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Man Who Stabbed Burglar Guilty of Manslaughter (Big Barf!)
Times Online (London) ^ | September 11, 2002 | Steve Bird

Posted on 09/12/2002 12:38:51 PM PDT by jstone78

Man who stabbed burglar guilty of manslaughter

By Steve Bird

A FATHER-OF-TWO who stabbed a “career criminal” to death with a bread knife after finding him burgling his family’s home was found guilty of manslaughter yesterday. Barry-Lee Hastings, 25, shook his head and fought back tears as an Old Bailey jury cleared him of murder but found him guilty of killing Roger Williams.

Hastings, who was remanded in custody to be sentenced next month, faces a maximum penalty of life imprisonment.

Amid cries from his family in the public gallery, Hastings shouted “look after the kids” to his estranged wife Nicola.

She replied “love you” before he was led away to the cells.

The prosecution claimed that Hastings had overstepped the mark and “meted out his own form of punishment” when he stabbed Williams 12 times, mostly in the back. Hastings insisted that instinct took over. He believed that he was protecting his children, a boy of four and girl of two, and their mother. He later discovered the family was not at their home in Tottenham, North London.

The case has drawn comparisons with the jailing of Tony Martin, 57, who shot dead Fred Barras, 16, as he burgled his home in Emneth Hungate, Norfolk. His life sentence was later cut to five years and the conviction reduced to manslaughter on appeal. Malcolm Starr, from the Tony Martin Support Group, said that Hastings should never have had to face a jury.

“Anybody who enters your property should do so at their own risk and the person who owns the property should be allowed to defend it however he sees fit,” Mr Starr said. “Who can predict what effect fear will have on any one person?” The jury of six men and six women found Hastings guilty of manslaughter on a 10-2 majority verdict after 13 hours of deliberation.

Williams, 35, who had many criminal convictions, including some for violent offences, was wanted by police. He had carefully selected the property where Hastings’s wife and children live.

Hastings, a gas engineer from Wood Green, North London, told the court that when he visited the home in January, he found the front door had been forced.

He picked up a bread knife “to scare” the intruder who was upstairs. But, when they came face to face, Williams charged down the stairs and appeared to attack him with a machete, he claimed.

No machete was found, but the court was told that Hastings may have mistaken a jemmy that Williams was carrying that he had used to force entry to the home.

A struggle ensued during which Williams was repeatedly stabbed. Hastings suffered a hand injury. After the fight spilled outside, Williams staggered away.

Hastings said he panicked and threw away the blood-stained clothing and knife after realising that he might have injured Mr Williams and be in trouble.

The court was told Williams had suffered 12 wounds, three of which were potentially fatal. One knife blow penetrated the heart. He died on the way to hospital.

After the brawl, Hastings discovered that his family was staying with relatives. He said that he had intended to call the police before the fight, but he feared that his children were in danger. “I thought I heard my daughter crying,” he said. “I thought I heard men’s voices. I thought someone had the children up there. I thought something was happening to them. I decided to help my family and scare whoever was there off. I never intended to stab anyone.”

Peter Kyte, QC, for the prosecution, told the jury: “The law recognises a man is entitled to defend himself, his family and his property only if his action does not go beyond the reasonable and the necessary.

“There is no doubt Mr Hastings stumbled across a burglary. There is no doubt that Roger Williams was a thoroughly bad hat in the eyes of the law. But, as a human being, he is just as entitled to the freedom to live as anyone else. We argue that, in this case, alas, this man overstepped the mark and went some distance beyond that.”

Outside the court Nicola Hastings said: “It’s wrong. There’s no justice.” Anthony Branley, solicitor for Hastings, said an appeal would be launched. “We are shocked by the jury’s verdict in this case,” he said.

“In our view, the evidence clearly showed that Barry-Lee Hastings at all times acted in self-defence when attacked by an armed burglar who had a long history of burglary and violence and who was on the run from the police at the time of this incident.

“Most people will recognise that the verdict today represents an appalling miscarriage of justice and flies in the face of common sense. We shall do everything possible to ensure that this conviction is quashed on appeal.”


TOPICS: Activism/Chapters; Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; Foreign Affairs; United Kingdom
KEYWORDS: crime; idiocy; selfdefence
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Aren't the British are supposed to be the most civilized nation on earth? In the old days, they used to say that an Englishman's home is his castle (i.e. don't dare step in his home without permission, or you will be in deep trouble).

In the motherland of Anglo-Saxon Civilization, a man has no right to defend his wife and children from home invaders. I thought only Zimbabwe denies Englishmen the right to defend their homes.

Instead of being put on trial like a common criminal, and threatened with the prospect of life in prison, Mr. Hastings should be rewarded for his courage in fighting off a violent robber with a criminal record, armed with only a knife.

Is Anglo-Saxon civilization on its last legs?

1 posted on 09/12/2002 12:38:51 PM PDT by jstone78
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To: jstone78
The jury of six men and six women found Hastings guilty of manslaughter on a 10-2 majority verdict after 13 hours of deliberation.

Here in the (former) Colonies, we would call that a "hung jury". Of course, in many of these united States, he wouldn't have been charged in the first place.

2 posted on 09/12/2002 12:43:55 PM PDT by ArrogantBustard
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To: jstone78
LOL @ There is no doubt that Roger Williams was a thoroughly bad hat in the eyes of the law.

The Brits are goofy, as usual.

