dupe?
Is this another incidence of pretty much the same thing or is it just a really old story?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1063933/Pictured-The-thief-forced-boss-walk-shame-town-guess-ended-arrested.html
Boss frogmarches bound employee to cop shop
An Essex boss who discovered one of his employees had stolen and cashed a company cheque frogmarched the miscreant to a police station with his hands tied behind his back and a sign round his neck reading "thief", the Times reports. Carpet fitter Mark Gilbert, 39, swiped the cheque from Witham-based In House Flooring, wrote it …
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Friday 28th November 2008 14:55 GMT EvilJason
Already seen this in the paper a while ago
I have seen this in the paper a while ago and there are a few things that where left out of the summery.
When the boss found the bounced check he did not know at the time that the employee had tried to steal anything he just suspected it, that he was proven right by the guy admitting it later but at the time it was just a suspicion.
The boss got a few other employees to go with him when they tackled the guy and bound his hands behind his back and put a sign around his neck saying thief, not once did the boss even ask the employee did he steal anything he just jumped to conclusion.
The boss and his other employees did not march the guy straight to the nearest police station he marched the guy with the sign around his neck all around town asking him stand in the center of town for a while before bringing him to the police station.
They where all arrested on different charges.
The boss was renting the place where they worked and was given a one months notice to get out by the landlord when he heard what the boss had done.
The boss said later that he can now understand what he did wrong but he is unapologetic about what he did.
Before anyone tries to defend the bosses right to do what he did remember he took it upon himself to be police,judge,juror,and executor of punishment of the law BEFORE any investigation either private or by the police was done.
If the employee was innocent what the boss did was inexcusable BUT even if the employee was guilty that does not justify what the boss did.
Imagine if everyone took the law into there own hands on crimes against them that they SUSSPECT happened.
-Jason
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Friday 28th November 2008 14:59 GMT Anonymous Coward
no.. No.. NO.. N O!!!
... This runs in line with not talking back to the 'hoody' in fear that you'll get your collar felt by the Fuzz!
FFs.. Ok, not sure about the violence and brandishing of tools, but you can make a citizens arrest and cuff a miscreant. Stop this fool-hardy abonishment of crime preventing citizens and through the book at the stupid prick who decided to nick a check...
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Friday 28th November 2008 20:00 GMT Tom
@EvilJason
"Before anyone tries to defend the bosses right to do what he did remember he took it upon himself to be police,judge,juror,and executor of punishment of the law BEFORE any investigation either private or by the police was done."
It sounds to me like he only took it upon himself to be the Police - he just effectively arrested him and took him to the Police station, he didn't send him to court or to prison. People get arrested on suspicion of having done something all the time - if fact that's all they ever get arrested for, it's only suspicion until it has been proven in court! I agree that making an example of him around town was too much though, but seems like the lesser of 2 evils.
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Friday 28th November 2008 20:00 GMT Sir Runcible Spoon
@Jason
Thanks goodness I'm not the only insane person on here who thinks two wrongs don't make a right.
This chap worked for him ,yes? So he knows his address, NI, Tax number, Car Reg probably. Not likely to skip the country for trying to nick £845 quid.
Answer : Report to police, let them handle it, it's what we pay them for.
Physical restraint has to be justified and proprtionate, even for the police. If you're a cashcow^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H Citizen, then you have to be doubly sure.
Not saying what the guy did was right, but tying him up and humiliating him wasn't exactly by the book was it?
Oh, and where's IT angle? :P
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Friday 28th November 2008 20:00 GMT Keith T
Member of Parliment who routinely makes citizens arrests?
Doesn't Britain still have that Member of Parliment who routinely makes citizens arrests?
I wonder what he'd have to say about this? "Citizens in uniform" treating honest citizens doing their duty as citizens like this.
The only false imprisonement I see is what the police are doing, and sadly the law allows them to make false imprisionments with impunity.
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Friday 28th November 2008 20:02 GMT Anonymous Coward
Sounds like they were both wrong
I hate thieves, but also don't much care for belligerent assholes that like to take the law into their own hands, especially for a non-violent crime. I think citizens arrest may be useful in some circumstances (eg. you spot someone being raped and by the time the police arrived, the crime would long be over), but also think that if "Dudley Doright" gets their head bashed in while trying to practice this sanctioned vigilantism on someone that sees the situation differently (like a petty theft suspect), that they should accept what they get. I don't much care for cops, but at least if someone is getting arrested by the police, they're being taken in by someone with training, and there's often a video record of the proceedings.
Don't taze me bro...
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Friday 28th November 2008 20:14 GMT Alan W. Rateliff, II
Just punishment
Foregoing the alleged violence, I believe that the boss should be perfectly within his rights to march a thief down to the cop shop like this. A little more public humiliation would go a long way. While "the system" may be geared towards the rights of the accused, I believe that it often goes too far to deprive rights from the accuser. In a number of cases to which I am directly familiar, an employee fired for theft was subsequently awarded unemployment benefits.
So much gets to be swept under the rug that many repeat offenders get to hide their transgressions from the public view.
When I was around five years old, I got caught enjoying the bounty of a recent trip to the local shop with my mother in which she shopped and I pilfered a pack of bubble gum. Upon being caught, I was marched right up to the store and forced to confess my crime to the store manager and apologize. Sure, I was embarrassed and in tears the entire time, but that is an experience which has stuck with me my entire life.
Most criminals do not like to be outed, they like to get away with things, or at least feel they got away scott-free.
Paris, confess your crime!
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Saturday 29th November 2008 09:01 GMT Anonymous Coward
Citizens arrests
In England and Wales at least, are only permissible if the citizen catches someone *in the process of committing a crime*, or to a lesser degree to prevent a crime. Anything else is potentially false imprisonment.
