he has a history of mental illness nothing to do with the burglaries thats why his gun license was revoked and his gun confiscated, i totally sympathize with martin but he crossed the line when he shot a trespasser outside his property he was not protecting his life as he was not being threatened, of course he had the right to protect his own safety but he shot somebody into his garden.

I understand that he shot them while they were inside the house.

It was a miscarraige of justice. The police failed Mr Martin when he needed them, and when he protected himself (a job the police are supposed to do) they were quick to condemn him.

I bet if those two lads had been making a getaway of 35mph in a 30 zone they would have been treat like.........*cough* criminals?

u understood wrong then

Apparently Feardon pulled a window out of its frame in order to get out of the building.
http://www.sky.com/skynews/article/0...388387,00.html...read the aug 20 1999 info

Where does that say Feardon pulled a window out of the frame?

I believe "you" when you say stuff like that!;)

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Ramrod

That's what's known as "moving the goalposts".

No, your original assertion was *wrong*. He was not "done" for, ie charged with, manslaughter, he was "done" for murder. The fact that it was later reduced on appeal doesn't change the nature of the original charge.

No, but I have never said they were.

You seemed to be arguing that someone who was known to be mentally ill was a reliable witness.

No, I'm someone who doesn't support the right of *anyone* to take the law into their own hands.

And I'm trying to point out (through those fast moving goalposts) that your assertion that "In most cases a quick 'oy! what you doing?' would be enough to establish wether force was necessary." doesn't describe the positions of several people in here (including yourself) who have already publically and for the record(!) stated that they would "hit first and ask questions later"!

Not in that article. I think I got that info from the Times. Talk about fear giving you wings....

It dosn't matter what the origional charge was, he was finally found guilty of manslaughter.

Quote:

You seemed to be arguing that someone who was known to be mentally ill was a reliable witness.

and you are arguing that a career criminal is a reliable witness.

Quote:

No, I'm someone who doesn't support the right of *anyone* to take the law into their own hands.

Not anyone, just the people who find intruders on their premises.

Quote:

"In most cases a quick 'oy! what you doing?' would be enough to establish wether force was necessary." doesn't describe the positions of several people in here (including yourself) who have already publically and for the record(!) stated that they would "hit first and ask questions later"!

I never said that I would do that. (I think) Its been a long thread, but it dosn't sound like me:D

I think ideally, had the court known about the mental illness in time, the original trial would not have taken place. TM may just have been commited.

Too right! Whether right or wrong, the law CANNOT allow people to take it into their own hands. Most people would be quite reasonable, but there are a siginificant few who would kill other people over minor incidents. The public needs protection from that significant few.

I agree, but because the law protects us from those few who would harm us if we did wrong against them, it fails to protect us from those who would do us harm in our own homes when we are minding our own business.
In any case, the nutcases out there would probably not be detered by the law anyway. Leaving us still hamstrung when dealing with intruders.

But when the law dosn't/ can't defend us, what then?

Actually, its not so much a matter of taking the law into our own hands, but the fact that the law is empowering the rights of criminals more than the rights of the law abiding people.

It is showing that today, in the UK there is a BIG difference between the law, and justice.

I think we've more than reached the stage where law-abiding citizens need to use the few legal rights they do have to lobby the government to remedy the situation.

Tony Martin would be more within his legal rights to sue Fearon for the distress he has caused.

What I find interesting is that a 16 year old boy isn't home in bed at 3 o'clock in the morning and his parents don't seem bothered.

Worse still he is in the company of a known habitual criminal and is an accessory to a crime. What were his family doing about this?

Tony Martin was placed in this inenviable position simply because parents failed to carry out their responsibilities. And a known criminal should have known better than to take a juvenile on a crime with him anyway.

Maybe in future when we are burgled we will not interfere with the burglar but merely gather evidence in the form of photographs,videos, witnesses, dna samples etc and take the burglar to court.

However, when we get there we'll probably find that we have violated his/her human rights.

Bring back horse-whipping and let criminals live with the pain!!