Tuesday 22 May 2012

How Can People Act Like This With Impunity?

Mr Fitzpatrick’s attackers were described as acting like “a pack of wolves” by storming into the pub near his home in Dollis Hill.
Police said the killing followed an argument in the pub though some witnesses said it occurred after a dispute in a shop opposite.
Three people were arrested, including two 17-year-old men who still being questioned in custody today.
And who can’t be named, of course.
The victim’s best friend, Ricci Whiteside, 25, who was with him all evening said: “There was an argument in the shop opposite the pub at half-time. Luke wasn’t anything to do with it, but we all heard that something had gone on.
"A group of black guys arrived at the door of the pub with bats and knives and they were looking for someone who had been outside the shop earlier.
“People were throwing chairs at the door to try and stop them from coming in.
“There was a lot of confusion. They got Luke and dragged him outside. They were pulling him up the road.
“His dad was running after them. But by the time he got to Luke he was already on the floor. Bernie threw himself on top of Luke. He was trying to protect him, but it was too late.”
So how can this sort of thing happen, in England, in 2012?

Well, one clue to this is…it’s because they know they can get away with it:
A father told today how a fellow parent ambushed him with a claw hammer as he was picking up his daughters from a dance class — and that police took more than 24 hours to respond.
Paul Dilworth feared he was going to die as he tried to shield himself from the blows the stranger aimed at his head.
And what started this all off? Why, the same sort of attitude to the one above, the feeling that you can do whatever you want and if you are ever challenged, you simply tool up and go in mob-handed, because you know that your opponent, being a decent law-abiding man or woman, won't be armed:
His ordeal — which left him with a badly injured hand — began as he chatted to his sister-in-law outside Sanders Draper School in Hornchurch, when a car with a mother and father inside nudged him.
Mr Dilworth, 43, said: “The lady then walked past without an apology, so I sarcastically said ‘excuse me’. Her partner shouted a torrent of abuse at me, then drove the car into my leg.”
Shaken but uninjured, Mr Dilworth left and returned three hours later to collect his seven-year-old twins, Elise and Tabitha. But he said the other father and a friend were lying in wait armed with a foot-long claw hammer.
In a company van. With the name and telephone number on the side.

A quick and easy collar for the cops? Well, yes. If anyone ever bothered to turn up…
Mr Dilworth rang 999 but after waiting an hour and half he drove himself to Queen’s Hospital in Romford, where doctors treated his hand.
Detectives finally spoke to Mr Dilworth last Monday, more than a day after the attack.
Mr Dilworth said: “The police did apologise but I can’t believe they’re letting lunatics run round hitting people with hammers. It should be a very easy job to find them, I’ve got the company on Google Maps.”
You’d think it would, wouldn’t you? But you'd be wrong.
A spokesman for Havering police said: “If any member of the public is unhappy with the response to an incident then they are free to make an official complaint.”
No arrests have been made.
‘Broken Britain’ indeed…

25 comments:

staybryte said...

Just making a cup of tea while I settle down to watch the rolling BBC coverage from outside the Fitzpatrick home. Complete with ashen-faced local police chief reassuring the community and making an abject apology for the collective failure of his force to prevent this foul racist outrage.

What? Oh.

Angry Exile said...

No arrests have been made.

That'd be the ideal motto for modern Britain if it wasn't for the police being so good at making certain kinds of arrests: non-payment of council tax, failing to stop people smoking in your pub, wanton use of a camera in a public place, etc etc. Fuxake!

Anonymous said...

black gang attacks white guy stabbing him to death. Don't expect a Stephen Lawrence style inquiry and media jamboree. The Fitzpatricks won't be able to turn this into a career. Will there be a publicly funded bronze plaque and cctv camera at the spot where he fell?

Captain Haddock said...

They act with impunity because when, or indeed, if they get caught, they know that they can play the "race" card, the "alcohol" card, the "drug abuse" card, the "wanted to be an architect" or the "turning their lives around" card, in the certain knowledge that an army of lawyers will be breaking their necks to defend them and who will offer any of the above "cards", or a combination of them as mitigation, thus earning themselves mucho denario from the public purse ..

