Category Archives: Crime

Unfair Stereotype?

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Greater Manchester Police were forced to make a formal apology earlier this week after carrying out a realistic training exercise designed to protect its citizens against the threat of terrorist attack. Now before you read any further just pause and ask yourself where the threat of terrorist attack is likely to come from. Yes, I know, silly question, the answer is more than obvious. Though not to some, evidently.

During the exercise the role-playing terrorist shouted out “Allahu Akbar”, as those real-life deranged fanatics tend to do before they open fire indiscriminately and blow themselves up, killing all around them.

According to Dr Erinma Bell, described as a “Peace Activist” the police were guilty of unfair stereotyping since, as she said, a terrorist could come from any group. True, a terrorist could come from any group but from where does the average person in the street think a terrorist attack is most likely to come?

As this blog has said before, not all Muslims are terrorists; of course they’re not. That would be a ludicrous and grossly unfair thing to say but nobody can deny that, at the present time, the majority of terrorists are Muslims.

If we cannot, or refuse to, identify our potential enemies we make it a lot harder to eventually defeat them. Our hard-pressed (and no-doubt demoralised) police and security forces need all the help they can get in keeping us all safe. Making their training exercises as realistic as possible with no detail spared is an obvious priority and no more than common sense. Political correctness and liberal sensibilities should have nothing to do with it.

Drones

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Yesterday a British Airways passenger plane was struck by a drone as it approached London’s Heathrow airport. Fortunately nobody was hurt, but the incident brings home the real danger of something feared by the aviation industry for some time.

This was said to be the first such incident in the UK and it is unlikely to be the last. There is always the possibility of a carelessly-operated drone accidentally colliding with a plane and usually there is unlikely to be any life-threatening damage, but what if terrorists decided to use an explosives-filled drone to target aircraft? What can be done to keep aircraft safe?

Firstly, the aviation authorities and forces of law and order have to maintain and probably increase vigilance. Secondly, we have to copy the US and make it illegal to own a drone unless it is registered with the police and marked with an official number making it traceable. Thirdly, whilst the use of a drone near airports is already punishable by imprisonment we have to look at further ways to extend criminal aspects of drone use.

None of the above will stop a determined terrorist however and all we can do is hope that our military and police intelligence services are good enough to prevent disaster. That and prayer.

Dead Right

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It was reported this week that Thailand,  facing one of the world’s worst records of drink-driving,  has passed new legislation compelling convicted drivers to work in mortuaries and to physically handle dead bodies to try and drive home (no pun intended) the seriousness of the offence.

Talk about the punishment fitting the crime!  Perhaps the Thai government will now compel car thieves to clean and valet cars unpaid for months at a time or require those convicted of assault to go ten rounds with a professional boxer.

Maybe persons convicted of indecent exposure will be forced to expose themselves, fully naked, in a commercial fridge-freezer until they turn blue or something drops off! The list is almost endless.

Time for Action

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Tragically, the world witnessed another entirely predictable slaughter over the weekend, 129 dead and counting. There will be others, of course, and next time it could be London, Manchester, Berlin, New York or maybe even Paris again, in fact anywhere in the world inhabited by we “unbelievers”.

Well, what are we going to do about it? Naturally, Western leaders have expressed outrage, President Obama has talked of crimes against humanity, Prime Minister Cameron has talked about sharing the pain and all have talked of solidarity with France which is all very well and good, but, to repeat the question, what are we actually going to do about it?

This is deadly serious, literally, and the only sensible statement I’ve heard from any politician has been the response of French President Hollande, who said that we are “at war”. We are, the whole of the civilised world is at war with the extremists of Islam whose self-proclaimed aim is to destroy us.

The United Nations, according to its own charter was set up to safeguard the security and liberty of sovereign nations and their citizens. Sadly, we all know that the UN is worse than useless and so it has to fall upon the civilised world, namely us and all our freedom-loving allies, to unite and defend ourselves.

