-
Posts
-
@forumhostpb wrote:
@eve wrote:
Surely the greatest point against the death penalty must be the Birmingham 6?
Just slightly aside from the topic – but this Birmingham 6 thingy has always puzzled me.
OK they were originally convicted of killing all those people in Brum, imprisoned, and many years later their convictions were overturned on appeal, and they were released.
The bit that puzzles me is this. Why, given that they were totally innocent of any sort of involvement at all, did the Police arrest them in the first place???
I mean, there they were presumably living in or around the Birmingham area, going about their lawful business as most everybody else does, when along comes Mr Plod and arrests them for, apparently, no reason at all. Not only that but then they are tried at great public expense and so on. What on earth made the Police just pick on 6 guys at random???
Can anybody shed any light on this at all???
Is that a serious question?
They were Irish, Catholic and in Birmingham at the time- that was all the police needed!
Have no idea how old you are PB but I can (just) remember the early 70’s when bombs were going off like firecrackers and the police were under a huge amount of poressure to find and convict those responsible. The fact they found people who they knew weren’t responsible but would “fit the crime” was irrelevant for the 20 years they were falsely imprisoned.
@American Woman wrote:
I guess so far I’m in the minority here. I don’t believe in the Death Penalty as I am a Catholic and believe the “Thou Shalt Not Kill” rule. They only way I could are if my family or I was being attacked. Sooner or later everyone will die and that is when the judgment will be handed down. For all those who honestly deserve the Death Penalty, it’s going to be worse than any torture we could ever pass. I do believe that they should be locked up for life and any luxury they could hope for would be taken away. I know some of the prisons are way too nice for these people to spend their end of days in.
Catholicism has been responsible for millions of deaths over the centuries- being a catholic has nothing to do with opposing the death penalty- being a human being may have?
@slayer wrote:
@forumhostpb wrote:
@eve wrote:
Surely the greatest point against the death penalty must be the Birmingham 6?
Just slightly aside from the topic – but this Birmingham 6 thingy has always puzzled me.
OK they were originally convicted of killing all those people in Brum, imprisoned, and many years later their convictions were overturned on appeal, and they were released.
The bit that puzzles me is this. Why, given that they were totally innocent of any sort of involvement at all, did the Police arrest them in the first place???
I mean, there they were presumably living in or around the Birmingham area, going about their lawful business as most everybody else does, when along comes Mr Plod and arrests them for, apparently, no reason at all. Not only that but then they are tried at great public expense and so on. What on earth made the Police just pick on 6 guys at random???
Can anybody shed any light on this at all???
Is that a serious question?
They were Irish, Catholic and in Birmingham at the time- that was all the police needed!
Have no idea how old you are PB but I can (just) remember the early 70’s when bombs were going off like firecrackers and the police were under a huge amount of poressure to find and convict those responsible. The fact they found people who they knew weren’t responsible but would “fit the crime” was irrelevant for the 20 years they were falsely imprisoned.
Well frighteningly enough Slayer I am 60 (61 in August) as many people on here know, so I do have a very clear recollection of the IRA bombing campaign – particularly as I was on the wrong end of a couple of their bombs. I do also know a bit about pressure to solve crimes as I spent some time in the Metropolitan Police Service during the 1970’s when the IRA were really active.
I read Magoo’s most interesting Wikpedia link and it does go some way to explain why these particular guys were picked up. It wasn’t in Birmingham but in fact they were on their way by train to Northern Ireland to attend an IRA funeral when Special Branch stopped them and arrested them.
Apparently there was ”evidence” of explosives but this was eventually discredited on their third appeal. Also they all made ‘confessions’ to the Police, but predictably withdrew them later on. this essentially left the prosecution with no actual evidence with which to press home the charges and no confession evidence either. Small wonder that the third appeal overturned the convictions.
Having now looked through the various Google hits on them, the tone and flavour are all very similar….. miscarriage of justice…. totally innocent…. Police malpractice…. that sort of thing. Curiously enough the Police have never pursued their enquiries further and no other persons have been suspected or charged with this apparently unsolved crime.
I’m going to stick my neck out here and say that in my opinion these guys actually did it and eventually got off after multiple appeals and the use of some smart lawyers.
Im sure other suspects wouldent have been pursued because the trail by that time would have colder than Moscow in winter.
My personal opinion would be that the Police were under pressure to find the bombers. They nabbed the wrong suspects, and when they realised they had nabbed the wrong suspects they decided to beat and torture a confession out of them anyway given the pressure they were under to find the bombers. Given that their confessions were taken off in them in this way it’s no real wonder that the B6 later retracted those confessions.I guess that this is one version of events BM. However, in the 1970’s long before Police interviews were taped and videoed, criminals routinely made confessions when confronted with evidence of their crime.
Equally routinely they then withdrew these confessions once they had been advised by their briefs and this often left Police with pretty thin forensic evidence to fall back on.
I have had this happen to me personally, and I can tell you that it is bloody frustrating too.
This whole ‘confess then withdraw’ scenario became such a farce that eventually Police taped (and later on videoed) interviews and confessions specifically to counter this tactic. Every criminal that ever there was againly routinely alleged that Police beat confessions out of them or subjected them to some sort of ‘torture’.
Yes, I am aware that prisoners have been beaten up in the cells – this was usually reserved for child molesters or rapists – but in the overwhelming majority of cases this simply didn’t happen.
@forumhostpb wrote:
I guess that this is one version of events BM. However, in the 1970’s long before Police interviews were taped and videoed, criminals routinely made confessions when confronted with evidence of their crime.
