Mark Duggan shooting inquest in London finally starts...

[leanderman]

No, you have an honest belief that it's best for you to do this.

No, it was just a tragic mistake

 

[ViolentPanda]

I'd do the same.

because you're a dick, obviously.

It's very poor practice if you're at all interested in preserving a semblance of probity as a police service, though.

 

[DotCommunist]

were the witnesses given a day to discuss things together pre-trial and work out who saw what?

no? No I didn't think so.

 

[butchersapron]

No, it was just a tragic mistake

What?

 

[TopCat]

What?

Translate: Cock.

 

[leanderman]

because you're a dick, obviously.

It's very poor practice if you're at all interested in preserving a semblance of probity as a police service, though.

It seems highly suspicious to me.

I'd have thought there was an embargo of some sort against it.

 

[leanderman]

What?

The shooting: it's either a tragic mistake - or an execution. Take your pick

 

[TopCat]

The shooting: it's either a tragic mistake - or an execution. Take your pick

It's not either or.

 

[butchersapron]

The shooting: it's either a tragic mistake - or an execution. Take your pick

What's that got to do with the post of mine that you replied to?

 

[leanderman]

What's that got to do with the post of mine that you replied to?

Human error

 

[TopCat]

Human error

His mums error.

 

[sojourner]

Doesn't matter, they have the defence of honest belief - how they can have a belief about something they couldn't have seen and how it fits with other copper explanations doesn't matter anymore. All that counts is saying in court that you had an honest belief. It's perfect. It's law around this boiled down to a great big fuck off.

Yep - which is why I followed it with this:

The form itself (the determination and conc) uses a discourse which makes it impossible to say anything other than what they did say, imo. It confines, and entraps.

8 of them are sure he did not have a gun in his hand when he was stopped. At this point they can still consider unlawful killing.

They only 'think' he threw the gun out of the window on the basis of probability.

The discourse used in the determination paper completely leads, entraps, and confines their final decision. "If V53 may have been defending himself...". Then "Did V53 honestly believe or may he honestly have believed, even if that belief is mistaken, that at the time he fired the fatal shot, that he needed to use force to defend himself or another; if your answer is NO then he cannot have been acting in lawful self-defence..."

^^ and that's what it rests on.

So the jury hear V53 insisting that he honestly believed he had a gun. The jury then cannot say no, for some reason, even though they have the knowledge that the gun and the sock have none of MD's DNA on it, no-one saw him throw the gun, V53 describes the gun and sock in detail - items which he could not have actually seen in his hand.

Sorry to repeat the wording on the conclusion but it's this that it rests on, isn't it? The document itself is worded in such a way that it is nigh on impossible to reach a conclusion of unlawful killing. And that fucking stinks.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

It's a starting-point certainly.

It's an ending point, I think, in that it is something that everyone can agree on. Once we go beyond that, you get to what looks to me at least like a strange compulsion among some to provide excuses and mitigation for the police that the evidence gives no reason to give. You, silverfish and open sauce all fall into this category - I simply do not recognise your idea of what the police force is and how it operates.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

The discourse used in the determination paper completely leads, entraps, and confines their final decision. "If V53 may have been defending himself...". Then "Did V53 honestly believe or may he honestly have believed, even if that belief is mistaken, that at the time he fired the fatal shot, that he needed to use force to defend himself or another; if your answer is NO then he cannot have been acting in lawful self-defence..."

The thing about this is that I'm pretty sure that it doesn't apply to us. The police have a special rule all to themselves. Someone might correct me here, but I'm pretty sure that if you or I were in this situation, the test would not be 'Did we have an honest belief, even if it was mistaken?', but 'Was such a belief reasonable, even if it turned out to be mistaken?' The so-called 'reasonable man' test.

The police literally have their own laws, just for them. Pretty much a definition of a police state.

