SHOOTERS’ JOURNAL Issue 68 ISSN 2398-3310

WINTER IS COMING SO’s CHRISTMAS MAKE IT A MERRY ONE And then THERE’S NEW HOME OFFICE REGULATIONS FOR 2021

SHOOTERS’ RIGHTS ASSOCIATION COVER PICTURE P.O. Box 3 Issue 68 ‘AUTUMN’ 2020 Cardigan SA43 1BN TEL: 01239 698607 www.shootersrightsassociation.co.uk follow us on Facebook .org is not up to date Existing members have had or will get at next renewal concessions to reflect the dormant period of lockdown. Join in 2020 to get 15 months membership for the cost of 12. New members welcome at any time and you get up to 15 months membership for the price of 12.

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New Individual £39.50 Extra family members, each £10.00 Photo Credit: Shutterstock Much as we’d like to send all our CLUBS, GROUPS, SYNDICATES members a Christmas card, in these (Minimum of three) per person £22.00 restrained times this is as close we

LARGER GROUPS 40+ per person £15.00 could get: a couple of foreign deer in Over 100 £12.50 a foreign landscape. That fits quite Group leaders can add new members to well, as most of what makes their group at any time for £22 per Christmas in the UK is foreign: person up to the group’s renewal date. chocolate, Holy Eucharist, turkeys, Pro rata if that’s soon. whisky, Xmas trees, Yule – enjoy! And ------let’s have a better 2021. Autumn is usually hectic, as we -our membership secretary Elizabeth remember three great battles – Law organised our local Senlac, Trafalgar and Agincourt in remembrance as a flash mob and the space of a fortnight, pause for attracted wreaths from our church, halloween and Guy Fawkes and then the SRA, the local community council, remember our military dead. Welsh Brownies and Guides, the Fire Station lockdown stopped all that, so - and two Women’s Institute groups.

SRA PHOTO SHOOTERS’ JOURNAL The Act was presented to ISSUE 68 Parliament as an anti-crime initiative AUTUMN 2020 while Lloyd George referred to it as Published by TSRA Ltd making sure only friends of the PO Box 3, Cardigan SA43 1BN government had firearms. Sir Ernley ISSN 2398-3310 Blackwell’s brief had been to find ways of preventing bankrupt European CONTENTS Page governments selling off surplus Editorial 1 weaponry to third world hotspots once Correction – Mass Ayoob 3 the Great War ended. New Home Office Regulations 3 Blackwell was a Home Office European Firearms Passes pass 7 mandarin with no skills, knowledge or SRA & the VCR ‘defence’ 7 interest in any goings on outside his Latest Australian ‘gun’ ban 10 own Home department. He’d had his Jermaine Baker Update 13 hands full anyway. Events which Breona Taylor 16 doubtless coloured his thinking: in the The US Supreme Court 20 simplistic world of dictatorial Rumbles in the countryside 25 bureaucrats banning something is Scottish Air Weapon ‘Licensing’ 26 seen as a solution. Book Review – Unnatural causes 28 The Home Office first came up with the idea of banning handguns in 1870 EDITORIAL and what Parliament allowed instead There’s always something going on was the Gun Licensing Act – a tax. The that can or will have an impact on the department made several attempts to diverse activities of the SRA’s further control firearms in the 1890s membership: whether you’re locked and Parliament rejected all but down, self-isolating, shielding, allowed the Pistols Act 1903 – another working from home or just working. tax. Even if you’re doing nothing, the Home He probably wanted to ban Office is beavering away in the handguns in 1917, but if he ran it up background to make your legitimate the flagpole nobody would have interest in guns and older weaponry saluted it: they were too useful and the more difficult for you to maintain pet Home Office gun-ban project safely and legally. wouldn’t fly politically. It was ever thus; Lloyd George’s Prior to the Great War, two government adopted the proposal of significant handgun incidents Sir Ernley Blackwell’s 1917 committee occurred, and both have gone down in for a system of firearm certificates for history for their severity. These were the public and registration of firearms perpetrated by eastern Europeans dealers for the trade, as the Firearms who brought their automatic pistols to Act 1920. the UK with them.

1 First up was the ‘Tottenham 1920 Firearms Act was as near as Outrage’ in 1909: an attempted armed Blackwell got to fulfilling his robbery. The suspects hijacked a tram department’s 1870 plan. to get away, hotly pursued by the The next fifty years saw police Metropolitan Police in another tram, to attempts to introduce de facto bans Chingford, where they got into their administratively thwarted by hideout and committed suicide. Over Parliament and the courts. Shotgun 1,000 shots were fired; ten times more certificates were awaiting a suitable than in the Hungerford massacre of legislative opportunity in 1966 as a 1987 with the difference that in replacement for the 1870 gun licence Hungerford only the murderer was when Harry Roberts obligingly shot doing any shooting. three Metropolitan Police officers and The following year, the siege of Roy Jenkins knee-jerked them through Sidney Street. Blackwell’s boss, the Parliament to head off media demands Home Secretary for the time being for restoration of the death penalty. Winston Churchill, attended the scene While every legislative control of to be immortalized in movie newsreel firearms since 1870 has been directed footage. He got close enough to the at making it more expensive and action, depending on which account difficult for the law-abiding, doing it you follow, for a bullet to have passed administratively really took off after through his top hat. This started when the 1968 Firearms Act. The ‘restricted’ three anarchists burgled a jeweller’s in 1969 memorandum of guidance to the City of London. Three responding police told them to criminalize the gun police officers and one robber were trade and resulted in a crime wave. shot dead and two officers wounded. Firearms crime has increased Metropolitan Police officers pursued dramatically since 1968 and most of the suspects to a house in Sidney Street the increase has been the persecution where a Met officer was wounded. of the people who thought they were Then the army came in support and the acting lawfully. Real gun crime as house burned down during the committed by real criminals has been engagement. lost in the statistics. After 1910 came further attempts And so it continues: a reinvention of to restrict handgun sales and to licence which guns can or can’t be antiques the gun trade. The Great War put these (elsewhere in this issue) is the Home on the back burner, so when Blackwell Office’s Christmas present to people was asked to ‘do something’ about war who thought they were doing surplus sales to the third world, he everything right. Based on calibres, simply trotted out his same old ideas. this way of excluding some antique The Home Office remains famous to firearms from antique status was this day for shelving bad ideas. They rejected by the Court of Appeal in await, in Douglas Hurd’s words, a 1977. Home Office policy is thus at ‘suitable legislative opportunity’. The odds with the common law.

2 There’s more to come: the publication, and we apologise to both for Eurotrash legislation has to be the confusion. Ω adopted, retained or repealed and guess which way that’ll go in the case New regulations from the Home of deactivated firearms. Office Not to mention the MARS rifles ban, Announced in November with the still hanging over owners like the intention of this slipping into law sword of Damocles. Stuck, we think, before Christmas, the Home Office because the treasury can’t afford it. have drafted a Statutory Instrument What is needed is for politicians to take they claim will enshrine their 1939 a good look at the Home Office ‘Serious cut-off date and the obsolete calibres Violence Unit’ and its handling of the list in law, with the following law-abiding public as target criminals. alterations: There’s so much trash on the statute Seven revolver rounds are to be books slipped in through the Dead removed from the list: Parliament and while Theresa May was Home Secretary that where we are • .320 British (also known as .320 now is not a good start point. Revolver CF, short or long) One ray of hope is Priti Patel has • .41 Colt (short or long) publicly identified her other ridiculous • .44 Smith and Wesson Russian department – immigration – as not fit • .442 Revolver (also known as .44 for purpose; and survived her Webley) department’s attempt to shrug her off • 9.4mm Dutch Revolver the way they dumped Amber Rudd. • 10.6mm German Ordnance Now we need her to look at our Revolver problems, as the minister in charge of • 11mm French Ordnance public order – Kit Malthouse – has Revolver M1873 (Army) proved he’s just another sleepwalker. Ω These are all centre-fire rounds - developed in the 1870s after Rollin CORRECTION White’s bored through cylinder patent Massad F Ayoob spotted some fake expired. They did not make the news in issue 67, which we are pleased to transition from black powder correct. Mass succeeded Jan Stevenson to propulsion to nitro, superseded by the position of Handgun Editor for Guns better rounds. Home Office concerns Magazine, a position he still holds. about them – particularly the .44 Smith The confusion arose in our tiny and Wesson Russian – are based on a editorial mind because Mass wrote for rogue dealer having imported some Police Magazine and its predecessor and sold them with made-up Police Product News, while neither he ammunition to people who used them nor Jan held an editorial chair in that on each other. He’d have been caught much sooner

3 if HM Customs had reported his • .577 – 3 1⁄4 in (Black imports to the Proof House. The guns Powder & Nitro Express) were exempt from import controls but • 6.5 x 53mm R Mannlicher not from the requirement to be proved (Dutch/Romanian) or certified proof exempt. • 8 x 56mm Mannlicher .320” was omitted from the 1992 list Schoenauer because the Forensic Science Service • 8 x 58 mm R Krag said there were too many of them • 8 mm Murata about and ammunition was still • 9 x 56mm Mannlicher available. It was true one could buy a Schoenauer box marked .320” but it contained • 9 x 57mm R Mauser short blanks. Fiocchi did a production • 9 x 57mm Rimless Mauser run of this round in 2015, which maybe • 9.5 x 57mm Mannlicher attracted Home Office attention, as Schoenauer their sale wouldn’t have been • 8mm Roth Steyr restricted in Italy. Apart from the last-mentioned, Twenty-three cartridges will be these are all black-powder rounds for added to the obsolete calibres shoulder arms. list: 1939 has been the Home Office • BSA (.26 Rimless Belted preferred cut-off date for obsolete Nitro Express) ignition systems since 1986 when they • .33 BSA (.33 Rimless set it out in a draft revision of the Belted Nitro Express) restricted ‘memorandum of guidance • .360 No 2 Nitro Express to the police’ for a pre-publication • .40 BSA (.40 Rimless consultation. It was another example Belted Nitro Express) of the Home Office doing, in the words • .400/360 2 3⁄4 in Nitro of Mr Justice Wien, “…something Express which Parliament has not seen fit to • .425 Westley Richards define.” And defies Lord Butler-Sloss’s Magnum view, in an antiques firearms case (R v • .475 x 3 1⁄4 in Nitro Brown 1994) that “time has moved on Express and so must the definition.” • .475 No 2 Jeffery Nitro Express The restricted 1969 memorandum • .475 No 2 Nitro Express caused the gun trade crime wave that • .476 Nitro Express (.476 started in the 1970s as police applied Westley Richards) the changed definitions of prohibited • .50-90 2 1⁄2 inch weapons etc. which the Home Office • .50-110 2.4 inch .577 – 3 put into their guidance without telling in (Black Powder & Nitro anyone. By keeping their policies Express) secret, both the gun trade and

