Tuesday 24 July 2012

LET JUSTICE BE SEEN TO BE DONE!



    So PC Harwood was found not guilty, well he joins a long list of police officers who have got away with what any reasonable person can only describe as murder. While death after contact with the police is not a rare event, a police officer being prosecuted is a very rare thing, to be found guilty is even more rare. It is 42 years since a police officer has been prosecuted regarding death in police custody, this despite innumerable unlawful killing verdicts and the fact that there have been more than 3,000 such deaths since 1969. Deaths in police custody and deaths from direct contact with the police, it doesn't seem to make much difference, if there ever is a prosecution we should expect a not guilty verdict to come up.
      How far back do we go? Blair Peach 1979, killed by a baton blow to the head, Stephen Waldorf, 1983, shot by police officers, James Ashley, 1998, shot, Harry Stanley, 1999, shot, Jean Charles De Menezes, 2005, shot making his way to work, Abdul Kahar, 2006, shot, Mark Duggan, 2011, shot, and of course the 2009 assault and death of Ian Tomlinson. From that list, one prosecution and a not guilty verdict.
      Ian Tomlinson's death at the hands of a police officer must be the first where there was clear video evidence of the assault and dozens of eyewitnesses but that didn't make any difference, the verdict was still not guilty, and now we get the full story, PC Harwood, it seems, had a record of violence with 10 formal complaints against him. Ten complaints, one videoed assault and death, one prosecution, one not guilty verdict. The British judicial system at work.
     Of course the police are the police the world over, from recent figures it appears that in America, an African American dies in an extra-judicial killing every 36 hours. Who are they protecting?

ann arky's home.

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