There is no choice but to form an armed coalition and put men on the ground in Syria and Iraq, in fact, anywhere where these psychopaths congregate, and neutralise the threat, whatever it takes. At home we have to be more vigilant than ever and must sadly abandon our failed policy of tolerance and get tough with those who live within our midst and whose self-avowed aim is our destruction.

This will inevitably bring forth allegations of breaches of human rights from the liberal politically correct elite who have such a big say in Western government but, too bad. As long as the authorities act rationally and in a cool measured manner, safeguarding the rights of law-abiding citizens, we have nothing to fear.

If there is another realistic alternative then, I for one, have yet to hear of it. This is not a game, this is deadly reality. Our leaders have talked too much, now they must act.

No More Bobbies on the Beat

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Earlier this week it was revealed by a leading police chief that soon we will no longer see British policemen on foot patrol, otherwise known as “bobbies on the beat”.

The reason given was that evidence shows that random police patrols do not prevent crime and nor do they make people feel safe. I have no idea what “evidence” they’ve been looking at but it seems a little strange. Maybe it is correct that “random” patrols are ineffectual but surely the same cannot be said of regular patrols or beats.

The law-abiding general public undoubtedly welcome the reassuring sight of police on the streets just as much as criminals feel the opposite!

In support of these cuts (and the continuing closure of police stations up and down the land) police chiefs assure us that crime is on the decline and detection rates are improving. Even if that is true, they ignore the fact that whilst crime detection is an important police skill crime prevention is even more so.

Britain’s criminals must be licking their lips in keen anticipation at the consequences of this latest step towards lawlessness.

Police Cuts

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It was reported earlier this week that a Gloucestershire woman in her 80’s was attacked and punched in the mouth by a young male whilst out walking her dog. The cowardly thug, clearly expecting no resistance, got a shock when the woman grabbed hold of his testicles causing him to fall to the ground in agony, allowing the woman to make good her escape.

It was fortunate that no serious injuries were incurred, at least on the part of the woman, although one could obviously have wished for greater harm to the young thug.

The main cause for concern other than the sickening attack on a vulnerable member of society is the knowledge that our government, carrying on the policies of its predecessors, is continuing to cut down on the funding of law enforcement by actively closing down local police stations and taking police officers off the beat.

Whilst public spending cuts are understandable, further budgeting on the police (not to mention the courts) is misguided and ill-advised. Until there is an urgent review and a reversal of this policy there are likely to be more crimes of this nature with some having a less happy ending than that of the heroic old lady from Gloucestershire.

The Truth, at Last

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I enjoyed, if that’s the right word, hearing a former apologist for multiculturalism in Britain admit last week that it had been a failure. He said, in a television programme presented by him,  that the policy, carried out extensively by Tony Blair’s New Labour government had not just failed to bring different races and communities closer together but, conversely, had led to greater segregation culminating in atrocities such as the July 2007 London bombings by Muslim extremists and other outrages across the country.

The man concerned was Trevor Phillips, the prime architect of multiculturalism under Blair. He concluded that they had got it all wrong and that it was, after all, acceptable to admit to racial stereotyping and indeed necessary if society is to come to terms and deal with its undoubted differences. He admitted that it is alright to tell the truth and to state racial facts such as, most London pickpockets are Romanians and most victims of murder are black and most of the perpetrators are black also. Of course, he was only saying what anybody with a slight degree of common sense and honesty has always said.

Phillips said that this overriding desire to force multiculturalism on the British people had backfired and in some cases had led to suffering and even death. He gave several examples, one being the case of the poor black child, Victoria Climbie, systematically tortured to death because none of the social workers had the courage to highlight the abuse because the child’s guardians were black. In other words, political correctness and the fear of being accused of racism trumped the life of a child.

