Chinese execute Brit!!!!

[señor ding dong]

The laws of each country are soveriegn and paramount to the corect function of that country - it is not acceptable to seek to apply presure to another soveriegn power in order to alter the outcome of there judicial process.

It is, however, perfectly acceptable to try and get them to follow their own judicial process, which, given that this man had been diagnosed with at least two mental disorders, would have required at the very least a second opinion. However, the matter was dismissed out of hand by people who were not qualified to do so, and the "trial" was over in less than half an hour. I wonder what the Chinese word for "kangaroo court" is?

Lets face it this guy was clearly not some globetrotting wannabe pop star, on a fairy tale mission to make fookin records - he was in China, who travels from britain to china to make a fookin record ffs.

Off the top of my head, Lisa Scott Lee. In all seriousness, China is actually a breeding ground for most of the cheap, vile, generic, non-brand pop that used to be sold at European rest stops. I'm not sure what the current state of that particular "scene" is, but there's still a huge industry in China that produces the sort of music you couldn't imagine anyone would ever buy. They don't just make cheap knock-off t-shirts and watches over there.

I'm curious, though. Do you think the years he spent in Europe trying to become a pop star, performing at grubby pubs, and filming this odd music video, was all a cunning plan to help him escape punishment, if he were ever caught smuggling drugs in China for a man he would only meet years later? This would almost make him something of a criminal mastermind with a remarkable degree of foresight and attention to detail. So what do you think? Does this guy strike you as that kind of a person, or is it more likely he was just a bit nuts?

 

[stevemac40]

Gonna disagree with you on this one steve, I don't think we are in any kind of position to think that we hold any moral high ground over the Chinese. Their judicial system is different to ours, it should be as they have appx 20 times our population. It's a different culture altogether and I wouldn't agree that we are more civilised than them just because we condemn the death penalty, that's a tad arrogant.

So far as human rights go we have no regard for them, just take a look at our foreign policy and the millions dead.

China is close to the top of the list (if not top) for having the worst human rights records, only countries that have been involved in more widespread genocide than the Chinese come near.
I don't think it's a case of culture but more the political structure having a lower regard for human life. Capital Punishemnt is used in China for many offences which any civilised society (okay, the yardstick im using here is my own beliefs and that of the majority of the Western World) would consider a little extreme (such as fraud, theft, corruption, poaching).
Although I agree that we have a poor foreign policy, I think it a little odd to compare ours unfavourably against that of China.

 

[TBC]

you make the point well that this man was well travelled and capable of looking after himself, indeed it would be unreasonable to assume he wasn't.
The very real question at hand is not entirely is mental capacity, it is infact wether this mental capacity was so diminished by illness as to excuse or lessen the gravity of his offence! The law is for the protection of victims and potential victims, punishments are so wieghted as to be proportionate to the percieved threat of the offence upon the populace.
If this man were indeed found to be suffering some form of mental illness does it diminish the crime or abstain him from punishment altogether - the answer is no!! Wether we wish that to be the case or not it must be..

Of course that is only my view doubtless it is unlikely to be shared, but it doesn't need to be lol.

 

[stevemac40]

Yes here a some below

Bahamas
Dominica
Jamaica
United States
Trinidad and Tobago
Singapore
St. Kitts and Nevis
St. Lucia
St. Vincent and the Grenadines
Malaysia

You're having a laugh aren't you, these are the ones I could find listed:

Murders per capita:

Jamiaca 3rd 0.324196 per 1,000
US 24th 0.042802 per 1,000
Dominca 28th 0.0289733 per 1,000
Malaysia 34th 0.0230034 per 1,000

UK 46th 0.0140633 per 1,000

Get outside the tourist resorts and a lot of the places you have mentioned become nasty places.


Theres a whole host of other international crime statistics here
Murders (per capita) statistics - countries compared - NationMaster

 

[stevemac40]

you make the point well that this man was well travelled and capable of looking after himself, indeed it would be unreasonable to assume he wasn't.
The very real question at hand is not entirely is mental capacity, it is infact wether this mental capacity was so diminished by illness as to excuse or lessen the gravity of his offence! The law is for the protection of victims and potential victims, punishments are so wieghted as to be proportionate to the percieved threat of the offence upon the populace.
If this man were indeed found to be suffering some form of mental illness does it diminish the crime or abstain him from punishment altogether - the answer is no!! Wether we wish that to be the case or not it must be..

Of course that is only my view doubtless it is unlikely to be shared, but it doesn't need to be lol.

It's not a view that is shared by law, neither UK nor Chinese. It's not the fact that he was mentally responsible for his actions, it was the fact that the correct processes weren't carried out to establish if he was mentally responsible.

 

[señor ding dong]

If this man were indeed found to be suffering some form of mental illness does it diminish the crime or abstain him from punishment altogether - the answer is no!! Wether we wish that to be the case or not it must be.

The issue was about whether this supposed mental illness could be cause for diminished responsibility, as the provisions of Chinese law clearly allow. The outcome of a mental evaluation should have then given a clearer picture of his mental state, which would be considered when it came to sentencing, or indeed to the validity of the exact case against him. It's not for you or me to say what the outcome might have been, but given his history and a pre-existing diagnosis, the matter of his mental health should at the very least have been investigated, and it wasn't.

 

[emarald]

You're having a laugh aren't you, these are the ones I could find listed:

Murders per capita:

Jamiaca 3rd 0.324196 per 1,000
US 24th 0.042802 per 1,000
Dominca 28th 0.0289733 per 1,000
Malaysia 34th 0.0230034 per 1,000

UK 46th 0.0140633 per 1,000

Get outside the tourist resorts and a lot of the places you have mentioned become nasty places.


Theres a whole host of other international crime statistics here
Murders (per capita) statistics - countries compared - NationMaster

You forgot to mention in that list the top 3 safest countries
Japan
Saudi Arabia
Qatar
All have the death penalty.

Some other's you did not mention.

Total crimes (most recent) by country
UK 2nd
Rapes (most recent) by country
UK 7th
Assault victims (most recent) by country
UK 2nd
Burglaries (most recent) by country
UK 3rd
Car thefts (most recent) by country
UK 2nd
Drug offences (most recent) by country
UK 2nd
Kidnappings (most recent) by country
UK 1st

 

[stevemac40]

You're right I didn't mention those countries as they weren't on your list of countries you'd move to.

The other crimes you have listed don't attract the death penalty in many of the countries so I didn't feel it added anything to the debate.
Though if you do want to compare the other crimes then you may want to reflect on the report rate (ie are these crimes more widely reported by the victims in the UK than in other countries). The murder rate is gonna be a fairly straightforward benchmark as there isn't going to be an onous on the victim to report this crime, but we do digress.

 

[Munkey]

China is close to the top of the list (if not top) for having the worst human rights records, only countries that have been involved in more widespread genocide than the Chinese come near.

Like a lot of Africa? I'd say Africa as a continent is much worse.

China's judicial system is not perfect, I doubt a perfect one exists. Yes China has a poor human rights record but some countries need to be ruled with a big stick, pretend democracy doesn't work everywhere.