4 individual certificate holders fell afoul manufacture continued for a while: of these new interpretations of the law, uptake of cartridge firearms followed which caused Clarke & Ellis to the railways the Belgians made them comment in their 1981 book on how until over-run in 1914 and the British few firearms cases had been to the gun trade made percussion muskets High Court and Court of Appeal before for the tribal areas of the British 1968 (two in 48 years) and how many Empire well into the 20th century. after (dozens in 12 years). There’s a dead spot until Aldo Uberti If one must have a cut-off date, it’s started making cap and ball revolvers actually quite a good one for obsolete again in 1959. His market was to give ignition systems. What it means is stuff buyers the Wild West experience predating ‘modern’ self-contained without them having to use expensive metallic cartridges: matchlocks, antiques. These ‘later production’ cap flintlocks, cap locks, capping breech- and ball loaders, pinfire, needle fire and such. If revolvers we follow one example – pinfire – this didn’t count French invention by Casimir as firearms Lefaucheux first appeared in the for licensing 1830s. purposes in The 12-bore shotgun cartridge his home version predates central fire by a country or decade or more and Eley made pinfire most of the 12 bore cartridges until 1968. Pinfire rest of revolvers were made up to 1939 or a Europe, but bit later: the Belgians resumed making they were and are section 1 firearms in them after the Great War and Britain. production ended when German forces Post-1997, the Europeans made a over-ran them in 1940. Pinfire is truly obsolete; but other systems, such as matchlock, flintlock and percussion cap systems are in current manufacture. Take percussion: ‘originals’ start to appear in the early 1800s. Sam Colt (1814-62) and Robert Adams (1810-70) both had good percussion revolvers on show in the Chrystal Palace Great Exhibition of

1851. Centre-fire cartridges from 1873 lot of versions of their cartridge and on gradually superseded these revolvers with cap and ball cylinders ‘loose ammunition’ products. so shooters could continue using the Colt sold their ‘cap and ball’ same holsters. Ω production tooling to Mexico where

5 The Obsolete Calibres List with possession without a certificate This way of differentiating between and the prosecution has never sought antique and modern firearms dates to discredit the owner’s claim of from 1903 when the Pistols Act didn’t antique status by calling his treasured count pistols for which ammunition old firearm ‘junk’ or ‘worthless’. Many was available as antiques. What was were but have other emotional values meant remains untested. The Pistols as an heirloom, an inheritance or Act 1903 obligated handguns owners keepsake. to buy a ten shilling (50p) licence if The onus is always on the they wished to carry their sidearm prosecution to prove a firearm is too outside the limits of their dwelling young to benefit from the exemption AND IF they hadn’t bought a gun or and they only have to address that game licence. The 1920 Firearms Act after the defendant has satisfied the repealed the 1903 Pistols Act and court his possession was solely as a stated that nothing in it applied to any curiosity or ornament, because failing antique firearm possessed solely as a on the first leg results in a conviction curiosity or ornament. Ammunition anyway. ceased to be relevant. This test: leg 1, establish curiosity or This one phrase encapsulated the ornament and then leg 2, consider age, two legs on which a defendant must superseded, obsolete etc. is what the stand to prove his property benefits 1920 Act says and was enshrined in from the exemption from the need to common law by a 1977 Court of Appeal hold a firearm certificate. The terms judgment ‘Richards v Curwen’. The ‘curiosity’ and ‘ornament’ came Crown argued that a firearm capable of together in 1878 when used to use with modern ammunition could advertise ‘Exchange and Mart’ not be an antique, as it could still be magazine, so by 1920 everyone knew used. The Court of Appeal rejected the what they meant. argument. It did not matter to the court ‘Antique’ means “a collectable object whether the firearm could be used; that has a high value because of its age what mattered was firstly whether the and quality” according to Google. This defendant possessed it solely as a definition implies one couldn’t dignify curiosity or ornament or not – i.e. he ancient junk by calling it antique and didn’t use it and then how old it was. when the courts looked at antiques in The two revolvers considered were a case their view was the value of an of 1890s manufacture, so over 75 item gradually descends as it ages. It’s years old at the time. In allowing the an antique when it goes up again in appeal, Lord Widgery remarked he value because of its age, rarity etc. (NB. couldn’t envisage firearms made in It works with most things except coins, ‘this’ (the 20th) century as being Ed.) antiques. We’ve had a hand in numerous cases In R v Brown (1994) Lord Butler- where defendants have been charged Sloss considered a 1906 dated War

6 Office pattern rifle and in allowing the The SRA and the VCRA ‘defence’ appeal said time had moved on and so Members will be aware SRA must the definition. A fixed cut-off date membership includes public liability is therefore at odds with common law, insurance, which happens to be what as is the antique calibre list; statutory realistic imitation firearms (RIFs) or otherwise. As to whether secondary vendors look for from customers as legislation can over-write common their ‘defence’ under the Violent Crime law, we’ll have to ask a lawyer. Reduction Act 2006. The VCR Act is Lord Justice Laws said ‘no’, in the unusual in making selling ‘realistic ‘Metric Martyrs’ case (Thoburn v imitation firearms’ a criminal offence, Sunderland City Council 2002) except when selling it to an Lord Bingham said ‘no’ in his book ‘authorised’ person – one who ‘the rule of law’ (2011). demonstrates a good reason for Lord Hewart of Bury said ‘no’ in his acquiring it. book ‘The New Despotism’ (1929) The 'problem' with the Violent Our research continues. Ω Crime Reduction Act 2006 regulations 2007 is only historic re-enactment is EUROPEAN FIREARMS PASSES mentioned as a possible good reason, These cease to be valid on 1st whereas RIFs have been in use for January 2020 regardless of the expiry decades for other good reasons date showing on the document. You including theatrical purposes, will need to comply with the specific collecting, target shooting, air soft licensing or other requirements skirmish, basic training, and history imposed by the country you’re in at the displays. time or you wish to visit in 2021 and Back in 2006 the Home Office only on. Britain’s exit from the EU is what seemed concerned with air soft guns as invalidates them. 'realistic', and at the time the SRA was Chapter and verse on how to be the only PLI scheme which mentioned legally compliant in the future should airsoft skirmish. We think that's why be available to you via the organization they went for PLI as the base evidence hosting your visit; your hunt tour for an intending buyer to show as operator if you’re after game shooting ‘good reason’. or the event organisers if you’re going Possession of a Realistic Imitation to a re-enactment event. Firearms is not an offence, whether it The ‘loss’ of EFPs only affects UK be an air soft, the Chinese knock-off residents going to EU countries with versions that shoot gardener's water guns. It does not change anything for retention pills, a replica gun made to EU citizens bringing guns to the UK: comply with the 1982 Act and they will still need a visitor’s firearm subsequent guidance, a blank firer or a permit issued by a UK police force to 3D print. We reach the point where the visitor’s host. Ω SRA members can buy any of these RIF products by protecting vendors with

7 their SRA membership and then insurance, as mentioned in the 2007 possess them without any additional regulations. authority being necessary. There are However a member of the public restrictions on having any of them in acquires a RIF, his possession is legal - public, which are to be found in the unless he crosses one of the legislative Firearms Act and public order lines in the Firearms Act or public legislation. Essentially, discreet and order legislation. Specifically, Jack secure transportation solves most Straw made a pig’s ear of section 19 of problems. the Firearms Act 1968 by extending its What you need to buy one is a good reach. Originally, a person carrying a reason for having it and PLI as proof. legally possessed loaded shotgun or a Soldier of Fortune wouldn't sell RIFs to firearm together with suitable SRA members until we included the ammunition in a public place could be word ‘re-enactment’ on the prosecuted, whereupon the onus was membership certificate. The United on the defendant to prove he had Kingdom Airsoft Site Association lawful authority for what he was doing (UKASA) affiliated all their members to at the time, or a reasonable excuse for the SRA after they negotiated SRA what he’d been caught doing. membership as a defence with the Peter and Harry Pullenger were UKARA cartel. stopped en route to their shooting club UKARA – United Kingdom Airsoft (by a policeman who had enquired Retailers’ Association - is the umbrella diligently as to when they’d next be body for businesses importing air soft going shooting) in a car full of guns and products from the far east. They ammunition: so, they had lawful developed a registration system for authority for being in a public place in airsoft players. Those taking part in a car full of guns (going to their airsoft skirmish are registered by their shooting club) and were duly site with UKARA and get a reference acquitted. The policeman involved in number for making purchases – after a this entrapment exercise changed his certain number of visits. The vendor statement four weeks after the original can look them up on the register for incident from ‘firearms and verification purposes and that was one ammunition’ to ‘loaded firearms’; of the three flaws in the system UKASA which made no difference to the event. perceived. It took two and a half years out of their They thought vendors having access shooting lives to get acquitted and to the register violated the Data their guns back. Protection Act. The registration An example of ‘loaded shotguns in a scheme didn't include a renewal date, public place’ crossing our desk was a so there could be people on it who group of lads thinning out a rookery. dropped out of active usage years ago They stood on the road to fire, then and it isn't backed by public liability cleared up the empties and the bodies and hid in the ditch until the rooks

