Tragedy (non-boaty)

[Sybarite]

Yesterday in France 57 bodies, victims of the heat wave which had been kept refrigerated since early August, were buried since nobody had come forward to claim the bodies.

What a sad end...

John

<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[tcm]

that is indeed very sad. Suppose another illustration of why a DNA database wd be a good idea.

<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[richardandtracy]

DNA Database

The state has no need, or right, to intrude on my privacy to the extent of having every molecule that makes me on record. A DNA database of the whole population is an abomination.

George Orwell's dystopia of '1984' didn't imagine the control over the population that a DNA database would give, and 1984 was bad enough.

Do YOU trust the PM and his monkeys not to abuse the data (after the Alistair Campbell lies and disinformation)? What about the lot that follow him, or the bunch in 20 years time? A database like that is to give a blanket statement of trust to any Tom, Dick or Harry, not just for today but for ever. Anyone who advocates such a course of action is supremely naive.

Just think how easy it would have been for Stalin, or Hitler with that information. Couldn't happen here? No, but then it wasn't possible in Royalist Germany or Royalist Russia. In both cases, within 15 years of the deposing of a monarchy, a dictator installed. No couldn't possibly happen here. After all there are NO parallels. And we have all the checks and balances needed - like a House of Lords that is appointed by the PM, an invincible majority in the House of Commons. No way we could get an elected dictator like Hitler is there?

Whatever benfits anyone can propose for a DNA database, the benefits are infantile compared to the risks.

Regards

Richard.


<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[tcm]

Re: wow

Even i haven't ben able to invoke the ghost of stalin and hitler so slickly! But your argument is simply a flash-horror listing of bogeymen. Ooer, eh?

Nazi germany didn't need dna samples. Although not to excuse their actions, it was no secret that the national socialists were anti-semitic. So were many at the time. It's now widely felt or hoped that Hitler, an elected chancellor, went individually bonkers, and together with a few cronies they decided that they'd kil all the jews. But in fact huge sections of the general population was anti-semtic, and to a fair extent so was the a lot of Europe. Many still are. Not to excuse the behaviour - an example of the jews' grip on business life in prewar Germany is that if you wanted a lawyer, over 93% were jewish.

Separately, you argue that it could easily happen again. I think not. In those days we were reverential towards politicians - these days its the reverse. There are better communications and transport is cheap. These alone would make it hugely difficult for a latter-day attempt for a european state to pass anti-racial legislation of the kind seen in Nazi Germany. Even the national front voting in france was hugely embarassing for that country at the time, although the large numbers can be explaned in part by the certainty that Le Pen was unlikely to win.

The state has every right to require a DNA sample. It holds lots of information about you, to the extent of what you do, how you do it, your medical and educational records. It grants the right of exmaining bodies to pass or fail people in their chosen profession. It has the right to declare war, and to demand that you fight that war too. It applies taxes with the threat of more taxes and inprisonment.

All this is based on a fairly hazy idea of us having different names, but you can change your name, so that we have to identify "richard smith" (excuse the lousy guess!) as that richard smith who lives over there, or at least he used to, who is keen on boating, and not the other one, who lives a few streets down.

The real value of a dna database is to upgrade our policing and court systems, still reliant upon almost medieval systems of witnesses of who did what and when. Yes, that's him, with the black face. I think. Well, I'm pretty sure. Yesy yes, I'm totally certain.

With a dna database, there'll be far less chance of false accusations ofa whole host of charges being brought against the wrong people.

Currently, we have no real way of identifying a person - without having them there in front of you. Indeed it is much easier to identify and count individual computers, cars, boats than it is between the thousands and thousands of John Smiths. To avoid a case of mistaken identity, one should really put them altogether and say hmm, yes, that's probably him. There is no such confusion with a physical item with a serial number. Despite computers, the current Census is carried out with proably less guarantee of accuracy than the domesday book a thousand years ago. This is quite ridiculous. And i think it is a huge source of cost, fraud and mistaken identity.

You are right that there are risks, and it is quite proper that they shouold be highlighted, and great care taken. But I do not think you are right that the risks outweigh the potential benefits. Only fraudsters, rapists, and many other criminals need be truly worried.






<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[david_bagshaw]

Re: wow

Why not go the whole hog & fit every body with a GPS chip & transmitter, then They & every hacker , nosey parker, do gooder can totally control the world.

