Scarlet Blake trial - the thing that never happens....

I'm also confused about the blanket reporting (initially, anyway) of this male perp as a woman. I have no idea about court reporting really. Would a journalist from a major national newspaper not be present, as well as ones from local papers? Surely the Oxford Mail didn't have a monopoly on reporting this case??

The hack concerned looks from her profile photos and snaps she's popped onto her Twitter feed to be mid-20's tops (and for what it's worth has she/her in her profile). Could she really have been the ONLY conduit through which reporting of this case all last week flowed?? And therefore all the nationals just lazily C&P everything? If anyone has a reliable insight into the way things are done, I'd be interested! However, if it's the case that there were specific instructions from the court to use this horrible man's preferred pronouns, I wonder if there's a way of finding out?

This case - which incredibly I had only recently heard about - happened literally just down the road from me and I'm appalled on so many counts.

I note that the current 'live' feed from Oxford Mail's Twitter/X hasn't actually said 'woman' this morning ... Maybe someone there is reading the room.

Ted Bundy volunteered for the Samaritans too. Make of that what you will.

I think it's probably like catnip to burgeoning psychopaths. Speaking to the right person may mean the difference between the caller committing suicide or not. It's power to play god, in a sense.

In the US. Colorado.

Is Bell in the US or the UK?

In one message Bell wrote to Blake, "You get another kill before you get here and then you can chill and I will officially have a serial killer big booby girlfriend."

[...]

When Bell received the jacket, [he] wrote: "Your smell immediately turned me on. Serial killer musk, serial killer musk, serial killer musk, serial killer musk."

How has Bell not been prosecuted for being an accomplice to murder?

Exactly, @ArabellaScott, thank you. I knew there was research on that but didn’t have the exact figures to hand.

MBM commissioned research which found that around a third of the public thought a transwoman was born female and pretending to be male.

Thank you! The rape text was sent to girlfriend Edie. No idea m or f.

Either way Blake = rapist. Therefore not a lady.

Oh dear, the reporting on this case is at sixes and sevens.

Four key protagonists and you don’t get the very basic truth about any of them except the poor victim. (Who could only have been killed by a man, admittedly, which is, savagely, the only gender fact we got).

Ted Bundy volunteered for the Samaritans too. Make of that what you will.

Not that that means Blake wasn't a danger. Interestingly Blake tried to claim as defence that he had acted under duress in a coercive relationship with Bell, that he didn't want to kill the cat and he was just smiling and laughing to look authentic.

If "girlfriend" refers to Ashlynn Bell, he too is male.

So not a girlfriend.

Bell is also male.

Blake threatened to rape his gf. She was eventually moved to safety by the police after he upped his game to death threats.

People obviously have different ideas about when respect for identity is appropriate, but when ‘respect’ is coerced for a violent murderer, it should be obvious that something has gone wrong.

@EsmaCannonball - my experience with the system is that this part of the issue, and I was very surprised at people who had good expertise effectively suspending their judgment in cases regarding transgender offenders. It should be a very minor aspect of an offender profile imo in the sense that it is the risk and attitudes of an offender that dictate whether they can ever be released. Transgenderism in prisons and criminal Justice is probably the new "I've become a Christian" ticket that offenders used to lessen restrictions upon them.

This is all about perception; I would regard this person and their mental state, inclusive of Transgenderism as an aggravating factor on sentence and for their management. This is what used to be the view in times past.

@Merrymouse I've emailed a complaint to them (Times) about Kieran Gairs article.

And is that really surprising, when papers of record print obfuscatory nonsense like the trial heard that Blake, previously known as Alice Wang, came to Britain from China at the age of nine, and told her parents she was transgender aged 12. She?

I've said right from the beginning that the choice of language is a very deliberate choice aimed to confuse. There must be a huge section of the general public who aren’t really clued-up who STILL have no idea what the terms mean.

Hell, I've even had conversations with highly-educated colleagues in our very academic field who've needed me to explain it to them.

He was volunteering for the Samaritans? 😱
Someone with a fetish for murdering strangers and killing animals? I hope the Samaritans will be reviewing all the cases Blake dealt with and reviewing their procedures to see if they missed any warning signs before appointing someone so deeply dangerous to the vulnerable.

Again, I imagine that biological sex becomes a salient factor in risk assessments surrounding things like parole, day release, open prisons etc., and don't trust that well-meaning idiots won't push for Blake to be considered a woman in future. In fact, I remember that report on trans-identifying men in the prison system stating that wishing to be seen as less of a risk and being moved to a softer regime or a women's prison was a big motivating factor.

wrt #RapistHill there are people on a catfish thread arguing that it's mean to play with catfishers because it's using up time when they could pass on to someone else who would be more receptive.

And some of them might have been trafficked into romance gangs. So, don't mislead them and waste their time as they have quotas to fill…

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5014692-i-am-being-catfished-right-now?page=2

Thanks everyone. I read this in the Times who are referring to the perpetrator as a woman. 'This is not a woman's crime screamed out' at me.

He was a very dangerous person. Many disturbing things in this beyond the crime.

He was volunteering for the Samaritans.

This predator should be looking at a very long time in prison of 30 years or more before parole is even considered. It seems very hard to imagine rehabilitation is possible.

Well the photo in the DM today leaves readers in no doubt that Blake is a man.

And the American creature looks a real peach ffs

I looked at some of the comments at the bottom of the Mail article and of course people are confused. One even asks if Blake is MtF or FtM. This stupid mangling of language needs to stop.😡

No.

Restrictions only apply before the verdict, in case the jurors are influenced.

The jury has already reached its verdict.

It is presumed that judges will not be influenced in their sentencing by media reporting and public discussion.