By John Crouch. Copyright John Crouch, 1995
Sheathe E'ermore the Burning
Lance
For the first time, Parliament authorized English police to chase
suspects into Scotland (and vice-versa) without getting a warrant
from the other nation's courts. Previously, only the actual
victim could do this, by "lawful trod with hound and horn,
with hue and cry and all other manner of fresh pursuit," and
she had to carry a burning turf on her lance and announce herself
to the first person she met to show her "open and
honest" intention.
Life-giving public policy
China executes so many people that it can provide organ transfers
for all its citizens, not to mention wealthy Americans and
Europeans. Executions are held near hospitals, and facilitators
are careful not to shoot the organs slated for recycling. In
special cases, doctors remove both kidneys before execution.
China provides the death penalty for embezzlement, car theft and
political intractability.
Pseudo-Islamic ear-swapping
Iraq's secular government imposed Islamic-based penal amputation
and face-branding this summer, televising the results intensively
for maximum deterrence. Repeat offenders lose feet, which does
not happen under real Islamic law. Last month, draft dodgers
began forfeiting their ears. Now the government is experiencing
some unsupportive reactions. A crowd in southern Iraq stormed a
local office of Sadaam Hussein's party and removed several
officials' ears. One accused thief had to use a machine gun to
pacify the doctor who chopped off his hand.
Judicial Rape
Iranian executioners rape their unmarried female victims as a
matter of official policy, because Islamic judges have ruled that
if they remain virgins they will go to heaven automatically, even
if executed, according to reports collected by the Parliamentary
Human Rights Group. Firing squad members draw lots to see who
rapes which virgin; then an Islamic judge performs a marriage.
The woman is tranquilized, raped and shot. The next day the judge
sends her family the marriage certificate and a box of candy.
Lifetime earnings sought as damages in wrongful death case
Somali Jama Adawill's family demanded sixty pregnant camels and a
woman to settle his claim against the U.N., whose soldiers killed
him when he threw a grenade into a World Food Program office.
The dark side of satanic child abuse
Bishop Auckland, a town in the North of England, enjoyed
full-blown Salem-style witch trials in recent months. It began
when two children accused their parents of leading an occult sex
abuse ring whose practices were identical to those inthe movies
Children of the Corn II, Hellraiser and certain music videos. The
parents had witnesses as to where they were during the alleged
rituals, but police would not talk to them. The children then
began accusing neighbors.
Everyone's children were seized, many were arrested, businesses
were ruined, homes were vandalized and foreclosed. The accusers'
parents spent months in jail, where the mother was beaten by
fellow-prisoners, but won bail on their 11th try. Prosecutors
dropped the case during the trial, but the parents still cannot
see their children alone.
In response, a social workers' group called for curbs on
cross-examination of children by defense lawyers. It accused
lawyers of trying to discredit children's testimony and
suggesting it was imagined.
Human rights obsolete, says liberal judge
High Court judge Sir Stephen Sedley said Britain should reject
the European Convention on Human Rights because it is "out
of date," being "based on the 19th-century paradigm of
the individual whose enemy is the state." It fails to
protect people's right not to fear "hate speech," he
charged.
Norman feudal law still reigns
In Jersey, one of the Channel Islands, lawyer/developer Richard
Falle has asserted his wife's feudal rights over tidal flats
where he wants to build a 1,200-boat marina. Under customary
Norman law, his absolute dominion extends as far as the seigneur
can ride his horse into the English Channel at low tide, and
the local government has no power over him. Jersey is in fealty
to the Crown but is not subject to Parliament, so its law has not
changed much in this millennium. This particular law probably
evolved as a way to get rid of unneeded seigneurs.
Minister Understands Youth
A loud crash interrupted Unitarian minister Robert Boyes's sermon
on "Greater Understanding of the Problems of Youth" in
Cleveland, England. A teenager had thrown a brick through Boyes's
car window. "I would love to get my hands on the little
[graphic anti-homosexual expletive] who did it so I could give
him some words of the Lord," Boyes remarked.
They Blame America For This Nonsense, You Know
Praising his "remorse," Judge Robert Pryor sentenced
Patrick Weighell to "anger management therapy" for
habitually squeezing and shaking his son, deliberately breaking
23 bones. He must keep a "hassle log" and "act
out." Weighell said he'd prefer jail. His girlfriend agreed,
"He's a bastard. I never want to see him again."
It Couldn't Happen Here
Prodded by a Parliamentary committee, Britain's Child Support
Agency said it would pay reparations to men it wrongly accused of
being deadbeat dads, and to others who suffered great distress
from its mistakes, in addition to paying damages for the
financial harm it has caused.
Spare The Rod, Spoil Civilization
Prison never rehabilitates, and only deters those who haven't
been there, said seven leading British judges. Judge Laws
demanded "retribution," not therapeutic "social
control" that denies the existence of free will. He sought
less wasteful "means of making criminals suffer" as
they used to when flogged or pilloried, and praised weekend jail.
Suspended sentences "scared" convicts straight but were
banned in 1991, Lord Acker recalled. He said the true problem was
permissive, amoral parenting. Judge Tuckey advised legalizing
"possibly all drugs."
Euro-Suit against Support Agency
Henry Logan of Denny, Scotland, sued the Child Support Agency in
the European Court of Human Rights for doubling his payments so
he cannot afford to visit his children. If he does not visit, his
ex may get his visiting rights revoked. The European Convention
on Human Rights protects the right to "private and family
life" against state "interference."
Jurassic Court
An Israeli rabbinical court told a dairy to take dinosaurs off
its milk carton labels or lose kosher status, on the grounds that
the ungainly creatures cast a doubtful shadow over the book of
Genesis.
Racial Purity Law
France now has a policy of preventing citizens from marrying
people from its former colonies. Most courts uphold it.
Shake Hands with Mr. Snake
Capital convicts should have to wrestle cobras in public
aquariums, said Manila judge Maximiliano Asuncion.
"Get tough" on deadbeats by being one
Pip Spencer received a parking ticket for $33 million in Moulton,
Engl. He has seven days to pay. (London Times). Spencer actually
need not worry; he can simply use a technique the Child Support
Agency pioneered. When Keith Richards of Co. Durham, Engl. won
$2,975.00 in an appeal against the agency, it said it would pay
the judgment at $2.25 a week. It had increased his support
payments 470 percent.
Whips, bondage needed
Juries should be able to recommend such public and corporal
punishments as flogging and the pillory, said former Solicitor
General Lord McCluskey, a Scottish High Court judge, because
prison "doesn't deter, it doesn't rehabilitate, it doesn't
[make] wrong-doers suffer, it is desperately expensive" and
it leaves prisoners' families destitute.
Feelings = Rights
Under the Children Act, a juvenile sentenced to get a free
vacation in Belize has the right to have his sentence carried out
and have his "feelings and wishes" considered, a
British review panel held.
U.N. Treaty Bans Spanking
Countries that have ratified the 1991 U.N. Convention on the
Rights of the Child must ban spanking, according to the U.N.
Committee on the Rights of the Child.
EC Fights Waste
Stale bread is "waste," so the English cannot feed it
to swans without $3,000 licenses, the EC decreed. "Nothing
surprises us about Brussels any more," said one pro-wildlife
group spokesman. Others endorsed a massive bombing campaign to
address the underlying causes of the European Community's
concerns.
Spain bans Spanish
Making all schools in Catalonia teach only in Catalan, not
Spanish, violates the Constitution and the Universal Declaration
of Human Rights, Spain's Supreme Tribunal held. It said parents
have a right to choose what language their children learn.
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