8 settled a bit and then did it all again. enactment fest, museum, castle, court, The complainant was a curtain street etc. twitcher half a mile away and when Given all this started with a Home police arrived, they seized guns and Office panic about air soft products, it’s prosecuted under section 19 and interesting they chose to exclude them under the Road Traffic Act for firing from the Firearms Act altogether in from within 30 feet of the centre of the 2017 by way of a new addendum to the carriageway. 1968 Act – section 57A – which says It’s only an offence to discharge a nothing in the Act applies to air soft firearm (or a firework) in proximity to products. It leaves air soft owners only the carriageway to the inconvenience at risk of public order legislation if of a road user and at court the police indiscreet about travelling with their couldn’t produce one. The court wasn’t weaponry. asked to decide between ‘lawful It’s not usually the weapons that authority’ and ‘reasonable excuse’ in attract criticism though; the last this instance, as the police withdrew several media attacks on re- the charge and returned the guns. enactment/living history have been Section 19 was thus about having directed at Nazi flags and German legally owned guns and ammunition in uniforms. Liking German stuff can a public place; the question was one of bring other problems with it; Blair motive or intent, as the guns would Grindle’s firearm certificate was only be capable of endangering public revoked in Gloucestershire twenty safety if misused. Jack Straw’s years ago because, inter alia, he had a amendment was to stretch section 19 Nazi flag (souvenired by his Dad in the to encompass ‘an imitation firearm’ war) airing on his wall when police and to separate an ‘air weapon’ from visited. And the same concern came up ‘firearm’ so having an air weapon again sixteen years later when he tried without any ammunition would be an getting his certificate back. offence unless the defendant could In Essex the popular Firearms show a lawful authority or a Enquiry Officer Dave Sims was reasonable excuse for having it in prosecuted for possession of various public without ammunition. firearms – and acquitted: but what This potentially complicates using drew attention to his Great War air guns, replicas, blank firers and 3D collection was the mannikins in his prints as props on your living history private museum wearing -shock, uniform, as the definition of a public horror, German uniforms. place is somewhere to which the public Back to the Violent Crime Reduction have access at the material time, Act; we’ve established the firearms whether on payment or otherwise: the aspects of it have nothing to do with War and Peace showground is a public violent crime, we wondered what was place, as is any other country show, re- driving Home Office paranoia. In the round, the police kicked off a policy of

9 reducing the number of firearms in the Latest gun ban – from South Australia hands of the public to an absolute Police minimum in 1972. Parliament rejected Announced on 7 October and the policy, presented to them as a effective the day after, gel blasters green paper (Cmnd5297) and it took became classed as imitation firearms in many years of lobbying and court South Australia. Gel blaster projectiles battles to get some of these police are 6-8mm diameter water-retaining policies reversed. beads used by gardeners and are frangible Now it seems to be going the other on impact. Invented in China, the guns way – the Home Office want stuff back are mechanically (and/or electrically) in the controls; they’ve re-worked the similar to air soft guns but are not made obsolete calibres list and are trying to from metal. The far east market for these make it stick so some 26,000 antiques products has been driven by anti-air soft will have to come back onto firearm legislation in mainland China, Pacific rim certificates or into the section 5 trade. countries and parts of Australia. The guns Then there’s the requirement to would probably be classed as ‘realistic register defectively deactivated imitation firearms’ in the UK and the firearms with the ‘Serious Violence projectiles as gardening accessories. Unit’ by April 2021. We don’t know The Officer in Charge of SAPOL’s whether they’re coming or going. Firearms Branch, Superintendent What’s really obvious is the Home Stephen Howard made the announcement, saying, “The firing Office is a poor choice of department mechanism in a gel blaster compresses air for managing trade and industry. to fire a projectile and therefore meets the The basic problem with the Home threshold test to be defined as a firearm. Office approving rifle and loose A gel blaster can easily be mistaken for a ammunition pistol clubs is precisely real firearm, with potential to cause that. Having no expertise in the concern in the community and trigger a management of sport, they have been police response that could involve the use using their approval sparingly to of police firearms, or other tactical eliminate some firearms from club options.” usage, while also failing to admit What he means is anyone playing with developments in the sport. It's about one of these toys in public is going to be withering the shooting sports on the ‘mistaken’ by police as an actual threat to vine by getting rid of some firearms public safety and shot. whereas a proper government This arbitrary change of category department with expertise in the catches some 62,000 gel blasters realm of what the public do for currently in private ownership in the organised enjoyment would sort all South Australian community and which these ridiculous problems out. Ω will now be subject to licensing and regulation. At the press launch of this latest counter-terrorism initiative, Supt Howard said they would be regulated the

10 same as paintball ‘guns’, which in South water content would penetrate the mesh Australia means their use is restricted to vizor. Ω ‘approved’ paintball sites and their transit WELCOME BACK and storage is the same as for actual firearms.

SRA Founder member Robin Stokes has retraced his steps to the UK after several years of travelling in the east and we also welcome Nang, who is here to keep an eye on him. Permanently. The SRA’s founder

A spokesman for UKASA – the United members were those who joined Kingdom Airsoft Site Association – said following the association’s launch in gel blasters weren’t really in the UK the October 1984 edition of market, although there are on-line adverts Handgunner magazine and prior to the for them. Anyone turning up at an air soft association adopting a policy of legal site with one wouldn’t be allowed to use costs insurance for all its members. it for safety reasons, but it would In other words, those who put their probably be OK at a paintball venue. The £10 membership up when there was gel beads are used by gardeners for water nothing in it for them besides sharing retention purposes in flower beds and the grief of those whom the powers have to be soaked before use in a gel that be were trying to eradicate from blaster launcher. the shooting sports. Being larger and heavier than air soft Jan A Stevenson’s editorial in the projectiles, but launched from a October 1984 magazine concentrated mechanically similar device, gel blasters on a Council of Europe proposal that have a more pronounced arc of trajectory British shooters should have to qualify than air soft and thus a shorter range. to continue their sport via a series of They can’t be used in conjunction with ‘tests’. Fifty hours of classroom study the usual air soft skirmish mesh facial of flora and fauna followed by the tests protection because the bead is frangible and then a shooting qualification test on impact and some bits as well as the for each type of firearm.

11 1984 rings a bell. Jan Stevenson Bee was in the process of believed the proposal emanated from a negotiating a lease on a shop in Stoke country sports organisation, Newington to open as a gun shop, so all presumably hoping to become the the conversation was around that body controlling the syllabus and tests. topic. The police side stalled the case It didn’t come to anything in the end, trying to crack who these mystery but the SRA’s in-tray filled up with ‘witnesses’ were until the lunch break, other stuff, including quite a few after which the real witnesses walked appeals. An early editorial bemoans in – both character witnesses who the fact that after a year none of the worked with Mr Walsh. appeals had come to court. The case itself was an anti-climax: It was the fifth newsletter (Autumn Graham’s firearm certificate had been 1985) before court reports started to revoked and the letter sent to his local appear and one such was Graham police station for service by hand – Walsh. His case was adjourned on the except nobody took it round to him 18 December via other dates to the 6 and by the time it was realised and the March 1986 and on the day Robin letter served on him it was months old Stokes turned up, accompanied by and New Scotland Yard had renewed another founder member Mr Bahadir the ‘revoked’ certificate by post in the Niazi (Bee to his friends) to offer moral interim. support. The cause of NSY’s consternation It went further though: the police about him having a certificate had also barrister was Mr Jeremy Carter- resolved itself, so the appeal was Manning. Graham told him he had two adjourned while Mr Walsh made a witnesses coming later, so naturally Mr fresh application for a certificate and Carter-Manning was both interested in then abandoned when it was granted. what they would have to say and Bee went on to open his gunshop – anxious to get the case into court Albion Arms in Stoke Newington – and before they might arrive. ran straight into trouble on two fronts; Then Robin and Bahadir arrived; one was the local gentrification Robin recognised Mr Carter-Manning community who objected to a country from a previous occasion and said, sporting goods store in their inner city “Good morning Jeremy,” at which point enclave and the other was Hackney’s Mr Carter-Manning’s entire effort Labour Party prospective pivoted around to figuring out who Parliamentary candidate Ms Diane this was. Abbot, who thought a shop called Robin and Bee Joined Graham and Albion Arms (it was in Albion Road) SRA Secretary Richard Law in the must be a white supremacist front for lobby and started a conversation – a right wing backlash against her until it was realised policemen were becoming the first black Member of hanging off the staircase trying to Parliament. eavesdrop on them.

12 Bee sort of headed that one off by his The IOPC is challenging a court presence; a Turkish Cypriot by birth, a ruling (see Journal 65) blocking them UK resident to avoid national service from bringing misconduct proceedings and a bachelor because his Mum hadn’t against the officer SFO W80, for the use sorted him out a wife yet, he couldn’t of "excessive" force. have passed for a white supremacist The police were monitoring the under any circumstances. three men in the stolen Audi with two He won the various planning bugging devices, yet when they closed appeals and traded until the 1991 with the vehicle it is said they didn’t recession stopped him. know how many people were in the car Robin went on meeting barristers in as the windows were steamed up. his capacity as a Waltham Forest Counsel for the IOPC, said in magistrate and later as chair of the documents W80’s position was that juvenile court before heading east for Mr. Baker moved his hands "up such adventures as the east has in towards a bag slung around his store for those who go there. shoulder... despite calls to put his So welcome back; it’s time to drink hands on the dashboard. W80 says this root beer and talk about the war. Ω action caused him honestly to believe that Mr. Baker was reaching for a Jermaine Baker 'was complying firearm and put him in fear of his life with police' when shot and that of his colleagues." Jermaine Baker was the front seat "However, the evidence shows he passenger in a stolen Audi motor didn’t have a gun in his bag and that the vehicle when shot dead by a police instructions given immediately prior officer known as SFO W80 while the to the fatal shot were for Mr. Baker to vehicle was parked near Wood Green put his hands up. The evidence also Crown Court on 11 December 2015. shows the position of Mr. Baker's hand The police operation was to at the time he was shot was consistent intercept and prevent anyone assisting with him putting his hands up in Izzet Eren escape from custody. He compliance with one of the was being driven to the court from instructions given to him." prison in a security van for sentencing “If one officer is shouting ‘Hands up’ after pleading guilty to possession of a and W80 is shouting ‘put your hands on Skorpion machine pistol and a loaded the dashboard’ whatever Mr. Baker did handgun on 13 October. was going to hit one officer or another’s Papers submitted to the Court of panic button,” comments Richard Law. Appeal on behalf of the Independent Lawyers for W80, who are opposing Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) say the IOPC appeal, say police had been the officer thought Mr. Baker was provided with intelligence that those getting a gun, which the IOPC says it involved in the plot had firearms - a was a "mistaken and unreasonable" ‘gun’ variously described as a replica belief. Uzi machine gun or as a BB gun was