It’s also been stated by more than one person, and documented on TV, that one of the favored interview techniques was to handcuff the suspect to a chair and hold a plastic bag over his head until he confessed. :roll:
We don’t have the death penalty at the moment and it doesn’t seem that countries where there is a death penalty (USA, Russia etc.) are free from murders, rapes, etc.
I have said before that although I agree that many brutal and callous killers certainly DESERVE to die and I wouldn’t weep any tears for them if they got bumped off by another prisoner, it’s a big step to bring back judicial killing because there is always the chance of executing an innocent person. Even with DNA evidence, how long before we might hear some expert saying that such evidence is less reliable than hitherto believed?
An exception here, I believe, relates to international war criminals like Saddam Hussein or terrorist leaders like Osama Bin Laden. The evidence against such individuals is so overwhelming and the scale of their crimes so great that they should pay the ultimate price.
@Ow£n Ka$h wrote:
@forumhostpb wrote:
I guess that this is one version of events BM. However, in the 1970’s long before Police interviews were taped and videoed, criminals routinely made confessions when confronted with evidence of their crime.
It’s also been stated by more than one person, and documented on TV, that one of the favored interview techniques was to handcuff the suspect to a chair and hold a plastic bag over his head until he confessed. :roll:
Owen the supposed list of torture methods used by Police to extract confessions is usually only limited by the imagination of the accusers. I can only speak from my own personal experience and say that I have never seen any of this and I have never even heard of Police colleagues boasting about it or discussing it in any way.
I’m NOT saying that it has never happened, but I am saying that it simply isn’t necessary for the followingg reasons:
The overwhelming majority of criminals are at the lower end of the intelligence scale and rarely if ever carefully plan their crime to include preparing a ”story” in case they are arrested. Usually a person is arrested in the vicinity of or escaping from a crime scene. Alternatively, and since most crimes are committed by ‘experienced’ criminals, Police have sufficient local intelligence to figure out who might be responsible – they know their ‘regulars’. For example burglars tend to have an MO to which they stick and this often gives them away, car thieves often use the same MO or dump a vehicle close to their homes etc etc.
A suspect is arrested and taken to a Police station. Generally they will be initially locked up in a cell awaiting interview. This isolation alone often breaks down the initial bravado that most display. They no longer have all their mates around them to support them and so on.
The interviewing officers start by being in possession of as many facts about the crime as possible – knowledge of the specific detail of the crime gives them an enormous advantage when trying to get at the truth in an interview. The suspect is then questioned in a formal atmosphere where the interviewer is seeking clear and specific answers to direct ‘open’ questions (who; what; why; when; where; how).
Believe me when I say that is is really difficult to sustain a lie convincingly when questioned in this way. A truthful person will normally have no difficulty in explaining their actions, a liar will often have to invent excuses which they find difficulty in accurately remembering later on in the interview sequence. the lie will come back later on to trap them.
As I say most criminals don’t have a carefully prepared story to account for their behaviour and slowly and gradually as the questions progress and the suspect is asked for more and more detail, anomalies in the ‘story’ appear which can be exploited by the interviewer. Eventually the suspect is verbally backed into a corner when lie after lie is exposed and they end up ”putting their hands up”. It really isn’t necesary to maltreat them to get a confession – a surprisingly high proportion of criminals end admitting their crime all by themselves, particularly when they see that continuing to lie in the face of evidence is pointless.
As an example, take the tired old excuse from a suspect caught with a stolen item in their possession. The usual (and boring) story is that they quite legitimately bought it from a bloke in a pub and didn’t know it was stolen.
So we need to break this story down into its constituent parts and trap the suspect by forcing them to make up a whole story on the fly to substantiate the basic ‘bloke in a pub’ story. The devil is always in the detail.
….. what was the name of the pub?? where was it?,…. when were you there (day and time)?….. how did you travel there?…. who was with you?….. did you chat to anybody in the pub when you went in and if so who?….. what did you talk about with them?……. what did you have to drink? …… how many drinks did you have whilst you were there?….. how did you pay for the drinks?……. how much money did you have on you when you went to this pub?…… how and where did you get this money?…… what work do you do?….. how much do you earn (net take home pay)?…..and so on. All this stuff is gone into long before you get round to the bit the suspect is actually expecting you to ask i.e. how much did you pay for the article and who was the bloke you bought it from.
This type of detail is rarely if ever prepared in advance by a suspect so as they lie and make stuff up, their answers become more and more unconvincing, they trip up over the details and frequently contradict themselves. Sooner of later most of them realise that the story has become utterly hopeless and the give in and admit the crime (Section 1 Theft or dishonest handling).
This technique does not require ANY form of coercion by Police, indeed a sympathetic interviewer will often get much further with a suspect than an aggressive one.
Later, and long after the interview, admission and charging sequence, the criminal has a chance to think things through more clearly and then concoct a story to explain their actions. Their brief will often get them to withdraw their incriminating statement, with the tired old story that it was beaten out of them, so that they can plead not guilty at Court.
@Magoo wrote:
@forumhostpb wrote:
Owen the supposed list of torture methods used by Police to extract confessions is usually only limited by the imagination of the accusers. I can only speak from my own personal experience and say that I have never seen any of this and I have never even heard of Police colleagues boasting about it or discussing it in any way.
You never watched The Sweeney then!!!
God, I loved that programme – great stuff. As with all TV police series it presents a highly stylised version of reality with the ‘Guvnor’ and the ‘Skipper’ charging around all over the place in high performance cars, shooting up the bad guys and generally causing mayhem.
The reality however, is far less exciting.
I would read all of this, but its far too hot!
Get involved in this discussion! Log in or register now to have your say!