Teenager Jailed For Murdering Surrey Schoolboy

Fourteen-year-old Breck Bednar from Caterham was stabbed to death by a teenager he met while playing online video games.

Lewis Daynes, 19 years old, pleaded guilty to the murder of Bednar and had been sentenced to a minimum of 25 years in jail. Mrs. Justice Cox had sentenced Daynes at the  Chelmsford Crown Court. She condemned his “sexual and sadistic” killing

Bednar was found in a flat in Grays, Essex, with a fatal neck wound in February 2014.

Daynes confessed to having met Breck at an online gaming community that he ran. He invited Breck to his home and he slit his throat. After taking photographs, he sent the photos of his body to his friends.

Daynes had also confessed to engaging in sexual activity with his victim.

Mrs. Justice Cox said "Having lured the young victim to your flat, you murdered him.

"You had befriended Breck and a number of other adolescent friends through an online community.

 

"Your contact with Breck increased in a sinister way.

"The precise details of what happened in your flat are unclear and may never be known.

"I'm sure that this murder was driven by sadistic or sexual motivation."

Daynes’ sentence included attempted rape, two counts of engaging a person in sexual activity without consent, possessing indecent images.

Source

Liberal MP Julian Huppert Against UK Porn Restrictions

According to Liberal Democrat MP Julian Huppert, the laws restricting explicit pornography in the United Kingdom should be based on issues of “consent” and “genuine risk”, not moral objection. He states that explicit pornography produced in the United Kingdom would implicate a mass exodus of companies from the industry, and will place the United Kingdom at a disadvantage from the rest of the world.

Adult Broadcaster for Portland TV Chris Ratcliff also agrees with the statement, saying that the UK’s porn industry will be at a disadvantage from overseas competitors.

The Audiovisual Media Services Regulations 2014 was implemented on December 1. It requires UK producers of pornography distributed online to fall under the guidelines set by the British Board of Film Censors for R18 rated films. It strongly regulates “explicit works of consenting sex or strong fetish material involving adults”.

The laws apply to online porn and video-on-demand (VOD). All these would require a certificate from the BBFC, must have effective age verification controls to prevent the content being accessed by minors.

Huppert said "It seems to me to be very odd to say that this, assuming it is consensual, is acceptable for somebody to do in their own home, for them to photograph it, film it, but not to look at it online if it comes from the UK.

"To me the case for banning things should be driven by issues around consent, and around genuine risk, not about whether we happen to like things or not."

Source

UN Official’s Anti-Marijuana Laws Have No Bearing Because “Things Have Changed”

UN Office on Drugs and Crime Director Yury Fedotov said that the US’ approval to use and sell recreational marijuana is not compatible with existing conventions. He had promised to take the case up the State Department and UN Officials the following week. 

However, the Drug Policy Alliance said that Fedotov is technically correct, but he is referring to platforms from international drug treaties in 1961. 

A Senior State Department Official, Assistant Secretary of State William Brownfield, said that many things have changed since 1961 and encouraged a “flexible interpretation” of UN Drug Policies.

The DPA said that the intervention of the UNODC will not make any difference despite Fedotov’s motions because the US government had already made the decision.

Post midterm election, Oregon, Alaska, Washington DC, and Colorado allow the sale and consumption of recreational marijuana. Meanwhile, a medical marijuana measure in Florida had failed to implement. Under Federal law, marijuana consumption is illegal. 

This is the latest intervention of the United Nations in local US matters. 

Source

Why Wouldn’t the UK Government Listen to 99% of People Opposed to Fracking?

 The UK has its own anti-fracking movement and this is done for good measure; UK property owners don’t want anything to do with companies digging underneath their legally-purchased and rightfully-owned land. According to Naomi Klein, the opposition against fracking is based on the fact that “the UK government is colluding with energy companies to force the right to frack underneath people’s homes.”

Energy analysts and economists say that the upcoming shale oil and gas industry will bring down the prices of energy and guarantee the UK’s flawless economic growth along with the rest of the world. 

However, not many are willing to pay the price of, let’s say, your house or two of your properties?

Even surveys show that many people oppose fracking underneath their homes and rightfully so.

