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Topic History of: Grooming - the new legal word!
Max. showing the last 5 posts - (Last post first)
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JC |
Oh Zooloo you preach a good official line.
A sting can also be a con. And yes police in this country have been known to pose as children online, just like in the USA.
Also, the police acted unlawfully in the Wimbledon Common case, sending a police woman to flirt with the suspect and lure him into a compromising position. The judge rightly threw that out. They conned Mr Herron into making a false confession up in Sunderland, although they took it too far and he confessed to things beyond which he'd been accused of and which had not happened, so a judge threw that case out too. There are many cases. Unfortunately the police never seem to learn, and they continue to push the boundaries, and sometimes get away with it.
Visit the appeal court, as I have, and you'll see convictions being overturned on a regular basis. The media only report on the high profile cases. I was quite surprised.
Nothing is black and white. There is an 'anything goes' attitude among British police if they think they can get a result. Not my words - the words of a police officer friend. His justification? It's either that or let the b******s get away with it. He thinks the law is too much on the side of the criminal. But the law is really in place to protect the innocent, against wrongful conviction as well as against crime.
It's treated like a game where all that matters is winning, but it's real lives at stake.
'Grooming' is the latest excuse for convicting people who have not commited a crime. They don't even have to prove intention, they just assume it.
There's no sign of things improving. |
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veritas |
I think police routinely blur the lines between entrapment and the actual planning of a crime.
Entrapment is a defence in the USA but this has been continually overlooked where defence, which is becoming the norm in the UK, depends how good your counsel is and whether you can afford the best advice.
That's one of the great disadvantages of being caught up in the law-police and authorities have deep pockets and spend like drunken sailors ( our money) and are never held to account when they make mistakes except for the ocassional token verbal slap on the wrist.
Have you ever heard of a polcieman being charged when they knowingly commit perjury or fit up suspects ?. I haven't-think back to those accused of IRA outrages who were found to be innocent and the victims of fit-ups.
2 crimes happened here-innocents were wrongfully convicted and the real perpetuators allowed to get away scot free. Not one single cop has ever been charged though.
No-one would surely want a real criminal planning a henious crime to go through with the act if they could be prevented-but we are bordering now on what could be fantasy which may never be put into action ,or the actual urging of someone to go through with a crime. Plus recourses are tied up in what looks like "thought" crime.
All so much easier since the so-called " War On Terror". |
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zooloo |
PBS wrote:
It happens here too. They tend to be called 'sting' operations. So British law has a lot to do with it.
A sting is where somebody has already instigated criminal activity and a very different matter.
Entrapment is not lawful in the UK and in a sting operation great pains are taken to avoid it as it would be, as you previously noted, used as a defence. |
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PBS |
It happens here too. They tend to be called 'sting' operations. So British law has a lot to do with it. |
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zooloo |
PBS wrote:
A few years ago there was a case where British police had worked with a "(news?)paper" to con a few ex-cons by offering them cheap firearms and a fake opportunity to commit a highly profitable crime. A judge ruled that this was entrapment.
Sounds very similar to these grooming cases. I'm increasingly seeing a lack of cosistency in British law and procedure. Where there are no firm rules, the lines become blurred and society becomes a less safe place.
The TV shows and grooming entrapment are in the US where entrapment is legal.
British law has nothing to do with it. |
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