Twitter study casts doubts on ministers’ post-riots plan | UK news | The Guardian
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/24/twitter-study-post-riot-plans
Twitter study casts doubts on ministers’ post-riots plan | UK news | The Guardian
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/24/twitter-study-post-riot-plans
Twitter study casts doubts on ministers’ post-riots plan | UK news | The Guardian
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/24/twitter-study-post-riot-plans
Taser deaths investigated by police watchdog
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/24/taser-deaths-investigated-police-watchdog
Spotlight on restraint tactics as Phillip Hulmes, 53, becomes third person in eight days to die after being shot with the stun gun
Revealed: the full picture of sentences handed down to rioters | #ukriots | The Guardian
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/18/full-picture-of-riot-sentences?CMP=twt_gu
This unprecedented access to national court results reveals that 70% of defendants have been remanded in custody to await crown court trial, fuelling a surge in the prison population, which reached a record high of 86,608 in England and Wales. The Guardian’s data also shows that 56 defendants of the 80 who have already been sentenced by magistrates were given immediate prison terms. This 70% rate of imprisonment compares with a “normal” rate of just 2% in magistrates courts.
More than half those imprisoned were charged with theft or handling stolen goods, receiving an average of 5.1 months. This is 25% longer than the average custodial sentence for these crimes of 4.1 months seen in courts during 2010, according to Ministry of Justice statistics. Public order offences are leading to sentences 33% longer than normal and those convicted of assaulting police officers have been jailed for 40% longer than usual.
England riots: pair jailed for four years for using Facebook to incite disorder | UK news | guardian.co.uk
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/16/uk-riots-four-years-disorder-facebook?CMP=twt_fd
Two men have been jailed for four years for using Facebook to incite disorder.
Jordan Blackshaw, 20, from Marston near Northwich, and Perry Sutcliffe-Keenan, 22, from Warrington, appeared at Chester crown court on Tuesday. They were arrested last week following incidents of violent disorder in London and other cities across the UK.
Neither of their Facebook posts resulted in a riot-related event.
England riots: pair jailed for four years for using Facebook to incite disorder
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/16/uk-riots-four-years-disorder-facebook?CMP=twt_gu
Two men have been jailed for four years for using Facebook to incite disorder.
Is it fair for severe sentences to be imposed on rioters as a deterrent? | Poll | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/poll/2011/aug/17/riots-sentencing-facebook?CMP=twt_gu
Is it fair for severe sentences to be imposed on rioters as a deterrent?
Criticism is growing of the ’disproportionate’ sentences imposed on some convicted rioters after two men were jailed for four years for posting messages on Facebook inciting people to create disorder. Are such sentences fair in the name of deterrence?
Man dies after Taser arrest in Cumbria | UK news | guardian.co.uk
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/17/man-dies-taser-arrest-cumbria?CMP=twt_gu
A man in his 20s has died in Cumbria after being arrested by police who fired a Taser at him.
Police were called to Hartington Street, in Barrow, at 6.30pm on Tuesday, following reports of a man causing a disturbance.
Riots: magistrates advised to ’disregard normal sentencing’ | UK news | The Guardian
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/15/riots-magistrates-sentencing
Magistrates are being advised by the courts service to disregard normal sentencing guidelines when dealing with those convicted of offences committed in the context of last week’s riots.
The advice, given in open court by justices’ clerks, will result in cases that would usually be disposed of in magistrates courts being referred to the crown court for more severe punishment.
It may explain why some of those convicted have received punitive sentences for offences that might normally attract a far shorter term.
MI5 joins social messaging trawl for riot organisers | UK news | The Guardian
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/15/mi5-social-messaging-riot-organisers-police
The security service MI5 and the electronic interception centre GCHQ have been asked by the government to join the hunt for people who organised last week’s riots, the Guardian has learned.
The agencies, the bulk of whose work normally involves catching terrorists inspired by al-Qaida, are helping the effort to catch people who used social messaging, especially BlackBerry Messenger (BBM), to mobilise looters.
Étudiant, pas d’antécédents: six mois fermes pour avoir volé pour 3,5 livres de bouteilles d’eau.
#UKriots: in courtrooms across country, there was little room for leniency | The Guardian
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/11/uk-riots-courtrooms-country?CMP=twt_gu
At Camberwell Green magistrates, Nicholas Robinson, 23, an electrical engineering student with no previous convictions, was jailed for the maximum permitted six months after pleading guilty to stealing bottles of water worth £3.50 from Lidl in Brixton. He had been walking back from his girlfriend’s house in the early hours of Monday morning when he saw the store being looted, his lawyer said, and had taken the opportunity to go in and help himself to a case of water because he was thirsty. He was caught up in the moment, and was ashamed of his actions, his defence said.