13 found on the floor of the car next to the The SRA’s VIEW back seat. Armed policing is a fraught SFO W80 was investigated in 2015 interaction of conflicting behaviour following the incident after which the and limited training. The problem is Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) that police carry arms under common decided not to charge him with law for their defence, while doing so to anything. an arrest or a premises raid is an In 2019, the High Court ruled an offensive act. If anybody else did that, attempt by the IOPC to launch the act of taking a loaded gun to where disciplinary proceedings against him it gets used is the evidence the for gross misconduct was unlawful prosecution would rely on to because the watchdog had applied the demonstrate premeditation, such as in wrong legal test in assessing the a murder case. officer's claim that he had acted in self- The training problem is officers tend defence. to do on the street what they've been The court said the IOPC should have trained to do, which is to react with applied the criminal law test, meaning gunfire to the suspect's movements, W80's belief that his life was in danger whatever they may be: you can't wait when he opened fire would not have to for the gun to appear in most be judged on whether or not it was interactive video training programmes "reasonable" in the circumstances. 'cos you'll lose. Next problem is police At the start of a three-day appeal, do such live ammunition training one Counsel for the IOPC said the High at a time, whereas in the street there Court ruling was "wrong". His legal may be several of them all shouting at submission says that if the judgment is once and not necessarily saying the allowed to stand, "firearms officers same thing; so in this case both "hands who make honest but unreasonable up" and "hands on the dashboard" mistakes when using potentially lethal might have been shouted. force cannot face any disciplinary The Met's initial instruction when proceedings for their conduct". approaching a vehicle used to be to In legal documents presented to the identify themselves as armed police appeal judges, Rosemary Davidson, and then order the driver to throw the who is representing W80, says he has a keys out the window. In New "legitimate expectation" that the Hampshire, learner drivers were criminal test for self-defence will be taught at driving school how to behave applied. in a traffic stop - get your driving "It would be an abuse of power for licence and the pink slip (car the [IOPC] to adopt a different test at registration) ready and put both hands this late stage in the disciplinary out the window to show them to the process," she says. The case hadn’t approaching officer. publicly concluded as we went to On Jermaine Baker's side of the press. Ω street, same as in other fatal shootings

14 that started with the deceased in a In Jermaine Baker’s case, armed vehicle, there's no obvious way to officers have been deployed pre- demonstrate immediate compliance emptively to engage an unknown with the babble of shouted number of suspects in a stationery instructions - if there are any - vehicle with steamed up windows: so especially when what happened before very unlikely to be about to do the shooting is included. Azelle anything hasty themselves. Tony Long Rodney's movements may have been comments in his book about the related to trying to get over having just adverse consequences of a senior been in a car crash without his seatbelt officer ordering armed officers to take on and Mark Duggan was fleeing a car action, when waiting it out was crash until the police arranged preferable. themselves in what we refer to as the What three men with a dummy gun Irish firing squad position. snoozing in a stolen vehicle might have Those shootings come down to done besides getting arrested for being ‘justified’ because there was a gun in in a stolen vehicle and prosecuted Azelle Rodney's car and Mark Duggan under section 19 of the Firearms Act managed to throw his over a fence as for possession of a replica (or was it a he de-bussed. We didn't think BB?) gun in a public place can never prosecuting Tony Long for the Azelle now be known. That would have been Rodney shooting was either a good a result and the chances are Izzet idea or likely to succeed – as in SFO Eren’s ride to court wouldn’t have W80’s case because they were reacting been interrupted anyway. to their perception of what was going Senior police officers have been on in light of the prior briefing they described to us by a retired received. Metropolitan Police constable as In these shootings, the question is having 'sloping shoulders syndrome': what would a reasonable and prudent to get to the top you have to have person do, knowing what he knew at sloping shoulders so any slurry the time? Then one is looking at directed at you cascades down to the training limitations at the scene and lowest available rank. That's what the contents of the briefing happened in this case; the briefing beforehand. If you go back to the Jean doesn't feature; all the focus is on the Charles de Menezes shooting in 2007 man on the ground. the reasonable and prudent officers And it’s the problem: armed officers were incorrectly if not recklessly are told to expect to be treated thus briefed he was a suicide bomber and and its always life-changing when it that, to our mind, points at corporate happens. And it keeps on happening manslaughter. We do think such a because investigators aren’t looking charge would have been a better for culpability in the right place. Ω runner in Azelle Rodney's demise than the murder charge on Tony Long.

15 Breona Taylor ‘routine’ and sometimes other enquiries or to seize firearms on the We briefly reported the death of Ms strength of the ‘seizure policy’ Taylor, an emergency room technician developed by police chiefs and aged 26, on 13 March 2020. She was in firearms managers to separate gun bed with her boyfriend Kenneth owners from the peaceful enjoyment Walker in Louisville, Kentucky when of their possessions without any three (white) plain clothed police judicial oversight or accountability. officers used a battering ram to break Certificate holders have experienced into her home shortly after midnight. numerous encounters with armed Mr Walker got up and engaged the officers, such as during the ‘orderly intruders with his licensed handgun: surrender’ of handguns in 1997 when firing first, his shot hit Johnathan they were ‘covered’ by armed officers Mattingley in the leg. Mattingley while doing so and one assumes the responded with six shots - according to same will happen again if or when the the FBI - who annoyingly don’t say treasury pledge the Home Office where they went. Mattingley’s partner sufficient funds for them to welch on on the battering ram was Myles paying out for the ‘orderly surrender’ Cosgrove; he fired 16 shots and of of MARS rifles. these 22 bullets from the two officers, British police behaviour towards five or six hit Ms Taylor while Mr firearm and shotgun certificate Walker survived unscathed. holders is tailored by the Home Office Meanwhile, the third officer on the ‘serious violence unit’ which regards search warrant, Brett Hankinson, fired all legally owned firearms in exactly ten shots into the apartment next door. the same light as possession of any This proved to be the grounds for his firearms – all – including those held by employment being terminated, as he the armed forces - are perceived as and fired with no clear line of sight to a treated as a public order risk. The valid, or indeed any, target. problem is if armed officers are briefed Breona died of her wounds before to expect certificate holders to be risky medical attention arrived: that may or dangerous to deal with, it’s only a have something to do with the police matter of time before an armed officer dismissing the stand-by ambulance an mistakes an innocent movement for hour before effecting entry to the something sinister and shoots a premises. certificate holder in case the briefing This sudden death emerged through were real. the ‘black lives matter’ campaign – she We monitor and review such was black – but our interest in it is information as emerges following the because UK police have taken to death of any suspect by police gunfire. turning up armed with prohibited What becomes clear is where officers weapons at the homes of firearm and are briefed to expect a suspect to be shotgun certificate holders to make armed and dangerous, they can and

16 will open fire pre-emptively; justified straight at another, who fired. The because they are proactively bullet went through Mr Duggan and defending themselves; whereupon the stopped against the other officer’s over-egged briefing becomes their radio. defence. Colin Greenwood, author of ‘police Jean Charles de Menezes was shot tactics in armed operations’ (Paladin on those grounds, as he was believed Press 1979) said (but not in the book) by pursuing officers to be a fugitive the safest course of action when would-be suicide bomber when they engaged by armed officers is to faint. ran into Stockwell underground Detailed information rarely gets station two weeks after the 7th July into the public domain when a suspect 2005 London suicide bomb attacks. is shot and injured; it does happen, There was nothing he could have though. Stephen Waldorf was shot and done to dissuade the police from wounded in January 1983. He was the riddling him with bullets, because they unarmed front seat passenger in a were faithful to the briefing and yellow mini at the time: a case of thought he would explode himself if mistaken identity and again, he could they gave him the chance to. And since have done nothing to calm police he was a dangerous suspect at the nerves, as he didn’t know either he was time, it was OK to shoot him. a dangerous armed suspect or that he The same can be said of Harry was in a gunfight until the bullets Stanley in 1999. The police believed started hitting him: or more the brief they were engaging an armed accurately, when he woke up in suspect, while he thought he was hospital after the surgery to remove walking home from the pub: and then them. he turned to see who was shouting Following the fatal shootings of two behind him, and that was sufficiently robbery suspects at the Plumstead ‘suspicious’ enough to attract pre- Slaughterhouse in July 1987, we emptive ‘defensive fire’ at a range of learned that before them and after 100 yards. Waldorf the Metropolitan Police had Mark Duggan, killed in 2011, shot eleven other suspects; all probably should have known the survived and none were armed. One of police who engaged him would have them would have been Cherry Groce: been briefed he was armed and shot and paralyzed in 1985 when an dangerous. He got shot because, with armed officer mistook her fleeing black time to respond to the moving traffic female form an advancing hostile black stop – he exited the vehicle and his man. The shooter ‘saw’ what he had actions – fleeing the scene - convinced been told to expect. police at the time he was a threat until The backstory to the Breona Taylor stopped by a 9mm bullet. What he did assassination is police suspected Ms was to exit the vehicle and when Taylor’s ex-boyfriend Jamarcus Glover running away from one officer he ran had used her address for drugs

