In message , Richard
writes
Personally my sympathies lie entirely with Mr Martin. As I understand
it he fired downwards intending to injure one burglar in the legs, with
no knowledge that the other was crouching there. People who break into
other people's houses (or factories, locosheds, etc) with criminal
intent deserve all they get, and the law should be on the side of the
burgled, not the burglar.

While it seems nice on the surface, the Daily Mail answer to crime is a
dangerous one.

At the moment we have a system where after committing on average about 10
burglaries, the person is bundled before the courts and receives a
punishment, usually of a hundred or so hours unpaid work first time round,

So, for totally destroying a family's feeling of security in their own
home, depriving them of items of possibly incalculable sentimental
value, you regard getting away with it 10 times and then doing a few
hours of unpaid work as a suitable punishment?

Perhaps you are a hermit who owns nothing of value, financial or
personal, but most of the rest of us regard our homes as places of
safety and security in which we can store our goods and memories.

The punishment for those who shatter that feeling of security should be
one hell of a lot worse than 100 hours of light labour, IMO.

custodial later on.

After they've wrecked even more people's well-being.

The punishment is not currently death.

I'm not suggesting that it should be. However those who set out to
commit such crimes should expect both a high level of risk (including
the possibility of death, maiming, or other very serious injury) while
carrying out their acts, and harsh punishment when caught by the proper
authorities.

Proper justice includes the extraction of fair vengeance from the
wrongdoer. Those who commit crime for gain should have fewer rights
than those who don't, or who only do so to protect themselves and their
property from criminals.

snip silly examples

And BTW, I don't read the Daily Mail.

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- Jack Howard, Systems Development Engineer, Firstnet Services Limited
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