How did this deplorable situation come about ?

Look no further than the politicians who draught the legislation, many of whom are themselves failed lawyers .. many of them who have friends still working in the legal profession ..

Brontosaurus said...

No use blaming the police. When some of these animals are caught for this offence and put before the courts you will hear that they have numerous convictions for violence and other offences. They will never have had any effective deterrent sentence or rehabilitation and so they carry on as they always have done. When they inevitably do something so serious, such as murder someone, they finally get a lengthy sentence. That is why our prisons are full. Too little too late. Welcome to the ineffective British justice system that completely fails to protect decent people in this country.

Macheath said...

'...the feeling that you can do whatever you want and if you are ever challenged, you simply tool up and go in mob-handed'

Whatever your views on teachers, stories like this should serve as a reminder that these attitudes are entrenched by the time pupils reach secondary school, bred in the home - or on the streets - and nurtured by infinitely repeated 'second chances' in primary education.

A matter of months ago, those 17-year-olds under questioning were in a classroom somewhere, aware that their teachers had virtually no sanctions to impose and were under constant scrutiny in case they infringed the pupils' rights.

While the theorists, progressives and heads - sorry Head Learners - are justifiable targets for criticism, I invite readers to remember Julia's words when the shortcomings of classroom teachers next come into the media spotlight.


(Sorry, Julia - rant over!)

Woodsy42 said...

Just one point - if these animals were too young to be named then they are not a group of 'men'. By definition they were boys. (That's assuming you grant such lifeforms human status at all)

Anonymous said...

Hang them. Show them the rope. Before that ask them where their father is.

Anonymous said...

Calm down you lot, Mrs May has finished a very important 'piece of work' and is able to announce a 'raft of new measures' believed (like all the previous ones) to enable the police to act effectively and to 'Force' them to deal with anti-social behaviour within 24 hours of a complaint being made. Ye Gods. The reality is that this is a white paper, there will be pilot sites and nothing will happen for ages and confusion will reign so SNAFU FUBAR.

DId I miss GAY PRIDE WEEK or BLACK HISTORY MONTH yet? In home office q's yesterday May spent more time diddling on about diversity than anything useful.

Robert the Biker said...

Certain phrases keep running through my head:
Bounty paid to large lads for'sorting' certain people,
Late night by the firm, petrol bomb.
Can't think why.....

Anonymous said...

I was beginning to think plod were the major culprits - so what a relief it has been to see their generous hand-wringing and finger pointing. Yes, it's those nasty politicians, soft judges, social workers and lawyers who can be blamed.

It was only by plod's ever vigilant presence that we can count ourselves fortunate for their crime-free canteens and the minimisation of radiator thefts from police premises.

Trundlemaster said...

What saddens me about such cases is they could be easily prevented or at least deterred by the judicious and equal use of laws that already exist - no need for new ones. All the police and courts need to do is to show the public that all are equal before the law and racial, religious, cultural and addiction excuses will not be entertained.

It's time to stop the 'I'm a victim' rubbish and start having some justice.

Anonymous said...

Melvin it was 70 degrees in London today so I had to turn the radiator right down.
That took most of the morning so I spent the afternoon being lazy fat and racist as well as throwing the odd prisoner down the stairs.
Jaded

Anonymous said...

@ WPC Jaded

Let us be clear here, Jaded. Are you relating an account of your Met work or your part-time bar job for that Romanian trafficker?

Anonymous said...

@Anon
"Will there be a publicly funded bronze plaque and cctv camera at the spot where he fell?"

Yes, probably the same imaginary one that covered the memorial to the IRA's victims in Warrington.

jonathan said...

A spokesman for Havering police said: “If any member of the public is unhappy with the response to an incident then they are free to make an official complaint.
In other words: "F**K You".

jonathan said...

A spokesman for Havering police said: “If any member of the public is unhappy with the response to an incident then they are free to make an official complaint.
In other words: "F**K You".

Randle said...

