Lawful killing of Mark Duggan

If the law was applied equally you'd expect roughly the same conviction rate for both police and the public but it seems from the high profile cases we see in the media that the police almost always get off whereas the MOP almost always gets some kind of conviction.

Come on shows us, so far you've utterly failed to show this. and have shown a lab of understanding of the law and different situations. Lots of civilians have killed in perceived threat and haven't been sent sown.
With Tony Martin, you really couldn't of picked a worse case to try and defend your assumptions. As it does nothing of the short and just shows how little you understand of the situation.
 
A split second to decide whether to shoot or not...and seeing Mark Duggan holding a gun shaped object wrapped in a sock ...the policeman shot him twice

But as Duggan wast holding a gun and had already got rid of the gun...how did the policeman having to make a split second decision, know that the gun was wrapped in a sock ...even though the gun wasn't found for some time after the shooting , and some 20-30 feet away

in fact the police did lie the day after the shooting saying that Duggan had fired at them, then they said he pointed a gun at them....and this is why they opened fire on him , but how could he still have been a threat when he held no pistol and had hes hands up in submission and was also in the sights of no doubt several armed police officers
 
Where did I claim they were trigger happy? I only implied that a lot more benefit of the doubt is given to firearms officers than it is to the general public (when given the former is supposed to be highly trained and cool under pressure it should really be the other way around).

If the law was applied equally you'd expect roughly the same conviction rate for both police and the public but it seems from the high profile cases we see in the media that the police almost always get off whereas the MOP almost always gets some kind of conviction.

This man speaketh the truth !

Another point I'd like to make. This so called scumbag. Has anyone come who actually knew him, come out to say he terrorised / or made their life hell for them? I mean, surely someone would have come out the woodwork to testify how evil this person was during the trial. No one did apart from the Police !!!!

So he may have known some dodgy people. To be labelled by the Police as the 50th most dangerous man in Europe? Really with all those rapists, child molesters out there, chavs with more convictions than god knows what ? Seems like they were really going out of their way to tarnish his reputation, knowing that it would work in their favor during the trial. As it has done so in this very forum.

Not saying he wasn't a little dodgy. Not saying his brothers hadn't been upto no good. But he didn't have any convictions did he. The only thing they had on him, was that he had obtained an illegal firearm and that he was known to deal a little in drugs.

While I can understand that many of struggle to find this palatable sitting in your little towns & villages. This is often the way of life, for young black men living in London. He probably wasn't as much of a scumbag as you're all been led to believe. You or I would probably be the same, if we were lived in a similar area, and everyone around us, were of that type of character.

With all the chavs out there with a long list of convictions for robbing old ladies, breaking into homes time and time again, GBH etc. This guy had none of that.

Just putting that out there, for you lot to think about.

No convictions. Just a cell phone. Gun suspiciously found 20ft away with no DNA or fingerpints?

Wasn't the same labelling made of the wooden leg man? Armed robber etc? .
 
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I believe that the law in general should apply to everyone equally, including the police. If Tony Martin gets put away for shooting a burglar on the basis on things like the direction the guy was facing when he was shot then I don't think the police can start using excuses like "well I only had a split second to react and I thought his Blackberry was a glock", why can a police trained firearms expert use that as a legitimate excuse whilst an untrained civilian can't?

They can, of course.

Ambushing someone, shooting them in the back as they were running away and leaving them dying in the dirt while you have a cup of tea and don't even tell anyone is not the same as "I only had a split second to react and I thought he was holding a gun", especially when dealing with someone who you know has a gun with them.
 
I understand witnesses stated he was surrendering himself. I don't understand how his death can be ruled as lawful.
Irrespective of who he was or what he represented, questions should be raised over the police handling of the situation. They're meant to protect us.

And besides:
The jury began deliberations on 10 December 2013, asked to render a verdict of unlawful killing, lawful killing, or open verdict. "If you are sure that he did not have a gun in his hand, then tick the box 'unlawful killing'", Judge Cutler instructed. Subsequently, Cutler told the jury that he would accept a conclusion based on a majority agreement by 8 of the 10 jurors.

The jury delivered their conclusions by an 8–2 majority that Duggan's death was a lawful killing, although he had already disposed of his firearm before he was shot by police.

