Police siege

[Hoddy]

John, you're not seriously suggesting that his ex-partner and her new lover deserved to be shot ?

Do we want our police to be so afraid of the public that they approach every car as though there's an armed killer inside ?

Hoddy

[ebaynut]

One thing is for sure, this guy had balls. Not crying on some forum for him, or to some camp social worker, he sorted his problems in his way.

Had he of course killed someone in a far off land who he had never met, because George or Tony had told him to, no doubt he would have been given a lump of metal to wear on his chest.

[just john]

Err, No. But as I understand it this is a crime of passion, which under French Law was (still?) a legitimate defence. At least the people involved were all aware before anyone else of who was involved. So to what ever minimal degree of knowledge of RM and his likely reaction to the liaison they had embarked upon, a prudent step might have been great big ones, even moving away.

I'm not familar with police training or procedures, but a few hours after a gunman has just committed an attack, would society, (ie you and me) assume they are warned that a gunman is on the run and to be aware?

 

[Hoddy]

I can't believe what I'm reading. This man shot three completely defenceless people.

His problems were of his own making. No-one asked him to beat his girl friend on a regular basis or injure his own nine-year-old child and end up in jail for it.

Hoddy

[Russethouse]

[quote user="Quillan"]You see this it it, people are already talking about him as a victim, he's not the blinking victim, the people he shot are the victims. [:'(][/quote]

 Victim is a catch all word, there is more than one type.

Perhaps we should see him of a as a 'product' of a society which increasingly  fails to value the basics, like a loving family, marriage, responsibilty for ones offspring.. How hard is it to imagine the mindset? His partner had deserted him and was being unfaithful, he'd 'lost' his children, he had no father and his relationship with his mother had broken down. Add to that a spell inside plus steroids and anti depresants.... and you have a lethal cocktail......

Others may have overcome it, but he couldn't, for whatever reason he didn't have the mental resources to see any future. It's not much good saying he could have done this or that, in his head he couldn't. There was nothing, no future, just nothing.....

In this country when someone dies in this way, isn't there always an enquiry ? There would have been if they had shot him, I don't see anything untoward in that....

[just john]

Dare I say that is your interpetation; my posts are about society being able to ask questions about why Prison and Police in these circumstances did nothing until someone was killed and two people attacked, despite an available history and a warning from the Prison service. Are you saying no restrictions or monitoring on RM, tagging or surveillance etc, and no watch, warning or protection on his partners home, is correct, - but the full force of the law on this scale should be applied only after the notified in advance attacks?
How many other women suffer in this manner, it seems to be well reported in the press, I don't buy the picture of a gunman surprising the Police in this or other incidences. They have made it difficult and expensive by the poor handling earlier (IMHO)

Shouldn't we be asking what kind of Prison monitoring / Policing is this?

 

[NickP]

[quote user="ebaynut"]

One thing is for sure, this guy had balls. Not crying on some forum for him, or to some camp social worker, he sorted his problems in his way.

Had he of course killed someone in a far off land who he had never met, because George or Tony had told him to, no doubt he would have been given a lump of metal to wear on his chest.

[/quote]

You must live in a different world from me? This guy was a coward and a bully of the highest order. It really takes "balls" to shoot an unarmed opponent. The guys who get "lumps of metal on their chests" face people with guns and ambitions.

[Russethouse]

 As far as the prison service is concerned I am surprised that his mental state wasn't picked up on and he be kept inside.....obviously whatever warning was given raised no more concern than other warnings of the same nature.

[Chancer]

[quote user="Hoddy"]John, you're not seriously suggesting that his ex-partner and her new lover deserved to be shot ? [/quote]

You forgot the unalert copper, just asking for it.................... [6]

[Chancer]

[quote user="Russethouse"][quote user="Quillan"](][/quote]

 Victim is a catch all word, there is more than one type.

Perhaps we should see him of a as a 'product' of a society which increasingly  fails to value the basics, like a loving family, marriage, responsibilty for ones offspring.. How hard is it to imagine the mindset? His partner had deserted him and was being unfaithful, he'd 'lost' his children, he had no father and his relationship with his mother had broken down. Add to that a spell inside plus steroids and anti depresants.... and you have a lethal cocktail......
Others may have overcome it, but he couldn't, for whatever reason he didn't have the mental resources to see any future. It's not much good saying he could have done this or that, in his head he couldn't. There was nothing, no future, just nothing.....

[/quote]

I would not even be aware of this incident but for this forum so my knowledge is limited to say the least but I think I prefer the description of the gunman by a little girl wasnt it who sent the card .

