Students Downloading Jihadist Material Acquitted 318
I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "Five UK students who were charged under the UK's 2000 Terrorism Act for possession of jihadist materials were acquitted after the jury found that, while they had downloaded the materials, there was no evidence that they were planning any sort of crime. The Lord Chief Justice was quoted as saying, 'Difficult questions of interpretation have been raised in this case by the attempt by the prosecution to use [this law] for a purpose for which it was not intended.'"
Re:Student or not... (Score:2, Informative)
Excuses, excuses... (Score:2, Informative)
These guys were caught because one of them wrote a "bye, I'm going to fight for Allah" note to his parents. He promised to engage in conventional warfare (as opposed to domestic terrorism). He quoted two passages from the Koran to support his position:
Surah al-baqarah 2:216: Fighting is prescribed for you, and ye dislike it. But it is possible that ye dislike a thing which is good for you, and that ye love a thing which is bad for you. But God knoweth, and ye know not.
And:
Surah at-tawbah 9:29 Fight those who believe not in God nor the Last Day, nor hold that forbidden which hath been forbidden by God and His Apostle, nor acknowledge the religion of Truth, (even if they are) of the People of the Book, until they pay the Jizya with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued.
The letter is here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/13_02_08_rajaletter1.pdf [bbc.co.uk]
I hope all of you defenders of freedom get that.
Re:Well, they are just students, after all. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:link please... (Score:4, Informative)
"By contrast, 18 U.S.C. 231(a)(1) -- like the proposed Feinstein Amendment -- arguably could be characterized as a prohibition on certain forms of speech. Section 231(a)(1) provides that: Whoever teaches or demonstrates to any other person the use, application, or making of any firearm or explosive or incendiary device, or technique capable of causing injury or death to persons, knowing or having reason to know or intending that the same will be unlawfully employed for use in, or in furtherance of, a civil disorder which may in any way or degree obstruct, delay, or adversely affect commerce or the movement of any article or commodity in commerce or the conduct or performance of any federally protected function . . . [s]hall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both. http://www.usdoj.gov/criminal/cybercrime/bombmakinginfo.html#IVA [usdoj.gov] "
link here [usdoj.gov] May just be violation of 1st...
Re:link please... (Score:4, Informative)
The reason to know is a bit wishy washy, but it's probably just a catch all for situations where you have a guy who goes into a room full of plans to blow something up claiming he didn't know that's what they were going to do with the bomb.
Personally I think this law is probably pretty much unecessary, as IMO, knowingly providing someone the means to commit an illegal act in this fashion should be covered under "conspiracy to commit _______" offense tree.
It's not illegal to sell a man a gun, but if someone asks you to sell him a gun so he can murder his wife you're treading on dangerous ground if you do it, and five years and a fine is probably pretty lenient.
Re:Well, they are just students, after all. (Score:3, Informative)
Americans were criticized for unsportsmanlike conduct, such as specific targeting of officers by sharpshooters. But it's a complete myth that we fought the British mostly by small skirmishes. The simple fact was, it was a large standing army, fought in traditional fashion, that eventually defeated the British (with the help of a Naval blockade). George Washington led this army from the front lines, and it's a miracle he was never even touched by a bullet or cannon fire.
I know that America-bashing is all the rage these days, but to casually equate the folks who founded the US with modern terrorism is such a ridiculous notion, I really don't even know where to begin except to recommend you educate yourself. Yes, it's foolish to believe that the founding fathers were somehow infallible, or not without faults, but all in all, they were a remarkable group of people who are worth learning about with an open mind.
I've got no qualms about making sure hard-won liberties are not easily surrendered, but leave our "rebel" ancestors out of this.
Bad summary. (Score:3, Informative)
They were all originally found guilty, and sentenced to "up to" 3 years each, just for possessing a few dodgy pamphlets and recordings of "extremist sermons".
The appeals court (luckily a Court of Note in the UK, which means this does set a precedent) decided that in order to convict, the prosecution had to show intent to commit terrorist offences. The convictions were quashed because the jury was not told this, and the prosecution evidence would probably not have demonstrated it if they had been.
There's a whole bunch of these 'going equipped' style laws in the UK, where the courts presume to know why you were doing something that, without the intent to commit a crime in the future, would not be illegal.