Also in England we have the premise of innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. So making someone wear a sign saying thief before they have been convicted of said thievery in not really acceptable.
As for all the support of vigilantism, has everyone else forgotten such gems as the victimisation of a paediatrician because the mob thought paediatrician was the same thing as a paedophile?
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Saturday 29th November 2008 09:01 GMT EvilJason
Re:
Funny thing was the guy was on 1000 quid per week wage as it said in the paper so that is why it was so odd that he was supposed to have stolen the 800 and odd on the cheque.
The problem with this is not that he was held and marched to the police but that he was degraded by having a sign put around his neck proclaiming him a thief BEFORE he was found guilty.
Also you can only citizens arrest someone if the crime carries a maximum sentence of over 2 years in prison other wise its illegal to hold someone against there will for a minor crime.
All the boss had to do was call the police as the employee did not suspect a thing and was not likely to run before they got there, it seams the boss wanted to punish the guy himself then hand him over which is wrong as he is not authorised by the public to dispense justice.
-Jason
-I'm evil for a given value of evil - (for thoughts like remove all the "stupid" safety stickers from everything and let nature take its course)
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Saturday 29th November 2008 09:01 GMT Zero Sum
Boss stuffed up
Aren't there pretty stringent restrictions on making a "citizen's arrest"? (Depending on jurisdiction.)
I doubt that tying up a white collar criminal and publicly humiliating him would fall under the conditions necessary. Especially if he wasn't informed that he was under citizen's arrest. Don't know the details of the case, but it sounds like the boss screwed things up.
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Saturday 29th November 2008 09:01 GMT david wilson
@Tom
>>"It sounds to me like he only took it upon himself to be the Police - he just effectively arrested him and took him to the Police station,"
AFAIK, the police aren't allowed to march *suspects* through the street with signs round their necks, and citizens generally have less right to do things to people and get away with it than the police.
Since it was deeply predictable that police would at least have to investigate any complaint from the suspect, it's clear that there was no way the manager was saving them work, but was, at best, wasting some of their time, and doing so in a way that had at least a possibility of reducing the punishment the suspect eventually received.
I'd imagine one significant reason for the police frowning on actions such as this is that there's always a chance that some passing citizen decides to have a go at the suspect. With a more serious crime, it wouldn't be at all hard for a situation to get out of control, and that would all ultimately fall at the feet of the person who decided they'd rather go out of their way to not bother calling the police.
One of the main reasons for having a justice system in the first place is to try and avoid people taking the law into their own hands, not least because the people most eager to do that are often the ones most likely to overdo it.
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Saturday 29th November 2008 09:01 GMT Anonymous Coward
What's worse ...
Is there are two people here trying to defend the Police!!
"it's too hard to catch and prosecute the bad guy, we'll go after Joe Public instead"
Sure, if the guy was innocent then the boss is up s**t creek, however given the guy is admitting to the crime (oh, yes, let's remember theft is a crime!) how on earth can you say the boss was wrong?!
It's not like he broke the guy's arms on the way to the Police station ?!
(although I bet he was tempted ..)
And (!) how come this guy admits to stealing 800 quid, then only gets a caution ???? It's hardly a deterrent .. if your chances (police stats) of catting caught for theft are 1 in 10, you could make a packet all for the price of a caution !!! Bloody ridiculous!!!
The next chap who catches someone stealing must be thinking, "not worth turning him in, there's no penalty .. so what's the alternative .. ?"
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Saturday 29th November 2008 09:01 GMT Anonymous Coward
Police had no choice
Greetings tabloid brigade.
Before you get your self-righteous knickers in any more of a twist, try and consider what a court would have made of the case had they charged the thief.
Of course the right thing to do would have been to charge and prosecute the bloke "wot done it". But by marching him through town, with his hands bound and a placard around his neck the business owner and hangers on managed to sabotage any chance of a fair hearing. The case would have been thrown right out of court, and you'd all be on here complaining about the waste of taxpayers' money in addition to a new round of 'what is the country coming to'.
I do agree it's a bit much to charge the boss and the other assailants (as that's what they are). The fact that they've totally ruined the chance of getting a successful prosecution against the perpetrator should be punishment enough.
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Saturday 29th November 2008 09:01 GMT Shane Lusby
BOOTNOTES!!!
For every bloody comment about 'Wheres the IT angle, whine whine whine' READ THE CATAGORY. Its Bootnotes. If you're not familiar with the boot notes section, go take a look. Its anything amusing that the Reg guys and gals feel like publishing that doesn't have an IT angle. So the next time you're scanning the front page, if you can't stand articles without an IT angle, don't click on the ones that are labeled bootnotes. Or if you do, don't bloody whinge about it.
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Saturday 29th November 2008 09:13 GMT Anonymous Coward
Vigilantes
the problem is if you encourage this type of behaviour everyone will be using it to settle scores.
Personally I would like to see the return of duels to settle a matter of honour, or cage fighting, but the law as it stands prevents people from doing this. Really police powers should also be severely curtailed as well.
No theft occurred, just attempted, but assault did occur.
Vigilantes, always remind me of the Devils of Loudon, easily moved into a witch hunt, and they often have huge planks in their eyes even before they go off and commit a greater crime in their faux hero antics.
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Saturday 29th November 2008 23:44 GMT Mark
re: ridiculous
That's OK, because the boss is only in jail for it, not being fried like the vigilante assasin the police know him to be.
1) Frogmarching to police OK, but unnecessary. Hanging a "Thief" sign is humiliating and illegal. As illegal as stealing. Which, apparently gets you frogmarched to the police with "theif" sign on you or risk your nuts crushed.
2) The police have solved TWO crimes. Goody for them.
3) The government and the police don't want you to know that you have power because you may not turn to them for help.
This topic is closed for new posts.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
