Not The Onion

12313 readers

585 users here now

Welcome

We're not The Onion! Not affiliated with them in any way! Not operated by them in any way! All the news here is real!

The Rules

Posts must be:

Links to news stories from...
...credible sources, with...
...their original headlines, that...
...would make people who see the headline think, “That has got to be a story from The Onion, America’s Finest News Source.”

Comments must abide by the server rules for Lemmy.world and generally abstain from trollish, bigoted, or otherwise disruptive behavior that makes this community less fun for everyone.

And that’s basically it!

founded 1 year ago

MODERATORS

kescusay

113

Anthony Bray sentenced to four months for possession of replica Master Sword (www.warwickshire.police.uk)

submitted 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) by [email protected] to c/nottheonion

42 comments fedilink hide all child comments

WARWICKSHIRE, ENGLAND—Bray claimed that the sword was a “fidget” – something to keep his hands busy. He had bought it online as a fidget toy. On 8 June 2024, officers were made aware through CCTV operators of a man – Anthony Bray – walking down Queens Road, Nuneaton with something in his hand. Bray approached officers with the item in his hand visible, at which point he was arrested as he was carrying a bladed article.

Officers tried to explain to Bray that, despite its intended purpose, it was in fact a sharply pointed item which could be used as a weapon and might put others in fear of it being used against them.

In addition to the four months in prison, Bray is required to pay a victims’ surcharge of £154.

Sgt Spellman of the Patrol Investigations Unit said “We take a zero tolerance to bladed articles in public, and Bray has fallen afoul of this.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2024/07/03/zelda-master-sword-gets-man-4-months-prison-time-but-theres-more-to-the-story/:

What’s missing from every report about this I could find, and what is so crucial to understanding this story, however is that Anthony Bray is a repeat offender with a long rap sheet and numerous prison sentences, several of which were for burglary including serial burglary. In 2011, Bray was convicted and sentenced to four years in prison after getting “three strikes” for burgling residences. But his run-ins with the law go back to 1989 and he was in court numerous times throughout the 90s as well.

The last wrinkle to this story is the very real problem with knife violence in the UK. Warwickshire is in the Midlands where knife violence is higher than any other region, higher even than in London. There were 5,234 knife offenses in the region in 2023 alone including a number of murders. Perhaps it is through this lens that we should view the arrest and prison sentence of Anthony Bray.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] [email protected] -2 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (2 children)

It does though. If you have massive amounts of knife crime, the context makes sense. If there is none and one person does it, it's all about the person.

Either way, walking publicly with a big sword claiming it's a fidget spinner substitute is BS.

[–] TheBananaKing 5 points 4 months ago (1 children)

So to be clear, you're fine with guilt by association.

Specifically, association with 11,000 square miles of land.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

No.

The context is useful to understand the area and what occurs there though.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

So you think that individualistic ethics become collectivist the more people are engaged in a particular ethical or unethical behavior?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Many studies have looked into this, culture etc. For example how people conducted themselves in say Nazi Germany or during the Rwandan genocide.

Simply trying to understand how so many folk can commit such atrocities.

Knife crime is viewed differently in areas with high amounts of it. It's more shocking in an area it doesn't exist. In an area where folk growing up knowing or seeing people being stabbed, it's seen very differently.

I don't think juries should necessarily take it into consideration, but understanding situations, it's quite relevant. If you've stepped into both poor and rich areas, you'll understand the differences.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago (1 children)

So it sounds like individualist ethics then, just with the cultural surround taken into account in how the numbers affect that individual’s perception of the crime? Something like that?

I thought you were saying the ethical value of the individual act was a function of purely the number of times it was happening in an area.

Kinda like how “we have record amounts of crack smoking so let’s punish crack smoking harder” is an example of what I mean by “individualist ethics becoming collectivist ethics on account of specific numerical thresholds”.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

Fair point, and no on the last point. Legalise weed, tackle gangs and help addicts get the help they need. Punishment doesn't always work on crime. Without some element of reform.

Of course knife crime is pretty high here and if anything, police are a little weak on it and it has got out of control because jails are too full.

In some parts of the UK, it is genuinely scary to walk around and even looking at some young folk wrong is the best way to end up in an ambulance.