After all the state knows where we are form our mobile phone transmissions, & soon from the smart chip registration plates, might as well have one in the head as well.


LET US HOPE NOT !!!!!!!

<hr width=100% size=1>David
<A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.euroboating.net>http://www.euroboating.net</A>

 

[richardandtracy]

Re: wow

Strangely enough I didn't quote Stalin & Hitler as a 'flash horror listing of bogeymen'. Why didn't I quote Osama Bin Laden too - he's a current bogeyman? I chose the two I mentioned with good reason, as they are extreme examples that back up my point - but there are many, many others. I could have started with the sublime [Pol Pot] to the ridiculous [Mugabe], however any or all would have served to back up my point. These people used the apparatus of the state to crush both opposition and those people they decided were their enemies, and in doing so are more terrifying than terrorists who have more limited resources but equal determination.

I rather think you and I view the state rather differently. I take a rather old fashiond view (around 2000 years old if one book is to be believed). I know it is idealistic, and not really practical but everyone has an ideal to aspire to - my ideal is so impractical the original proponent got nailed to a hunk of timber because of it, but it's a good starting point. The ideal I aspire to is the 'Rule of Law without government under the eyes of God'. Starting from this ideal the state is an un-necessary evil. The modern world can't exist without the intervention of the state, but let's minimise its intervention in everyone's life.

Now, let's see whether the state is on my side as a law abiding citizen. It takes taxes off me to pay for the services it claims to provide. The most important services are law and order, education and health. Right. I'll leave law and order til later.
Education. I have the misfortune to be a school governor, and am able to see the PARTY political interference in education first hand. (What's the first rule of dictatorship, 'Give me the children, they'll be mine for life', something like that anyway). The value for money is dreadful and the services provided are awful.
Health. Ah yes. A collegue has waited 18 months for a gall bladder operation. She's off for 2 days a month due to the pain. The original operation date was June, but it got postponed to December due to 'Service Restrictions'. Yep, the state is really going out of its way to help people.
Now law and order. This is a really sore point with me due to 2 incidents this year. In April I was beaten up on my 5 minute walk from home, in view of a Police Spy camera, on a Monday. Our police took until Saturday to turn up to take a statement. 3 weeks later a second constable phoned me to take a second statement as the first had been mislaid. 2 weeks later they apologised and said they didn't have any resources to investigate the incident and were closing the case.
The second incident was at the end of January. I live down the road next to the Coniston Hotel in Sittingbourne. You may have seen it on the news this year, over a hundred assylum seekers were due to be housed in it on a temporary basis. You won't have seen me protesting, as I think the poor sods need somewhere to go - but those in charge of the state decided that regardless of the protests they were going to put people in 2 weeks after agreeing not to. Anyway, here's my diary entry for Monday 27 April - I've added a few explanations to the text to make it readable:-

"Yesterday afternoon at 2pm I took my 2 daughters [3 and 6] to the park to fly a kite. Within 10 yards of my front door the Police security camera picked us up, and tracked us until we passed into the view of a second camera. The second camera was in position to take over and tracked us until we were 150 yards from home and turned up Johnson Road (not under surveillance). Then, on the way back, we noticed that there were 4 police officers on duty at the hotel, and a number of cars with suitcases and were arriving being driven by people with coloured skin. The local grapevine worked rapidly and within a couple of minutes there were 20 residents in groups talking on the pavement. My neighbour, Rob, went to talk to the police on guard. 3 minutes later about 20 police officers arrived in 2 vans, closed the road and then ordered everyone off the street and into their houses or they'd get arrested. While the road was closed by the police, they let in 6 or 7 cars with foreign looking occupants into the hotel. The road remained closed for 2 hours. It appears there were a further 40 Police in the centre of town in vans ready in riot gear as backup - 3 minutes drive from us. We usually have 2 Police on duty in the town weekends and evenings (for 140000 people)."

After this, is the state on my side as a law abiding citizen? The answer is a resounding NO.
How far are we from a police state in the UK. I would contend that we are there already, but the aim of the state is to control those who may dream of opposing it. Control of those who do not oppose the state (like the thug who beat me up) is considered a waste of resources, so they don't bother.