17 deliveries (he said it was clothes he UK if the court hearing it followed had delivered there) and it seems they common law. didn’t know he was no longer her beau; Our interest in this case is that plain she having dumped him. The clothed officers forced entry to a relationship started in 2016 and their private home during the hours of last telephone contact was in February darkness and shot up the occupants. In 2020. Mr Glover was arrested the same Louisville, Kentucky, as here, the night on the same warrant and ‘problem’ bringing armed officers up declined to name Ms Taylor as a co- against law-abiding members of the defendant in proceedings against him, public is ‘intelligence’: it’s the over- despite being ‘leaned on’ to do so. egged briefings and speculative search And therein a clue: they picked him warrant applications that set the train up the same night on the same warrant of events on the path leading to the – so the officers on the raid knew he death or wounding of a ‘suspect’ in the wasn’t at the address. Crashing in with comfort of his or her own home. a battering ram during the hours of In the UK, search warrants tend to darkness to an apartment they be served at dawn, or at least in the believed to be occupied by a woman hours of daylight. We think this is a alone was a ‘shock and awe’ tactic: a tried and tested modus operandi, form of terrorism. which works; more policemen are on Three armed white men doing this duty in the daytime than at night, so after dismissing medical backup and rounding up extra bodies from other without a female officer present to duties is easier; and detectives don’t do search the ‘suspect’; nor any unsocial hours in the UK. uniformed officer to enable the The Kray twins were arrested in occupant to identify the intruders as dawn raids on the 7 May 1968 – dawn law enforcement seems to us to be that day being shortly before 5am. inviting the disaster this incident Stone’s Justices Manual (1907) became. differentiates between day and night The officers didn’t know about the in the context of search warrants thus; current boyfriend being there and “the search should be made in the legally armed. No drugs were found on daytime, if there be probable the premises, but the district attorney suspicion only, but where there is watered it down when he said the positive proof, the warrant may be search authorized by the warrant did executed in the night-time (Crozier v not take place following the shooting, Cundey 1827). Moriarty’s ‘police law’ thus to ‘suggest’ there might have been (Butterworth’s 1929) says warrants to something to find. Mr Walker was search for stolen goods should be charged with the attempted murder of served in the daytime and can be both the officer he shot. The case has been applied for and served on a Sunday, dropped, as it would have been in the while ‘the police officer’s assistant’ (1954) is silent about day and night

18 but indicates a warrant of commitment incident happening and then met or in respect of arrears under a officers at the scene during the hours bastardy or wife maintenance order of darkness. The police would not must not be executed on a Sunday and attempt to enter the premises until must be in the possession of the dawn. Our ‘interpretation’ of this is any constables executing the warrant. The intruder onto private property during five-volume ‘Book for Police’ (1958) is the hours of darkness is fair game for likewise silent on the question of an armed householder, as per the timing. Overall, common law was reference in Stephen’s Commentaries suspicious of the whole warrant and the 1924 decision Rex v Hussey. business a hundred years ago and But not once they break off the much has changed (legislatively) since. attack, as Tony Martin discovered. Stephen’s Commentaries gets In 1989, the burglar alarm went off quoted in the 1907 Stone’s Justices in the Liverpool Pistol Club and Manual in the context of murder; “if various committee members any person attempts….to break open responded, but weren’t allowed in a house in the nighttime and is killed until dawn, when an armed in such attempt…. the slayer shall be Merseyside police unit preceded them acquitted and discharged.” ‘Any to ‘sweep’ the premises. person’ would presumably include a Back in 1983, the Metropolitan police officer. John Hurst, who served Police were searching for fugitive 30 years in the Metropolitan Police David Martin, a persistent escaper who said the first one through the door was was known to have handguns on at risk if there were an armed account of his having used them in his response. In R. v. Geogiades (1989) a hasty December 1982 departure from charge of possessing a firearm with custody. The police trailed Susan intent to endanger life was quashed. Stephens, suspected (or assumed) to He’d pointed his shotgun at intruders be his girlfriend. She picked up and stopped threatening them when Stephen Waldorf, who was they identified themselves as police. As superficially similar to David Martin an unchartered chemist, his initial (blond curly hair) and as the officers thoughts related to protecting his closed with her yellow mini while it stash. waited at traffic lights, Waldorf We went to vintage reference dropped his spliff and bent forwards to books in search of any common law pick it up. An innocent movement custom and practice around warrants persuaded the three officers to open and found none, but in consideration of fire, hitting Waldorf with five of the the ‘daylight principle’ there are some fifteen rounds they pumped into the anecdotes to introduce. In the 1986 vehicle. They stopped shooting after case in Essex where the Bamber family 15 rounds because they each had a were massacred in their own home, five-shot revolver and no further Jeremy Bamber alerted police to the ammunition.

19 In Louisville, Kentucky, the opaque The court has nine judges, who sit for reportage doesn’t include details such life. Ruth Bader Ginsberg died in as what arms the officers had or who September 2020 creating a vacancy hit what with their gunfire – apart from and choosing a successor to the post is Brett Hankinson – who hit a patio door, the President’s job. a window, the closed blinds behind In the bipolar world of American them and next door’s apartment; nor is politics a president will nominate it clear how 22 shots entering the someone whose track record suggests apartment found Breona five (or six, empathy with his views and those of depends on which report one reads) his party. This seems to be fairly easy times while missing the armed and to divine, given the gulf fixed between provenly hostile co-occupant the two wings of American politics. altogether. One searches in vain for the fuselage. If we translate the Breona Taylor Gun control is one of those wedge search warrant visitation to the UK, we issues dividing the Union. expect the raid to have been at dawn, Simplistically, Republicans support the or at least in the hours of daylight, with second amendment right to keep and at least one uniformed officer present bear arms while Democrats favour and at least one female officer or controls, restrictions or limitations on matron present to search a female ownership. suspect. Forced entry can be Gun owners are a minority in the authorised by a magistrate – it’s to United States. It is said around one in secure evidence occupants might four Americans owns a firearm while otherwise have time to destroy. 3% of the population own half the guns And that brings us back to the over- in circulation. Gun ownership is a egged briefing scenario. In Breona broad church, ranging from sporting Taylor’s case, the expectation seems to hobbyists to a central core of be she would be home alone. They Americans outside the military who knew where her erstwhile boyfriend have guns for defensive purposes – law was to be found: so they turn up using enforcement, security guards and shock and awe tactics, without those who own guns to defend their anybody who can search a female selves and homes against attack – to a suspect in the middle of the night and right wing of anything but well- expect it all to go all right? Ω regulated (and mostly white) far-right militias. US SUPREME COURT MATTERS Pausing to think for a moment; most In the run up to the US Presidential Americans can, like most Brits, pass election in November 2020, John R Lott through their lives in peace without Jr. provided a detailed consideration of having anything to do with guns, what might appear to outsiders as a police, drugs, violent crime, abortion fringe issue: that of appointing a judge or any of the other issues that become to the United States Supreme Court. critical in American political debates. It

20 was ever thus: readers with long immigrants took with them the memories or a history channel knowledge of brewing. subscription will be familiar with the By the end of the 19th century, beer polarisation in American society a drinking was very popular and the century ago on the subject of drinking industrial quantity brewers were intoxicating liquor. primarily German-American To start at the beginning, America dynasties. The temperance movement was founded (white America anyway) grew as the brewing industry – or by religious dissidents emigrating more accurately its advertising – grew there in the early 1600s to escape the and the brewers had to become a confines of the embryonic and still political lobby to defend their industry. developing Church of England. And they were big; breweries ‘Organised’ religion had, since the time owned the bars, which were political of Constantine the Great (AD272-337) hotbeds, employments exchanges, been a tool of governmental social union meeting houses and where the control (and the cause of more ballot box was during elections. unnatural deaths than any other cause The Great War had a considerable besides the Mongol expansion) and the impact on the brewing industry - Church of England’s ‘control’ position because of their German names – and was one needed the intercession of an the temperance movement won in ordained priest via his absolution and 1919 with a national prohibition on Holy Communion to achieve a state of the production and sale of alcoholic grace with the Lord. beverages in 1920 passed as the 18th The Pilgrim Fathers and subsequent Amendment. think-a-likes believed a state of grace The unintended consequences of with God could be achieved without imposing rural puritanical values on the intercession of an ordained priest. the urban majority who didn’t have These ‘puritans’ had (negative) views abstinence anywhere in their genes about the pleasures of life – Oliver was the opportunity it afforded Cromwell’s tenure as a military organised crime to flout the ban and dictator in Britain saw theatres closed, give the people what they wanted. The bear-baiting banned and the feast of 21st Amendment to repeal the 18th Christmas reduced to just Christmas. Amendment passed in 1933 and Puritans didn’t drink intoxicating reduced organised crime to serve the liquor although what counted as such much smaller demand in certain niche is a muddle. markets, such as gambling and America’s British white settlers took prostitution. abstinence with them – Native Thus America nationally see-sawed Americans didn’t drink anyway – and from one extreme to another. There sent tobacco products back. French are still local ‘dry’ areas on a county by and Spanish settlers took grapevines county basis; that trend had been with them and later German developing before the national ban

21 kicked in and continues to this day. serve a search warrant on the sect, And it’s not uniquely American. The who were ready for them (tipped off by fifteen counties of Wales were ‘dry’ on the press) and what started as federal Sundays from 1881 and periodic authorities showing off their might and referrals to the public saw gradual storming the place deteriorated into a shifts until 1996 when a referendum firefight in which four ATF officers saw most go ‘wet’. The law was were killed. No clear evidence of any repealed in this century to spare federal offence subsequently emerged, supermarkets the ‘uncertainty’ that a and no Branch Davidians were potential change of policy perpetually prosecuted, as they all died in the hangs over interested parties. incident. We could write a book about that – The year before, federal authorities on the firearms/antiques see-saw – had tried to arrest Randy Weaver at his but an article elsewhere will suffice on Ruby Ridge, Idaho, home for failing to this occasion. appear in court on firearms charges. In a recent BBC Radio 4 programme There was a gunfight in which Deputy ‘two minutes past nine’ journalist Leah U.S. Marshal W F Degan, and Randy Sottile explored Timothy McVeigh’s Weaver’s 14-year-old son Sammy bombing of the Alfred P Murrah were killed. During the siege, an FBI Federal Building in Oklahoma City on sniper shot and killed Randy’s wife 19 April 1995: drawing a thread Vicki, while missing the child she was through prior events and influences holding in her arms at the time. The and introducing gentle Radio 4 siege ended with Randy’s surrender. listeners to America’s militia, such as He was subsequently acquitted of all ‘the Covenant, the Sword, and the Arm the charges laid on him – including the of the Lord’ or CSA for short. murder of Marshal Degan - except for This band of interesting people the original bail violation that brought blended a Christian identity of some the heavily armed authorities to his sort with survivalism and door in the first place. preparedness for whatever came over McVeigh’s bomb exposed the real the horizon hostile to their beliefs. detachment of the right wing quasi Their relevance to Leah Sottile’s thesis militia from the core principle of was the plan McVeigh executed was volunteer warriors in a free society – one they’d talked about and been which is the obligation to turn out in gaoled for talking about some years support of the government when before he actually did it. circumstances demand it, or when the 19 April 1995 was the second government requests them to do so. anniversary of the end (in flames) of McVeigh, the CSA and such had lost the siege of the Branch Davidian sect’s their understanding of that basic compound near Waco, Texas. The siege obligation and sought to enforce a started when the Bureau of Alcohol, principle that they weren’t responsible Tobacco and Firearms attempted to to any government. What they called

