WHAT DROVE
RESPECTABLE TEACHER, JAILED
THIS WEEK TO FIGHT BACK AGAINST YOBS * Daily Mail APRIL 2, 2005 I know I must
have looked like a loony with a gun. But I’m not
sorry I confronted the lad. I had to get rid of my anger. The law’s on their side and I’d had enough. [We are sure millions of
people in village, town and in inner city communities have felt exactly like
Mrs Walker -particularly over the last eight years] * WHAT DROVE THIS RESPECTABLE
TEACHER, JAILED THIS WEEK, TO FIGHT BACK AGAINST YOBS. By Fiona Barton The
Residents of Holly House Drive takes a great deal of pride in their homes. There
are primulas and hyacinths in the flowerbeds, conservatories, spotless net
curtains in the windows, and one or two of the 26 detached houses in the cul-de-sac
have been given names like Rose Briar. But
behind the front doors, many of the professionals, retired folk and families
who own these homes are living under a modern siege. Like
thousands of others all over the country, their peace of mind and property are
routinely being violated by thugs [YOBS] who mindlessly hurl abuse and
vandalise their possessions. The
people of this road in Urmston, Manchester, have turned to the police for help
over the years, but claim they were largely ignored-until their neighbour,
special needs teacher Linda Walker, reached the end of her tether one night
last year. The
48-year old mother of three took a gas-powered pistol her partner used for
shooting pests in the garden and confronted Robert McKiernan, the youth she
suspected of the latest attempt to vandalise her son’s car. It
was the tipping point for Mrs Walker who, over two years, had endured repeated
damage to the cars on her drive, the theft of bicycles from her garden shed and
goldfish from her pond, garden ornaments thrown over a wall, doors kicked in
and, in a more sinister twist, malicious phone calls threatening her with rape. Driven
to the brink, she fired six times into the ground as she confronted 18-year
McKiernan. ‘I wanted to put fear into them’, an anguished Mrs Walker
later explained. ‘I wanted them intimidated, not me. I’d had enough. I’d simply
had enough. It
is a desperate cry de Coeur that will strike a chord with countless families
whose lives are made miserable by vandals and thugs. But
it failed to move the Recorder at Minshull Street Crown Court in Manchester, who this week jailed the
teacher for six months for possessing a firearm with intent to cause fear of
violence and affray. Perhaps
it is no surprise Mrs Walker has been adopted by an increasingly beleaguered public
as a martyr of the scourge of ‘anti-social behaviour’ and has found a
vociferous supporter in Tory leader Michael Howard. For
what drove this bright, educated, respectable women to an act of complete folly
is no mystery to thousands who are blighted by yob culture. Their
plight appeared also to have put at the heart of government policy by the Prime
Minister, who declared last September: ‘For many people, anti-social behaviour is probably one of the most important things to affect our lives. If You’ve got really difficult people living next door or down the street, it makes life absolute hell.’ Anti-Social
Behaviour Orders and Acceptable Behaviour Contracts were hailed as the answer
to the rising tide of yobbery, and 3,826 were issued between April 1999 and
September 2004. But the latest
figures show that 42 % [1609] of those orders were breached, some up to
five times. * [It
is obvious that though the idea of ASBO’s was a part of the solution it really
depends on a change of attitude by the Government towards the Family and discipline
in schools and the politically correct attitude which has put rights first and
duties forgotten. The
only way to change is for the politically-correct lobby to be told they have
had their chance and it hasn’t worked and as the present government is riddled
with PC -then there is need of another government with a clean sheet to makes
its position clear at the outset that PC is abolished and a Zero-tolerance policy
taken towards CRIME and that includes what Inspector Victoria Murtagh at Urmston
Manchester considers low-level criminality which proves the necessity of a
Zero Tolerance policy on ALL crime. And most important of all -the return of the
local Bobby in their traditional uniform which will still the growing fear in
the population at large.] * To
continue: And,
tellingly, none of the residents of Holly House Drive, whose local police force
issued 608 Anti-Social Behaviour Orders between April 1999 and September 2004,
dared be named this week for fear of retribution from the thugs who cruise by
every weekend, drunk, aggressive and out of control. These
people understand all too well the desperation Linda Walker felt. One
neighbour, who works in social services said: ‘If you keep chipping away at someone, they will
give way. Linda taught difficult kids
and was used to dealing with bad behaviour, but she is only human. The family was targeted and tormented. It was a question of how long do you want to
be a victim?’ Another
resident, a retired consultant engineer, simply shrugged his shoulders. ‘I
am woken three nights out of seven by youths screaming and shouting and
fighting outside and vandalising our property. The
first incident was at Christmas 2003 when pot plants were vandalised. They were smashed and one was put upside
down on the bonnet of my car. Youths have also urinated in the hedges and
vandalised the Belisha beacons on the road. The police are just
not interested. ‘I have phoned many times, but a policeman never comes. It is so disheartening and totally
unacceptable to have thugs who intimidate you into violence’. Linda