Re:Student or not... (Score:5, Informative)
Obligatory RMS link: The Right to Read [gnu.org]. In many situations, reading is already a crime. Thank you for your attention. Carry on :)
Re:Free speech in the UK? (Score:5, Informative)
I don't like to whinge but this is really starting to bug me, there are no British courts. There is English law based on precedent and Scots law [wikipedia.org] based on jurisprudence [wikipedia.org].
It may seem like a semantic difference but it is in fact like saying North American law rather than Canadian and US. It is also important to Scots historically because it is one of the few things that were kept after the act of union with England.
Re:Free speech in the UK? (Score:4, Informative)
The House of Lords in the context or parliament is the non-democratically selected load of old codgers that was gutted by both parties in an attempt to make the British political system more responsive to change.
The House of Lords in the context of Law is the English equivalent of the Supreme Court. The Lords who sit and decide cases in regards to law are only selected from high ranking judges.
They also get to sit in the Parliamentary House of Lords above but this does not work both ways. The Hereditary Peers (land owners who inherited their position in the Parliamentary House of Lords) have never been able to sit as Law Lords unless they also trained to be a barrister then spent their entire life practicing Law first.
The only exception to this when all Lords (not just Law Lords) can decide a case is in the case of impeachment.
Your comment about them owning most of the land implies that you think both bodies to be the same thing, they are not.
The following wikipedia page has some interesting info, pay attention to the section marked Judicial Functions.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Lords [wikipedia.org]
Re:Well, they are just students, after all. (Score:3, Informative)
In 1765, the Sons of Liberty were formed in response to the Stamp Act, they threatened violence upon anyone selling the stamps. (The stamps were designations that the appropriate tax had been paid on the article.) "In Boston, the Sons of Liberty burned the records of the vice-admiralty court and looted the elegant home of the chief justice, Thomas Hutchinson." - wikipedia [wikipedia.org] (yes, its not a great authoritative source, but its handy and these aren't facts in dispute.)
In 1767, the Boston Massacre, a major incident where British soldiers fired upon civilians, was instigated by the civilians first mobbing and pelting the soldiers with debris.
In 1772, American patriots burned a British warship.
In 1773, a group of men dumped £10,000 worth of tea in to the harbor in the Boston Tea Party.
In 1774, in response to the passing of several British acts (The Intolerable Acts), the First Continental Congress called for the formation of militias.
In 1775, when the British sent a regiment to seize a stockpile of the growing insurgencies arms, a skirmish erupted resulting in 273 British casualties. The insurgents laid seige to Boston and eventually the British were forced to evacuate the city.
In 1776, the Declaration of Independence was issued.
Now, I've made sure to cast the revolutionaries in a poor light, here, because that's the sort of news the British would be receiving back in London. It wasn't until after the battle of Concord and Lexington in 1775 that the Continental Army would formally be created.
So, terrorists or not?
The Lords are not perfect (Score:3, Informative)
Actually, there might be something to be said for dividing the peerage system and House of Lords into two distinct Houses, such that one represented the economically powerful - the latterday Barons - and the other represented the intellectually powerful - a "purist" meritocratic House.
Another thing I like is that Lords and the Royal Family have no vote in elections. At least, they're not supposed to have one. They pay taxes and have representation, but their representation is in the form of the second House, not in the makeup of the first. In the same way that the Commons aren't supposed to have influence over who is in the Lords, the Lords aren't supposed to have influence over who is in the Commons. Along those same lines, the Lords cannot "impeach" anyone in the House of Commons, or vice versa.
It's not a flawless system, it has evolved through thousands of years of experimentation and theorizing, but it has evolved into something very close to what is likely to be the best intermediate/compromise form of democratic Governance, as described by Plato.
Plato imagined a democracy might avoid degenerating into what is dictatorship by anything other than name by a two-fold approach. He rationalized that although democracy is a powerful tool, people are easily manipulated and can be swayed into folly by a good enough talker, that this was a fixable problem - you just needed good enough education and good enough dissemination of information - but that this would take time. You needed an imperfect, temporary workaround where you had a hybrid democracy/meritocracy, where (in principle) the flaws in each of these systems is negated - or at least held in check - by the strengths of the other. Once the population is strong enough and smart enough, then you don't need the workaround.
The English system is a thousand miles from Plato's idealized intermediate system, but if it works better than solutions even further away, we should learn what we can from it, not junk it as "old-fashioned".