22 ‘freedom’ is defined in the dictionary some police forces are routinely using as ‘anarchy’. It was the beginning of armed officers to carry out firearm the end of extremist outfits in the certificate renewal enquiries it’s only a 1990s. matter of time before someone gets America’s right would make a shot here for having a firearm comeback in due course and in various certificate. guises, seeking to enforce their ‘rights’ In seemingly going ‘over the top’, not to be loyal to their government. A particularly in Randy Weaver’s case, far cry from when Jimi Hendrix played the authorities are following the trail the national anthem at Woodstock on blazed by their forebears during the last day, to remind everyone that prohibition. Enforcing the you can love your country and hate unenforceable lead federal authorities your government at the same time. into committing criminal acts on an Randy Weaver was, like the ‘end justifies the means’ basis. That Mormons before him, a separatist also happens in the UK now the police rather than an extremist. A man who are routinely using the unlawful wanted to live his life in reclusive ‘seizure policy’ to grab guns from seclusion and as it turned out he wasn’t certificate holders who have no way to doing anything wrong in doing so. challenge such violations of firearms Except missing a court appointment. law and the Human Rights Act. The Branch Davidians seem to have John R Lott Jr. takes the view that the gone to some lengths to stay within the Second Amendment is hanging in the law: all the circumstantial evidence to balance, and Trump’s Supreme Court the contrary assembled in the ATF’s nomination of 7th Circuit Judge Amy 67-page search warrant didn’t include Coney Barrett is thought to be to the any allegation of a violation of any right of centre. At the first senate Texas law – nor any federal law either hearing, much was made of her not and thus didn’t establish any lawful saying which way she’d go on abortion ground for their intrusion. They rights – another ‘wedge’ issue. She suspected the sect were acting stuck rigidly to the protocol we expect lawfully, so they must be hiding of judges – she would consider the something. The document contains no evidence if a case came before her and locus for the federal authorities to act vote in the Supreme Court according to on: it was intended as a lucky dip the evidence. search or a shock and awe smack in the We have our own opinions about the face for the sect. abortion issue and have long since It matters to us when federal learned to keep them to ourselves. authorities take violent action with What separates the extremes is the fatal consequences against people who rights of the pregnant woman on the it seems weren’t doing anything one hand and the rights of the unborn wrong, because the same thing child on the other: any favouritism one happens here in the UK and now that way or the other highlights the

23 resultant doctrine of competing harms. court, I wouldn’t have made the same Politicians struggle with that ruling.” Interesting place to make that concept – weighing the evidence and observation, New Hampshire: a low- following its lead. In American politics, crime state where half the (mostly certain wedge-issue areas of law seem white) adult population have to be up for reversals: it depends on concealed carry permits to keep it that the make-up of the supreme court way. bench at the time. A somewhat right John R Lott Jr. tells us the Supreme wing or conservative supreme court Court considered 10 Second ruled in favour of the 2nd Amendment Amendment cases in 2020 but right to keep and bear arms in the declined to hear any of them. Four Heller case in 2008, while President Republican-appointed justices clearly Elect Joe Biden has indicated care about enshrining the right to self- opposition to that position and the defence, but probably feared Chief court itself has avoided the issue for a Justice John Roberts would side with decade. the liberal justices. Roberts did so in The US Supreme Court opted for cases concerning religious freedom, women’s rights over those of the immigration, and Obamacare. unborn child in the 1973 case Roe v The lower circuit courts in states Wade. In both cases the opposite wing controlled by Democrats (with of politics wants to see the court jurisdiction over 24 states, plus D.C.) reverse its decision in their wing’s have approved even the most favour. More immediately, if the draconian state gun control outcome of the presidential election regulations. These courts have upheld continues to hang in the judicial the refusals of California, Hawaii, balance after we stop writing this Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, issue, having gotten Amy Coney and New Jersey to recognize that Barrett in place before the election people have a right to self-defence started swings the court Donald outside of their homes. States such as Trump’s way. At her second hearing, California and Illinois require democrats boycotted it, paving the residents to pay $400 to $1,000- plus way to her appointment. to get concealed-carry permits, putting American politicians have to nail gun ownership out of reach for their colours to the mast on these minorities in high-crime wedge issues. At a town hall event in neighbourhoods. Illinois now New Hampshire in September, Joe completely bars non-residents from Biden was asked whether he agreed carrying. (We used to carry there on that the Second Amendment protects New Hampshire permits to take part in an individual’s right to own guns. the Second Chance fest – Ed) Biden made it clear enough that he No gunmaker has figured out yet would overturn the court’s Heller and how to meet California's requirement McDonald decisions: “If I were on the for micro- stamping — a technology by

24 which firing pins would in theory could have acted to prevent any imprint a unique, identifying code on damage. each shell casing, which reminds us of The Government changed its previous legislative forays into the position in October and said that it micro-management of the firearms would introduce an interim licensing industry: such as the scheme for the release of pheasants misunderstanding of Glock’s polymer and red-legged partridges on or within frames which led to a prohibition on 500m of an SPA until assessments had guns not made substantially of metal. been completed and a monitoring You couldn’t make it up. Ω program put in place. In light of this, Wild Justice have indicated their RUMBLES IN THE COUNTRYSIDE intention to withdraw their case. The Tim Bonner of the Countryside Government will now consult on its Alliance reminds us ‘Wild Justice’ rated proposals. a mention in shooting magazines last Wild Justice will probably claim this year, made famous because they as a victory but in reality it is very threatened the legal action that caused likely that little will change in practical Natural England to withdraw General terms for shoots on or near SPA’s that Licences for the control of avian pest are operating to best practice, and species. A bit of bureaucratic re-jigging there is little evidence any are not. The later and the licenses were back, Government has suggested that there slightly re-worded to by-pass the ‘Wild will be a General Licence with release Justice’ threat. densities based on GWCT guidance. All This year, Tim Bonner reports the that Wild Justice will have achieved is same group has been pursuing another another layer of bureaucracy and an Judicial Review – this time of DEFRA’s awful lot of wasted Government time policy on allowing the release of and resource at a time when it has pheasants and red-legged partridges plenty of more important priorities. on or near Special Protected Areas This is exactly what happened last year (SPAs). Wild Justice argued that the when the only practical impact of Wild Government could not be sure the Justice’s legal challenge on General release of gamebirds was not causing Licences was that farmers and damage to SPAs and under the conservationists were not able to ‘precautionary principle’ enshrined in manage corvids and other species EU law that their release should during the crucial Spring period, and therefore be prohibited on SPAs or the General Licences were within 5km of them as the failure of subsequently reinstated by Defra in an Natural England to carry out almost identical form to those that assessments and monitoring of SPAs were withdrawn. which could have provided the It is difficult to escape the necessary information on which it conclusion that Wild Justice is fundamentally a vehicle for pursuing

25 the prejudices - and polishing the egos cartridge revolver owners applied for of - its principal members - Chris firearm certificates in 2004; that didn’t Packham and Mark Avery. They have increase the number of certificate identified what is, from their holders as none of those applicants perspective, a rich legal seam created who didn’t already hold a firearm by an unholy conjunction of EU certificate was granted one – so far as legislation and Natural England’s we can tell. failures. This allows them to make In 1968, 600,000 people applied for mischief in the courts even if it simply shotgun certificates, representing means that the Government has to find about a quarter of owners. The alternative routes to delivering the legislation didn’t schedule the guns same policy result. held, which didn’t feature on the Further legal challenges therefore application form either, and much of seem inevitable unless the law, the ‘increase’ in certificate numbers up especially on issues like the until 1988 is attributed to people precautionary principle, is changed. belatedly finding out that they needed The irony is that the really significant one. Ω impact of Wild Justice’s legal activism may well be that it forces the Air ‘weapon’ ‘Licensing’ in Scotland Government to consider divergence of Back in 2015, the Scottish UK law from EU environmental government was firmly set on the path legislation after the UK leaves the EU: of creating a licensing system for air which was what the people who voted guns in Scotland, while largely ‘leave’ had in mind all along. misunderstanding what they were Another ‘issue’ that is sure to come blundering into. At the time, there up is lead shot. The EU are pressing were thought to be about 200,000 air ahead with a general ban, which the UK guns in Scotland, and we thought it was government doesn’t want to. An time we had a look at what happened. ‘independent’ lobby in the UK are They’d already designed the pressing for a lead shot ban while paperwork and designated the forms cartridge manufacturers are against it. with the initials AWL before they Ω realized that they couldn’t create a ‘licence’ if they wanted to ape firearms NB. At the time of writing, the Home controls: it had to be a certificate. And Office are predicting their changes to so it came to pass: the Scots got air the definition of antiques will add weapon certificates via the Air 26,000 antique firearms to certificates Weapons and Licensing (Scotland) Act – an increase of 6.5% on firearms held. 2015. Previous changes attracted only a The term ‘licence’ crept in because tiny proportion of owners to bring part 2 of the Act is all about alcohol their ‘off-ticket’ possessions into the licensing. In the same vein, police controls. An estimated 1% of air firearms departments call themselves

