I think the victims of crime are better placed to truly understand the outpouring of rage which has followed the conviction of Norfolk farmer, Tony Martin, for murder.

In the past 12 months, we have personally had 3 robberies. First, my husband’s car, then a few months later a valuable collection of tools from the garage and more recently the theft of our front doorbell, an antique brass affair.
Now I realise these are not exactly the crimes of the century and I am grateful that no one was hurt, but if I ever catch one of these toe-rags in action, I will not hesitate to hit out with the frying pan or nearest available heavy object!

I didn’t attend the ‘Tony Martin’ trial, I didn’t hear the evidence, but since we live in a democracy I have to trust the judgement of 12 of his peers, the jury.
They voted 10 – 2 to say that Martin used unreasonable force against the low life that invaded his home and found him guilty of murder. I’m prepared to accept the verdict but what is very, very wrong is the sentence. In the circumstances the Judge had no option, under the law of the land, than to hand out a life sentence and this is a ‘bad thing’. Unfortunately in this country we have a system of jurisprudence, which says that a householder who goes over the top in protecting his property against a burglar is in exactly the same category as one of the Kray brothers or the Yorkshire Ripper! This is madness not justice.

When capital punishment was abolished in 1969, politicians, against the advice of the judiciary, insisted that in it’s place we must have mandatory life sentences and thus we find ourselves in this ludicrous situation.

There is no point in the newspapers whipping the nation into a frenzy or William Hague jumping on the bandwagon; the law is an ass and it is up to the politicians to change it. Once again it seems that the lunatics are in charge of the asylum.

Besom