So basically this is starting to sound less and less like a case of injustice and more and more like a legitimate prosecution of someone who probably owned the shotgun in the first place which is just starting to be hijacked by the right wing American media to try to make out that Britain has overly draconian gun laws (The ThisIsSurrey article is the only one in the British press because anyone present seems to think it's a non-story but it's starting to appear more and more over America).
1) The link goes to a UK news site, not an American one.
Which in case you didn't notice I mentioned as being the only British source that has picked up on the story. However American sources have begun to pick up and spread this story now. While I was digging around I heard several people mention seeing this in American blogs and news sources. No links though, at least none that didn't simply point back to the ThisIsSurrey report.
2) This has nothing to do with gun laws, this is about the legal system not knowing the meaning of the word "discretion". Substitute a stick of dynamite, an unexpired WWII munition, or a bag of heroin in the story, all other facts being equal, and it would trigger the same reaction.
Except that it's starting to appear in lots of right wing blogs in the America where it is being pointed at as a "Look at these crazy Brits and their gun control laws!" style story. Hell I don't want to make huge assumptions but I'd be willing to bet fairly large sums of cash that Bengal Tiger doesn't read ThisIsSurrey.com on a daily basis and instead found this story when it was forwarded to him or posted on a blog as a case of "Look at England and their draconian laws!"
If you say that this news article is inaccurate, then let's see some other links covering the same story, and we can compare them.
That was my entire point. There are no other sources covering the same story. All I managed to find were forum posts from other people who also said that they'd gone digging into the case and found out things that made them think that this is not the same ridiculous miscarriage of justice the ThisIsSurrey report says it is. ThisIsSurrey isn't the website of a national newspaper, it's belongs to a regional one. None of the national newspapers are carrying this story at all (I think The Sun may have published a paragraph about it on page 27).
This isn't a news story as far as the papers are concerned. And when this happens with something as newsworthy as the TheIsSurrey story sounds, when even the Daily ****ing Mail ignores the chance to protest about something like this, then the entire thing starts to smell fishy to me.
As I said, I don't think we've heard the full story on the ThisIsSurrey website and I suspect that the only reason anyone has heard of it is because people like Bengal Tiger are passing it around so they can post "Only in the UK" topics.
Let me put it this way. Look at the website for
Liberty. **** all about this case. Now I can't imagine them ignoring this if it was as ridiculous a miscarriage of justice as is being claimed.
Oh and while I'm here, a couple of links for those interested in doing some spading.
The only other UK Media website to cover the story I've found (and all they're doing is commenting on blogs).
A blog post showing the coverage this is getting in the US (pay special attention to the third one).
EDIT : More fish, this time from the original news report.
The court heard how Mr Clarke was on the balcony of his home in Nailsworth Crescent, Merstham, when he spotted a black bin liner at the bottom of his garden.
In his statement, he said: "I took it indoors and inside found a shorn-off shotgun and two cartridges.
Okay, who the **** upon finding someone has dumped a black bin liner in their garden
takes it into their house to open it?