3 posted on 09/12/2002 12:44:17 PM PDT by EggsAckley
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To: jstone78
This is a familiar story. The British government won't protect its citizens from crime and won't let them protect themselves.
4 posted on 09/12/2002 12:44:42 PM PDT by Thud
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To: jstone78
Mr. Hastings' mistake was to have not placed a butcher knife in the hand of the bastard.
5 posted on 09/12/2002 12:45:30 PM PDT by Eric in the Ozarks
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To: jstone78
Much like America, British citizens allow government to step all over their rights.
Unfortunately, I see no sign that the british people (or american people for that matter) are ready to initiate change.
6 posted on 09/12/2002 12:45:51 PM PDT by Drammach
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To: jstone78
I can't even think of a cogent response to this rediculous ruling. What the hell were they thinking? This man should be celebrated, not imprisoned.
7 posted on 09/12/2002 12:48:52 PM PDT by WindMinstrel
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To: jstone78
A disgusting verdict, but this jumped out at me:

Hastings, who was remanded in custody to be sentenced next month, faces a maximum penalty of life imprisonment.

The Brits don't have the death penalty, right? And yet the maximum for *manslaughter* is life in prison? Huh?

8 posted on 09/12/2002 12:51:15 PM PDT by Sloth
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To: Sloth
Taking a life while protecting your property will get you a manslaughter rap most anywhere in the US, too. But in Mr. Hastings' case, the infant children were at home and so he could have made a fair case of defending his family. I really wonder if he had a poor lawyer...
9 posted on 09/12/2002 1:00:55 PM PDT by Eric in the Ozarks
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To: WindMinstrel; Sloth; Eric in the Ozarks; EggsAckley
Hastings, originally from Glasgow, has a conviction for burglary and police cautions for carrying a knife and causing actual bodily harm.

Seems like the Brits have got the best deal all round. They have one dead burglar, and another one with a propensity for violence about to be banged up for life.

10 posted on 09/12/2002 1:02:44 PM PDT by walwyn
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To: Sloth
{....The Brits don't have the death penalty, right? And yet the maximum for *manslaughter* is life in prison? Huh?....}

I am just as clueless as you are. All nations of the world look up to Britain, the nation that is supposed to be the gold standard of Western Civilization.

Whatever happened to English Common Law? What happened to the nation that provided America with its founding fathers? Institutions of modern democracy are derived, not from the Greeks, but from the British (Magna Carta, Parliaments, independent courts, rule of law, etc.)

If the gold standard of civilization as we know it, is not performing as it should, what does that say about the rest of us?
11 posted on 09/12/2002 1:06:43 PM PDT by jstone78
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To: Eric in the Ozarks
After the brawl, Hastings discovered that his family was staying with relatives.

No poor defence at all. We just have a knifeman with excuses.

12 posted on 09/12/2002 1:08:04 PM PDT by walwyn
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To: jstone78
This is the result of 65 years of Labour governments and 150 years of statutory law mucking up the common law. Under the Common Law, as it existed even at the turn of the 20th century, an Englishman, confronted with an intruder who had broken into his house (or was indeed inside the 'close') in the nightime, would have been absolutely justified in executing the miscreant. That was, and in my view remains, the only sensible rule.
13 posted on 09/12/2002 1:12:34 PM PDT by CatoRenasci
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To: walwyn
walwyn signed up 2002-09-12.

Bored at DU?

14 posted on 09/12/2002 1:13:02 PM PDT by freeeee
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To: Eric in the Ozarks
{.....Taking a life while protecting your property will get you a manslaughter rap most anywhere in the US, too.....}

For crying out loud, we are not talking about a person who lost the directions to his intended destination, and accidentally wandered onto someone else's property.

We are talking about a armed felon (armed with his homebreaking tool) with a conviction for violent crime, who was killed while in the act of robbing a home, and he posed a real danger to children. The felon died while in a struggle with the property owner, who was himself injured, while protecting his property. Where in America can you be convicted for that? The city of Berkeley, California?
15 posted on 09/12/2002 1:17:14 PM PDT by jstone78
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To: jstone78
By all means, ping uk_nomad about this. She's a "refugee" from the US (Texas) to England, and she's absolutely convinced the English are superior to Americans in every way, AND they're not barbarians about justice. She'd LOVE the verdict in this case.
16 posted on 09/12/2002 1:19:21 PM PDT by Treebeard
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To: jstone78
I hereby propose a trade. England can have as many of our death row inmates as they would like - seeing how they find our death penalty barbaric. In return they may send us this terrible hardened criminal who committed the "bread knife massacre."
17 posted on 09/12/2002 1:21:15 PM PDT by Snuffington
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To: Eric in the Ozarks
If that's the way John Law wants to play it, we'll just have to start burying the bodies deeper or get a hog farm.
18 posted on 09/12/2002 1:22:24 PM PDT by Indrid Cold
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To: Eric in the Ozarks
Mr. Hastings' mistake was to have not placed a butcher knife in the hand of the bastard.

Ah yes, the unregistered 'throw-down knife'. No home is complete without one. Or two or three.

19 posted on 09/12/2002 1:24:36 PM PDT by asformeandformyhouse
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To: asformeandformyhouse
Well, the guy who broke into the house was armed - he had a crow bar.


20 posted on 09/12/2002 1:29:57 PM PDT by Jeremy_Reaban
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