I fear the kids.
A 50-year-old businessman was today charged with the murder of a teenage boy.
Emery was charged over the fatal stabbing of 15-year-old Pihema Clifford Cameron in Southview Place, Manurewa, on Saturday night. The stabbing allegedly occurred during an argument that arose after Pihema was about to tag a fence on a property and was chased. (full article)
The Mayor of Manukau City, which has been the scene of two murders since Friday, says minor offending such as tagging is the starting point for youngsters to go on to commit more serious crimes. Len Brown was commenting after the murders in Manurewa, including one in which a 50-year-old man is alleged to have killed a 15-year-old boy he caught tagging a fence in Southview Place. (full article)
A 50-year-old man charged with the murder of a teenage tagger in Manukau should be allowed to “get away with it”, Christchurch City councillor Barry Corbett says. “If I was on the jury, I would let him get away with it, but that is just me,” Corbett said. “Everyone is feeling sorry for the kid and his family, but if the kid was not tagging, he would still be alive.” (full article)
Violent youth crime is at an all-time high. Young criminals are graduating from petty crime to more serious crime; unexploded time-bombs on a fast-track to Paremoremo. The victims are people like you and me. – John Key’s speech to start the National party’s election campaign*
Looks like a white man lost it when he discovered a tagger. These days you can’t even protect your own property. South Auckland has been tagged into some huge coloured cesspool. With no support from police and others – I guess retreat is the only option.- Guy on the Stormfront (white power) messageboard
Especially the brown kids.
* For those who don’t hear the dogwhistle, look at this quote from the same speech: “The staggering discovery of a lost tribe of 6,000 children who are not enrolled at any school.” A lost tribe, huh?
Fearless Leader Auntie Helen also had a lot to say about youth in her big speech, but the fear-pandering was much less obvious.
“If I was on the jury, I would let him get away with it”… “but if the kid was not tagging, he would still be alive”
I am gob-smacked. This man is a city councillor?! I struggle to understand how anyone can justify murder on the basis of a minor property crime… but hey, I guess it’s implicit in Capitalist ideology that property can have a higher value than a human life… I’m just not used to hearing it stated so explicitly in NZ!
Wow. Since when has vandalism been an acceptable excuse for murder? What the hell is wrong with people? 🙁
also, the stuff poll today is ‘what should be done about NZ’s wayward youth’ and the stick them in boot camp option is winning.
I just can’t believe that so many people seem to think that the murder was somehow okay.
The poll Jenni references, as at 11am 31 Jan:
What should be done to improve the lot of NZ’s wayward youth?
* Keep them in school until age 18 (302 votes, 9.3%)
* Put them in boot camp (1919 votes, 59.0%)
* More guidance councillors in schools (279 votes, 8.6%)
* Fines for slack parents (751 votes, 23.1%)
Lordy.
I particularly liked the point on Morning Report the other day when Phil Goff, on being asked about John Keys’ proposal of boot camps, gently pointed out that boot camps have a 92% recidivism rate and that most countries (except the US) are moving away from that sort of thing. Pointless punishment that achieves nothing usually being held to be a bad thing when you could use an alternative that might actually rehabilitate a few more kids. Except, hey, they wouldn’t be suffering, and we all know that retribution is the point of justice.
Yep.
As an aside, I think the poll is inane. “Youth” are not a problem in themselves; they are where other social problems manifest.
Yeah, but people like to be able to assign blame and like simple solutions. And simple solutions don’t exist in complex systems. If you say tagging or violence are fueled by poverty, media violence, poor diet, alcohol abuse or whatever, then everyone can come up with a counter-example of a kid who was just as poor or watched just as much tv who grew up just fine… All we have is statistical surveys of various communities, which suggest reasons, but can’t control for every variable (and are limited by the imaginations of the researchers when inventing questions, the honesty of the participants etc etc)