26 licensing departments because they output of 6 foot pounds or the French deal with explosives licenses. Or used equivalent while rifles can do 12 foot to; they’re called certificates in the pounds. Besides the power output, the 2014 regulations. rules are silent as to how to tell one The Scottish government left their from another. ‘AWL’ codes in place but use the word The ‘transitional’ arrangement for ‘certificate’ 189 times in their air weapon owners was that guidebook. They still use ‘licence’ six applications for certificates were times and ‘licensing’ 70 times, but accepted from 1 July 2016 and owners mainly when quoting legislation that had to apply before 31 December 2016 incorporates the word. when the hammer came down. That The controls themselves are largely said, late take-up is possible, as the a clone of firearm certificate controls, application form didn’t ask any but adapted in places and sans the applicant for details of what he has – or more recent Home Office obsession intends to acquire. New certificates with medicals. The fee is payable on were not necessarily issued for five application, for example and while year terms, thus to avoid a traffic jam most of the ‘conditions’ shadow those in 2021 and interestingly, provided a used on firearm certificates there is no certificate holder applies for renewal such thing as an approved air gun in good time next year, his old range in Scotland. Nor is there in the certificate continues in force until the rest of the UK – the army stopped the new one arrives: however long that Range Safety certificate programme in takes. 2006 because the Home Office had The Scottish air weapon certificate rendered it obsolete. is a ‘fit person’ certificate covering any The term ‘weapon’ is used number of air weapons, limited only by generically in ‘air weapons’ to the holder’s capacity to safely (i.e. encompass them all. Pedants dislike it securely) store them. The weapons are but ‘gun’ means, according to where not scheduled on the certificates you were brought up, either a smooth making it impossible to know how bore gun, such as a shotgun or a many of the 200,000 air weapons in cannon on wheels with a maximum Scotland are currently being held by barrel elevation of 45 degrees. ‘Rifle’ the 29,769 successful applicants (334 excludes smooth bores (except in the applications were refused). Home Office definition) and a lot of Police Scotland don’t keep records early air guns (hence ‘guns’) were of air weapons handed in – if they’re intended for use with darts and thus anything like West Yorkshire they’ll didn’t have rifling. have been recorded as firearms seized There is a distinction between pistols – but they did tell us in an FOI request and rifles to be found in the Firearms that 690 were surrendered in a two- (Especially Dangerous) Air Weapons week campaign in 2018. Rules: pistols have a maximum power

27 There is no provision in the At 464 pages in paperback it’s a transitional arrangements for people bumper read. Dr Shepherd trained in who didn’t find out about the medicine at St George’s Hospital requirement in time to apply late, but a medical school in London and lot of these applications were made completed his postgraduate training as after the cut off date because anyone a forensic pathologist in 1987, holding a firearm or shotgun whereupon he joined the forensic certificate doesn’t need to apply for the department at Guy’s Hospital under Dr air weapon certificate until their Iain West. existing certificate is due for renewal: It was a phase of multiple death so we won’t have the total number of incidents; in his own words, “In the applications in until the end of next late 1980s the UK saw a series of year. disasters which claimed many lives. The current numbers pan out to an Few if any of these disasters could average of six per certificate, which exactly be called an accident. They suggests a much higher compliance almost all exposed major systems rate than the Home Office have ever failures. Or maybe this was a period achieved with changes to UK law and is when post-war values of self-reliance probably a reflection of the much were morphing into conflicting greater publicity the licensing scheme interests of self and state. Certainly, was given in Scotland. The only topic to attitudes were changing as the get more airtime is the campaign for population grew and the systems we yet another referendum. Having lost relied on had to increase in size and two, the SNP seem intent on making it complexity. In March 1987 the car the best of five. Ω and passenger ferry Herald of Free Unnatural Causes by Dr Richard Enterprise capsized outside the Shepherd. Published by Penguin in Belgian port of Zeebrugge because 2019 ISBN 10:1405923539 the bow door had been left open: 193 passengers and crew died. In August 1987 Michael Ryan went on a killing spree and shot thirty-one people in Hungerford before killing himself (The only incident on this list not to have been subject to judicial scrutiny. Ed). In November 1987 a lighted match dropped down through an escalator on the Piccadilly line at King’s Cross, causing a fire that claimed the lives of thirty-one people and injured a hundred more. In July 1988 the Piper Alpha oil rig in the North Sea blew up, killing 167 men.

28 On 12 December 1988 three trains might say exploded – employers collided due to signal failure just began to recognize the importance of outside Clapham Junction. Thirty- training, of corporate and state five passengers died and more than attitudes to risk and responsibility. four hundred were injured, sixty- These areas had suddenly become nine of them very severely. Later that more serious and security was no month a bomb planted on a Pan Am longer just a managerial jumbo jet exploded over the Scottish afterthought but a necessity.” town of Lockerbie, killing all 259 Dr West took his summer holiday in people on board and eleven on the August, so it was Richard Shepherd ground. Less than three weeks later, who got the call about multiple on 8 January 1989, an engine fault shootings in Hungerford on the 19th: developed in a British Midland much to his boss’s chagrin. He Boeing 737 which, compounded with introduces himself as the forensic pilot error, brought down the plane pathologist who copped that case – and on the embankment of the M1, just name drops repeatedly thereafter short of the runway at East Midlands (Diana, Princess of Wales – at the Airport. Of 126 people on board, Stevens Inquiry; Stephen Lawrence, forty-seven died and seventy-four Harold Shipman, Rachel Nickell: and suffered serious injury. In April 1989 many involved in the above list), while ninety-six Liverpool football fans filling in the background of his growing were crushed to death and more up in a one parent family, the years of than seven hundred were injured at training for the job he got: inspired, he Hillsborough stadium in Sheffield. It says by reading a third edition of was only in 2016 that a second Professor Keith Simpson’s ‘Forensic inquest ruled the victims were Medicine’ that one of his friends unlawfully killed due to gross brought into school. negligence: the police, ambulance That book is still around, now in its services and safety standards at the 14th edition: reworked and updated by stadium were all criticized. In August others (Richard Shepherd did the 12th) 1989 a collision between a pleasure and the mortuary photos thus boat and a dredger in the Thames sanitised for the 21st century: which is claimed the lives of fifty-one people, why early editions are sought after. most of them under the age of thirty. Keith Simpson (1907-85) also wrote Each event shocked the nation. Each ’40 years of murder’ and handled quite resulted eventually in significant a few famous cases. He probably holds improvements, when emotions were the record for the number of post- calmer and the often multiple, mortems he was presented with at one interconnected causes had been time, as his biggest case was the 173 unravelled and analysed. Ancient people crushed to death at Bethnal systems were overhauled, the health- Green tube station in 1943: panicked and-safety culture blossomed – some by the noise of a newly installed anti-

29 aircraft rocket Z battery opening fire in either took their own firearms or used Victoria Park. ‘club’ guns. In seeking to prevent that casual access to firearms, the unpublished and restricted 1969 guidance to police introduced a condition for firearm certificates that guns held on the certificate for target shooting could only be used on MoD approved ranges. That change stopped firearm certificate holders using commercial ranges until the range proprietors Hungerford remains Dr Shepherd’s went through the bureaucracy of record – 17 bodies at one time. He creating a club, adopting a constitution dealt with the murderer first to get him and affiliating their club to the NRA as out of the presence of his victims. As a route to getting an army range safety there was no public enquiry, any certificate. The unintended insight into that case is sought after by consequence was that casual users of the shooting community who commercial ranges became, without inadvertently became its victims: not the social checks and balances so much of the murderer but of the provided by proper clubs, members of political consequences. We learn little a club that was a good reason for from Dr Shepherd: he confirms that the getting their own firearm certificates. murderer committed suicide and that Most ‘proper’ clubs could trace their he’d shot his mother down at a pedigree back to those volunteer rifle distance and then closed to shoot her regiments raised in Victorian times to twice in the back. keep Napoleon III on his side of La Other than that, he comments that Manche. Despite that objective, these Michael Ryan seems to have fired on were social clubs and their annual his longer range victims with single meeting on Wimbledon Common (the shots while firing multiple shots at first one opened by Queen Victoria in closer range victims and in making that 1860; moved to Bisley after 1894) observation he may not be correct. became a fixture in the social calendar, Ryan was inexperienced with the as that was where every eligible firearms he’d bought on the strength of bachelor with sufficient income to buy joining a commercial club of the sort his own fancy uniform and rifle would that wouldn’t have been a ‘good be – coincidentally in the same season reason’ for owning firearms at all until as debs came out to play. A bunch of the Home Office made it so by their later clubs were Home Guard units, policy shift in 1969. who adjusted to being rifle clubs for Until then, commercial ranges were the same reasons: preparedness for shooting galleries where patrons defending the realm, while having a

30 good time in the social company of death with the doctor’s spelling their like-minded peer group. The mistake: unwilling to be corrected by commercial clubs had none of that. the next of kin whoever he was. It The police only paid lip service to their amuses the author that his Dad is the duty to check firearm certificate only one in medical history to have applicants, according to Jan A died of what the registrar wrote. Stevenson (he joined the Oxford Pistol A very entertaining writer, Dr Club in 1974) because the police Shepherd flicks from one extreme to trusted the clubs to only put suitable another; discussing his emotional people forwards and while traditional baggage as he climbs the greasy pole of clubs did that, commercial clubs didn’t. his trade while not pulling his weight The police said it was their domestically: abandoning the family responsibility to decide who got one for a call-out when he was supposed to and the commercial clubs left them to childmind while his wife studied. it. There’s the incident where he took his The police thus approved Michael son with him to wait in the car while he Ryan for possessing firearms without did a post-mortem on the south coast; him having gone through any process so that they could take a walk along the of training or mentoring that a cliffs afterwards. probationary member of a proper club The official at the mortuary thought would; and he would never have lasted leaving the kid in the car was child in such a club anyway. He fired abuse and took him into the office multiple shots at all his victims and the through where Dr Shepherd was further away they were, the fewer wielding the knife. His son didn’t seem bullets found their mark. to mind much, such as when he Back to Dr Shepherd’s book, 23,000 entered Dad’s study without knocking post mortems took their toll on his and found Dr Shepherd attacking a mental health and ended his marriage. pillow with a knife. Dad had to explain Writing the book was cathartic for him that he was trying to figure how – lots of self-analysis as well as in- wounds in a particular case had been depth reviews of the other traumas in caused and could it have been this way his life. His Mum died when he was or that? nine and years later Dad produced the Half an hour later, he comes back postmortem report and asked the now with his small sister; “Dad, we think qualified Richard to explain it. Which we’ve got it…” and while they explain he did. Later in the book, he gets told Mum walks in and icily reminds the off by a registrar for opening the sealed good author that she leaves her work envelope containing the notes for at the hospital. In between these family death registration from the doctor who anecdotes we get three pages of the attended his father at his end. The minutiae of understanding infant rather unsympathetic registrar deaths and the differences death insisted upon recording the cause of