A nutter!

As I say I am just a bemused or should it be amused onlooker in another country but I have no doubts who the victims are.

[Gardener]

His brother grew up in the same family and hasn't afaik gone off the rails.

This man commenced a relationship with a girl when she was 15 and he in his early 30s. Was this because he hadn't got the mental capacity to have a grown up relationship with women his own age, or for other reasons such as easier to control or mould a young girl into the type of woman he wanted?

She ditched him, relationships break down all the time but they don't usually result in murder. The young man who died seems to have been the forgotten victim in all this.

Victim does have different connotations to different people and whilst it is possible to give reasons why Moat acted the way he did, I for one cannot condone it.

I do share concerns that perhaps by tasering him, it panicked him (especially as the negotiator did say he wouldn't be harmed and there was no one coming behind him, which may not have been untrue at the time he said it but...)

and this hopefully will form part of the enquiry. But I never expected him to just give himself up and come quietly, I am just glad no one else was hurt.

[just john]

Bob Quick, a former chief constable who was once Britain’s most senior counterterror officer, singled out the failure to alert Moat’s ex-girlfriend, Sam Stobbart, that threats had been made against her by Moat while in prison.
 telegraph. -missed-opportunities

Family of Raoul Moat is considering asking for a second postmortem because contained no mention of Tasers police used 
Northumbria police topped a recent league for the number of incidents (704) in which a Taser was aimed or used, recording more incidents involving the stun guns than the Metropolitan police, which covers a population more than five times larger.
Medical experts say they can trigger involuntary muscle spasms.

Moat's uncle said yesterday he was "upset" police did not respond to his offer to talk his nephew out of hiding. "If I went up, he would have somebody that loves him ... it would possibly have turned him that little bit that he needed [to give himself up]."

Details about Moat's background have emerged, which may explain his enmity towards the police. Arrested 12 times since 2000, Moat had been charged on seven occasions, but convicted only once.
 guardian. -moat-family-postmortem-taser Check photo caption

Prison send, Friday 2 July, warning to Northumbria police that Moat may attempt to harm his former partner. No action was taken by the force. 
 .independent.prisonwarning

 

[Quillan]

Sorry RH but he was in prison because he beat his partner and child. She sought a better life and met somebody else who it seems treated her much better. Moat was 'wound up' by some other prisoners apparently who told him a policeman was also 'having off' with his 'bird'. Now as Jean says that part of the world is pretty bleak and sparsely populated so I guess everyone knows who the police are so he tried to shoot the one he thought it was having killed his ex-partners new lover and maiming her and the kid. Now as you say he was on a cocktail of antidepressants and steroids, nobody forced the steroids down his throat, he took them of his own free will. His mother disowned him after the shooting.

There are a lot of people out there who have had equally as bad 'breaks' in life, some even worse but they don't go round murdering and maiming people.

Its not society that let Moat down its the system, one group not listening to the other and other groups being interfered with by the government resulting in more money spent but less people doing the 'sharp end' work. Just like other big organisations in the UK (NHS for example) too many Chiefs and not enough Indians as the saying goes.

[Russethouse]

His brother said he loved him despite what he'd done, and his Uncle obviously cared, but the police seemed not to want to use these people......perhaps it was too dangerous.We're all different, his brother was obviously a stronger character

Also I wonder as he was so much of a nutter why didn't they keep in prison?

I'm not saying he was a victim, he was a nasty bully who hit children but neither do I wonder why people are leaving flowers... I bet lots of us all know or have known someone who would be capable of this sort of thing if the cards fell differently

[Gardener]

[quote user="Russethouse"]
His brother said he loved him despite what he'd done, and his Uncle obviously cared, but the police seemed not to want to use these people......perhaps it was too dangerous.We're all different, his brother was obviously a stronger character
Also I wonder as he was so much of a nutter why didn't they keep in prison?

I'm not saying he was a victim, he was a nasty bully who hit children but neither do I wonder why people are leaving flowers... I bet lots of us all know or have known someone who would be capable of this sort of thing if the cards fell differently
[/quote]

But isn't that what sets us apart, those who try and deal with what life throws at them without bloodshed and those that don't?

He lost his life, but whilst his death wasn't inevitable it was a likely outcome when he chose the path that he did on his release from prison, he could have tried to sort his life out without resorting to this, he chose not to. If people (family and close friends) are leaving flowers because they really knew a different man,that is one thing, if people are leaving flowers because they think he is some kind of rebel who got one over on the police no matter who got hurt / killed, then that is a worrying state of affairs.

