Another Innocent British Family In Despair Over Obscene British Self Defense Laws

[shadowrider]

--SNIP--

"Roberto Ranieri, 45, of Andover, Hampshire, is awaiting trial having been charged with the murder of Steven Griffiths, 38.

Roberto was protecting his wife and four children in their home, from an intruder.

Roberto did not intend to cause harm, let alone take life. He just wanted to protect his family. He should not be locked up for doing what every husband and father would do when scared that harm will come to their family.

http://armedselfdefense.blogspot.com/

Man, am I glad I don't live in the UK.

[onehandle]

1. Europe bad. America great.

Got it.

[shadowrider]

2. I get it

You'd prefer the British homicide cops investigated the murder of that family?
Hey, I guess that keeps them employed.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

4. Depending where you live in the UK, any form of resistance can get you in serious trouble

Its not UK/Europe vs US in domestic firefights

Having lived there, in the US, and in other nations, Urban UK was least safe in the net

[proteus_lives]

29. Who said that?

[paulsby]

34. strawman bad

hth

[DirkGently]

3. Got a better source

than "Armedselfdefense blogspot?" A quick search turned up no clear description of the facts from legitimate news outlets. One BBC story says the man charged claims the killing was "an accident," which seems a strange thing to say if you were defending yourself.

Interesting reading the Brits' posts on their own online newspapers. Neither the posters nor the paper provide a narrative of what supposedly happened, but their views are definitely different. Several of them focused on the fact the accused was "Italian or of foreign stock." A lot of posters put forward the view that violence is rarely, if ever justified EVEN IF someone breaks into your home. Not saying I agree with that, but here we have trouble getting people to agree you don't shoot a kid for walking across your grass, or reload and empty your gun into an unconscious, unarmed would-be robber.

http://www.mysun.co.uk/go/thread/view/88618/22217717/What_would_you_do_when_confronted_by_an_intruder?pg=1

Got to be a middle ground somewhere.

[n2doc]

5. +1000

Something less "free" than Somalia would be nice. I get the impression that the gun rights folks won't be happy until everyone is "locked and loaded" going to the Wall Mart.

[SteveM]

21. Pumping the latest Brady bumper-sticker, eh?

So, how do you feel about self-defense? Do you "support" it as a right? Would you exercise it yourself? How do your views differ from M. Gandhi's?

"the gun rights folks won't be happy until everyone is "locked and loaded" going to the Wall Mart." A good sign of when one side is losing is bloated exaggeration of the "winning" side's goals. But of course this was sarcasm, right?

[Name removed]

24. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[PavePusher]

26. Your grasp of history...

is as weak as your assertion of the desires of firearms owners, and your understanding of Civil Rights.

Massive fail.

[n2doc]

27. People who accuse others of ignorance while providing no proof are the real Fail n/t

[RichS]

30. everyone

who wants to be, and is not prohibited in the first place from owning/possessing their firearm, should have that opportunity.

No proponent of right-to-bear, or right-to-carry wants to force anyone to own, or carry a firearm.

[armueller2001]

31. No... more like

everyone who is over the age of 18 and can legally own a handgun, pass a background check, has gone through the fingerprinting process to obtain a concealed weapon permit, and is not mentally ill should have the

CHOICE

to go to "Wall mart" locked and loaded.

At least that's my ideal vision.

[Statistical]

6. Doesn't seem to be working though. Violent crime rate in UK is 5x the United States.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1196941/The-violent-country-Europe-Britain-worse-South-Africa-U-S.html



Meanwhile violent crime in the United States is on a 17 year decline.
http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2008/data/table_01.html

Falling from 758.2 incidents per 100,000 persons in 1997 to 454.5 in 2008.
2009 looks to be another 4% decline but final numbers are not out yet.

[shadowrider]

8. That happens when people are unable to defend themselves

And get sued by the bad guy when they do.

[RaleighNCDUer]

12. You know how silly that sounds coming in a thread about a guy facing

trial for killing an armed burglar?

Seems he defended himself pretty well.

Lack of details is interesting - it doesn't say HOW he killed a gun-armed burglar. Did he, himself, have an illegal gun? Or did he use a perfectly legal shotgun he had for hunting? Or did he hit him with a hammer coming around a corner? Wouldn't the cause of death maybe have something to do with WHY he is facing trial for defending himself?

Also, in UK, is 'trial' the same as here, or is it possibly more like an inquest he is facing, where he answers questions on an apparently justifiable homicide?