Similarly, he admitted what we all know but rarely say (although this blog has referred to it on more than one occasion), that the UK child grooming scandals are the result of sexual and violent crimes committed overwhelmingly by Pakistanis on young white girls. Again, he stated that the fear of accusations of racism prevented authorities (politicians, police and social workers) over a period of as much as ten years from taking action to prevent the commission of the crimes. Yet more innocent lives ruined because of political correctness.

At last, a politician and a decent one at that, with the courage to speak the truth and the courage to (finally) put truth and common sense above political correctness. It helped that Trevor Phillips is black because I suspect that the liberal, left-leaning media would have been outraged if the programme had been presented by a white man. Still, at least it’s a start.

Setting the Record Straight

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No decent, right thinking person could fail to have been incensed last week when apologists for the brutal beheadings by IS extremist and British citizen, Mohammed Emwazi, sought to blame MI5 for his actions.

According to political activist, Asim Quereshi, the cold blooded murders of aid workers and journalists were carried out not by a sadistic psychopath but by “an extremely gentle” and “kind” man. The fault, he said, lay not with Emwazi but with MI5, who had been tracking him for a number of years and in so doing had “radicalised” him.

The reaction of our Government was predictably lame so it was heartening to hear the response of London Mayor, Boris Johnson to Mr Quereshi in a radio phone-in. Boris Johnson, clearly in touch with the majority of the country, said –

“The focus of your indignation and your outrage should be on people who go out to join groups that throw gays off cliffs; that behead people who do not subscribe to their version of Islam, that glorify in the execution of innocent journalists and aid workers.”

By setting the record straight, Johnson clearly demonstrated that he is a man both with cajones and the courage to speak his mind; rare traits in a politician.

Political Assault

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Last week Alistair Campbell, the former chief adviser to the Labour Party, was walking to his London home, minding his own business after completing his regular morning jog when some fruitcake stopped him, told him he was “the biggest piece of s**t  I’ve ever seen in this street”, kicked him and then spat in his face.

The abuser then went to the police claiming that Campbell had punched him, a claim which the former politician denies. It’s very similar to the incident in 2001 when the then Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott, punched a protester after the man, from close range, had thrown an egg striking the Deputy PM on the face. The difference was that the Prescott incident was recorded by television cameras so we were all able to see the smart right hook expertly thrown by the politician, who just happened to be a former amateur boxer!

It doesn’t matter what we think about the politicians involved in these incidents and it doesn’t matter what we think of their policies. The point is they were both innocent targets of assaults by men who no doubt thought that their victims, as politicians in the public eye, would not respond to their cowardly and unprovoked attacks. However, by law, any victim of assault has the right to defend him or herself provided the defence is proportionate to the attack.

I have no idea whether or not Campbell punched his assailant but I hope he did. We often say that politicians are no different to the rest of us and should not be above the law and that is right. It works both ways however and, like us, they surely deserve the protection of that law. Violence should never be condoned but sometimes neither should turning the other cheek.

Postscript to Paris

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As the dust settles following last week’s terrible events in France and yesterday’s uplifting worldwide displays of public solidarity Western governments must now address the problem of keeping their citizens safe.

All will be aware of the difficulties of fighting an enemy from within and the British Government’s experience of combating IRA terror in the 1970s and 1980s is no doubt still painfully vivid. However, many lessons must have been learned during those awful times and the experience gained must surely prove useful now.

The most obvious lesson is that for any terrorist to succeed, he must have a support network, or cell, with “safe houses” and the backing of accomplices within the society that he wishes to attack. This is undoubtedly the case in Britain today.

Our Government must stop pussyfooting around and ignore the clamours of politically correct liberals with their distorted views of civil liberties. There must be no safe houses and no safe communities either. If it means an increase in the number of armed police on the streets, so be it; law abiding citizens have nothing to fear.

A strong message has to be sent to those found guilty of preaching violence and sedition and to those found guilty of harbouring and supporting terrorists. If the perpetrators are UK citizens they will be imprisoned and if not they will be deported. That is neither right wing nor reactionary, it is common sense.