I really hope that the media have not  triggered the seeds of discontent in some other person out there. There was a good article I read this week about how media blanket coverage can cause copy cat attacks and how the press should really be a bit more careful as to what they report and how they report.

[Russethouse]

From his brother (BBC web site)

"He was a mentally ill man under a lot of stress who cracked, and it was just

the final straw.

"His actions, although I appreciate were absolutely horrendous, and although

I wish he hadn't gone ahead and done what he did, were a cry of anguish.

[Gardener]

From the same brother who has had nothing to do with him for several years.

He may have been mentally ill but under a lot of stress, I'm not so sure. If not being able to accept that your girlfriend has moved on , equates as being the the final straw and thus results in carnage, then this kind of event should be a daily occurence.

[Russethouse]

 The thing is we don't know, we can suppose x, y and z but the fact is we all have different genetics and life experiences.

If an enquiry helps to sort the fact from the fiction and may be prevent a recurrence personally I think its money well spent

[Chancer]

Its a peculiarly British thing all this hand wringing for the victim, for me the game is over, the bad guy lost and society/the Police won, end of.

Was it always this way, did the same thing happen after Thatcher sent the SAS in to the Iranian embassy with instructions not to bring out any bad guys alive?  At the time I was of an age where getting drunk/laid was far more important than watching the news or reading the newspapers.

It's interesting that I have not seen any reporting of this on the French news programs, perhaps the international pages of les journals ran stories on the mediatisation of the event.

Can anyone in their wildest dreams imagine that the events would have unfolded in the same way in France?

They may not have found hm any quicker, after all Treber ran rings around them for ages but he wasnt believed to be armed or a danger to society, but I cant somehow see the G.I.G.N pussyfooting around with tasers or being handicapped/hamstrung by the media.

How do you think it would have panned out in France?

What do you think the public reaction would have been?

If this were to happen near to you what county would you prefer to be in?

 

[Russethouse]

For me its a heart and head thing - if it happened here I'd be terrified for my children (despite the fact that they are fairly sensible adults) but there's a part of me that thinks of any baby/child as a blank canvas...genetics play part of couse, but I'd like to know why on earth PM (and others like him) end up as he did.

 I noted the remarks about his brother and then compared them to my own and my OH family, quite interesting...... for instance there are 19 years between my brother and sister, their growing up experiences were completely different in many ways, but read that  X had a brother and sister and most would assume a much smaller gap

[LEO]

I am surprised by some  of the comments on this Raoul Moat thread when, those  posters can only be relying on hearsay.

ps.

Madeleine McCann is still missing!

[Thibault]

Another question:  He was sentenced to 18 weeks in prison, but was released after serving only 9 weeks even though the prison authorities were concerned about threats he had made regarding his ex girlfriend etc.    So....why was he released early?

[Quillan]

[quote user="Thibault"]Another question:  He was sentenced to 18 weeks in prison, but was released after serving only 9 weeks even though the prison authorities were concerned about threats he had made regarding his ex girlfriend etc.    So....why was he released early?[/quote]

You can also add to that, why didn't they section him if they thought he was a real danger to himself and others. Too much paperwork I suspect.

The other thing is that they said on the BBC it will take around 6 months for the coroner to release his findings and a year before we get the results of the investigation/enquiry. I don't think that this length of time (and related cost) is acceptable nor that the coroners report should be before the enquiry is finished as the results from the enquiry may uncover critical information relevant to the coroner. I think 6 months in total is quite sufficient in this case. Why do I get the feeling that somebody may become the scapegoat for all of this whilst the bumbling people at the top walk away relatively untarnished.

[Chancer]

Wouldnt happen in France [Www]

[just john]

[quote user="Quillan"] Why do I get the feeling that somebody may become the scapegoat for all of this whilst the bumbling people at the top walk away relatively untarnished. [/quote]

All the police emphasis has been on a describing this man as a danger after the event, and none placed on the failure of the Prison / Police service to deal with him before the event. The disgrace to society is that the events were completely preventable, either by prison authorities or the police, acting on a ''prevention is better than cure'' could have prevented these two deaths and two serious injuries (not to mention the subsequent costs) by dealing with the recommendations of the staff report of this man. The subsequent events are a warning to people at the top and Society that if more intelligence is not used then people will be attacked before the prison service or police act.  A more preventable stance could be adopted to better protect people and make better use of funds available. I hope the report will reflect this.