Police investigating death of Ann Widdicombe

[GoodHonest]

Very strange

I guess because hitting someone 21 times is shocking. It’s not like he hit her once and ran off. Evil

We prob don't need to know but the court did.

Awful.

Mail said it was caught on cctv? She had cctv in her
kitchen? Or a ring doorbell saw him go in?

im hoping she was unconscious very quickly. Poor woman

It’s so distressing, said he was in and out in five minutes, and took her purse. Horrible.

In her hall I think.

She never had a chance.

This is just awful awful news so violent and brutal.
I hope the camera did get everything and get this bastard bang to rights. An old lady in her kitchen ,frail and needing care.

Why did he travel from the north of England to the south to do that? And how did he know her address?

there had been a tv programme showing her house just a few days before, which may be helped him find the house

Apparently, she was clobbered on the head 21+ times, according to what I read yesterday.

I hope she comes back and haunts the scumbag who killed her.

There needs to be a debate about the far left. There’s always plenty of focus on the far right, but never the far left, which seems to be gaining traction in recent years.

I am also glad (although horrified) to know the number of times she was struck.

No one can be under any illusion that this was anything other than a cowardly and brutal attack on a physically frail woman.

I can only hope that she knew nothing after the first blow.

The show was a re run, I saw it last year. So why now?

Maybe he missed the first showing?

I just think it's a red herring, and pure coincidence, but I'm sure the trial will say if they ever get to the bottom of his motivation. Which I will never understand, even if they lay it out in court.

I think his brother lives around there - possibly he already knew where to go?
The timing of the drive does put me to shame, but I’m confident that it’s him and all will be explained to the jurors/court in due course.
It seems unfathomable that someone would do this - there are closer MPs, and I don’t think he had a previous record of taking against people and attacking them violently - but I guess it might come to light why at some point - why in his head at least.

It tells me all I need to know if - for a particular reason or indeed no reason at all - a man chooses to attack a woman instead of choosing to attack another man.

Choosing to attack an elderly, physically frail woman is a level even lower.

There needs to be space to criticise extremists on all sides
However, in respect to this attack we don't yet know the motivationsmor political ideology of the killer. They opened up the possibility of it being a terrorist incident so it may well be inspired by far left ideology. Especially given Widdicombes politics. But we don't know yet.
It's also hard to tell sometimes since increasingly the lone wolf attack type terrorists are quite hard to place. They are often very online young men who bounce from one esoteric ideology to another or have a weird mix of views. Which means after a lot of political violence in America you have had both sides cherry picking and arguing the same violent man proves the problem.with the opposing side. It's very messy. It's not communists versus fascists anymore. Which also begs the question are young men violent because the absorb radical ideologies or are they looking for radical ideologies as an excuse to be violent.

Yes, I felt sick when I heard that. It's just awful. As an atheist left of centre voter who supports gay marriage and women in the priesthood, my politics are very different from Ann Widdicombe's but I admired her political conviction and very much enjoyed her personality in both Big Brother and Strictly. She's a loss to politics and it's an utterly hideous act.

Obviously we have no idea who this man is as a person (his thoughts and motivations) and have been asked not to speculate. So I shall be very careful and clear to say that I am not linking this murder to the image below.

However, what I would like to say is that the image below is an example of social media being used to spread ideas about how to kill someone if you feel angry about something.

The word "trabsphobia" could be substituted for any cause here. The image is from an organisation called Bash Back and taking a hammer (or your weapon of choice) to smash transphobia is their particular message. Irrespective of what led this murderer to choose a hammer, drive all that way and spend 2 minutes in Ann Widdicombe's house murdering her, I really hope that there is a crackdown on organisations spreading this kind of message.

I hope this post is within MN guidelines. We don't know what made this man do this hideous act. For Ann Widdicombe's sake, I hope we do get to hear what it was. She deserves that justice.

Edited for clarity

Irrespective of what led this murderer to choose a hammer, drive all that way and spend 2 minutes in Ann Widdicombe's house murdering her

If you have time to edit please change it to 'alleged murderer' or do not link it specifically to the drive, because this man has not yet been found guilty. Your post makes a really good point and it would be a shame for the whole thing to get deleted because of one slip of the tongue.

That is a good point.

I have just missed the edit window as I was sorting out some ambiguous grammar.

I hope that clarity here is enough:

The above comment should read "alleged murderer" not "murderer". At the moment he's just a suspect.

That said, I've not mentioned his name. My understanding is that has been officially classified as a murder. So by definition, whoever did it is a murderer.

I hope my comment is within the guidelines.

She was a relatively famous and controversial character, that is what draws certain types of killers, he is now "famous" in his head, where before his neighbours barely knew who he was.

That image is encouraging violence for the easily persuaded. TRA have often posted extreme violence against anyone who doesn't believe that you can change aex (uou can't, its biologically impossible). These images should be prosecuted as hate speech.

I'm willing to bet that the fact she was a very short, elderly woman was also a factor when he was picking which politician to go after. Someone who had no chance to fight back, even against a fat loser.

That is as may be.

But there are plenty of men who would arguably match that description.

Not that they deserve it either. But you would think they’d stand more of a chance in a similar situation.

More than a wee older woman anyway.

Not sure I can think of many politicians who would be capable of taking on a very determined male with a hammer, maybe a couple of the ex- military ones who"s names I can"t remember, Paddy Ashdown maybe, he was in the SAS or something and in combat? (I know he is no longer with us BTW)