31 makes to a baby as the corruption of all die almost instantly, giving no signs flesh stalks the tiny remains. of classic asphyxia. And even those A call out west to what seems a who do show those signs have routine death at a traffic accident generally died too quickly for lack of becomes more than that when he is oxygen to be the sole introduced to the heavyweight cause…compression of the jugular detective brass at the mortuary on a vein – here in the neck – will increase Sunday. The deceased had crashed his venous pressure in the head to an car, got out and lit a cigarette, got in a unbearable extent – that’s what row with a pedestrian who tried to turns some victims blue. Pressure on stop him lighting up because of the the carotid arteries, here, means the spilled fuel on the ground and then victim will rapidly lose died. consciousness as blood supply to the Dr Shepherd identifies damage to brain is cut off. But strangling can the guy’s neck caused by the crash as also put pressure on the nerves of the the cause of death – to the relief of the neck, which then can affect the brass, as the pedestrian involved was parasympathetic nervous system. an off-duty police officer and their This controls the bodily processes we concern was whether his actions had don’t really think about, like played any part in the casualty’s death. digestion. One of the main nerves in Professionally, Shepherd wants to this system is the vagal nerve and both identify the knives that caused you can die instantly from neck the wounds he sees on his slab, such as pressure, which, via a complicated when Stephen Lawrence was before mechanism, instructs the vagal him AND understand the dynamics of nerve to simply stop the heart the incident in which those wounds beating. It’s a reflex reaction.’ were caused. Sharp instruments seem This extract is in the context of to feature in the bulk of his unnatural restraint techniques applied to people cause’s portfolio. Gradually, another who the Home Office were having kind of death features in his work – deported. Dead bodies turn up in the deaths in police custody – and with the mortuary wearing a heavy leather belt ‘black lives matter’ campaign still that has handcuffs bolted to it. One active, his findings in these deaths are woman had four metres of sticky tape significant. wrapped round her mouth – after But hear some of that in his own she’d spat at officers – and in the heavy words: “Even today most lay people exertion of fighting for her life, she probably think that constricting the simply couldn’t get enough oxygen into neck simply cuts off the air supply. her body through her nose alone. She But we know that asphyxiation alone had sickle cell trait and the way that can’t always be the cause because reduces the oxygen supply to the body some victims die very quickly from anyway seems to him one of the pressure on the neck. In fact, a few reasons why a disproportionate

32 number of deaths in police or that make it quite deadly. Those who immigration custody die during a died that night were dead in a matter physical struggle. “I can’t breathe,” as of minutes, but only gradually made it one recent victim got time to mention. to the mortuary over a period of You can test this yourself. Take a weeks. It was a complicated job slug of mouthwash and see how long identifying the bodies to be sure that you can go while exercising every bereaved family got the right moderately without having to spit it corpse and part of the process was to out. You probably won’t make it fingerprint the bodies. through a four-minute shower. Since fingerprinting was specialized He became involved in training work in the case of people who’d been those who find it necessary to in the river for long (you know what manhandle other people in safer ways your fingers look like after an hour in of doing it but doesn’t feel he got much the swimming pool) the hands were credit for that. No, he finds that he’s amputated and sent off for better remembered for other cases. fingerprinting. And then the press Lampooned for his reconstruction of found out. Normally – if we can use the Rachel Nickell murder, he was such a word here – the hands would be ignored when he got a similar victim processed and returned to the bodies on his slab because as far as the police where mortuary staff were skilled at were concerned, they’d got their man reassembling the remains before and he was in custody. bereaved relatives viewed them. Then there was the matter of the Dr Shepherd has always favoured missing hands. When the Marchioness bereaved relatives viewing bodies if collided with a dredger fifty-one they want to, whatever their condition, people went to Davy Jones locker. And and after suitable preparation. This gradually returned from it in varying wasn’t allowed for some reason in the stages of decomposition, which he Marchioness case, which raised discusses in such detail you can smell relatives’ suspicions and then the what it was like doing the post- missing hands episode stuck firmly to mortems. Doctors engaged in that his CV for eleven years until Lord work carve up the bodies and take Justice Clarke’s non-statutory inquiry samples. Mortuary staff put everything exonerated his profession. back in the chest cavity and prepare A few pages on his children’s the bodies for undertakers to remove growing up, the millennium, giving up to their final resting places. smoking, buying a retreat on the Isle of Bodies that have been in water for Man, resuming flying and a lot of any length of time show that off and meetings for planning – more the Thames isn’t only water; it’s a fast brainstorming really – for how London moving salty tidal river full of hard would cope with an emergency get obstacles (like bridge buttresses and interrupted by the 2001 attack on New propeller blades) and constrictions York, which he watched on live

33 television. Nine days later he was carried out on their loved ones as there; partly to help, but also to clean unnecessary, since the cause of death off the Americans that which might was obvious and in consideration of help London prepare for something that, post-mortems were not carried big. out on the 7/7 bombing victims. Then Here’s a few of his words on the their relatives accused the emergency aftermath; “Finally, in 2015, 1,637 services of causing some deaths by the victims had been identified, delays in getting help to the injured accounting for just 60 per cent of parties. Without having conducted full those believed to have died: the post-mortems, Dr Shepherd couldn’t others had become dust, as all bodies comment either way. He does say must. Now there are plans to turn ambulance crews can’t go into harm’s Fresh Kills (to where the rubble was way and they’d been told to wait in taken and sifted twice for human case there were further bombs. (The remains) into one of the world’s delay was for Geiger counters to be largest urban parks. An brought from Lippits Hill to check if the anthropologist friend who worked bombs had been ‘dirty bombs’ – Ed) sifting through the debris was, like As the book brings us up to more many others involved in the disaster, recent times, pathology got privatized; traumatized by it. After months of dumped by the universities for not sieving for bits of human tissue and publishing enough academically: bone she developed a horror of instead of getting paid by universities flying. When she returned to the UK, as lecturers, Dr Shepherd et al now before boarding her flight she wrote have to bill the police, courts etc for her name on every part of her body, their services. every single limb, in case the plane Some cases keep coming back to bite crashed and she was dismembered.” participants. One such was the murder The 2005 London bombings on a of Rachel Nickell, for which Colin Stagg bus and three underground trains was convicted. Dr Shepherd became the first test of the developed commented when examining another mass-disaster plan they signed off only slasher victim – Samantha Bisset – she a few days before it happened. He looked like Rachel Nickell had in a hoped by having a plan, they wouldn’t passing comment ignored by police – be called upon to implement it. Bodies but eventually Colin Stagg was were taken to a temporary clearing acquitted, and Robert Napper mortuary on the Honourable Artillery convicted of both murders. He was Company’s playing fields – the most already in Broadmoor by the time this valuable rugby pitch on Planet Earth was put together. and holes appeared in the plan soon Sally Clark’s conviction was after. overturned on appeal and rebounded Relatives of the Marchioness victims on Sir Roy Meadow who’d given the had criticised the full post-mortems chances of having two Sudden Infant

34 Deaths in the same household as 1 in NEXT ISSUE: 73 million. The GMC struck him off. He was over 70 by the time they Lead shot reinstated him. We’ll round up all the issues, historical, And then one of his ‘SIDS’ cases political, and practical. Europe versus came back to haunt him. Baby Noah Britain and within Britain the ‘pro and turned into the catalyst for his PTSD anti’ views of the various interested overtaking him while the General parties: shooters, cartridge Medical Council investigated him. And manufacturers, landowners, and then dropped it. government departments. Many ‘what might have beens’ and he kept the biggest until last. Diana, MEDICALS Princess of Wales, died of injuries Firearm and shotgun renewals sustained in a car crash in Paris in Policing has shifted from a 1997. If she and Dodi had put their presumption that there’s nothing seatbelts on, she’d have survived. The wrong with you unless your GP says so only one of the four in the car to have to presuming that there’s something been wearing a seatbelt was her close wrong with you unless your GP says protection officer. He survived getting there isn’t. squashed by her cannoning into the This mission creep has gone from back of his seat as the air bag blew up refusing to process applications of in his face. people who aren’t registered with a GP Her injuries included a small through to asking all GPs for chapter internal bleed that went undetected at and verse about all applicants the scene where she was treated including shotgun certificate holders, second, being apparently the less in case they have a condition that seriously injured of the two survivors. makes them a danger to public safety His retrospect at the end of his or the peace and then as an career and looking back, is how we’ve afterthought to all dealers. How one changed: thin was as normal in the gets medical approval of a limited 1980s as obesity is now. Tattoos and company remains to be seen. piercings are common now: as is death. We’ll look at the whole mess in out Ω first 2021 issue.

35 Merry Christmas Y’all

IMAGE CREDIT: SHUTTERSTOCK

IWA Outdoor Classics When NürnbergMesse once again hosts the world’s leading trade fair: 12 to 15 March 2021 Participants will not have seen each other for two years because of the pandemic. That makes talking in person and closing deals with a handshake all the more important – even if the handshake is likely to be only symbolic in the circumstances.