"A Threat to Burglars"

[Jeff Higgins]

Kind of an old article, but I thought of it again when reading the San Fransisco PD thread.

British Man Denied Parole, Ruled "A Threat to Burglars"
By Val MacQueen
FrontPageMagazine.com | January 28, 2003


Tony Martin is not a worldly man. He has never been to San Francisco. It’s probable that he’s never even been to London. He’s a middle-aged man who, until two and one half years ago, lived a quiet, unexceptional life in a remote farmhouse in Norfolk, one of England’s least populated counties.

Because he lived alone in a place without neighbors, and was judged, by their own low standards, to be faintly eccentic, he became the target of local Gypsy raiders, who broke into his home and robbed him several times. Each time, Martin called the police, who sometimes turned up an hour or two later, or didn’t turn up at all, citing the distance they’d have to come. After each robbery, Martin responded by boarding up more windows and jamming the doors. He had no neighbors to turn to for help.

Fatefully, in August 1999, two Gypsies broke into Martin’s home while he slept. In a blind panic the 55 year-old Martin took his gun out of the cupboard, crept down the stairs and fired three shots blindly into the dark, intending only to frighten them away. One wounded 30 year-old Brendan Fearon. The second shot killed 17 year old Fred Barras. Subsequent forensic evidence proved his assertion that he fired in the dark in a blind panic.

Martin then called an ambulance and made the only phone call to police that ever caught their attention.

Martin became a hero in Britain, a country where self-defense has been legislated away in a mush of Princess Diana-esque "emotional intelligence." This is a country where private citizens were outlawed from keeping a gun after a madman broke into a Scottish school and killed several children a few years ago. One madman and millions of law-abiding, sane people were deprived of their ancient right to self-defense. When only the police and the military are armed, the authorities tend to become distanced from the ordinary, unarmed citizenry, and unquestionably the police have become less responsive and less friendly in recent years.

A fund established for Martin’s defense was overwhelmed with contributions.

Natural justice was once again thwarted when Martin was found guilty of murder. In the face of public fury, the charge was later reduced to manslaughter and his five year sentence was reduced by one-third. But Martin had done no wrong by any civilized measure of judgement.

He has now served two and one-half years and he came up before the Parole Board two weeks ago. Martin has been a cooperative and untroublesome prisoner. He keeps to himself, but shows no hostility to other prisoners or the guards. But he was refused parole because he has failed to show remorse. He refuses to go along with the thought police. He still thinks he had a right to protect himself and his property. If he’d shown remorse and expressed Clintonian pain for Fred Barras’s death, he would be out today. But he’s made of sterner stuff and refused to wrap himself in the mantle of political thought fascism.

That he has shown no remorse led the Orwellian Parole Board to refuse him freedom on the grounds that he poses a "threat to burglars."

At the same hearing, authorities cited another damning cause for refusal of parole: "He tends to think things were better 50 years ago." This sentiment surely puts Martin in the land of the sane. Who doesn’t think things were better when parents weren’t afraid to allow children to walk to school, when there was general respect for law and order, when there were no hordes of illegal immigrants begging with their children in the streets and subway stations, when police took threats of life and liberty seriously? Tony Martin seems a good deal more tethered to reality than the British Parole Board.

Finally, the Parole Board sneered, "He doesn’t seem to be up to speed with the 21st Century." Well, heaven forefend! Lock him up forever and throw away the key! Society needs to be protected from people who are mildly out of kilter with the new century!

Tony Martin was said by a friend to have been "depressed" by the judgement.

This case take place against a background in which, a month or so ago, a senior member of the judiciary handed down "guidance" that judges should no longer send "first time burglars who didn’t use violence in the course of their burglary" to prison because British jails were "too overcrowded". They should, instead, be given community service sentences. So now the word is out to ambitious British burglars everywhere: First time’s free.

Later the Lord Chief Justice, the most senior legal figure in Britain (a political appointee of Tony Blair) stated, in response to outraged letters to the newspapers, that he couldn’t believe most people wanted first time burglars (meaning, let us remember, "first time caught") to go to prison. He didn’t believe the law-abiding British were upset by the new guidelines. Something tells me that being chauffeured around in a government provided limousine, drawing an immense salary from the taxpayer and living in luxurious and well-policed housing causes dementia praecox in the legal profession.

