Edwards denied murder but accepted that he had committed manslaughter on the grounds of provocation.
The jury returned a not guilty verdict to murder but guilty on the manslaughter charge.
Mr Justice Andrew Nicol, sentencing, said the events of June 11 were “the proverbial straw which broke the camel’s back”.
Jailing Edwards for five years, he noted that he had shown genuine remorse.
We\’ve been told often enough that women who suffer abuse do not react like men do. That emotional (to say nothing of physical) abuse can indeed lead to a killing but that this should not lead to murder charges, indeed, some of the more vehement tell us that it\’s all self defence, not even manslaughter.
So, when a man suffers years of such abuse and kills, should it be murder? Manslaughter? Or simply self defence?
Whole interesting question. Be careful here, we are getting into a ‘climate denier’ situation. There is only one truth. And this goes against it.
I spent some time googling the whole question of domestic violence last year and finally came up with a study of studies in the States. Can’t remember exactly but I think they had collated the results of 250 domestic violence studies. The figure they gave was aprox 42% female instigated v. 58% male instigated domestic PHYSICAL violence. No mention of psychological violence and abuse.
Here, speaking to a lawyer friend, he claimed (yes I know it is merely anecdotal) that the local police reckoned that a lot of older men dying from illness had been shuffled off by their partners who controlled their drug intake. Frightening, as they don’t investigate.
My point, merely that the whole subject is mis-researched from one politically correct point of view. And we need to go a lot deeper.
Men are bastards, the science is settled. Heard it before?
More unlawful killing than self-defence, I think, so it’s either murder or manslaughter. In this case the jury said it was not murder but it was manslaughter.
I think self defence has to be against a perceived imminent or ongoing threat.
Is anyone seriously saying that killing in response to purely emotional abuse should should count as self-defence? Or complaining about this verdict?
I think the feminists may be in your head, Tim.
Also, with the male v female physical violence thing, it’s pretty clear that instigation doesn’t prove much without reference to actual capability. People would worry more about men punching women than the other way round, because the science is pretty much settled on men punching harder than women.
A knife is a knife.
Much violence isn’t punching.
Violence is violence and any adult is capable of grievous bodily harm on another, irrespective of sex. Almost any household object is an efficient weapon for somebody thinking of violence. Size has proved to be irrelevant. The studies make that clear.
But the point is, we no longer believe that this may be a two way thing, despite the studies that contradict the PC opinion that only male on female violence is real and is of course in all cases worse, just because.
I’m not defending Edwards, nor complaining about the verdict. Actually quite a good one. It is a recognition that he wasn’t a brute and woman-beater but a man who lost it. Can we now start asking how an obviously gentle man reached a point where he lost it?
In Spain when a woman kills a man (yes it happens and usually with a knife, size doesn’t matter), it is always assumed (in the press) that she has been subjected to years of abuse and that sort of makes it OK. Double standards??
Of course we have special courts for gender (read male on female) violence and the latest debate is whether they can be used by lesbians because one is the dominant partner (seriously! not me, but our marvellous Minister for Health, Leyre Pajin).
This has lead rise to accusations (by a female magistrate among others) that men are being denounced to these courts as a bargaining chip (bargaining block of concrete actually) in divorce proceedings as the burden of proof somehow seems to shift.
Our view of violence in intimate/domestic relationships is skewed (and extremely simplistic) and ignores an enormous volume of contrarian evidence against the current simplistic PC feminist position
The whole situation (and for what its worth I think he should have been convicted of murder, as should any woman doing a similar thing – killing is only justified as self defence when you are in immediate and present danger) just makes me very glad I am not married, and plan to ensure I never am.
Pete –
” because the science is pretty much settled on men punching harder than women”
Is it?
http://radiofreestan.blogspot.com/2010/06/nothing-like-dame-no-really-nothing-at.html
@555PPS
Yes. You can always pick examples that go the other way. I don’t plans to fight Lucia Rijker any time soon. But it’s silly to pretend that, on average, women are going to come off better in violent confrontations.
@Bilbao Boy
Wasn’t suggesting that you’d be complaining about the verdict. But that’s the point. The feminists were the ones who lobbied for the law on manslaughter to be changed so that it can accommodate precisely this sort of situation, in which a sufferer of long term abuse snaps.
So now (nearly?) the first person to make use of the revised defence is a man. If the feminists had turned round and said “Hang on, it was only meant to be about protecting women, this is unfair”, then there’d be some grounds for bitching. But everyone seems to think that the law the laws working exactly as it should. Except for Tim’s straw-feminists.
Two words: Mary. Winkler.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Winkler
I love the bit: “She told a jury of ten women and two men that her husband often “berated” her and forced her to wear “slutty” costumes for sex. As proof she displayed a pair of high-heeled shoes and a wig to which those in attendance gasped.” Yes… they *gasped*.
“I just wanted him to stop being so mean,” she said through tears.
She served 7 months for shooting her husband in the back while he lay on the bed, and within a month of her release she was on Oprah… you Go Girl!
@Pete
“But it’s silly to pretend that, on average, women are going to come off better in violent confrontations.”
No, it’s down-right stupid to make black n white statements in such cases. For many men, indeed, likely most, hitting a woman isn’t the done thing. For the feminists, who apparently only exist in Tim’s head, men are baaaad, women are nice. And lesbian DV does not exist, since sugar and spice + sugar and spice = lots of niceness.
@ irritable bile syndrome
“No, it’s down-right stupid to make black n white statements in such cases.”
You’ll thus be pleased to have another read and see the words “on average.”
I’d also point out that the idea that women suck at violence didn’t really begin with feminism. If society believes it, I don’t think we can lay that one entirely at feminism’s door. Case in point: Mary Winkler. Looks to me like it was a bible thumping town that viewed wigs and slutty shoes the same way most of us view bestiality “And him a man of the cloth!” I’m not saying it was a smart verdict, but I don’t think it happened because the jury was packed full of professors of gender studies.
The feminists who are upset about this verdict are the ones who exist in Tim’s head. There are such things as actual feminists, obviously. I will even concede that some of them are immensely irritating. On the other hand, if there were no feminists, Edwards might be facing life right now, because the law on provocation wouldn’t have been changed:
http://failuresforgodesses.blogspot.com/2009/01/women-in-uk-license-to-kill-men.html
In the face of all that they got the law through, and the first person to benefit from it is a man, in what everyone seems to agree is a manifestly just result. So I don’t see how we get to “Grr, feminists suck” from there.