Walker is now facing her fifth night behind bars at Styal Prison in
Wilmslow. Her long-term partner John
Cavanagh, is a 56-year-old college lecturer, is deeply concerned about the
effect prison will have on her and the family for whom she is the linchpin. Like
many women of her age, Mrs Walker held down a responsible job as head of Food
Technology and Year 11 at the school for children with emotional and
behavioural problems, as well as looking after three generations of her own
family. At
home, she cared for her partner and their twin 17-year -old sons, James and
Craig, but also cooked meals for her father-who lives nearby-and was a constant
support to her daughter Donna, 20, who has left home. Life
last summer, however, was particularly difficult. There was increased pressure at work because the school where she
worked, New Park High School in Salford had failed an Ofsted inspection. Mrs
Walker was also worried about her health. She had been to see the doctor with
concerns about symptoms of the menopause. The
jury hearing her case was told: ‘She put a lot of herself into work and often acted
over and above what was required of her. ‘The
combination of working with children with behavioural problems, the school
failed by Ofsted and the fact that she felt she should solve everyone else’s
problems before her own all came to a head. ‘Things
were becoming too much for her and she was having something of a breakdown.’ And
forever in the background, the constant low-level criminality was
chipping away at her self-control. Mrs
Walker’s son Craig, a student nurse, claims the family had complained to
police 15 times, but no action was taken. He
said: ‘All the time we
have telephoned about things, but they never even turned up’. They are supposed
to be there to protect you when you are in danger, then they don’t come and
it starts getting to you.’ During
interviews with the police immediately after the confrontation with McKiernan
-who has criminal convictions for burglary, theft and criminal damage and
lives a quarter of a mile from Holly House Drive -Mrs Walker gave a powerful
insight into the relentless pressure she and her family suffered. [STATEMENT] ‘I’m
very sorry for frightening the police officers, because I know I must have
looked like a loony with a gun,’ she said. But
I can’t say I’m sorry I confronted the lad. I needed to do that to get rid of my
anger. The
laws on their side-they are protected. And I’d had enough. ‘Wing
mirrors were smashed off one of our cars and broken into and bikes had been
stolen. My garden ornaments had been
chucked over the wall and my front door has been kicked, splitting the PVC. Last summer when I was away on holiday, they
stole the fish from my pond. ‘Since
Craig and James were young boys, they have always saved up money and they had
£1,200 between them. Craig bought a car and James bought a bike, but that was
stolen from him so he bought an old banger. ‘Kids
kept coming down the road to vandalise my son’s cars because they don’t have
cars and are jealous. When your kids
work hard for things and they get damaged, you get proactive. ‘I
have had harassment and mischievous phone calls claiming James was gay and asking:
“Does he want a good b***ing?” I asked
who it was and why they were doing this and he said I would “get b***ed” as
well.’ * The
persecution may have been carried out by any one of the scores of teenagers who
pass the cul-de-sac in the early hours of the morning, on their way to and from
pubs and the nightclubs in nearby Flixton. The
final straw came at 12.30 am on August 14, when Mrs Walker noticed a plastic
washing-up bottle had been taken from their back garden and emptied on the roof
of Craig’s Ford Fiesta, which was parked on the drive. Mrs
Walker did not see the culprit but rushed out onto the main road and saw
McKiernan, 16-year-old Nicholas Viollett and friends 250 yards away. Viollett,
who had been convicted of shoplifting the day before the shooting and McKieran
were putting a traffic sign in the middle of the road. Mrs
Walker told officers from Greater Manchester Police: ‘I
thought they had tried to vandalise Craig’s car. They didn’t know if it was the
brake fluid or anti freeze, but they poured it all over the car. ‘All
he has is this old car and I was fuming mad. So I went down the main road to
see who it was. I saw these lads messing about at the bus stop and I said:
“Right, that will be them.” I
was ranting and raving, calling them vandals. One youth was answering me back,
calling me a psycho. Then
this other lad got up from behind a wall and squared up to me and tried to intimidate
me. Others started laughing and shouting
me and my partner’s names, Linda, John, Linda, John,’ as if they knew where we
lived. That’s when I got frightened.’ She
told the youths, who deny vandalising the car: ‘I’ve got guns at home and I’m going to get them.’ Mrs Walker had taken shooting lessons and had a
Walther CP88 pistol which belonged to Mr Cavanagh, who used the gas powered
weapon to scare squirrels in the back garden. That night, she checked it was loaded with pellets,
took an air rifle and telephoned the police. ‘I’m going to that field over the road,’ she
told them. I’ve got an air rifle and a pistol and I’m
going to shoot the vandals that come around here.’ Mrs Walker told police later that she went to
get the guns for self-defence. ‘I didn’t want them to get away before the police
came, but I didn’t go out to hurt anyone. I’d had enough. I was totally distressed. I
deal with children with emotional and behavioural difficulties in
confrontational situations every day, but you never get used to it.’ Armed police were called, but uniformed officers who