Before the British could recover from their outrage over the latest dismantling of law and order in Britain, the head of the Metropolitan Police (London’s police force, which can’t keep the law, yet is much bigger and better paid than New York’s police force, which manages to keep its citizens safe) announced to the press that the police would no longer even investigate burglaries forget calling the police unless the perpetrator were obvious and there was plenty of evidence against him. In other words, unless he crept out of your house in a Zorro mask carrying a big sack marked Booty and happened to have jotted his name and address down on your telephone pad. It was announced that the Metropolitan police will henceforth be saving their manpower for the three most important offences in the country: Murder, rape and hate crimes. Defending property is now formally no longer on the table in London.

The chief of police seems perplexed by the public outcry. "We will still," he explained patiently, "take a note of any burglaries reported for statistical purposes." They just won’t investigate them.

Meanwhile, Fred Barras’s companion-in-crime Brendon Fearon had his three-and-a-half year sentence reduced by half and was released in August 2001. Fred Barras’s father has been sent to prison for 14 years for leading a £400,000 ($600,000) armed robbery. Fred Barras’s 69 year-old grandmother is facing charges of possessing an illegal firearm and assisting an offender. And Fred Barras’s mother is suing Tony Martin for wrongful death.

[Joeaksa]

Something is very, very wrong here and I hope that the rank and file citizens wake up soon...

[legion]

But this is the Utopia that the left wants...

[Jims5543]

That is amazing.... and sad.

What a mess.

[nineoneone]

hire someone without a record to break in to Lord Justices house!

[cmccuist]

Tony could move to TX where he could hunt the burglars as sport.

[Rodeo]

The saddest thing about this story is that some poor, disillusioned people believe it. I know NOTHING about the case, but it could not be more apparent that this is a slanted, hack piece by someone pushing an agenda.

How can you lap this stuff up without question? A piece of crap story like this sets in motion all these posts of people crying and feeling sorry for themselves?

What ever happened to strong conservatives, men and women of resolve and dignity? All you Bushies do is whine. About the media, about the legal system (here and abroad, I guess), about the terrorists out to get you, and of course about the dreaded "liberals."

Whine, whine, whine, just like my 2 year old.

Grow up for God's sake!

Use your God-given intelligence to sift through bull***** like this story. And stop whining!

[nineoneone]

cheese with that whine, Sir!

[kach22i]

Originally posted by legion
But this is the Utopia that the left wants...

That's BS, break into this so-called liberal's house and find out.

I could find nothing in Snopes about this story. Very sad if true.

http://search.atomz.com/search/?sp-q=gun+control&getit=Go&sp-a=00062d45-sp00000000&sp-advanced=1&sp-p=all&sp-w-control=1&sp-w=alike&sp-date-range=-1&sp-x=any&sp-c=100&sp-m=1&sp-s=0

[kach22i]

Originally posted by Rodeo
I know NOTHING about the case, but it could not be more apparent that this is a slanted, hack piece by someone pushing an agenda.

True, but it's entertainment to ya know.

[Nathans_Dad]

It appears that the story is indeed true, at least according to a quick look at a Google search of the news. Here is an article about the parole board appeal:

Martin loses parole appeal

Staff and agencies
Thursday May 8, 2003
Guardian Unlimited


Martin: the PCC has received dozens of calls in support of his Mirror deal. Photo: PA

Tony Martin, the farmer jailed for killing a teenage burglar, today lost his high court battle over the parole board's refusal to allow his early release from custody.
A judge rejected an application for a court order forcing the board to reconsider the case of Martin, 59, who is serving a five-year sentence for killing 16-year-old Fred Barras.

Mr Justice Maurice Kay, sitting in London, said that although there was an initial error of law when his application was first considered, that had been corrected and there were no grounds for allowing his challenge.

In January this year, the board turned down Martin's plea to be set free, and refused to review its decision a month later, even though it had received new psychiatric reports.
Probation officers said there was an "unacceptable risk" that Martin might again react with excessive force if other would-be burglars intruded on his Norfolk farm, Bleak House, as Barras had done.

Bitu Bhalla, appearing for Martin, argued during the two-day high court hearing that the farmer was "not a nutter" and there was no serious risk of him reoffending. His counsel argued Martin was entitled to release because statistically there was more chance of "winning the lottery" than the "simple farmer" reoffending.

However, Pushpinder Saini, counsel for the board, argued that it had not acted irrationally and burglars were entitled to protection from violent homeowners and were not to be treated as "fair game".

The jailing of Martin, who is due in any event to leave prison on July 28 after serving two-thirds of his manslaughter sentence, led to a national debate over the rights of people to protect their property - as opposed to "burglars' rights" not to have "lethal force" used against them.