Personally, I think that ANY death that is not clearly purely accidental SHOULD result in a trial, to not only weed out the bad ones but also to give closure to the good ones - good people, even when forced to shoot someone in their own living room, will have doubts and second thoughts and guilt, and a jury ruling the shooting as justified will help that person live with what he's done.

[Euromutt]

32. The blog entry contains a link to a newspaper article

From the Andover Advertiser (http://www.andoveradvertiser.co.uk/news/5034962.Andover_man_pleads_not_guilty_to_murder_charge/):

AN ANDOVER man who had suffered a fatal wound to his heart staggered to his local shop leaving a 100 yard trail of blood in his wake, a court in Winchester heard.
<...>
Nigel Pascoe QC, prosecuting, said: "Mr Ranieri stabbed Steven Griffiths with a large knife weighing 1lb 3oz and a blade 30cm long."

All it takes is the willingness to click on a link.

[paulsby]

35. you can't and shouldn't subject people to a TRIAL

without probable cause (and a belief by the prosecutor that guilt can be proved beyond a reasonable doubt) of a CRIME.

it;'s really disgusting that you think somebody should be subjected to a trial, iow prosecution w/o PC of a crime.

how is that due process?

[RaleighNCDUer]

41. Ah, the trial IS "due process". That is the fucking definition of due process.

Letting someone walk away from a killing because one person says "It looks all right to me" is the OPPOSITE of due process.

I know that in America, that due process usually ends in cases like this with an inquest and if the inquest finds that it was clearly self-defense then no charges are brought and the suspect is exonerated. I don't know if British law works quite the same way.

It seems to me that the presence of a dead body offers 'probable cause'. If you don't think so, try driving around a couple days with one in your back seat, and see what happens.

[paulsby]

43. but that is wrong

a dead body is not, despite what it "seems", PROBABLE CAUSE

period.

i've investigated scores of "apparent natural deaths"

old person dies in their sleep for instance.

heck, young person dies in their sleep.

no trials.

that's routine here and in england with apparent natural unattended deaths

however, here we are talking homicide. iow, a person clearly dies at the hands of another, so to speak

homicide =/= probable cause of a crime.

you need more. fortunately. due process and rule of law matters

technically speaking, inquests don't exonerate anybody (at least not in WA state). that is not their goal or scope.

here in WA state, inquests are always done when there is a homicide by a LEO. only sometiems when a nonLEO kills somebody.

regardless, unless there is probable cause of a crime, nobody should be subjected to ANY prosecution . IF rule of law and due process matters to you, you wouldn't subject people to a trial merely because there was a "dead body". certainly not in the apparent natural (which i'm going to assume you didn't mean) and certainly not in the homicide when there is NOT probable cause of a crime.

if somebody breaks into your house, for example, and the evidence supports your story that you shot them in self defense, why should the state have the power to subject you to criminal prosecution unless they have PC?

that's the world you want to live in?

fortunately, we do not live in such a world, or at least such a nation

you are advocating trials as "fishing expeditions" in order to see if they can GENERATE probable cause.
.
that's like saying it's ok to do search warrants and arrests w/o probable cause

[RaleighNCDUer]

44. if somebody breaks into your house, for example, and the evidence supports your story that you shot

them in self defense, why should the state have the power to subject you to criminal prosecution unless they have PC?

What evidence?

How does the cop walking in, seeing I shot someone in my home, know that I'm telling the truth about that person breaking in? Just looking around and saying "good job"? That is FUCKING NUTS. I would EXPECT there to be an inquest (or hearing, or whatever you want to call it - you could even call it a 'trial') to look at the facts and see if my story holds up. The FACT is, there is a body in my living room and a gun in my hand. I'd call that probable cause. I would certainly NOT expect any LEO to take MY word for it that I was threatened. Faking a break in is simple. Lying is simple. WHY would a LEO believe me? Isn't it his job to NOT believe me, to investigate a possible crime?

I would hope that I would be arrested. Because if the same thing happened next door I would hope my neighbor would be arrested because I don't know that he DIDN'T do it and I don't fancy living next door to someone who may have shot someone in his living room without cause.