In fact, dictators like Pol Pot and Mugabe tend to refute one of your points. Dictatorships, whether they come into force by a coup (Pol Pot) or are elected (Mugabe), couldn't give a monkeys about what the outside world think. Cambodia and Zimbabwe also have considerable lengths of land borders with their neighbours - so transport to the next country is a matter of walking. How many escaped Pol Pot as a proportion of those murdered? How many are leaving Zimbabwe as a proportion of those being oppressed? Is the quantity of people leaving the country affecting the dictator one iota? No, I thought not.
The way Mugabe exerted his dictatorship was a slow, stealthy attack on individual freedoms, one at a time. What argument was commonly used? "Only criminals have anything to fear". Yes. That was the one. Recognise it? To begin with most people in Zimbabwe agreed with what was going on. It promoted stability. Nice. Until it ossified into a tight grip around the hearts and minds of the people, the borders had become difficult to cross and the criminals were in charge of the state.

Now, the state - the UK State I mean - is slowly gathering the same tools as Mugabe and his co-horts use into its power. Is it sane or rational to permit the state to have this power. No it isn't. Is is sane or rational to permit further power even if there is no intention to use it - yet? No it isn't. I would also contend that the state is already using its powers to stifle legitimate dissent.

If the state had a choice of your life, or the destruction of the state, which would it choose? Not your life, so the state is, regardless, your ultimate enemy whatever platitudes may be spoken in its favour. Don't give it more power.

Regards

Richard.



<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[ccscott49]

Re: wow

I agree with your views and sentiments, DNA, no way any government is getting mine willingly, unless of course they already have it, through previous blood/urine tests etc. I wouldn't be surprised!

<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[coco]

Re: wow

Please read this little snippet from the NY Times. I think it might be of some interest to you!


Prosecutors Fight DNA Use for Exoneration

By ADAM LIPTAK


SHARPES, Fla., Aug. 26 — After seeing more than 130 prisoners freed by DNA testing in the last 15 years, prosecutors in Florida and across the country have mounted a vigorous challenge to similar new cases.

Prosecutors acknowledge that DNA testing is reliable, but they have grown increasingly skeptical of its power to prove innocence in cases where there was other evidence of guilt. Defense lawyers say these prosecutors, who often relied on the same biological evidence to convict the defendants before DNA testing was available, are more committed to winning than to justice.


The fight has become particularly heated in Florida, where prisoners will soon be barred from seeking DNA testing for old cases under a 2001 law that set an Oct. 1 deadline for such requests.

In this state, the cases of two prisoners illustrate both the power and limits of DNA testing.

In one case, Wilton Dedge was convicted of rape based in part on two light-brown hairs found in the victim's sheets here in 1981. It was the only physical evidence against him. The hairs were, the prosecutor said at his trial, "microscopically identical" to those of Mr. Dedge.

In a 1983 trial of another man, Richard McKinley, for the rape of an 11-year-old girl in Homestead, the prosecutors told the jury that semen recovered from the girl matched his blood type.

DNA testing, which was not available at the time of either trial and which was performed recently only after fierce resistance from two sets of Florida prosecutors, showed that the hairs and the semen could not have come from the defendants.

Yet both men remain in prison serving life terms, and the prosecutors who relied on the biological evidence to convict them now say the DNA testing is not proof of their innocence.

Other Florida prisoners may never have the chance to argue about whether DNA evidence exonerates them. In 2001, the state Legislature opened a two-year window for DNA retesting in older cases. The window will close on Oct. 1, after which courts cannot hear the cases of hundreds of inmates who say that testing could free them, and lawyers across the state are in a race against time to file motions on behalf of such clients.

While prosecutors concede that DNA can prove whether someone is associated with a given piece of biological evidence, they insist that is not the same thing as proving whether a defendant committed a crime.

In the cases of Mr. Dedge and Mr. McKinley, for example, the prosecutors say that the remaining evidence in those cases was strong enough to uphold the men's convictions.

Defense lawyers say these arguments amount to prosecutorial vindictiveness. Prosecutors respond that it is time to reconsider the power of DNA evidence, saying its usefulness in many cases is overstated.

The debate about the value of DNA evidence also rages in other states.

In Houston, prosecutors have resisted an appeal for an unconditional pardon by Josiah Sutton, who was cleared by DNA testing in a 1998 rape and has been freed. The victim continues to maintain that she identified the right man.

