Why do this?

[womble]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/beds ... 036551.stm

There is a photo of the dead swans so may not be suitable if a toddler is close by.

I can't understand why anyone would shoot birds for fun, i hope they are caught and thrown in prison


xx

[9ball]

B****rds, one would be bad enough but 30? I can't even begin to know what goes through some peoples heads. I hope they get caught, get six months for each and every one and go away for 15 years. Bloody morons, 'scuse my french.

[Milims]

Don't all the swans belong to the Queen? In which case shouldn't they be hanged for treason???

[hamster]

I thought you could only be hanged for high treason (and even that is pretty unlikely!!).

And yes, that kind of senseless cruelty is terrible. Makes me furious.

[possum]

I thought you could only be hanged for high treason (and even that is pretty unlikely!!).

And yes, that kind of senseless cruelty is terrible. Makes me furious.

There is no longer any death sentence for any crime in the UK

cruelty? hand up all those who eat chicken, pork, beef, lamb? they are all animals who have been killed, in probably a human way as these birds were.

I don't condone the wanton shooting of any animal, but it does not necessarily make it a cruel death. If they died instantly without suffering than it can be no more cruel than slaughtering a beast.
The difference is that in this case it was not done for meat.

I have lived in Bedfordshire, and yes these animals can be a problem, in my canoeing years i had to paddle for my life to get away from one.

If it is slaughter purely for fun that is one thing, if those involved thought them a pest, is it any different from shooting rabbits (apart from the fine that is?

Or is the horror because it was a pretty bird?

[hamster]

Sorry, maybe cruelty wasn't the right word. You're right about the manner of death being no more cruel than for farmed animals. Senseless wanton shooting, then.

I do eat meat, and I think it does make a difference whether an animal is killed for meat or solely for fun. I know people enjoy going on organised shoots, and I don't mind that, because in general they're well-managed and the birds are eaten afterwards. I also appreciate there is a need for pest control, but if there was a genuine need in this case I don't understand why it was done in this underhand manner.

The impression from the BBC article and articles in the Times and the local press are that this is being treated by the police as a suspicious incident. In my case the horror is that so many birds were killed for no apparent reason. If that turns out not to have been the case, I am quite happy to stand corrected.

[hamster]

There is no longer any death sentence for any crime in the UK

I'd always thought that the death penalty still technically existed for high treason, and some archaic things that no-one had bothered to change (like spying on naval bases or something), although clearly no-one would ever be executed in practice. (This might be an urban legend.)

[pskipper]

No, the death sentence is still on the statute books for high treason. Included as high treason is interfering with the royal succession, when Diana had an affair within wedlock the BBC news pointed this out as technically the bloke she was seeing was interfering with the royal succession had she gotten pregnant.

[Thurston Garden]

There is no longer any death sentence for any crime in the UK

I'd always thought that the death penalty still technically existed for high treason, and some archaic things that no-one had bothered to change (like spying on naval bases or something), although clearly no-one would ever be executed in practice. (This might be an urban legend.)

The death sentence still exists for Mutiny in the navy (technically, more than one person registering the same complaint!) and Arson in Her Majesties Dock Yard.

[possum]

Until recently I thought that the death penalty still existed for high treason, however, no it doesn't

The UK has abolished the death penalty for all crimes

from
http://www.fco.gov.uk/servlet/Front?pag ... 5715424996
if you do a google you will come up with various other references to it having been abolished, I was looking for the year in which they did it but i can't find it.

[the.fee.fairy]

Back to the original topic, i was reading in a magazine yesterday abouit a city farm that had 13 piglets 24 yhours old stolen. Thye found 10 of them, all with some form of fatal mutilation. People are sick.

[Florence-Blue]

That horrable. I work in a shooting club on sunday in a small hut making bacon sandwiches and such like, and they do only shoot clay pigeons.

Now, I hate guns and stuff, but if it purely sport and there not harming wild life then thumbs up, but I get some people in who just shoot animals and dear for fun, which is really bad, but others will just shoot for food and not waste, so i gues thats okay if keep in the law.

But some of the twats are just pure ignorent.

I mean, they just shot 30 swans for no reason, they didn't use them as food even, not that it would make it anymore acceptibal.

[Chickenlady]

I think some people are just angry and destructive.

What about the rare hen harriers that were killed on the Sandringham Estate? Bit dodgy that...