I don't want my human rights torn up - letting terrorism win

I don't want my human rights torn up - letting terrorism win

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BlackLabel

13,251 posts

122 months

Tuesday 13th June 2017
quotequote all
Abu Qatada all over again.


A terrorist described as the "very model of a modern Al Qaeda terrorist" has won £250,000 in legal aid to fight deportation. The extremist was caught with manuals on attacking nightclubs and airports, but has reportedly been given taxpayer funds to try to stay in the country. Having served a five-year prison sentence, he is using some of the funds to try to stay in the country, claiming being deported would breach his human rights.

Telegraph said:
The Jordanian came to England illegally in the months after the September 11 attacks on orders of a group linked to Al Qaeda.

He was able to avoid deportation by using a fake name and was given a council house with his wife and claimed at least £100,000 in benefits, according to the Daily Mail.

It was not until his bank tipped off police about unusual activity on his account that he came to the authorities' attention.

Officers discovered material carrying instructions on how to carry out bombings and where to strike.

He also had instructions on setting up a terror cell linked to Al Muhajiroun, a banned extremist group which included convicted hate preacher Anjem Choudary and London Bridge terrorist Khuram Butt among its number.

The terrorist was jailed for nine years at Manchester Crown Court, but released after serving five years.

However, since completing his jail term he has yet to be deported. He currently lives with family and wears an electronic tag with strict conditions, including banning him from major train stations or airports.

TooMany2cvs

29,008 posts

125 months

Tuesday 13th June 2017
quotequote all
Daily Telegraph reporting the Daily Mail said:
A terrorist described as the "very model of a modern Al Qaeda terrorist" has won £250,000 in legal aid to fight deportation.
Tha awarding of legal aid is entirely down to the UK government.

Daily Telegraph reporting the Daily Mail said:
he is using some of the funds to try to stay in the country, claiming being deported would breach his human rights.

The figures include more than £210,000 in costs for his defence in his terror trial as well as almost £40,000 for lawyers working on other cases, including his deportation.
So Johnny Foreigner shouldn't be able to mount a defence against a charge? And the deportation trial was somewhere around 10% of the headline figure...?

And, later in the article...

Daily Telegraph reporting the Daily Mail said:
The terrorist's lawyer ... told the Daily Mail: "The bulk of our costs related to demonstrating that the Home Office had been wrong to say my client would not be tortured on return to Jordan. The Home Office now accepts we were right about that."
Seems like a fair use of legal aid funds, then, given that he's won the case and costs would be awarded as part of that...

Meanwhile, going to the even more shrill Wail article...
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4597508/Ji...
Daily Mail said:
Philip Davies, Tory MP for Shipley, said the case showed the need for legislation to make it easier to deport terrorists.

He added: 'It's bad enough that we are finding it difficult to kick out somebody who may do us terrible harm, but it's an absolute kick in the teeth to be forking out such colossal sums for his legal bills.

'This is why we need to be looking at the Human Rights Act.'
Except the HRA has nothing whatsoever to do with legal aid, apart from requiring people to have a free and fair trial. Is that a bad thing, random MP cherry-picked for inflammatory rentaquote? The HRA meant that it was a UK court that could hear this case. No more, no less. The legal bills would have been larger if it'd been heard at the European Court, but at least that would have meant a decently frothy sub-head about foreign judges and sovereignty...

Daily Telegraph reporting the Daily Mail said:
During a deportation hearing, a lawyer for the Home Office had described the terrorist as "in many ways, the very model of a modern Al Qaeda terrorist".
Charge him with something, then, if you've got any evidence.

Daily Mail said:
...echoing the major-general's song in Gilbert and Sullivan's Pirates of Penzance.
See, you get a better class of knee-jerk in the Telegraph. They don't need such cultural references explaining to them. Harrumph.

Stickyfinger

8,429 posts

104 months

Tuesday 13th June 2017
quotequote all
TooMany2cvs said:
See, you get a better class of knee-jerk in the Telegraph. They don't need such cultural references explaining to them. Harrumph.
Everything you say should be trumped by the fact he is both illegally HERE and has been convicted.....but

he cannot be charged as his rights under the present system would result in failure, legal knots again to be exploited by parts of the legal system and wet sops like you.

Change the system.

Fat Fairy

503 posts

185 months

Tuesday 13th June 2017
quotequote all
TooMany2cvs said:
See, you get a better class of knee-jerk in the Telegraph. They don't need such cultural references explaining to them. Harrumph.
I thought all DM readers were old, with blue rinsed wives, and therefore undoubtably amateur theatrics lovers (can't beat an evening down the church hall. You get a cup of tea and a biscuit at the interval as well! None of them young scalliwags hanging around either mumble mumble....).

Surely they would not need an explanation of Gilbert and Sullivan?

Or is this you tarring them all with the same brush......?