La justice n’a pas toujours la main aussi lourde:
Deaths in police custody since 1998 : 333 ; officers convicted : none | The Guardian
►http://seenthis.net/messages/30475
A total of 333 people have died in or following police custody over the past 11 years, but no officer has ever been successfully prosecuted, according to a watchdog’s report.
Ou encore:
The moral decay of our society is as bad at the top as the bottom – Telegraph Blogs
►http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/peteroborne/100100708/the-moral-decay-of-our-society-is-as-bad-at-the-top-as-the-bottom
A great deal has been made over the past few days of the greed of the rioters for consumer goods, not least by Rotherham MP Denis MacShane who accurately remarked, “What the looters wanted was for a few minutes to enter the world of Sloane Street consumption.” This from a man who notoriously claimed £5,900 for eight laptops. Of course, as an MP he obtained these laptops legally through his expenses.
Yesterday, the veteran Labour MP Gerald Kaufman asked the Prime Minister to consider how these rioters can be “reclaimed” by society. Yes, this is indeed the same Gerald Kaufman who submitted a claim for three months’ expenses totalling £14,301.60, which included £8,865 for a Bang & Olufsen television.
Or take the Salford MP Hazel Blears, who has been loudly calling for draconian action against the looters. I find it very hard to make any kind of ethical distinction between Blears’s expense cheating and tax avoidance, and the straight robbery carried out by the looters.
MBD on education: Reporting the badly behaved
►http://mbdoneducation.blogspot.com/2011/08/reporting-badly-behaved.html
Dear Met Police,
(cc The Guardian Letters page)
Further to your request to report anarchists formally to you (Guardian, 1st August) I would like to report a dangerous person living in my community in central London.
Your definition in the police guidance is that “Anarchism is a political philosophy which considers the state undesirable, unnecessary, and harmful, and instead promotes a stateless society, or anarchy.” You encourage citizens to notify police of any such individuals immediately. Under these terms, I would like to report a Mr. George Osborne of 11 Downing Street. I am uncertain of the exact motivations for his actions, or indeed the detail of many of them, as (like most extremists) his political philosophy appears piecemeal, dated, self-contradictory and an odd fusion of dogma, prejudice and fantasy.
My suspicions about his behaviour include: an intention to destroy all public services in the UK; to trigger a national and possibly international economic collapse; to eliminate all legislation relating to protecting workers or the environment; to cease the effective functioning of any branch of government; to reduce people to a state of fending for themselves in a stateless society; and to allow an anarchic free-for-all in labour markets, pensions, and commodities. Whilst I am aware that you will be shocked by this violent and wide-ranging programme for total social disaster, I assure you that a raid on 11 Downing Street will secure detailed documents supporting all my suspicions in this regard.
As a concerned citizen and active member of the “Big Society” promoted by his neighbour David at number 10, I write to inform you of the serious risk to Britain posed by this extremist individual. I urge you to take swift action – as I will urge my fellow concerned citizens to continue to ring your helpline to back up my reporting of this vile man.
Yours sincerely,
Michael Drennan,
address withheld (but probably not for very long after this letter.)
j’ai ri aussi
fin de l’histoire ou bien
Scotland Yard dismisses counter-terror unit’s bizarre appeal for anti-anarchist whistleblowers as ’badly worded’
The Metropolitan police initiated an embarrassing climbdown after a police station in Belgravia, west London, published a leaflet asking the public and businesses to report anyone with anarchist sympathies.
The call for information on a political rather than criminal group echoed a similar appeal for information about al-Qaida activity and “could have been better worded”, Scotland Yard admitted.
City of Westminster police’s “counter-terrorist focus desk” had last week called for anti-anarchist whistleblowers, stating next to an anarchist emblem: “Anarchism is a political philosophy which considers the state undesirable, unnecessary and harmful, and instead promotes a stateless society, or anarchy. Any information relating to anarchists should be reported to your local police.”
The move angered some anarchists who insisted that being an anarchist does not imply criminal behaviour.
After 24 hours trying to discover why the counter-terrorism desk at Belgravia police station had issued the injunction under the banner of Project Griffin, an initiative raising awareness of counter-terrorism and security issues among business, public sector and security personnel, Scotland Yard said: "The Metropolitan police service does not seek to stigmatise those people with legitimate political views.
“People purporting to be anarchists have caused criminal damage this year to business premises, and government buildings in Westminster. The message we were trying to convey was to gather information on criminal acts to help us prevent crime and bring offenders to justice.”
❞
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/01/grass-war-met-police-anarchists