Re: The Mark Duggan verdict. : Sun Jan 12, 2014 11:48 am  

WIZEB wrote:

Hundreds.
Buckinghamshire is going bonkers.

So nothing yet then?

Re: The Mark Duggan verdict. : Sun Jan 12, 2014 11:54 am  

JerryChicken wrote:

The thing is - that is already the case although as you say its often an internal enquiry by another police force, but each armed incident where a weapon is fired is investigated, officers are often suspended pending the enquiry and at that point their career is in jeopardy.

The ultimate arbiter is the inquest and that is what we had in the Duggan case, a complex enquiry presented before a jury of citizens who are then asked to decide on a series of questions and legal principles - the fact that the verdict has not matched expectation from some people is irrelevant, we didn't ask the police to judge their own here and I don't think its a case of a lack of trust in the legal process that we already have, rather than preconceptions of murder and executions that in reality are shown to be just ridiculous.

I totally agree that to suggest that the police execute people like the Duggan relatives and friends did is absurd.
The jury came to a verdict based on the evidence presented to them and a lot of it is taken on trust particularly if it comes from authority.
It's what happen before that that interests me, and as you say the police weren't trying themselves here.
However, now, they have hindsight and they should indeed in a non-legalistic way try themselves to see where things went wrong ... and things did go badly wrong from some people's viewpoint.

There were according to reports 11 firearms officers sitting in a room together for three hours writing accounts of the incident.

Re: The Mark Duggan verdict. : Sun Jan 12, 2014 12:07 pm  

But if there are 11, and only 1 shooting, would the other 10 actively lie to protect him/her.

You're telling me that not one would have the integrity to tell the truth?

All it would take is that one differing account or that one person to say NO THIS IS WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED.

I work in a team currently, there are 15 of us, off those, 3 I socialise with beyond work and of the remaining 12, 7 I have a very good working relationship with. I would imagine this be the case for lots of people working and would find it difficult for all of them to close ranks and back each others stories 100%.

Re: The Mark Duggan verdict. : Sun Jan 12, 2014 12:07 pm  

I'm not even going to bother finding the guy's name, but the Guardian correspondent who used to be a Met advisor but stepped down because they police didn't jump as high as he said, he made a point about the police failing to stop Duggan getting the gun in the first place.

Briefly, in the week before Duggan's shooting, the gun that was later found 20ft from Duggan had been used to pistol whip someone in London. That had been reported to the police and from what he wrote there was CCTV to back up the assault.

Now, the Guardian writer was basically saying the cops should have acted on that and that would have prevented Duggan from even getting the gun in the first place, therefore he wouldn't have been shot.

A point I'd like to make is that the Guardian writer and the Duggan family try and make out that Duggan never had a gun at all. Duggan was supposed to be unarmed and the cops planted it to get off after "executing" him. However, that would have meant they'd have needed to get the gun off the criminal without charging him, killed Duggan, planted the gun and then went and charged the guy whose gun they somehow stole.

It's BS. It doesn't make sense. The only way that gun got there is that Duggan got it from him. Sure, the police could have tried to arrest the guy over the pistol whipping and that may have meant the sale to Duggan couldn't go through, but that would have probably resulted in a pathetic assault charge with the gun disappearing anyway.

I think it has only been recently that the family have even admitted that Duggan had a criminal record. They still cling to the fantasy that he wasn't carrying the gun. If they want complete transparency from the police and any legitimacy to their campaign, the first thing they need to do is admit that Duggan was carrying the gun in the taxi. But IMO it's pretty much impossible for them to admit that because most of their support will disappear if Duggan is revealed as the gangster he was.

Re: The Mark Duggan verdict. : Sun Jan 12, 2014 1:12 pm  

Wire Yed wrote:

But if there are 11, and only 1 shooting, would the other 10 actively lie to protect him/her.

You're telling me that not one would have the integrity to tell the truth?

All it would take is that one differing account or that one person to say NO THIS IS WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED.

