June 08, 2004

Oh my goodness...

I am so glad I don't live in Britain. There's the typical things I could make fun of (driving on the wrong side of the road, misspelling words, the BBC), but then there's the occasional serious issue. This article in the UK Telegraph proves, first, that the strict gun laws in Britain have not eliminated guns from their criminal element. (But we knew that already.) Secondly, if the accusations noted in the headline are true, it proves that the police force in Britain is, at best, criminally incompetent.

A police force was accused yesterday of waiting too long to act after a shooting at a family barbecue left two sisters dead. One witness claimed that their lives could have been saved.

Roy Gibson, 70, said he spent an hour waiting for help to arrive as he tried to save one of the women. Paramedics were prevented from entering until Thames Valley Police had completed a one-hour assessment of any further risk to life.

...

He [a neighbor, Mr. Roy Gibson] said: "Vicky took her last breath as we tried to comfort her. There was no ambulance and no police officer with us, despite my repeated reassurances to officers that the gunman had long since fled. I think there is a very real chance that Vicky and Emma could have been saved if the paramedics had been allowed to the scene."

(My emphasis)

Ya know, I don't think this would happen on ER. There's a certain amount of risk involved with being either a police officer or a paramedic. That's why the entertainers make so many doctor/police dramas. It seems that, in attempting to avoid the risks of its profession and in preventing others from taking those risks themselves, the British police force has managed to fail in its duty and kill two of the citizens it was supposed to protect.

(Via Samizdata.net)

Posted by Blog Jones at June 8, 2004 10:04 AM | Category: Politics

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