For instance, if we take V53 at his word, he was experiencing a full-on hallucination, and killed a man on the basis of that hallucination. Manslaughter with the mitigation of temporary insanity would be the charge for you or me, I think, at the very least. It certainly wouldn't be called lawful.

 

[leanderman]

It's an ending point, I think, in that it is something that everyone can agree on. Once we go beyond that, you get to what looks to me at least like a strange compulsion among some to provide excuses and mitigation for the police that the evidence gives no reason to give. You, silverfish and open sauce all fall into this category - I simply do not recognise your idea of what the police force is and how it operates.

Pour 'discourager les autres', at least, an open verdict or even lawful killing would have been a better result.

But the fact the Met rarely shoots people in cold blood, the weight of the jury's verdict and the evidence I have read on the inquest website all still make me think this was a tragic fuck-up.

 

[TruXta]

the Met rarely shoots people in cold blood

They seem to prefer strangulation, blunt force trauma and starvation and stuff like that instead, don't they?

 

[leanderman]

They seem to prefer strangulation, blunt force trauma and starvation and stuff like that instead, don't they?

I think this point has been made already!

 

[TruXta]

I think this point has been made already!

Seems it needs some more making.

 

[TopCat]

For instance, if we take V53 at his word, he was experiencing a full-on hallucination, and killed a man on the basis of that hallucination.

The issue with this is that the "hallucination" was an accurate one in that the gun was described accurately and according to the accepted evidence he had not seen the weapon at all at this time and had no knowledge of what type of weapon it was nor that it was contained within a sock.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

The issue with this is that the "hallucination" was an accurate one in that the gun was described accurately and according to the accepted evidence he had not seen the weapon at all at this time and had no knowledge of what type of weapon it was nor that it was contained within a sock.

That's true. Maybe he's psychic.

That's the thing, isn't it - any approach that isn't 'the coppers were lying their fucking heads off' bumps up against these problems.

If you or I attempted such a defence, we'd be up on a charge of murder.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

But the fact the Met rarely shoots people in cold blood, the weight of the jury's verdict and the evidence I have read on the inquest website all still make me think this was a tragic fuck-up.

Do you not think this attitude is weird? The police only rarely execute people and then conspire to lie about it afterwards. That should never happen.

 

[8ball]

I guess some people think all the stuff that happens afterwards is a formality so the police should be able to say whatever they like. I imagine the police find it a tedious waste of time that they have to go into a room for a whole day in order to cook up a story.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I guess some people think all the stuff that happens afterwards is a formality so the police should be able to say whatever they like.

Defining 'what the police do' as lawful, essentially. Butchersapron is right about this - the whole inquest boils down to a simple 'fuck you'. The pretence that it is anything else is patently absurd.

 

[8ball]

Defining 'what the police do' as lawful, essentially. Butchersapron is right about this - the whole inquest boils down to a simple 'fuck you'. The pretence that it is anything else is patently absurd.

Not sure about the inquest, but definitely the verdict.

 

[sojourner]

The thing about this is that I'm pretty sure that it doesn't apply to us. The police have a special rule all to themselves. Someone might correct me here, but I'm pretty sure that if you or I were in this situation, the test would not be 'Did we have an honest belief, even if it was mistaken?', but 'Was such a belief reasonable, even if it turned out to be mistaken?' The so-called 'reasonable man' test.

The police literally have their own laws, just for them. Pretty much a definition of a police state.

For instance, if we take V53 at his word, he was experiencing a full-on hallucination, and killed a man on the basis of that hallucination. Manslaughter with the mitigation of temporary insanity would be the charge for you or me, I think, at the very least. It certainly wouldn't be called lawful.

Interesting.

So there may be a document with different wording on? Can anyone lay their hands on one? Any legal people here?

 

[laptop]

The thing about this is that I'm pretty sure that it doesn't apply to us. The police have a special rule all to themselves. Someone might correct me here, but I'm pretty sure that if you or I were in this situation, the test would not be 'Did we have an honest belief, even if it was mistaken?', but 'Was such a belief reasonable, even if it turned out to be mistaken?' The so-called 'reasonable man' test.