I can't make sense of that.
 
The only thing they had on him, was that he had obtained an illegal firearm
Is that all?

thedoc46 being the same person that tried to portray that bike gang in New York who surrounded and attacked a Range Rover as being just a bunch of bikers. The scum there got their just desserts too.
 
I understand witnesses stated he was surrendering himself. I don't understand how his death can be ruled as lawful.
Irrespective of who he was or what he represented, questions should be raised over the police handling of the situation. They're meant to protect us.

And besides:
The jury began deliberations on 10 December 2013, asked to render a verdict of unlawful killing, lawful killing, or open verdict. "If you are sure that he did not have a gun in his hand, then tick the box 'unlawful killing'", Judge Cutler instructed. Subsequently, Cutler told the jury that he would accept a conclusion based on a majority agreement by 8 of the 10 jurors.

The jury delivered their conclusions by an 8–2 majority that Duggan's death was a lawful killing, although he had already disposed of his firearm before he was shot by police.

I can't make sense of that.

Source, as the verdict in the second post of this thread does not say any off that.

Why would the judge instruct that. As him actually having a gun or not, does not make it lawful/unlawful. Even if he had a gun it doesn't make it lawful. Its the perceived threat, then if reasonable force was used.

If he did instruct that, then he was wrong (judges often are) and the legal advisor(I forget what they are called) who is the expert on the law would have corrected him.

As for the witness, the witness who was pretty much discredited due to the reporters notes, having him saying the total opposite.
 
And besides:
The jury began deliberations on 10 December 2013, asked to render a verdict of unlawful killing, lawful killing, or open verdict. "If you are sure that he did not have a gun in his hand, then tick the box 'unlawful killing'", Judge Cutler instructed. Subsequently, Cutler told the jury that he would accept a conclusion based on a majority agreement by 8 of the 10 jurors.

The jury delivered their conclusions by an 8–2 majority that Duggan's death was a lawful killing, although he had already disposed of his firearm before he was shot by police.

I can't make sense of that.


Because the full quote from the Judge is:

If you are sure that he did not have a gun in his hand then tick the box
accordingly and then go on to consider unlawful killing, lawful killing or an
open conclusion;
 
The jury delivered their conclusions by an 8–2 majority that Duggan's death was a lawful killing, although he had already disposed of his firearm before he was shot by police.

I can't make sense of that.

How about looking at it from this perspective. You are a policeman, told he is armed and potentially dangerous.

How on earth do you know that he just has 1 firearm on his person? Can you really afford to take the chance if he makes a suspicious move towards himself and go for something? Put yourself in his shoes, would you really want to take the chance that you, a fellow officer, a bystander could potentially get shot if you just assume he has 1 weapon? There are too many factors that would and could run through your mind in those split seconds.

He had a honest and reasonably held belief that his life or someone else's was in danger and acted accordingly. That does apply to civilian and police alike.
 
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80% of the Jury didn't agree that it was unlawful. 20% couldn't say either way. You don't get to round up the remainder just because it fits in with your ideology ;)

I shall try and keep it short and simple for you.

3 options. Lawful, open, unlawful. 0 people chose unlawful. 100% chose something other than unlawful.

And nope, i haven't made any case or statement either way. Stop making me out to be your nemesis and misrepresenting the facts. Its boring and somewhat indicative of mentally challenged.

Nemesis? I think the one with mental issues might be yourself, possibly paranoia? :D If you don't like being disagreed with can I suggest not getting involved on a discussion board?
 
They can, of course.

Ambushing someone, shooting them in the back as they were running away and leaving them dying in the dirt while you have a cup of tea and don't even tell anyone is not the same as "I only had a split second to react and I thought he was holding a gun", especially when dealing with someone who you know has a gun with them.

Whereas after shooting Duggan, going straight to the media and briefing them for three weeks (by launching a major character assassination) before even thinking of visiting the family is acceptable?

For the first 4 weeks after his death the Duggan family had to get updates on the case from the news because the police refused to converse with them.

