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In reply to the discussion: Bullied Teen Stabs and kills tormentor [View all]spin
(17,493 posts)28. Looking at the UK regulation on knives...
you can get in a world of trouble if caught carrying a pair of scissors in public.
Knife legislation
***snip***
United Kingdom
***snip***
Summary
In recent years, laws criminalising knife possession in the United Kingdom have been strictly interpreted and applied by police and prosecutors to citizens and foreigners alike of all ages and backgrounds, even where the evidence supporting the crime is in doubt.[52][58] This development, combined with increasingly frequent application of such laws to marginal or inadvertent offenders by the police and the public prosecutor[46][59][60] can easily result in an arrest and a criminal charge in the event a person carrying a folding knife, scissors, plastic knife, multi-tool, or bladed object is detained and searched, and the defendant may have to wait weeks or months for a trial or other disposition of his case by the public prosecutor.[45][58][61][62][63][64][65][66] HM Customs officials in the Customs Inspection unit at the Mount Pleasant Postal Depot in London, aware of the steadily narrowing interpretation of what constitutes a legal knife in England and Wales, have begun confiscating knives imported through the mail, going so far as to individually test otherwise legal locking and non-locking[67] bladed pocket knives to see if they can be made to open their blades to the fully opened position with a practised "double-action of the wrist"; those that open fully and thus fail the 'test' are confiscated and destroyed as illegal 'gravity knives' under the Restriction of Offensive Weapons Act 1959.[68]...emphasis added
Paradoxically, the acknowledged failure of previously enacted anti-knife legislation in reducing the number of violent crimes involving a knife[69] has led to demands for even stricter measures.[70][71] The likelihood of being detained and searched by the police in the United Kingdom depends frequently upon circumstances and the policies of the local constabulary, but is more likely to occur in areas noted for incidents of random assault and violent crime, where an individual encounters the police in the course of an investigation of a criminal complaint involving a knife, during vehicle stop-and-search operations at police checkpoints,[72] or where the police are conducting mass searches of the public at large in so-called dispersal zones as part of knife crime crackdown operations under Section 60 of the Public Order Act.[46][62][63][73][74][75]
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knife_legislation
There are also some people in the UK who would like to see the sale of pointy kitchen knives banned.
11.45am
Doctors: Ban dagger-type kitchen knives
Sarah Left and agencies
theguardian.com, Friday 27 May 2005 06.42 EDT
A group of doctors today called on the government to ban long pointed kitchen knives in an effort to reduce the number and severity of stabbings.
Knives are the most common murder weapon in Britain, and three doctors from West Middlesex University hospital in London said their experience indicated that at least half of stabbing cases involved a kitchen knife.
Writing in the British Medical Journal, Emma Hern, Will Glazebrook and Mike Beckett said the use of dagger-type kitchen knives owed more to tradition than culinary necessity. The knives, they argued, could be banned without unduly inconveniencing cooks.
The doctors quoted findings that 24% of 16-year-old boys reported carrying knives or other weapons, with 19% admitting they had attacked someone. In the first two weeks of 2005 alone, 15 murders in the UK were linked to stabbings as well as 16 other non-fatal attacks.
The doctors said many assaults were impulsive, often triggered by alcohol or other drugs, and the long pointed kitchen knife was an easily available lethal weapon, especially in the home.
http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2005/may/27/ukcrime.prisonsandprobation
I will agree that we could live in a world where the sale of firearms to civilians was illegal. That would do little to address the 300,000,000 firearms we currently have in our nation and the millions that are added every year.
I doubt if such a law will every pass in my lifetime and probably not in yours. If it did it would create a black market for firearms and some very lethal fully automatic weapons as well as more common firearms would be smuggled into our nation from other nations. Tons of illegal drugs are smuggled into our nation every year. It would be easier and very profitable to sneak firearms across our border. Also any good machine shop can manufacture firearms.
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Bullying needs to be brought under control to help stop future tragedies like this. n/t
RKP5637
Jun 2014
#13
It is murder. It is also self defense. But I wouldn't classify it as legally justified self defense.
ieoeja
Jun 2014
#51
You left out any reference to his self-defense, which comes from the OP's article:
pacalo
Jun 2014
#101
Yeah, there seems to be disagreement about whether Crump was one of the bullies.
Vattel
Jun 2014
#99
So are you saying that my mother's use of a handgun to stop her rape or murder ...
spin
Jun 2014
#39
Since you are "not making any assesment about the good or evil of a firearm" then ...
spin
Jun 2014
#70
Major thread hijack! I am all for gun control, but this is not a gun control thread. nt
tblue37
Jun 2014
#140
You are not taking the interpretation of knife seriously enough. All one needs to do is carry
MillennialDem
Jun 2014
#19
Could you get in trouble for carrying a pair of scissors in public? Yes. Is it likely if you are in
MillennialDem
Jun 2014
#43
Not to mention guns could be enforceably banned but knives never can be. There are
MillennialDem
Jun 2014
#11
Nice try on your part to call an obvious negligent discharge an accidental discharge caused by ...
spin
Jun 2014
#84
A good number of those who own firearms and practice gun safety would agree with me ...
spin
Jun 2014
#108
I did acknowledge that if the shooter did not have the weapon the incident would have never ...
spin
Jun 2014
#110
If that is the truth, you are correct. Very sad he felt there was no other way out.
NCTraveler
Jun 2014
#54
We need to recognize that those who witness bullying and do nothing are part of the problem.
KittyWampus
Jun 2014
#105
I have wondered about this a lot and wrote an article about it a few years back...
stevenleser
Jun 2014
#96
I saw another article about this in NY today that said the kid that was killed was an angel
Renew Deal
Jun 2014
#72
Sounds more like manslaughter than murder, if the allegations against the victim are true. n/t
nomorenomore08
Jun 2014
#93
So the NEIGHBORS SAW AND KNEW? They knew the kid was being abused and did nothing?
KittyWampus
Jun 2014
#104
KamaAina, I like you -- but with a fourteen year old dead and another being tried as an
fishwax
Jun 2014
#134
Whoa! It is more complicated than it seems. The kid with the knife had been recently
tblue37
Jun 2014
#142