Missing Girl in Wales...

[ColinJ]

Well, I suppose we need to choose a ribbon colour for the boy killed by the hit-and-run driver in Bradford now?

What I find really offensive is that the prettiest children seem to get the most media attention in these cases. I don't think that I am imagining it, but do ugly children ever get this amount of air time?

It's a tragedy. Find and punish the guilty. Let the family grieve in private.

Oh, and don't ruin your children's lives by locking them up indoors all the time. They are more likely to suffer from ill health from that, than the bogey man getting at them.

A teenage girl was murdered here 18 years ago and her murderer was never found but life goes on here as normal - young children run about the cobbled backsteets unsupervised and they are not afraid of strangers.

 

[Thomk]

Its probably appropriate to remember that the man who is being held has not been found guilty of any crime yet and it is not certain that the girl has been murdered or is indeed dead.

 

[hotmetal]

Agree about not being overprotective. That robs the child of freedom and confidence. Apparently the statistics of these things happening is very very small and has neither risen nor fallen in 100 years according to a woman on the radio. However, just one such event is one too many. It's absolutely sickening when you hear these stories of kids being harmed. But media overreaction instils fear into parents and children alike, yet does very little to stop these tragic events happening, and as Colin says, does have a direct negative effect on people's health. I think it is important to be able to understand risk and deal with it appropriately. Children and adults need to manage risk as it is a part of life. It is then up to the individual (or in the case of young children, their parents) to make a judgement call about what is reasonable and safe. Sometimes it can go tragically wrong, but it is the small handful of murderers or paedophiles that need locking up, not the nation's kids.

 

[Red Light]

What's the betting of a massive difference in public interest and in the penalty awarded in the April Jones case and this case? Both equally culpable in my opinion and both leaving devastated families and friends.

 

[Accy cyclist]

What's the betting of a massive difference in public interest and in the penalty awarded in the April Jones case and this case? Both equally culpable in my opinion and both leaving devastated families and friends.

April Jones was sought out, raped and strangled(probably). Bilal Khizar was not the victim of a premeditated crime, more a total disregard for human life action. The girls case has brought about large scale public interest because of the large scale man hunt to at first hopefully find her alive, then to search for a body! Peoples emotions will have been up and down over the last week. If she'd have been killed there and then it wouldn't have drawn the same emotions as the uncertainty of "is she still alive"?, and "where is she"? The boy has not gone missing, if he had there would've been much public

 

[zombiemiked]

April Jones was sought out, raped and strangled(probably)

Where did you get this information from? Has a body been found? Has sky been talking crap again?
Looking from a slightly different angle this makes interesting reading http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-19360824

 

[zombiemiked]

Well, I suppose we need to choose a ribbon colour for the boy killed by the hit-and-run driver in Bradford now?

What I find really offensive is that the prettiest children seem to get the most media attention in these cases. I don't think that I am imagining it, but do ugly children ever get this amount of air time?

It's a tragedy. Find and punish the guilty. Let the family grieve in private.

Oh, and don't ruin your children's lives by locking them up indoors all the time. They are more likely to suffer from ill health from that, than the bogey man getting at them.

A teenage girl was murdered here 18 years ago and her murderer was never found but life goes on here as normal - young children run about the cobbled backsteets unsupervised and they are not afraid of strangers.

I seem to recall reading an article that defined the parameters for a newsworthy M/P story. You have pretty much hit the nail on the head.

 

[ufkacbln]

Where did you get this information from? Has a body been found? Has sky been talking crap again?
Looking from a slightly different angle this makes interesting reading http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-19360824

This is an important point.

We had a friend murdered in London, and it was on Crime Watch.

We had interviews with Police, the BBC and others. Their biggest fear was not actually being accurate, as they knew that the public as a whole will believe what they see on TV as being factual... it is quite possible that by accident they can induce false memories, or even inflate the importance of a particular event in the public's mind.

 

[mangaman]

I have no problems with personal grief. I have no real issue when that is misplaced or simply inappropriate, what I have a problem with is the compulsory grief.

The Diana roadshow was a classic.

I was on holiday when all this happened and was down in the West Country

On the local radio a group was organising a boycott of a small "open all hours" shop as he had failed to show due respect and close on the afternoon of the funeral!

I was at Portsmouth vs Norwich at the footie the Saturday after she died.

The Norwich mascot was a giant canary and the Pompey one a giant mobile phone (a sponsorship thing)

Out of the blue the announcer said, "now, 3 minutes silence for Diana" and the phone and the canary were still on the pitch in front of us.

I remeber they were in a lose, lose scenario - they couldn´t just scarper, so they stood still and tried to look respectful.

I remember the phone bloke managing to bow at the waist and clasp his hands in front.

Gradually the whole ground noticed and startied tittering - it was a moving tribute to "The Queen of all our hearts"

 

[Mad Doug Biker]

I wrote in one of those Diana books of condolence 'RIP', not because of any mawkish 'you are with the angels now' type crap, but because I knew that once it was all over, the media circus would pack up, go home, and everyone would get some peace from it, not least her family.

 

[ASC1951]

Let us not forget that since April Jones disappeared, about 35 people will have been killed on our roads and ten times that number seriously injured. Most of them equally blameless and with lives just as valuable.

 

[Accy cyclist]

Where did you get this information from? Has a body been found? Has sky been talking crap again?
Looking from a slightly different angle this makes interesting reading http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-19360824

Of course it's not been officially confirmed that April has been raped and killed. There hasn't been a body found and therefore no post mortem carried out, but the police and prosecution services must have strong grounds/evidence to charge the culprit.
I wish i was totally wrong, that she was still alive and that maybe someone was holding her against her will, and that the suspect was totally innocent, i really do!, but it would be impossible for April to have run away from home due to her age, or for her to be somehow wandering around lost and for the hundreds of police, mountain rescue and volunteers to have not found her.

 

[Vapin' Joe]

Let us not forget that since April Jones disappeared, about 35 people will have been killed on our roads and ten times that number seriously injured. Most of them equally blameless and with lives just as valuable.

Quite so, but having a child killed by a car and having one abducted, probably subjected to a vile and terrifying assault and then murdered is so much harder to live with.

 

[zombiemiked]

Of course it's not been officially confirmed that April has been raped and killed. There hasn't been a body found and therefore no post mortem carried out, but the police and prosecution services must have strong grounds/evidence to charge the culprit.
I wish i was totally wrong, that she was still alive and that maybe someone was holding her against her will, and that the suspect was totally innocent, i really do!, but it would be impossible for April to have run away from home due to her age, or for her to be somehow wandering around lost and for the hundreds of police, mountain rescue and volunteers to have not found her.

I agree she is probably dead but any further speculation is uncalled for.

 

[on the road]

Well, I suppose we need to choose a ribbon colour for the boy killed by the hit-and-run driver in Bradford now?

What I find really offensive is that the prettiest children seem to get the most media attention in these cases. I don't think that I am imagining it, but do ugly children ever get this amount of air time?

That's so true.

I'm sure you all remember baby P but who remembers this http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-lancashire-14297092