[paulsby]

45. you clearly don't understand how criminal investigations work

let me (briefly) explain it to you.

cops are evidence gatherers. their goal is to gather evidence, whether exculpatory or incriminatory. iow, to do their best to preserve the scene, investigate it, and help determine WHAT HAPPENED.

and no, in my jurisdiciton, you would NOT be arrested for shooting a burglar.

i know of several recent clearly self defense shootings where no arrest was made.

you think it's ok for cops to arrest w/o probable cause.

i, otoh, don't want ot live in a police state, and believe that, as the law holds, cops cannot arrest w/o probable cause.

if a family calls me because they claim their dad died in his sleep do i have the right to arrest them? IN YOUR police state, i would

heck, there;'s a dead body!
i am REALLY glad i do not live in your proposed police state

as i said, i am describing the lawthe AS IT IS

how many deaths have you investigated? (i've investigated scores of them)

the issue is not whom the LEO believes. the issue is WHAT DOES THE EVIDENCE SAY

the LEO is MORE than ok with preserving the scene (w/o probable cause), gathering evidence, etc. but he cannot arrest you w/o probable cause

and the state cannot subject you to a trial w/o one either

hth

[RaleighNCDUer]

46. You keep bringing up natural deaths which you, yourself, admitted

is NOT what I'm talking about. Why is that?

When Person A stabs Person B to death and there are no witnesses, why would you just believe what Person A says went down? How does an inquest, or even a trial, create a police state? How does it violate the accused's due process. If YOU saw a man with a bloody knife standing over a body on the ground would YOU just ask if it was self defense, or would YOU arrest him? You know damn well he'd be in cuffs in 30 seconds, and if he didn't drop the knife he'd be put down. Where does probable cause fit in that scenario?

I don't know why you are creating these strawman arguments. The FACT is, this man killed another and the circumstances warranted his going to trial.

Isn't that what your job is all about?

[paulsby]

48. i will explain it to you one more time

it's called probable cause

cops can't arrest without it

in your police state you can

the circumstances NEVER warrant somebody going tos trial without facts and circumstances that lead to a likelihood of conviction (proof beyong a reasonable doubt)

and people don't get arrested w.o probable cause

as for the knife scenario (which is NOT what you claimed. you claimed ANY TIME THERE IS A DEAD BODY which is why i brought up the apparent naturals, etc. based on waht you said. it wasn't a strawman, then i said you likely didn't mean apparent naturals iow gave you the benefit of the doubt), if ALL i had to go on was what the knife holder said, and there were no witnesses to corroborate his story AND he was not in his own house, etc. and he didn't have defensive wounds, etc. etc. iow if the totality of the circumstances supported a custodial arrest, i would make one

of COURSE i would hold him at gunpoint and cuff him initially. you do not need PC to do that. you need reasonable suspicion.

probable cause fits in , in my country where we have rule of law

it doesnt fit into your police state, where you believe the burden is on the defendant to prove himself innocent, because you believe it's ok to try him and arrest him w/o cause

i prefer my world. you prefer the police state

[RaleighNCDUer]

49. Who said it is without cause? He's standing there with the bloody knife

in his hand. If he doesn't have anything more than "I felt threatened" then he damn well better get bound over for trial - as the person in this case, who you are defending, apparently was.

"the circumstances NEVER warrant somebody going tos trial without facts and circumstances that lead to a likelihood of conviction"

WRONG. The circumstances never warrant somebody going to trial without facts and circumstances that lead to a belief that a crime has been committed. Your way of thinking is what POISONS our judicial system, with the belief that if a person is on trial he MUST be guilty, or they wouldn't have bothered to put him on trial in the first place. THAT is what makes for a police state, a belief in the infallibility of the police.

Maybe you need to read up on what defines a 'police state'.

[cowman]

52. Well apparently

you are wrong because there are hundreds of defensive uses of guns every year with no arrests,

I'll take the word of paulsby over yours any day as he' been a cop for years and has investigated many more deaths than you.

Now if you want to live in the kind of country where you are arrested even though the evidence clearly shows the death was in self defense, then go live in England

[RaleighNCDUer]

9. And yet, somehow, the MURDER rate in the US still far exceeds that

of the UK.

How's that happen?

[shadowrider]

10. How many of those murders

are committed by gangbangers with illegal weapons, regardless of the number of laws on the books that prohibit them from having weapons?

How many murders are committed that involve drugs?

Compare that to the number of murders by LEGAL CCW people and you'll see it's the bad guys who are responsible. The south side of Chicago and D.C. are prime examples.

[Statistical]

11. The likelihood of being invovled in a murder is very low.

Homicide ~5 per 100,000 in the US
vs
Violent Crime ~500 per 100,000 in the US

100x more likely to be involved in a violent crime.

Another way to look at it is the UK trades 3 less homicides per 100,000 people (5 vs 2) for ~1,600 more violent crimes.