I think people are misunderstanding my point about Tony Martin. I wasn't saying he was innocent and should have been let off, I was pointing out how the general public look at cases involving a MOP killing someone with a gun completely different than when coppers do it. I believe that if a firearms officer shot someone in the back whilst they were running away they would probably get off and say something like "I thought he was running to his car to get a gun" and people would accept that and sympathise.

How many comments in this thread can be summed up as "I don't really care about the facts of the case as Duggan was a wrong'un so therefore he deserved to get killed" or "Live by the sword, die by the sword"? Loads, yet the same mentality could be used to justify Martin's actions couldn't they given he killed a burglar.
 
Once again. The Police actually went about putting more innocents at risk than the deceased by their actions.

And yet, the jury was unanimous in believing that "the stop [was] conducted in a location and in a way which minimised to the greatest extent possible recourse to lethal force." Besides, if you apply any form of logic, the police never would have been in that situation had Duggan not sought to obtain a firearm in the first place.
 
How many comments in this thread can be summed up as "I don't really care about the facts of the case as Duggan was a wrong'un so therefore he deserved to get killed" or "Live by the sword, die by the sword"?

On the flip side, there seem to be quite a number of posts that can be summed up as "I don't really care about the facts of the case as I can reach my own verdict without sitting through weeks of evidence - the police were in the wrong, the jury was wrong, the verdict was wrong". I am not saying you fall into this category by the way!
 
I think it's acceptable that the family weren't involved in the ins and outs of the situation straight away, he was known to the police as being potentially dangerous, and was linked to organised criminal activity. These are the repercussions of having a scumbag as a family member.

Funny thing about stories like this is if it was a gang related incident, and he was shot by another gang member, it would have been the end of it, probably on that day. Now we've wasted plenty of taxpayer's money and people's time just to prove what we already knew.

I for one thank the police service for removing a dangerous criminal from the streets of this country.
 
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Of course - that's why in all court cases the jury just goes "ah look, the police and CPS say he did it and they must be right." No "not guilty" verdicts are ever returned.

Don't be childish.

Because people on the internet with a prejudice against British police are much better qualified to give a verdict than sheeple who spent weeks upon weeks pouring over the detailed evidence in the case.

All I'm pointing out is that the only evidence the jury has to support the killing being lawful is the words of the police, who even if they had executed Duggan or even just made a mistake, would be very unlikely to admit to it. They would be far more likely to say they felt there was a threat and they had no choice, regardless of whether it was true or not as they will naturally protect themselves.

Note - I'm not saying I believe the police executed him as I obviously don't know. I'm saying the only evidence we have that they didn't, is them saying that they didn't, which isn't very strong evidence.

I have no idea how those 8 members of the jury could know that the police were telling the truth, but it seems many people here have absolute faith in the police so maybe those jurors do also. I'd assume the other 2 jurors who returned the open verdict did so for the above reasons.
 
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Are you really that naïve?


You believe Mark Duggan was so very dangerous because the Police said so right ?....the very same Police who the day after they killed him ...said he fired at them so they fired back ?


they lied , they couldn't even get their story straight as to why they shot him
 
I understand witnesses stated he was surrendering himself. I don't understand how his death can be ruled as lawful.
Irrespective of who he was or what he represented, questions should be raised over the police handling of the situation. They're meant to protect us.

One potentially discredited witness who was 9 floors and 150 feet away and independent evidence exists to suggest that he may have originally stated that initially he thought Duggan had a gun.

And besides:
The jury began deliberations on 10 December 2013, asked to render a verdict of unlawful killing, lawful killing, or open verdict. "If you are sure that he did not have a gun in his hand, then tick the box 'unlawful killing'", Judge Cutler instructed. Subsequently, Cutler told the jury that he would accept a conclusion based on a majority agreement by 8 of the 10 jurors.

The jury delivered their conclusions by an 8–2 majority that Duggan's death was a lawful killing, although he had already disposed of his firearm before he was shot by police.

I can't make sense of that.

Because Cutler is misquoted. The actual quote is "If you are sure that he did not have a gun in his hand then tick the box accordingly and then go on to consider unlawful killing, lawful killing or an open conclusion". Just because Duggan may not have been holding a firearm at the time does not rule out the possibility that the police believed (a) he had the firearm in his possession; and (b) lives were at risk.
 
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