Martin determined to return home....

[Lead_Head]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_news/e...lk/3096377.stm

"Jailed farmer Tony Martin is determined to return to his farmhouse despite its rundown condition. "

Discuss!

Nick

[Trash Man]

If I was him I would not be so worried about the state of my house I would be more worried about the £60,000 that had been put on my head by a so called gypsy court.

[steve threlfall]

Originally posted by Trash Man
If I was him I would not be so worried about the state of my house I would be more worried about the £60,000 that had been put on my head by a so called gypsy court.

i agree. If that gypsy sues successfully thentony will have to sell his house to pay him off

[petrefax]

just to let u know, to coincide with tony martins release date, "tonight with trevor mcdonald" is looking at taking the law into ur own hands tony martin stylee on monday

were i him, & i had a choice, i wouldn't go back there but its his home....where else is he gonna go?

[gilgamesj]

hm, this bugs me.
In America if someone enters ur land u can pretty much cut their head off, but in the UK, the intruder has the rights to steal ur stuff?
As this gives the impression, their is a law protecting law breakers.... does that make sense ?

[petrefax]

it don't make sense does it - there was a programme on tv last week that interviewed some americans who said tony martin would have received an award for wot he did

afaik if someone steps inside ur home uninvited, with the express intention of stealing ur posessions (and possibly causing you harm if u should try stopping them) u should have the right to shoot them in the face

i know there are reasons why ppl end up turning to crime & its often the case that ppl who end up following a criminal lifestyle are themselves victims of circumstance but regardless of this, i didn't cause the hardships in their life that led them to crime & i have worked, honestly and hard, to earn the money to buy the posessions i have & should therefore be allowed to defend my right to retain posession of my property

[Zathras]

The key is reasonable force. Martin shot an unarmed guy in the back from twelve yards away with an unlicensed and illegal gun(pump action shotguns are banned in the UK). The police have warned him in the past about illegal possession of firearms. Instead of calling the police or an ambulance for Fred Barras he went and spent the night in a hotel. The burglars weren't the nicest people in the world, but neither was Tony Martin, not by a long stretch. I have little sympathy for the guy.

[petrefax]

sorry zathras, nowt peronal since i respect many of the opinions you've previously expressed on these 'ere forums, but i can't agree with you there, i know the law of this country relating to this issue centres around "reasonable force" and its specific definition on a case by case (or jury by jury) basis, but imho this law is wrong, i feel the key point is, the burglar was in tony martins house with the intention of deprriving him of things that were rightfully his....fair nuff, tony martin isn't the sanest person in the country & he has unwittingly become the "mascot" (for want of a bettter term) of the "right to defend your own property" cause, but imho why should he be calling an ambulance for the scum that has repeatedly violated his property? his intention that night was to ensure they didn't break into his property time & time again & he was successful in his goal, ringing an ambulance would possibly have saved the kids life & a few months later where would that same kid be??

....right back where they started, breaking into tony martins property, stealing his posessions

[DaBeeeenster]

Just because someone is on your property does not change the law. It's as simple as that. Do you agree or disagree with that?

Do you think people should have the right to torture people on their property? Or shoot them in the back at point blank range and then leave them to bleed to death without telling anybody?

[gilgamesj]

Ah now thats a different case.

Entry without permission is something else. IF a guy/girl broke thru ur window thats unlawful entry, and so u should have the right to remove them using a fairly poorly defined act of 'reasonable force'. Now if u dragged someone onto ur property... hence the difference.

America's laws make little sense, and i dont agree entirely with being able to shoot someone on ur grounds. But in this case, i think the court made the right choice of imprisoning neither of the people as they were both in the wrong.

'Ton's gun = illegal'
'Stealing = illegal'

maybe a short sentence for both would have been better,,,

[Zathras]

Firstly, let's dispense with this nonsense where people state 'criminals forfeit their rights'. If you speed, does that give me the right to come round your house and cave your head in with an axe? If you pirate some software off the internet, can I castrate you with a rusty spoon? Of course not. We live in a civilised society and there is a judiciary and police force to deal with criminal justice. Barras and accomplice broke the law, but that does not give Tony Martin right to break the law and shoot them. I've talked to a criminal forensic scientist about this case and he is in no doubt Martin was under no direct threat from the burglars - they were trying to escape. He shot them because he was angry at them being on his property, not out of self defence. I have no sympathy for thieves, but I don't think that capital punishment is a suitable response. There have been cases in the past where manslaughter has been committed in self-defence and the jury have aquitted - this was far from the case with Martin. I see you show glee that Barras died and that Martin did absolutely nothing to try to save him - do you support capital punishment for burglary, not even aggrievated or violent burglary, just so it might stop perpetrators reoffending? Do you think that the decision is Martin's to take, rather than that of a legally appointed and independent judiciary? Martin has shown no remorse for what he did nor has there been any indication his behaviour will change, including the possession of illegal firearms. In my opinion Martin is a dangerous man and should be treated to psychological examination. It's all very well to paint a picture of a poor harrased decent working man and the evil 'gypsy' scumbag layabout thieves threatening his life but that is gross economies with the truth in this case.

Should you support householders being armed to 'ward off' burglars, you're only going to persuade burglars to be armed themselves. Not only will someone come to steal possessions, they're going to ensure the homeowner is suitably incapacitated as not to pull a weapon on them, so violent and aggrievated burglaries are going to proportionally increase. You also get towards the situation where guns are easily accessible to all, and we all know where that leads - look at gun-related crime in America. You may bring about a fall in burglaries, but you'll also ensure that the remaining burglaries will be violent and there will be fatalities. I'd rather have 10 non-violent burglaries than 5 burglaries but two home-owners and a number of perpetrators killed during those burglaries.

[DaBeeeenster]

Imprisoning neither of the people? How do you mean?

[Knoxville]

to rights don't make a wrong, an illegal pump action justifys a longer sentence than an illegal entry.

I think that reasonable force is a very difficult thing to justify. Is reasonable force me beating someone over the head with a big stick should they enter my house illegally? i mean i'm but a young 17 year old scared minor make me 18 though and the sentence if any may well be longer.

Whatever stops these people doing what they're doing to my house/family/friends is imho reasonable force, and i won't hesitate to use it.

[DaBeeeenster]

Dont forget that the courts that make these rulings are made up of a jury of normal people like you and I. People (urged on by the Daily Mail et al) seem to work themselves up into a blind "us and the government/courts" panic, forgetting that the people that decide what "reasonable force" actually is are people like us.

Regarding what Knoxville said in his last paragraph, I think that sums it up pretty much. as long as it is reasonable, and not unreasonable force...I dont think there is an argument to suggest that a pump action in the back without warning at point blank range is unreasonable...

[Zathras]

Again, it's something the judiciary will take into account. Believe it or not, the system would be on your side, not on whoever's broken in, and evidence showing your emotional state to be extremely frightened would most definitely be taken into account. However if you had the choice of the big stick and a bf gun and you chose the gun when the stick would have more than sufficed, you'll be for it. The idea is "whatever" is good enough but not excessively more force than that.

[Flibb]

Just a quick correction. Pump action shotguns and semi-autos are not ilegal in this country as long as the total capacity is less than 3 shots on a shotgun certificate, or you can still have 10 shots (or more) on a section 1 FAC. Martin had his certificate taken away due to mental problems, he then acquired the shotgun.
Flibb