[old mark]

13. UK has a LOT more knife assaults - th the point where many types of knives

are illegal there. Muggers there may wear heavy boots and actually beat and kick victims to death on the street. People, not objects, cause violence, they just use various tools to carry out their intentions.

mark

[shadowrider]

14. Before anyone screams for proof, here you are

http://www.ralree.com/2009/03/07/british-store-bans-knife-sales-cites-knife-crime-as-reason/

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/4581871.stm

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/27/international/europe/27knife.html?ex=1274846400&en=cef76721be98494c&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss

[Callisto32]

28. Victims of the drug war.

We turn our violent offenders out onto the street to make room for pot dealers.
We also created a massive black market ruled at the top by violent cartels.

Both problems with misappropriation of state violence.

[spin]

15. Holy crap...The U.S. is less violent than the U.K ...

and the U.S. doesn't even make the top 10 list!

[Statistical]

19. Yeah Violent Crime rate in UK is roughly equal to that of Detroit.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_the_United_States#Violent_crime

Most people don't associate the UK with high level of violence but just visualize UK = Detroit.

[shadowrider]

7. Well

A lot of posters put forward the view that violence is rarely, if ever justified EVEN IF someone breaks into your home.

> If someone comes into my home, in the early a.m., uninvited, I'm assuming they aren't there for tea and crumpets. I will defend my family and I.

Not saying I agree with that, but here we have trouble getting people to agree you don't shoot a kid for walking across your grass, or reload and empty your gun into an unconscious, unarmed would-be robber.

> If someone is simply walking across the grass, shooting them is unacceptable and criminal under any circumstances. IF they're walking across the grass and approaching me in a threatening manner, that MAY be a different story.

> Emptying a gun into someone who's unconscious is absolutely unacceptable. You never, ever know if someone is armed or not if they've entered your home at 2 a.m., uninvited. Should I wait until they hit my stepdaughter over the head with a bat for them to prove intent before I defend her?

[Cronus Protagonist]

16. According to the BBC, he was stabbed while in the ROAD

Hardly an "intruder" situation. They were having an altercation in the road and this guy stabbed the other guy, outside, in the road, not at home with his family quivering behind him.

The BBC -

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/hampshire/8216863.stm

Man charged over stabbing death
King George Road, Andover

The altercation happened in King George Road, Andover, on Friday

A man has been charged with murder after a 38-year-old man died of stab wounds in the Hampshire road where they both lived. Steven Griffiths died in hospital after an altercation in King George Road, Andover, on Friday afternoon. Roberto Ranieri, 45, of King George Road, has been charged with murder and will appear before magistrates in Basingstoke on Monday.

Andover Sound

http://www.andoversound.com/pages/extranet/trial-begins-i-5330.php

Trial Begins
Tuesday 2nd March 2010

The trial of an Andover man accused of killing 38 year-old Steven Griffiths has begun. 46 year-old Roberto Ranieri from King George Road was arrested after Mr Griffiths was stabbed in the road last August.

The Local Police

http://www.hampshire.police.uk/Internet/news/releases/Operation+Carpel+update+-+Man+charged.htm

Operation Carpel update - Man charged
Press Releases
Published: 23/08/2009

Police have charged a man following the death of Steven Griffiths on Friday, August 21. Mr Griffiths was pronounced dead following an altercation in King George Road, Andover.

[shadowrider]

18. Yet nothing appears in any of the above stories

To indicate what type of threat, if any, Ranieri was responding to. To read them, one would think this was just a violent outburst on an innocent citizen.

These stories are not presenting all the facts.

[Cronus Protagonist]

20. It's pretrial and the facts will come out during the trial

The press in the UK is generally speaking (Murdoch excepted) a lot less inflationary than the US press. They reported the facts, not the story as told by either side. The facts will come out during the trial, and I suspect they may be surprising, given all this spin-doctoring that's going on.

[Euromutt]

33. It's British English idiom

"In the road" in this context can mean any property located along that road, as well as on the road itself.

[shadowrider]

37. See #25. I said the same thing only different

[moodyUK]

50. ACQUITTED

Just in case anyone is interested, Roberto Ranieri was ACQUITTED of ALL CHARGES, on March 9th. The Jury took just 2 hours to make their decision.

http://www.andoveradvertiser.co.uk/news/5049805.Andover_man_cleared_of_murder_and_manslaughter_of_Steven_Griffiths/

The incident did not happen in the road, it happened in the Ranieri family's home, in front of their four children in the middle of the day. The deceased entered their property with the intention of causing harm to Roberto. Roberto was protecting his wife, his children and himself.

