The mother of a young man who died after he was pinned down in a citizen's arrest has branded his killer's sentence 'a joke'.
...he should have got the freedom of the city for ridding it of a menace. Instead, he found himself in the dock, and now in prison.
Stafford Crown Court heard Benjamin Hunt chased 25-year-old Christopher Walters after he had damaged a car with a hammer in Longton in May 2019.
Hunt, aged 32, then held Mr Walters by the neck, on the ground, for several minutes, using his body weight to pin him down even after Mr Walters lost consciousness.
Now Hunt, from Longton, has been jailed for 38 months in prison after admitting his manslaughter.
Clearly, his companion had even less faith in the justice system:
Hunt's work colleague Jonathan Hassall, who was also involved in the incident, took his own life just days before he was due to go on trial for manslaughter.
But back to mommie dearest:
The 58-year-old, from Bentilee, said: 'I'm not happy at all; it's disgusting. It's one big joke. It's disgraceful and shocking.
'If he had let my son go, the police could have found him if they had given them his description and he would have been charged with criminal damage.
'I don't feel like I've got justice for Chris' death. Everyone gets dealt a pack of cards in life, and I got the joker.
'I'm not happy with his sentence at all.'
Nor am I. You should be behind bars for giving birth to a habitual criminal...
7 comments:
Yep, that's the thing. The left isn't just evil because it lets predators free to terrorise the public, it's evil because it helps push the exact worldview that predators use to justify their own evil actions.
"after admitting his manslaughter."
Makes you wonder how many of these cases would result in prison after a not guilty plea and a jury trial. Why do people keep admitting guilt and throwing themselves at the mercy of the judge?
Its a miracle we don't see many more such cases. The truth is the police wouldn't have been interested in this case, its no wonder people take the law into their own hands when they are abandoned by the police who should protect people and property. When my garage was damaged by criminals trying to break into it to rob me the police tried to fob me off by saying it was a road traffic accident. UK police, anything short of actually doing the job.
There is nothing wrong with a citizen's arrest but that doesn't mean you can kill someone. What on earth is wrong with you?
I'm shocked and dismayed by this particular case. There was obviously, at least from what I've seen in the media reports, no intention on the part of either of the two men who went after the out of control vandal, to kill this man. Neither was there any intent as far as I can see to do the criminal serious injury. Yet one of the men who intervened has died by his own hand possibly due to the stress of these court proceedings and the other man has got a similar sentence to what a person would get if they killed someone in a fight in a pub, a situation where you could honestly say that there was or would be some intent to cause injury to another.
My sympathies in all this are with the man gaoled and the man who died prior to trial and not to the vandal. These men were only doing what we pay our police handsomely to do, apprehend those who cause disturbance and damage, but which they so often fail to do either because it's not 'a priority' or because our police are just too damned lazy to do their jobs.
I'm afraid the mother of the dead vandal is talking absolute bollocks about how this was a matter for the police. The honest truth is I doubt that the police would have been arsed to apprehend or charge this vandal even if it had been reported.
As for Bucko's comment about why the true victim in this case, the man gaoled, pleaded guilty then I can only suspect that this was the result of advice given to him by his counsel. The counsel may have told him that to fight the case would be excessively expensive and that it might be better to plead guilty in the hope (forlorn in this case) of a lenient sentence. This is what normally happens with 'thought crime' cases as counsel say 'plead guilty and get it over with'. I suspect that in this case similar advice may have been given to the man who has been given an excessive gaol sentence for what was merely doing the police's job for them. Yes a criminal has died during this incident but there was plainly no intention to kill here. The criminal was deprived of air not as a deliberate act but merely as a byproduct of members of the public tying to stop him getting away and continuing to cause damage and havoc. Of course some would say that they should have released the criminal when he lost consciousness but this may be one of those occasions where the adrenaline was flowing and this fact may not have been noticed. We must not forget here that we are dealing with members of the public who are not trained either in the use of force or the consequences of said force.
I find that I cannot find it in my heart to feel sympathy for the criminal, who could have avoided his own death by not being a violent arsehole and instead reserve my sympathy for the civic minded individual who took his own life prior to case coming to court and the man who is now sitting in a prison cell for merely trying to protect the property of those in his community. Instead of gaol, I believe that this is one of those cases where a suspended sentence could be morally justified.
I generally have a pretty low opinion of the police but I think that I should give credit where it is due. When my motorcycle was stolen by joyriders the Humberside police did everything that could be expected to try to find the perpetrators. It was an almost impossible task but I couldn't really have asked for more than they did. The bike was recovered and it cost me about a thousand quid to repair it.
"...it's evil because it helps push the exact worldview that predators use to justify their own evil actions."
Spot on!
"Why do people keep admitting guilt and throwing themselves at the mercy of the judge?"
Because they have a rosy-tinted view of British justice?
"The truth is the police wouldn't have been interested in this case, its no wonder people take the law into their own hands when they are abandoned by the police who should protect people and property."
So very true, and yes, we WILL see more and more of these...
"There is nothing wrong with a citizen's arrest but that doesn't mean you can kill someone. What on earth is wrong with you?"
It might not mean that, but the chances of it happening increase exponentially if people are forced to take the law into their own hands, doesn't it?
And there's nothing wrong with me. I semply feel that, in this case, the law is an ass. And nothing of value was lost here, except one man's life (not the criminal's) and another's liberty.
"My sympathies in all this are with the man gaoled and the man who died prior to trial and not to the vandal."
Yes, mine too. If the justice system offers no consequences, reality will step in.
"...the Humberside police did everything that could be expected to try to find the perpetrators. It was an almost impossible task but I couldn't really have asked for more than they did."
It's reassuring to know that some joined the force to do this, and not prance around in rainbow vehicles...
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