8 January 201116 December 2022 4WardEverUK

Police killings and the law

originally by: International Socialism
4th January 2011

Many people, even those of us with little or no illusions in the police, felt a deep sense of shock and outrage when on 22 July 2010 the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) announced that there would be no prosecution of PC Simon Harwood, who was filmed striking Ian Tomlinson shortly before he died during the G20 protests in April 2009.

What made the announcement especially perverse was the date on which it was made, the fifth anniversary of the killing by the Metropolitan Police of Jean Charles de Menezes, a killing that also failed to result in any criminal prosecution of the police officers concerned.

3 January 201116 December 2022 4WardEverUK

More sentenced to die while executing none

originally by: latimes.com
29th December 2010

California continued to buck a nationwide trend away from costly and litigious death sentences in 2010, adding 28 new prisoners to the country’s most populous death row, according to correction officials and a national database on capital punishment. Los Angeles County alone condemned eight defendants to death this year, the same number as Texas, and Riverside County sent six men to await execution, officials said.

The state’s death chamber was idle for a fifth year, though, because of protracted legal challenges of lethal injection practices and a nationwide shortage of the key drug used in the three-injection procedure.

24 December 201016 December 2022 4WardEverUK

Convicted wife killer freed from prison

originally by: BBC News
published: 23rd December 2010

A man who has always maintained he was wrongly convicted of murdering his pregnant wife has been released from prison on parole. Eddie Gilfoyle, 49, was found guilty of killing his wife Paula, who was found hanged in the garage of the couple’s home in Upton, Wirral in 1992. Prosecutors claimed he had fooled the 32-year-old into writing a suicide note before tying a noose around her neck.

The Parole Board said Gilfoyle was not allowed to speak to the media. He was released from Sudbury Prison in Derbyshire on Wednesday with conditions attached to his licence.