arrived at the scene persuaded Mrs Walker to put the weapon down and she was
taken to Streford police station. Her moment of madness, which is likely to end her
career as a teacher, has been seized upon by fellow victims, lobby groups and Michael
Howard, who claimed the sentence proved there ‘Was something seriously
out of kilter with our criminal justice system.’ But the police are adamant
that the punishment fits the crime. * [Well! we have said so many times before that
it is the failure of the police in the first instant in not protecting the
people in their homes. Of course their statement would
ring true if they had bothered to do their duty in the first place. It is very highhanded of the police to use
the severity of the law as an excuse to cover their own incompetence. Until
there is a return of the local Bobby on the Beat with more powers against law breakers
and those who terrorise people in their homes and the obliteration of the politically-correct
culture and return discipline in the home and in schools and support for the
FAMILY there will never be an answer to this great menace which is plaguing our
Society. It is no wonder 5 millions of the elderly
have now opted to live in countries where they have a more firm hand in Law
& Order, which in OUR COUNTRY is a JOKE if it were not so SERIOUS. ] * To
continue: Inspector
Victoria Murtagh, who heads the Urmston Area Policing Team, said yesterday that all
instances of anti-social behaviour can have a serious impact on those affected. We
appreciate that people want to protect their property and that low-level
criminality has an effect on its victims but Mrs Walker’s actions were simply
not proportionate to the situation. ‘We
cannot tolerate any members of the public going onto the streets with a loaded
firearm, whatever the circumstances. ‘It
is never acceptable for people to take the law into their own hands.’ [The
fact is that this will happen more frequently in the future because people will
realise they can get no protection from the police. What
is most revealing about the case of Mrs Walker is how they have managed to find
a space in a prison when one has numerous examples of persistent offenders and ASBO’s
possibly over 100,000- could be higher- who break their parole and who should
be in prison. Some
would say that If Mrs Walker had been able to catch the culprits on her
property then a few pellets in their backsides might make them think twice
before they threaten anyone else. She
would have done a service to those who are still suffering and are driving innocent
householders into breakdowns - and pensioners to suicide- appear to get all the
support they need in community service -if they trouble themselves to
turn up -or pay their fines. In Mrs Walker’s case we see Rough Justice with no
account taken of the circumstances, which would have driven many people to a similar
re-action. The
Police have used this vulnerable greatly distressed lady who they failed to
protect to carry their message that no firearms should be permitted on the
street. What
we ask is there not some gunrunning thug in the area who could take the place of
Mrs Walker- which will have a more powerful and telling message to the public
at large.] In
many cases the perpetrator of so-called low-level crime is a persistent
offender so why was he or she not in prison in the first place. Well
the Lord Chief Justice has put his foot down against young offenders particularly
burglars going to jail -instead they are left to destroy the lives of innocent
householders who are left to defend their homes alone. It
is possible that had that not been the case with the thugs attacking Mrs Walker’s
home she would not be in prison now.] To
continue: Meanwhile,
John Cavanagh worries how his partner will cope. ‘The
prison regime is not one that Linda will deal well with at all. She likes to be up and about, working hard
and helping people.’ The fact that career based on patience and care has
now been jeopardised by an extreme act born of sheer desperation will not be
lost on anyone. [Font altered-bolding
&underlining used-comments in brackets.] APRIL/05 * *
*
The abolition of Britain * Veteran parliamentarian TONY BENN speaks of the absolute necessity of a REFERENDUM HEAR HIM ON http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=o0I-ZdvQz1o *
13th October,2007
So You Want Out Of The EU
THEN WHY NOT SIGN THE RENUNCIATION of EU CITIZENSHIP http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/OptoutDetails from petition creator With the signing of the Maastricht Treaty the people of Britain were given DUAL CITIZENSHIP -both EUROPEAN and BRITISH The extra tier of citizenship was thrust upon the people without their consent -and in many cases knowledge. The PEOPLE of GREAT BRITAIN should be allowed the option of opting out of the EUROPEAN CITIZENSHIP if they so wish. The GOVERNMENT will then be able to provide those who have opted out with BRITISH DOCUMENTATION -only such as British (not EU) passports, driving licences and other national documents. EU laws will also NOT APPLY to those who HAVE OPTED OUT OF EUROPEAN CITIZENSHIP
[PETITION OPEN UNTIL OCTOBER 08]
*
*
[Latest Addition - June07] * * *
*
Daniel Hannan - Forming an OPPOSITION to the EU
*
VOTE MAY -2007
WITH THE ONLY PARTY WITH A MANDATE TO SET YOU FREE
THE UK INDEPENDENCE PARTY
TO RECLAIM YOUR DEMOCRACY DON'T VOTE FOR THE TRIPARTITE PARTIES IN WESTMINSTER BUT SMALL PARTIES THAT SPEAK THEIR MINDS WITHOUT SPIN AND LIES. *
ONLY WILL BRING DEMOCRACY BACK TO THE ENGLISH PEOPLE * WHY NOT
* MAY/07
[All underlined words have a separate bulletin
|
|||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||