Melv! Nurse Ratched is looking for you, they need to shoot a few thousand volts through your head...run along...there's a good nutjob.

Anonymous said...

hehehehe... have a niche pose...t

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JuliaM said...

"What? Oh."

Before the moderators shut it down, many, many people noted the glaring discrepancy too.

And strangely, there've been no riots or looting either.

"That'd be the ideal motto for modern Britain if it wasn't for the police being so good at making certain kinds of arrests..."

The easy ones, that give you a good promotability marking?

"They act with impunity because when, or indeed, if they get caught, they know that they can play the "race" card, the "alcohol" card, the "drug abuse" card, the "wanted to be an architect" or the "turning their lives around" card.."

They seem to have a lot of cards. It's almost as if the deck is stacked, isn't it?

"Welcome to the ineffective British justice system that completely fails to protect decent people in this country."

The police ARE a part of that, though. Aren't they?

JuliaM said...

"(Sorry, Julia - rant over!)"

Apology not needed - you're spot on!

"Just one point - if these animals were too young to be named then they are not a group of 'men'."

Well, quite!

"It's time to stop the 'I'm a victim' rubbish and start having some justice."

First, we have to ensure the 'victim' business starts becoming unprofitable, both for those who use it, and those who run it.

"In other words: "F**K You"."

That does seem to be the size of it, yes..

Trundlemaster said...

Julia I agree that we as a society we need to as you say 'make the victim business unprofitable' but how could that be achieved? The main problem as I see it is those who advocate the idea that the type of justice that is dispensed depends on skin colour, religion, sexuality or gender are pretty well embedded in the justice system now.

Justice should always be tempered with mercy when necessary but this is totally different from the current system where there appears to be a sliding scale of 'victim' labels that some people can use to escape justice.

I'm in favour of one law for all, from the monarch down.

Dr Evil said...

But if you say a police horse is "gay you get arrested on the spot. Truly their ojectivs and behaviour are so very, very wrong

Anonymous said...

You are so right! Too right, I fear, to ever listened to.

Radical Rodent

Anonymous said...

This comment is only for those private individuals who have suffered as victims. It's not for any reporters to take, recycle and make money out of my comments:

Sorry you had a bad time outside the school gate. I’m on the whole a supporter of the police but…
1. In 2007 ROMFORD POLICE also failed to investigate the deliberate murder of my father by a local nursing home that was working together with Giles Wilson solicitors - appointees of the Court of Protection, to bring about Dad’s exactly timed death – before he spilled the beans on them in front of a court judge. The COP had kept on postponing the hearing whilst the nursing home took its opportunity to kill Dad off with as little suspicion as possible. They refused to call a doctor for him when it was clear he urgently needed one, having threatened to cause an outside doctor the sack if he interfered by trying to help my Dad. The police said, “Your Dad was old & it wouldn't help anyone if the matter was investigated, as murder would be too hard to prove and he was dead now anyway”.

In 2004 Brentwood police failed to act correctly during an actual bodily harm attack. The police told the victim to go home & dial 999 if we thought it was an emergency. Harlow station picked up the emergency call & was appalled at Brentwood's response. But the person who did the attack got away with it; It wasn’t even formally reported by Brentwood police and if you want to follow through these mistakes with the Essex Police, then the Independent Police Commissioner when Essex Police fail to respond, forget it.

We have discovered in three different solicitor fraud cases that the police have been too scared to act on and investigate.

The others who have also failed to act include The Law Society and the Legal Ombudsman. Self Regulation is not working in Britain.

And so called independent bodies stuffed full of the very professionals that it’s supposed to be overseeing, before they are returned to the main professional bodies from whence they first came, after a usual two year stint aren’t worth the paper they write their reports on.

Between 2009-2012 criminal damage to a property continues to be ignored by the police - just because the business people causing the regular criminal damage seem to have the ear of the police. It's all either seen as too petty for the police to bother about or perhaps something worse?

Is it little wonder that people are starting to suffer mental illness by withdrawing from society and endlessly talking about safeguarding children, or else take matters into their own hands as the police seem unable to?

I wish you well with your recovery...