Barras, of Newark, Nottinghamshire, he broke into Martin's remote farmhouse in August 1999 with accomplice Brendon Fearon, 33, also from Newark.

Fearon was shot in the leg by Martin, who was convicted of murdering Barras and wounding Fearon by a jury at Norwich crown court. He received an automatic life sentence but the murder conviction was reduced to manslaughter and the sentence to five years by the court of appeal in October 2001.

Interestingly, Mr. Martin was released from prison after serving 3 years (the maximum amount of time given good behavior) while one of the burglars he shot was released 3 days earlier (at the first opportunity). Ironic.

One of the burglars was fatally shot and the family attempted to sue Mr. Martin for loss of wages, but that suit was thrown out. Mr. Martin is apparently a politician now, which I find funny since the psychiatrists in the case said he was a paranoid schizophrenic with an undue amount of hostility towards burglars who enter his home....

Nice to see that the British system of justice is even more wacked than the US system.

[Rodeo]

Originally posted by Nathans_Dad
***Nice to see that the British system of justice is even more wacked than the US system.

Nice to see that you know more about the case than the twelve men and women that took a solemn oath, sat through both the prosecution and defense cases, heard all the evidence, and convicted this man of murder.

Stop whining!!

[Nathans_Dad]

Someone pee in your Lucky Charms today, Rodeo?

The story is true as presented in the original article. Look it up on Google or wikipedia or whatever. The guy shot 2 burglars inside his own house with his shotgun.

If the article offends your liberal sensibilities then fine, but the story is accurate.

[masraum]

Well, my first thoughts while reading were "that's insane", and then my second thought was "sounds too crazy to be true, even for those crazy Brits."

True or not, seems to me that the plan is to make sure you kill them, no wounding, and then just bury them out back, don't tell anyone or call the police.

Problem solved.

[masraum]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Martin_%28farmer%29

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/norfolk/3087003.stm

http://www.google.com/search?q=tony+martin+norfolk&start=0

[legion]

I love how whenever someone posts something that Rodeo dislikes, he insists that none of us know the "real story"...

[Dottore]

Originally posted by Rodeo
The saddest thing about this story is that some poor, disillusioned people believe it. I know NOTHING about the case, but it could not be more apparent that this is a slanted, hack piece by someone pushing an agenda.

Well I usually agree with you Rodeo, but this story has also been reported here. But it really didn't need to be reported here for me to believe it might be true - because I can easily see something similar happening where I live.

I don't see this issue as one of left and right - but simply one of a criminal justice system that has completely lost it's sense of priorities.

We have been burgled twice in two years. We're told by the police that the perps are "meth heads" who just need to "feed their habit" and who like our toys. Most are juveniles and would not be prosecuted even if they were caught. And the police officers in attendance tell us to relax because this is after all a "victimless crime" (i.e. we have insurance). The police makes zero effort to catch them - and if they are caught - they cannot be prosecuted under our juvenile offenders legislation.

Oh yes, and the police assure us they will be back for the brand new toys we have bought with the insurance proceeds.

Were I to shoot one of these perps - I would be in exactly the same legal position here as Tony Martin. Prosecutors could make a clear case for "excessive force" - and I would be in the slammer. Ditto if I worked them over with a baseball bat.

Believe me, there is absolutely nothing inconsistent about being a liberal and also being in favour of a very robust criminal justice system.

[David]

Sure makes me glad to be a Texan.

[Rodeo]

Originally posted by Nathans_Dad
[B***The story is true as presented in the original article.*** [/B]

Subsequent forensic evidence proved his assertion that he fired in the dark in a blind panic.

****
Martin was found guilty of murder.

I guess you don’t see any contradiction in those two statements, only a few sentences apart.

Oh well ... if I've learned anything on the board, it's that the Bushies believe what they WANT to believe, facts be dammed.

[kach22i]

Originally posted by masraum
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Martin_%28farmer%29

Submissions by the defence that Martin had fired in self defence were rejected by the appeal court. But on this occasion the defence submitted evidence that Martin
suffered paranoid personality disorder specifically directed at anyone intruding into his home; this submission was accepted by the Court of Appeal, and on the grounds of diminished responsibility, Martin's murder conviction vacated and replaced with manslaughter carrying a five year sentence, and his 10-year sentence for wounding the Fearon cut to three years, to run concurrently.

............suffered paranoid personality disorder specifically directed at anyone intruding into his home;

I suffer from that too.

The original article was flush full of colorful agenda and commentaries - fact. The story is true - fact.

Now go home and clean your guns, and don't forget to unload them first.