"If this is not categorically dispositive evidence of innocence," said David Dow, a lawyer for Mr. Sutton, referring to the results of the DNA testing of sperm collected from the victim, "there is no such thing."

Chuck Rosenthal, the district attorney in Houston, saw things differently. "From the standpoint of the law, he's innocent until proven guilty," he said.

"Whether he's actually innocent, I don't know," he said. "I'm not about to call the victim in this case a liar."

Mr. Dow said this exchange illustrates a trend. "What we're seeing is a double standard," he said. "Evidence will be considered more than sufficient by prosecutors if it establishes guilt and questionable or insufficient if it established innocence."

Barry Scheck, the cofounder of the Innocence Project at Cardozo Law School in New York, said prosecutors in New York, Illinois and many Texas counties have embraced DNA testing. But in Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi and New Mexico, Mr. Scheck said, prosecutors often resisted testing requests on the ground that even a positive result would not conclusively establish innocence.

On Monday, for instance, Lonnie Erby was released in St. Louis after 17 years in prison for rape. The prosecutor there, Jennifer Joyce, had opposed efforts to perform DNA testing, calling it pointless because tests could not conclusively clear Mr. Erby, since biological evidence was available in only two of three rapes with which he was charged. She changed her mind after testing excluded him as a suspect in those rapes.

In Florida, Mr. Dedge had to sue to have the evidence in his case retested, over the objections of prosecutors who said that the state's interest in finality and the victim's feelings should preclude it.

Judge Winifred J. Sharp dissented in a 1998 appeal ruling that initially turned down his request. "The results of the tests, if successfully performed, will likely be absolutely conclusive of either guilt or innocence," she wrote.

The tests were performed in 2000. Though the victim said that only she, her sister and the rapist could have left the hairs in her sheets, the tests excluded the sisters and Mr. Dedge.

But prosecutors say that Mr. Dedge has not proved his innocence or his entitlement to a new trial. They rely on three other pieces of evidence against him.

The victim, who was 17 at the time, identified him. But she first said that her assailant was 6 feet tall, weighed 200 pounds and had a hairline receding to the point of baldness. Mr. Dedge is more than six inches shorter than that and weighs about 145 pounds; at the time of the crime, according to court records, he was about 125 pounds. He still sports a full head of hair.

A prison informant testified that Mr. Dedge had confessed to him in a passing conversation. The informant received a 120-year reduction in his sentence in exchange for his testimony. A truck confiscated by the state was also released to the informant's wife as part of the same deal.

And an expert witness was allowed to testify that his dog had compared the victim's sheets three months after the rape to a selection of sheets from the local jail and had picked out Mr. Dedge's sheets. Such "scent line-ups" have since been questioned by the Florida courts.

In June, a trial judge, J. Preston Silvernail of Brevard Circuit Court in Viera, ruled that Mr. Dedge could pursue his motion for exoneration.

"There is," he wrote, "a reasonable probability that the defendant would have been acquitted if the DNA evidence excluding the defendant as the contributor of the pubic hair had been introduced at trial." Prosecutors appealed that decision.

Robert Wayne Holmes, the prosecutor in the case, did not return repeated calls for comment. In court papers, he emphasized the justice system's interest in finality, the hardship that a retrial would inflict on the victim and the strength of the remaining evidence. "The fact that it can now be said that the defendant was not the source of the hair has little significance," he wrote.

Mr. Dedge, a steely man who wore a bright-red prison jump suit, handcuffs and leg shackles during an interview at the detention center in Cocoa, Fla., disputed that.

"They used it against me," he said of the hair evidence, "and now they say it doesn't matter."

Mr. Dedge, now 41, presented six witnesses at his trial who said he was working as an auto mechanic and was on the job at the time of the rape.

In the McKinley case, prosecutors concede that DNA testing of the sperm found in a rape of an 11-year-old girl shows that it could not have come from the defendant. The prosecutors now say that doesn't matter. "The DNA is a sideshow," said Edward Griffith, a spokesman for the Miami-Dade state attorney's office.

More important than the DNA, Mr. Griffith said, was a police officer's testimony that he saw Mr. McKinley atop the girl with his pants down.