I work in a team currently, there are 15 of us, off those, 3 I socialise with beyond work and of the remaining 12, 7 I have a very good working relationship with. I would imagine this be the case for lots of people working and would find it difficult for all of them to close ranks and back each others stories 100%.

The point is not that they did, but that they could.
Yes, it is unlikely to have happened.
But can you not see that the police have to be seen to be squeaky clean.

Re: The Mark Duggan verdict. : Sun Jan 12, 2014 1:17 pm  

I am amazed how this has turned into a cause celebre for anyone with a axe to grind with the police or the 'establishment'.

If you are going to pick a standard bearer and look for popular support, Mark Duggan is probably the last person you would choose.

Re: The Mark Duggan verdict. : Sun Jan 12, 2014 1:20 pm  

I agree with Stand-Offish that there should be stricter procedures in place after a shooting like this. I think the police involved should be treated like any other witnesses or suspects at a crime scene and split up and not allowed to confer until after they've given their statements.

As we've seen there is a discrepancy between the officer's statement and how the gun came to be where it was. There are a few possible explanations for this:

- The officer is lying, there was no gun in Duggan's hand at all, he wasn't carrying one and it was planted at the scene by the police covering up.
- Duggan acted as said in the officer's statement and then the gun was moved by the police for some reason
- Or (as would seem most likely to me anyway) Duggan, on seeing the police, reached for his gun to throw it out of the window so he wouldn't be caught with an illegal firearm, the officer saw him holding the gun and (quite rightly in my view) fired. At the same time Duggan threw it out of the window.

The third one would seem most likely to me. In that it would at least partly tally with the officers statement and explain how the gun ended up where it was found. But it raises the question of how the officer's statement is partly incorrect. Because the way his statement is worded is very certain without ambiguity. As if to me he's been sat in a room afterwards and thought "I've got to make 100% sure I wasn't at fault here". It would be better, in my opinion, if his statement included some ambiguity, as I'm certain in the few seconds this all took place that the officer didn't have time to view the actions so clearly and to think so clearly and quickly, it'd be more an instinctual thing (ie seeing the gun drawn and firing, rather than the step by step account in the officer's statement).

By the way, from everything I've heard I think the officer who fired was justified to, but I do think the way the police investigate these incidents could be a lot better and could help reduce some of the mistrust of police investigating police if there were better procedures. Things like the police being allowed to confer before giving statements isn't right in my view.

Re: The Mark Duggan verdict. : Sun Jan 12, 2014 1:24 pm  

What was with the unions turning up to the vigil, what does this incident have to do with the NUT or the RMT?

The teachers worried their cocaine supply is going to dry up if the police are bumping off all their shadier pupils or do the RMT actively want idiots lining the steets to justify having station staff to protect us?

Re: The Mark Duggan verdict. : Sun Jan 12, 2014 1:51 pm  

Wire Yed wrote:

What was with the unions turning up to the vigil, what does this incident have to do with the NUT or the RMT?

The teachers worried their cocaine supply is going to dry up if the police are bumping off all their shadier pupils or do the RMT actively want idiots lining the steets to justify having station staff to protect us?

No idea. Presumably those particular members saw the incident as some kind of social injustice. In my opinion the only social injustice in this whole affair was Mark Duggan himself.

Re: The Mark Duggan verdict. : Sun Jan 12, 2014 1:52 pm  

The Video Ref wrote:

I am amazed how this has turned into a cause celebre for anyone with a axe to grind with the police or the 'establishment'.

If you are going to pick a standard bearer and look for popular support, Mark Duggan is probably the last person you would choose.

I don't think it has really.
There have been a few posts about murdering police, but these have been shown up for what they are.
My stance is all about transparency.
I am a staunch supporter of the police. One of my relatives is a police officer, not that that is in any way relevant.
This event led to riots the like of which we haven't seen in many a day.
People lost their lives.
Yes most if it was wanton crime for its own sake, but the catalyst was the Duggan killing.
We don't want to see that again.
We must learn from this.