead burglars.

Your argument is to have us replicate the situation in the USA, and no-one sensible should really want that for us

For the avoidance of doubt any comments in response to a previous post are directed to its ideas and not at any, or all, posters personally.

Did you spend much time quizzing the Arabs on that during your time there?

Are Al Jazeera spending much airtime navel gazing over which directions criminals run in?

'Who are you and how did you get in here? I'm a locksmith. And, I'm a locksmith.' (Leslie Nielsen)

If it bounces off at a 45 degrees angle then Allah says they were innocent.

Then they have to give two barrels of oil to the family.

Edited by Stirlingsays (13 Apr 2022 12.18am)

'Who are you and how did you get in here? I'm a locksmith. And, I'm a locksmith.' (Leslie Nielsen)

Of course people should be free to defend themselves. Stop and think what the consequences of not being allowed to do so. It isn't really practicable to inquire into the mental or pharmacological state of whoever has invaded your home and threatened your life and property. Many criminals already go armed with knives and guns yet you want to give them the benefit of the doubt that they won't murder us in our beds.

Judge Judy! She would have sorted it out

I have just come back from Fez, great city has the largest market in Morocco really interesting place.

Edited by Badger11 (13 Apr 2022 10.19am)

One more point

People who are removed from violence are often the least qualified people to talk on it. They don't really understand how those situations work in real life, other than fear for themselves.

Situations that involve fast moving events combined with high stress produce outcomes that when written down on paper and analysed can look very different.

Take highly stressful situations and ten different people will have ten different versions of what happened, because their perspectives are affected by so many factors.

For me, what mattered are the basic facts of the case and from what I remember Martin defended his home from criminals and in my view the system jailed him because it failed him and couldn't bring itself round to taking the responsibility.

'Who are you and how did you get in here? I'm a locksmith. And, I'm a locksmith.' (Leslie Nielsen)

He was found guilty of murder which was reduced to manslaughter on appeal. Some of us are merely questioning whether the verdicts were correct.

Edited by georgenorman (13 Apr 2022 12.33pm)

That's at least a change of tone. Some aren't doing that, though. They are claiming that the "system" let him down, and he should not even have been charged.

Disagreeing with a verdict is fine, but without being on the jury and hearing all the evidence is not really that valid, as it relies on what you have seen and heard in the media, some of which whipped up sentiment. The jury heard it all.

For the avoidance of doubt any comments in response to a previous post are directed to its ideas and not at any, or all, posters personally.