Re: Self defense injustice in the UK

On 2025-05-29 12:46 PM, Adam H. Kerman wrote:

Rhino <no_offline_contact@example.com> wrote:

2025-05-29 1:43 AM, Adam H. Kerman wrote:

 

Woman accepts ride home from man she recently began dating. However,
he's drunk, drives in the opposite direction, stops the vehicle, and
begins sexually assaulting her. She pulls out a knife she carries for
self defense and kills him with one thrust.

 

She turns herself into police.

 

This is the UK. Do I even have to tell you what happens to her next?

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TYoStIDRJE

 

That was truly obscene. Both sets of lawyers agreed that it was
unquestionably self-defence yet she got 17 years in the slammer.

 I don't even think this is recent law. She committed a crime by using
the knife she had brought with her anticipating she might need to defend
herself. She'd been sexually assaulted previously.
 With UK's prohibition of being able to act in self defense using a
weapon, suppose you use your own body to defeat your attacker. In the
ultimate illogic, did you violate the law as you used what you brought
with you as a weapon?
 

Excellent point: you could conceivably kill someone with a martial art like a kick where the attacker lands badly and breaks his neck.

The
contrast with the sentences for the people convicted in the rape gang
scandal were extremely disproportionate by comparison.

 

Maybe Reform can preside over a major rewrite of the laws in the UK so
that they make sense again. (Reform is substantially ahead of both the
Conservatives and Reform in polling on a national basis but the next
election is still a few years away so anything could happen between now
and then.)

 I have no idea as UK voters do not seem to be inclined to punish their
politicians for illiberal laws.

I've seen plenty of commentators remark on their frustration with how crime is handled in their country and the meagre sentences most people get for serious crimes. Meanwhile, people who do mean tweets get longer jail terms than serious criminals. Many of these comments are probably by people who just repeat the same gossip they hear from others.
However, an essayist I used to read frequently, Theodore Dalrymple (who also writes under his real name, Anthony Daniels) was a psychiatrist who spent part of his practice (two days a week) in a prison, worked in a public hospital the rest of the time, and had often been called upon to testify in trials due to his expertise so he spoke from deep personal experience and he expressed similar concerns about sentencing. I should note that he is a compassionate man and not someone who would happily throw everyone who commits the slightest offence in jail.
--
Rhino