Harry Roberts has been freed
- Thread starter Citizen66
- Start date
Bahnhof Strasse
Met up with Hannah Courtoy a week next Tuesday
If you're quite sure that you will spend the rest of forever in prison, you may as well make the most of it by basking in the glory of three dead coppers. From what I understand he makes fine pastries with images of cops being shot on them :-/
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
perhaps he should take part in the great british bake off next time
Lurdan
old wave
Indeed, including pioneering the use of Agent Orange as a defoliant, and developing the mixture of collective punishment and forced resettlement that had been employed since the Boer War (shorn of the unpleasant connotations of it's original name 'concentration camp'). And unlike the Americans in Vietnam it was done 'successfully'.Malaysia was also probably the first conflict where the post-war British army openly terrorised in the name of fighting insurgency. We pulled some horrible shit in Kenya, but Malaysia was a whole different realm of horror, IMO. The Yanks got some of their ideas about how to operate in Vietnam from us in Malaysia, and the French in "French Indo-China".
Doesn't make Roberts any less of a cunt however.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
what you're missing is that like the americans in vietnam there were lots of conscripts in malaya. do you think all of them were the same as your rm man above?Indeed, including pioneering the use of Agent Orange as a defoliant, and developing the mixture of collective punishment and forced resettlement that had been employed since the Boer War (shorn of the unpleasant connotations of it's original name 'concentration camp'). And unlike the Americans in Vietnam it was done 'successfully'.
Doesn't make Roberts any less of a cunt however.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
it's strange i can't recall you posting this beforehand. i wonder why you've never mentioned it.
You only have to read The Virgin Soldiers to see how most of the blokes in Malaya were, daft, young conscripts flung into yet another conflict.
Lurdan
old wave
And why should one assume that he was anything exceptionally vile - the heads were removed after death to facilitate a body count. He's simply posing with them.
Lurdan
old wave
I said exactly that in post #87.
I've known a few blokes over the years (some family) who served in Malaya, the one thing they had in common is that none of them would ever speak about it.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
before today
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
of course this was merely continuing a trend: see, e.g. ireland 1919-21, mesopotamia etc etc.
DotCommunist
So many particulars. So many questions.
check out the 'citation needed' bits of the wiki on the malayan 'emergency' 
found this tho
https://markcurtis.wordpress.com/2007/02/13/the-war-in-malaya-1948-60/
found this tho
https://markcurtis.wordpress.com/2007/02/13/the-war-in-malaya-1948-60/
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
I don't think Roberts was lionised, although I'd concede that he became part of the anti-police folk mythology pretty quickly. I think we have to look at what he did in the context of the "normal" relations between the working class public and the Metropolitan police force, both at the time and later. The Met has a history going back to foundation of fitting up villains, of being on the take, and of going after "easy nicks" as opposed to dealing with "white collar crime". This was particularly pronounced after WW2, and that's the lens through which a lot of working class people in Greater London viewed the Met, for better or worse. What Roberts did was thoroughly reprehensible, but for some Londoners it tasted like, for the first time, the Met was getting a taste of its' own medicine.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
there's a long tradition of killing members of the met going back to 1833: http://www.islingtontribune.com/news/2010/jul/police-officer-killed-union-protest
incidentally, pc culley was buried in the churchyard of st ann's, soho. his funeral procession was notable, according to the times, for the hoots and jeering of onlookers.
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
The second copper Roberts shot was running away though. Roberts chased him down and shot him in the head.
That suggests more than just trying to save his own skin, doesn't it?
maomao
普費斯
Said copper had a description, and quite possibly the registration, of his van full of guns, as well as being a witness to his crime. So not as simple as you're suggesting either.
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
Perhaps. It still aggravates an already vile crime and marks Roberts out as a ruthless murdering bastard who should have died in prison.
Idris2002
canadian girlfriend
I keep reading this as "Harry Potter has been freed".
The stuff about the attacks on the animal sanctuary suggests that this Roberts fellow would have been a sociopathic killer regardless of his service in the Malayan emergency, or the bad blood between the Met and working class London.
The stuff about the attacks on the animal sanctuary suggests that this Roberts fellow would have been a sociopathic killer regardless of his service in the Malayan emergency, or the bad blood between the Met and working class London.
maomao
普費斯
With you up to the last 6 words. I don't think anyone's arguing he should have been given a medal and sent on his way.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
A copper running away was still a copper that could have ID'ed him. He was trying to save his own skin from prison.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
Nasty piece of work who isnt remorseful at all frankly him getting out is a bit of a miracle at least he is too decrepit to be much of a threat these days.
Hopefully danny dyer and his ilk dont try to lionise him
Dave Courtney has probably already been photographed shaking his hand.
Andrew Hertford
Chocolate Jesus
Desperately trying to make what Roberts did into something a bit noble and heroic aren't you?
He killed two innocent men in front of watching children. He is not a working class hero, he is scum.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
i'm not certain which part of stabbing pc culley you find noble or heroic. perhaps you could enlighten me.
maomao
普費斯
Don't think so. I think he was trying to put the crime and the popular memory of that crime (including the use of Roberts' name in chants at football matches and demos) in its historical context. If you just want to scream 'hang him, flog him' than the Daily Mail comments thread is here: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...er-cleared-release-Parole-Board.html#comments
Louis MacNeice
Autumn Journalist
This is a good thing - one of not many - about the criminal justice system. Releasing Harry Roberts, 78 year old unrepentant 'copper killer' shows that as a society we can be better than a greedy, selfish, violent and fundamentally anti-social individual such as Roberts. It also shows we can be bet better than the those calling for unending or ultimate vengeance; whether they be the Met or those calling for capital punishment.
Cheers - Louis MacNeice
Cheers - Louis MacNeice
Louis MacNeice
Autumn Journalist
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
and being a better bettor is always a good thing.
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