[OneTenthofOnePercent]

51. It's bullshit that this would even make it to a court.

Only 2 hours of deliberation... must've been open & shut. Cops/and prosecuters should have looked at the situation and been able to determine it was purely self-defense. This is one reason I favor Castel Defense laws. The onus is not on the victim to defend his actions - the STATE must prove a crime was comitted.

Hopefully, Ranieri will not be responsible for court/lawyer costs.
I think they have the tort reform thing in brittain (loser pays legal fees).

[DirkGently]

17. So no one has the real facts here>

and ... the whole point of bringing up this story of an Englishman knifing someone who may or may not have been a threat to him is for American gun enthusiasts to fret, once again, that they are under constant threat of having their weaponry taken away and criminals given the right to pillage their homes and threaten their families?

No thanks.

I'd be interested in discussing the ethics of *this specific killing with a reliable set of facts,* but not in yet another recitation of the gun lobby's amusing theories on how Europe's gun laws are pointless, because more people get beat up there, while more people get shot and murdered here.

[Katya Mullethov]

23. Really

Let's get back to discussing some reasonable common sense compromises . One more couldnt hurt .

[bowens43]

22. do you really expect anything

in something called http://armedselfdefense.blogspot.com / to be taken seriously?

Sorry to burst your bubble but every husband and father would not stab a man death in the road (the man was not in the guys house) and then claim he was defending his family.......

[shadowrider]

25. You are confusing British descriptions with American descriptions

After having worked in Britain, there is a difference between IN the road and ON the road. This incident happened IN King George Road which is their way of saying that's the area where the incident occurred, not that it happened ON the road. It may very well have taken place in a house, the articles are not clear on that point.

I was there once and got extended a week. We went to the pub after work where I called my (now ex) wife to tell her of the extension. I made sure to tell her I was pissed. Pissed there means drunk here. She understood I was "mad" but I had to do what I had to do.

Knock you up in the morning? = Do you want a wakeup call?

It's under the bonnet of the car = Look under the hood

Lift = elevator

Understand the term as THEY use it, not as WE use it.

[DissedByBush]

36. The problem with the law in England

Is the people of England, the jurors.

The British technically have the right to use "reasonable" force to defend themselves, but in practice jurors don't often see the use of force by a civilian for defense as reasonable.

[shadowrider]

38. "Reasonable" to the British means

They say "Stop or I shall say stop again". Anything over and above that is unreasonable.

[Statistical]

39. LOL. Sigh it would be funny if it wasn't so sad. How far the empire has fallen.

[PavePusher]

40. Which is why I was glad to leave after nearly 8 years.

Lovely place, but going in a bad direction, rapidly.

Edit: And being a crime victim 5 times with no police response. But ghod help me had I demonstrated a willingness to defend my self or my home.

[Euromutt]

42. Actually, it's the Crown Prosecution Service, and the judiciary

At least in England & Wales (I'm not so sure about Scotland) the judiciary is pretty rigid about the notion that the jury are the triers of fact, whereas they, the judges, are the triers of law. The thing is that, in self-defense cases, the facts are pretty much beyond dispute; it's clear that the defendant shot/stabbed/beat the assailant. The question is whether the amount of force used by the defendant was "reasonable," and that's a call the judiciary has appropriated to the exclusion of the jury.

The real issue, though, is that the inhabitants of the UK don't trust the criminal justice system, and they have every right not to. If you catch some guy breaking into your house, even if the police catch him, there's a damn good chance he'll be out within a few days on a "supervision order," at which point he might come back to exact revenge on the people responsible for having him arrested.

In the case of Munir Hussain--initially sentenced to 30 months in prison for beating a burglar who threatened to murder him and his family, but whose sentence was reduced and suspended on appeal--the burglar he chased down and beat to the point of brain damage had fifty prior convictions. In spite of which, he was able to roam the streets, break into peoples' houses, and threaten to murder them when they came home. Frankly, when a guy threatens to murder you and your family, and you (justifiably) don't trust the criminal justice system to actually put him away, how the hell else are you going to deter him from coming back to try to harm you and your family except by demonstrating that you are utterly ruthless and beating him to within an inch of his life?

The criminal justice system may decry this behavior as "vigilantism," but history shows us that vigilantism typically manifests itself when the formal criminal justice system proves itself unable or unwilling to adequately perform its job in the perception of the people it's supposed to protect. And that's very much where the criminal justice system of England and Wales has been for twenty years.

[gorfle]

47. The article is confusing.

The article you linked to is confusing, but it appears that the first man spoken of was acquitted, and the second man is awaiting trial.