FF

TooMany2cvs

29,008 posts

125 months

Tuesday 13th June 2017
quotequote all
Stickyfinger said:
Everything you say should be trumped by the fact he is both illegally HERE and has been convicted...
So as soon as somebody's found guilty of one thing, they should be absolutely fair game for anything?

Hell, if articles 3/5/6/7 are so inconvenient, why bother with article 2?

Stickyfinger

8,429 posts

104 months

Tuesday 13th June 2017
quotequote all
TooMany2cvs said:
So as soon as somebody's found guilty of one thing, they should be absolutely fair game for anything?

Hell, if articles 3/5/6/7 are so inconvenient, why bother with article 2?
Why complicate it.....we should act based on the first offence

TooMany2cvs

29,008 posts

125 months

Tuesday 13th June 2017
quotequote all
Stickyfinger said:
TooMany2cvs said:
So as soon as somebody's found guilty of one thing, they should be absolutely fair game for anything?

Hell, if articles 3/5/6/7 are so inconvenient, why bother with article 2?
Why complicate it.....we should act based on the first offence
The one he was charged, tried, found guilty, and sentenced for?

"Act" in what way, other than that?
Act in the way that's barred under article 2, y'mean?

wst

3,494 posts

160 months

Tuesday 13th June 2017
quotequote all
Stickyfinger said:
TooMany2cvs said:
So as soon as somebody's found guilty of one thing, they should be absolutely fair game for anything?

Hell, if articles 3/5/6/7 are so inconvenient, why bother with article 2?
Why complicate it.....we should act based on the first offence
By that logic, the last lot of London attackers shouldn't have been shot, because that's a disproportionate response to driving on the pavement.

turbobloke

103,736 posts

259 months

Tuesday 13th June 2017
quotequote all
wst said:
Stickyfinger said:
TooMany2cvs said:
So as soon as somebody's found guilty of one thing, they should be absolutely fair game for anything?

Hell, if articles 3/5/6/7 are so inconvenient, why bother with article 2?
Why complicate it.....we should act based on the first offence
By that logic, the last lot of London attackers shouldn't have been shot, because that's a disproportionate response to driving on the pavement.
Driving on the pavement laugh

IanH755

1,848 posts

119 months

Tuesday 13th June 2017
quotequote all
The Acts "black and white" nature can be used against the UK as in this case where a known convicted terrorist can't be removed from UK despite that being the "best thing" for the UK which is to remove a convicted terrorist from our shores for our safety.

This means the Act is abused to allow the "right" of a single person (who has been convicted, not just suspected) to have more importance that the "right" of the many who are potential future victims.

However any change to the Act post Brexit would definitely lead to abuses, as sadly proven so many times in the past (councils using anti-terror laws etc) so the countries in a sticky place really, do we accept a few abuses to "keep us safe" or do we stick with the black and white and remain legal but potentially suffer a higher number of terrorist acts?

A seriously difficult ethical choice there which will need more than PH to sort!

TooMany2cvs

29,008 posts

125 months

Tuesday 13th June 2017
quotequote all
IanH755 said:
This means the Act is abused to allow the "right" of a single person (who has been convicted, not just suspected) to have more importance that the "right" of the many who are potential future victims.
"Potential future victims"?

If there's evidence of a risk, prosecute. There are plenty of anti-terror laws that could be brought to play.

Article 3, the anti-torture article, is the ONLY one that isn't caveated with "well, it's OK if it helps protect others, within the law"-style clauses. That's because it is NEVER, EVER OK to torture people. There is never any justification. Deporting somebody to where you know they'll be tortured leaves you complicit, just as surely as rendition did. And you cannot EVER deport somebody to anywhere that isn't provably their home country, by nationality, unless that other country agrees to take them.

And, as has already been covered in this thread, even if a post-brexit UK did also leave the Council of Europe, we'd still be bound by UN conventions which say the exact same thing...

IanH755

1,848 posts

119 months

Tuesday 13th June 2017
quotequote all
Like I said, it's too difficult for PH to solve.

"Black and white" statements of "never ever" are lovely for legal talk but don't work as well in the "real world" where, god forbid, some group eventually gets something very nasty hidden in the UK (CRBN based) which would cause mass casualties but we can't have another country waterboard etc him for its location. The rights of the single vs the rights of the many etc as mentioned above, although that example is obviously picked as a worst case.

As I also mentioned above however, introducing any changes which even hint at allowing (by consent in another country) any form of torture is starting an incredibly dangerous path which I'm not sure we want to start on. I certainly don't want that but I think at some point in the distant future we may be "forced" onto that path by public opinion following the continued terrorist acts and which is exactly what they want to happen.

So in both posts I've put both "for & against" opinions forward with calm rational cases for both, so it'd be nice if people remembered that rather than assuming I'm all for torture thanks, although I realise it's an emotive subject.