The DNA evidence does not contradict that testimony, he added, because the girl had had sex with another man not long before the rape. She also said that Mr. McKinley had not ejaculated.

Testimony about the girl's earlier sexual encounter was excluded under a Florida law that bars introduction of a victim's sexual history in a rape trial. "That's insane," said Mr. Scheck, who represents Mr. McKinley in his current request. "Whoever had sex with an 11-year-old committed a crime."

He said that Mr. McKinley deserved at least a retrial. "There is no question that the prosecution took the position at trial that the semen came from McKinley," he said.

Other prisoners in Florida may never be able to seek DNA testing because of the Oct. 1 deadline. Almost 500 inmates have contacted lawyers and groups that represent potentially innocent people asking for help in reviewing transcripts, finding evidence and making motions. Teams of volunteer lawyers and law students are working furiously to beat the deadline.

They have been able to review about 280 cases, said Jennifer Greenberg, the director of the Florida Innocence Initiative, and have concluded that about 20 have viable DNA-based innocence claims. Each will now require quick and intensive litigation to file motions before the deadline.

Many other files remain unexamined, and letters keep arriving. "We have 202 people for whom we've done nothing," Ms. Greenberg said. "We've been inundated."

Defense lawyers plan to ask the Florida Supreme Court to extend the deadline, and they hold out hope that federal courts would allow retesting even after the deadline passes.

But these lawyers say they are concerned with one aspect of the testing law: Except in death penalty cases, in which biological evidence must be saved until 60 days after execution, the law allows the destruction of DNA evidence.

Mr. Dedge said that his experience shows the deadline should be extended. "There's no statute of limitations on murder one," he said. "How can there be a statute of limitations on proving your innocence?"




<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[salvex]

Obviously not sad enough to get some people off their soap boxes!

<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[craigbalsillie]

Remember Richard, you're only paranoid if they're not really out to get you..!!!

<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[richardandtracy]

I stand on my soap box to get a better view of the world.

You're right though. It is a real shame when families break up to the extent it doesn't occur to anyone to check up on the more frail members. To die without anybody caring is the saddest way for a life to end.

Regards

Richard.


<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[tcm]

tcm: outed as closet leftie

I don't disagree with your comments gainst an overbearing state, and I have long clamoured for a hands-off state. That being impossible regarding policing - we need police. But we don't need police with silver BMW's hauling up people for not paying road tax - we need police to protect us against career criminals. People driving down emopty motorways at 100mph in cars that are capable of 150+mph aren't career criminals - but they are a lot more traceable and "worth" a nick it seems than people who commit burglary.

Regarding the dna database - or some other method of identification - it is worryingly difficult to prove that something wasn't you. "Coco"'s post about mistaken identity is relevant - hundreds of people in prison who really shouldn't be there. Likewise, it's also impossible to prove that you are indeed you - for example the stolen identity issue with credit cards, and dole fraud of unknown proportions.

Could dna testing be obligatory if a) you commit crime and b) if you take state handouts? - or is this also a bit horrid? I find it difficult to belive, for example, that the number of people long-term incapacitated at work is actually eight times what it was in 1980 - but it is. Ariound 50% of police retire die to ill-health, and in some constabularies the figure reached over 80%. There is no doubt that many of these are genuine but i know that many are spurious - perfectly healthy people playing the system. One policewoman I know tripped over her handbag, and was signed off on full pension aged 38.

So, i think that dna testing has a place - though like you, i thinik there's a whole load of other stuff to put right first.



<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[Mirelle]

Re: tcm: outed as closet leftie

Someone summed up the Hutton enquiry, so far, on R4 yesterday as having shown the BBC to be too lax and the Government to be too heartless. Two people who had sat through the hearing in the public gallery said that they had been shocked at the loss of impartiality in, and the extent of political control over, the senior Civil Service.

About right. And I have a very clear idea of which worries me more - laxity in the BBC I dislike, but can cope with. I was never scared of the British Government before Blair, Campbell and the rest. I am now quite scared. We have the mind control apparatus - the Newspeak and Doublethink - of "1984" in our midst. Blair has wrecked the Constitution, turning the Lords into Tony's Cronies, strangling local government and so on and half of this has passed un-noticed.

Incidentally, I have never voted Conservative in my life.

<hr width=100% size=1>