Farmers are the ones who will be dealt the biggest blow because of fracking. If an area is labelled as a fracking site, their home mortgages could be jeopardised simply because the equity could not pay for the value of the mortgage because the land, as collateral, has its property value blown to bonkers.

So much for democracy, but maybe the UK government needs to fill in more pockets, fuelling the drive for immediate implementation of shale gas and oil fracking to fulfil the needs of the 1%.

With All the Bureacracy, You Won’t Even Think the UK Could Do Anything Against ISIS

How do you measure what makes sense and what does not? Political enemies in the western world, including whistle blowers, have been exiled from their countries pending their legal cases. But that seems to be the easier case because it is an isolated and politically-justified causes. As for returning terrorists from abroad, banning them from the land is difficult.

The dilemma the UK and the US faces today is hundreds of Islamic State (IS) fighters in combat against the Iraqi government came from western soil and international law does not allow them to declare these individuals stateless without trial. Why it seems easier for political enemies to be exiled is because they are isolated cases that are easier to televise; showing the details of a single case is easier rather than televising three or more different ones.

Television and media helps expose the stories, which would serve as evidence in the local courts to have a person exiled or punished for their crimes. In the case of the IS, these anonymous soldiers each have a story. The UK government’s only choice, which is to try each suspected terrorist who are incoming or outgoing from UK airports, is a long shot to actually eradicating the threat.

Meanwhile, the common folk will whine about lengthy security checks, possible passport confiscations and discrimination among certain individuals travelling to Iraq and Syria. People don’t want hassles, but then again, with all this bureaucracy, meaning considering the freedom of everyone, I don’t even think neither the UK nor the US could do anything to stop the terrorist threat.

Revenge Porn: Why Peers Don’t Like It

Some people met the news about the revenge porn law’s disapproval by the peers of the British parliament. I met it with a slow disappointment, but eventually, I realised what was in store for the United Kingdom if the revenge porn law was approved. 

Let’s define terms first. Revenge porn is when a former partner uploads to a public network media explicit in nature that both of them have produced. However, in publishing law, all parties who had partaken in producing a medium must have the approval of both parties in question. This means that the victim is also part-owner of the produced media and has a veto on the publishing of such.

This is the law that British peers are trying to use instead of having the revenge porn law. The revenge porn law incriminates anybody who had uploaded explicit media that could tarnish the reputation of another party, namely the victim. This gives the victim the right to litigate the suspect or uploader because of damages to privacy.

However, it is similar to Google’s defiance against the EU data laws that allow people to erase their online histories because it damages the private lives of such persons. If we have the revenge porn law, journalists will have limited rights to publish material especially with exposes and documentaries. It commits damages to personal privacy.

So, until the definition of revenge porn, cyber bullying and other new terms the internet has come up with is put into the constitution, we will never have a good chance of having good governance in the internet. This may work for the worse, or for the better.

The Benefits of Revised Renting Laws in the United Kingdom

After reading an article in The Guardian regarding people who are calling for the government to revise the laws on renting in the United Kingdom, I found myself thinking about the possible benefits it could bring. Apparently, any revision entitles change and improvement, but still, it is not perfect. Revised renting laws could bring the following options to UK tenants.

1.    Prevent “Revenge” Evictions

The Guardian article told about the story of Andrezj Koper, a tenant of Fergus and Judith Wilson. The latter couple had been infamous because they used the rights of landlords abusively. It was described in the article that Koper had been evicted because he only wanted to have the boiler in his rental home repaired. A revision of laws could better protect tenants from such situations. Apparently, the UK property laws do not obligate landlords to give a reason for eviction.

2.    Enforce Landlord Responsibilities

Many of these infamous revenge evictions, as far as I am concerned, refers to the Landlord trying to evade their responsibilities to tenants. Here is a full list of landlord responsibilities, and these need to be reinforced. The UK legislation must realize that tenants are still customers,

and that landlords need to act like proper business personnel who provides service.

3.    Improve the Economy

Renting is the best option for moving professionals and their families, and avoiding a hundred-thousand streak of evictions yearly could improve the economy. With stability in terms of landlord-tenant relationships with proper laws in place, industries could have mainstay employees, and property prices could even increase.