Edited by IanH755 on Tuesday 13th June 16:23

TooMany2cvs

29,008 posts

125 months

Tuesday 13th June 2017
quotequote all
IanH755 said:
Like I said, it's too difficult for PH to solve.
Not in this specific instance, no.

IanH755 said:
"Black and white" statements of "never ever" are lovely for legal talk but don't work as well in the "real world" where, god forbid, some group eventually gets something very nasty hidden in the UK (CRBN based) which would cause mass casualties but we can't have another country waterboard etc him for its location.
Even in the monumentally unlikely scenario where you 100% knew that was the case, you 100% knew who'd done it, you 100% had right person, you 100% had the time available, and all you needed to know was where because you couldn't possibly find it any other way than an unmarked jet to a quiet little airbase somewhere in a friendly-and-compliant-and-thoroughly-amoral country...

It's very simple. Torture doesn't actually work. Even Trump's defense sec, General "Mad Dog" Mattis, says so - backed up by a massive scientific consensus.

IanH755

1,848 posts

119 months

Tuesday 13th June 2017
quotequote all
It's refreshing to see someone whose world is unmoveably black and white, when the rest of us seemingly have to live with various shades of grey.

wst

3,494 posts

160 months

Sunday 25th June 2017
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It's a hell of a gamble throwing away the rights of 70 million innocent people just because of 40 stheads.

SeeFive

8,280 posts

232 months

Sunday 25th June 2017
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wst said:
It's a hell of a gamble throwing away the rights of 70 million innocent people just because of 40 stheads.
Feck. We are in deep do do. 70 million innocent people suspected terrorists.

Teresa May said:
“But I can tell you a few of the things I mean by that: I mean longer prison sentences for people convicted of terrorist offences. I mean making it easier for the authorities to deport foreign terror suspects to their own countries.

“And I mean doing more to restrict the freedom and the movements of terrorist suspects when we have enough evidence to know they present a threat, but not enough evidence to prosecute them in full in court.

“And if human rights laws stop us from doing it, we will change those laws so we can do it.”

C.A.R.

3,967 posts

187 months

Sunday 25th June 2017
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wst said:
It's a hell of a gamble throwing away the rights of 70 million innocent people just because of 40 stheads.
Wow, I've read some stupid stuff on here before but you've got to win some sort of prize for your lack of comprehension on this one!

wst

3,494 posts

160 months

Sunday 25th June 2017
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Humans Rights are, by their inherent nature, not something that can be selectively applied. They apply to everyone. In saying that she would change human rights laws for some individuals, Theresa is conveniently omitting that this changes human rights laws for everyone.

Combine that with her deep seated love of data collection and you're in for a recipe for insanity.

"Oh but I have nothing to hide". Well guess what, sunshine? It wasn't illegal to be Jewish in Germany for a while (why would it be? It's literally of no consequence as to your worth as a human being), and then someone arbitrarily decided to chuck them all into ghettos, and later on arbitrarily decided to do a whole lot elsewise. What arbitrary part of your character might a malicious government with "no human rights for ~~terrorists~~ anyone they want" and your internet history decide?

It was legal to be gay in Russia in the mid-90's, nowadays it lands you in a camp in Chechnya.

It was legal to go to wear glasses in Cambodia until Pol Pot came along and decided that being intellectual or even looking intellectual was reason to execute you and your family.

But oh, let's just cut back on what all humans are legally entitled to in the UK, just because 40 people didn't get sent to their developing country of origin to get tortured in a stty developing justice system.

I've read some stupid stuff on PH but those last couple of comments are taking some kind of bloody biscuit.

Theresa May said:
And I mean doing more to restrict the freedom and the movements of terrorist suspects when we have enough evidence to know they present a threat, but not enough evidence to prosecute them in full in court.
If you haven't got enough evidence to prosecute someone in court, you haven't got enough evidence to detain them at all. You can't just go arbitrarily detaining anyone without evidence. What's the point of having a justice system at all if you can just detain them forever while scrabbling for evidence?

Ooh can I put anything here?


Edited by wst on Sunday 25th June 04:57

Robertj21a

16,475 posts

104 months

Sunday 25th June 2017
quotequote all
wst said:
If you haven't got enough evidence to prosecute someone in court, you haven't got enough evidence to detain them at all. You can't just go arbitrarily detaining anyone without evidence. What's the point of having a justice system at all if you can just detain them forever while scrabbling for evidence?

Ooh can I put anything here?


Edited by wst on Sunday 25th June 04:57
You do seem to be getting a bit carried away with your examples of some extreme action taken, by various powers, right across the world and covering very many years. I'm not convinced that we are heading down that same route but I agree that it needs care to ensure that we do not make matters worse. Having said that, I fully support any future arrangements that will enable us to take sensible action against those who wish us harm.