The police literally have their own laws, just for them. Pretty much a definition of a police state.

For instance, if we take V53 at his word, he was experiencing a full-on hallucination, and killed a man on the basis of that hallucination. Manslaughter with the mitigation of temporary insanity would be the charge for you or me, I think, at the very least. It certainly wouldn't be called lawful.

Hmm. I find a wonderfully tangled case:

In R v Williams (Gladstone) (1984), a man named Mason had seen a youth trying to rob a woman in the street, and had chased him, knocking him to the ground. Williams, who had not witnessed the robbery, then came onto the scene and was told by Mason that he was a police officer (which was untrue). W asked M to produce his warrant card, which he was of course unable to do, and a struggle ensued. W was charged with assault occasioning actual bodily harm, and at his trial raised the defence that he had mistakenly believed that M was unlawfully assaulting the youth and had intervened to prevent any further harm. The trial judge directed the jury that his mistake would only be a defence if it was both honest and reasonable. The Court of Appeal quashed the conviction and held that the defendant's mistaken but honest belief that he was using reasonable force to prevent the commission of an offence, was sufficient to afford him a defence.

Law Teacher http://www.lawteacher.net/criminal-law/cases/self-defence.php

That relates to the "prevention of the commission of a crime" aspect, not fear of immediate harm to self.

But it seems that Williams had to show that he did have a reasonable belief (even if mistaken) - not just that he may have done so (as the jury were instructed in the immediate harm context.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Interesting.

So there may be a document with different wording on? Can anyone lay their hands on one? Any legal people here?

There does appear to be an 'honest belief' defence, in fact:

D saw a man assaulting a youth. The youth was calling for help. The man was in fact affecting a lawful arrest of the youth, albeit falsely claiming to be a police officer. D intervened

Held: D was not guilty of assault. He honestly believed that he was preventing an unlawful assault. If the belief was in fact held, its unreasonableness is neither here nor there. It is irrelevant.

So we just come down to whether or not the police officer's statement that he honestly held the belief is credible. You or I cannot just say that our belief is honest - we also have to be believed, as in:

Defendant invited several companions to have sexual intercourse with his wife. Told them that her resistance would not constitute lack of consent but rather enhanced her satisfaction.

Held: D was guilty of aiding and abetting rape. The companions were guilty of rape. Mistake as to V's consent must be honest but need not be reasonable. No room for either a 'defence' of honest belief or mistake.

(The House of Lords upheld the convictions on the basis that the accused had not actually held any mistaken belief.)

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Hmm. I find a wonderfully tangled case:

That relates to the "prevention of the commission of a crime" aspect, not fear of immediate harm to self.

But it seems that Williams had to show that he did have a reasonable belief (even if mistaken) - not just that he may have done so (as the jury were instructed in the immediate harm context.

That's the same case as the first one I quote above.

I think we're at a bit of an impasse here now. If you think the copper had an honest belief that Duggan was pointing a gun at him, his actions become lawful, perhaps. If you think the copper is lying his head off about that honest belief, which I think is provably the case given what TC pointed out above, his actions become unlawful.

 

[TopCat]

Either V53 is lying regarding seeing the gun or his colleagues are lying as to the location they found the gun in contained in the shoebox or both, or they are all liars.

 

[laptop]

That's the same case as the first one I quote above.

I know. But I think I captured more of the confusing complexity of that case, before you posted

I think we're at a bit of an impasse here now. If you think the copper had an honest belief that Duggan was pointing a gun at him, his actions become lawful, perhaps. If you think the copper is lying his head off about that honest belief, which I think is provably the case given what TC pointed out above, his actions become unlawful.

Eh? I'm pointing out ways in which the test suggested in the coroner's instructions gave the cop more leeway than Williams appears to have had.