To think justice served on the Mum of Disabled Child in Revenge Attack

[Mitmoo]

Thanks to milkmilk for posting this on a different thread but it has got lost.

The mother of a disabled child who plotted a revenge attack on a poster who launched attacks on a disabled child via the internet found not guilty.

DM but that doesn't matter - it's an important article.

A mother who joined a revenge attack on a man responsible for a vile campaign of internet abuse against her disabled daughter has been spared prison.

Sylvia Hooper, 52, was described as a ?decent and law-abiding? woman who dedicated her life to her seriously ill daughter Kim Arnold. But she snapped after looking on helplessly as a cowardly bully sent her a series of appalling comments via Facebook.

One labelled her a cripple and said the wheelchair user should be left to ?roll down a hill.?

Another message read: ?Your mother should have had an abortion. She only had you because she felt sorry for you.?

Mr Hooper, 19, punched the bully after his mother said ?hit him? and Berwick was then taken back to the family home by car. He was forced to crawl inside and make a ?grovelling apology? to his victim while on all fours. At one point he was hit on the chin with a rolled up newspaper.

All three admitted assault but denied false imprisonment and the judge ruled that not guilty verdicts should be entered.

He said: ?I sentence you on the basis that Mr Berwick sent messages that were wholly disgraceful and shameful but then tried to put the blame on his girlfriend.?

Mrs Hooper was given a conditional discharge. The two men were given community orders which included voluntary work.

Read more: www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2028961/Judge-spares-mother-jail-plotted-attack-internet-troll-posted-horrific-comments-disabled-daughter.html#ixzz1Vpq1S3To

Precised down full article on the above link.

Good for the judge, the right decision was made.

no he was the bully who tormented a young girl. but like all bullies he has made himself the victim(in some people eyes)
he has won

What he did should have been equally wrong. It's not though.
Can you see the injustice in that?

I am absolutely exhausted aswell. Social services have cut my care package to zero hours a week and have decided that I need to go on a parenting course in JANUARY for parents who have children with emotional problems My child with disabilities is twelve fgs, I have a degree. i can't cope because it is hard bloody work and I have no family support whatsoever and my husband works extremely long hours. I can see how someone who was at the end of their tether could snap like that, I really can.

glitterknickaz - I do live it day in, day out, too. and there has been no dismissal of "words on a screen" in the belittling "get a life" sense.

wannabe has pointed out a few times that words on a screen are easier to control than words in RL, which is true. but no one has said the girl (or her family) should not have been upset/offended/disgusted by whatever was said.

but that upset/offense/disgustdoes not give licence to act - not in this case, or in any case. we have societal rules ofr a reason. and it is wrong of teh family to act violently and humiliate, just as it was wrong of the man to humiliate and taunt in the first place.

They tried the rules, they didn't work.

If it is OK to say the girl should have protected herself by changing her FB settings etc. Then it is OK to 'blame the victim' when all he had to do was not be a twat.

The mother tried to do it 'society's' way, it didn't work, so she did what she needed to.

do the police/authorities take discrimination of this kind seriously though? because I don't think they do

2shoes - no. he didn't "make himself the victim" - he didn't claim he was made to taunt her, or forced to type the messges. he was made the victim by being assaulted and kidnapped. the family of the girl made him a victim.

that is clear, by the laws we have in this country.

his original offense was awful. he should have been punished for it in some way, but by the law, not by anyone who felt like it. that is not the way our society operates.

But people are not punished by the law silverfrog, the law doesn't care. So what are people supposed to do when the society they are part of doesn't give a fuck? Just accept it as their lot?

everyone on this thread has said that the police shoudl have acted. someone further up, who seemed to be in the know, said that there was legislation to deal with this type of offense (EldritchCleaver, maybe? sorry if not - not going to scroll back and check)

THAT is the travesty here. that the original crime was not acted on by the authorities. THAt is what people should be getting up in arms about. not the fact that the girls family were charged for the crimes they committed. because they did commit crimes.

the rules don't work
follow them and you end up a wreck.
we had 4 years of hell, only ended when ds dealt with it.
the police ....yeah ok they cam out, but the yobs had rights don't you know.
that is what has to change, the attitudes.
we could start here, mn is a breeding ground for men like him, we have all seen the disablist crap allowed to stand in the name of education.

(oh and I will leave the victim argument as imo that vile man got what he deserved, he got of lightly)

morloth - x-posts, but apt.

I don't have all the answers. society doesn't care abotu a whole lot more than "words on a screen" crimes (not trying to be flippant). this is something (in general, not just in relation to this crime) tha tneeds to be addressed.

Roger I don't think the police - or society for that case - do deal effectively and consistently with disablism.

It's still an acceptable 'ism'. You only have to look on some threads here to see it. Then of course we in the purplepants brigade are looked upon as haranguing harpies..... People 'liking to be victims' - this is why I don't post here as much as I used to tbh.

Yet practically any parent would defend their children. Why can't people see that is what we do? Why can't people see that actually we are trying to chip through the bone skulled ignorance and say "look, this is real, this is happening and it's happening to us" without being derided and told we're quite wrong?

and another x-post. sorry.

2shoes, I do know what it is like to be on the receiving end of this kind of shit. thankfully not (yet?) wrt dd1, but we had it growing up wrt my brother. not much was done then either.

there will always be ignorant people. there will always be bullies. it is not right that this is so, but it is reality.

I agree with you - attitudes need to change. but you cannot change them by violence. can you honestly say that in your situation, the person who was giving your ds grief about your dd has never taunted anyone else in the same way? or has the fact that your ds thumped him just meant that he has moved on to someone else? a bit like the facebook blocking scenario? great that you and your family are being left alone, but has his attitude really changed? or does he just leave you alone now?

violence does not necessarily change attitudes. it can, in fact breed resentment, and escalate the feelings of insecurity or worry that prompted the original horrible behaviour.

I'd not use violence. I'm well able to shout

I think it is OK that they were charged and sentenced, perfectly reasonable. I also think it is appropriate that they only received a slap on the wrist. Personally, I would have attempted to not get caught but obviously they thought the apology he had to administer was more important than that.

Society doesn't care because on the whole people are selfish, it is law of the jungle out there - as much as we all like to pretend otherwise in our cozy western bubbles.

As I said upthread 'Be careful who you fuck with'. I bet this guy won't be fucking with anyone any time soon, so as far as I am concerned, Result.

silverfrog, yep they moved on and targeted someone else. but what else can you do if the police do nothing, the HA have so many rules to abide by that getting them moved on is so lengthy.
as seen by this thread people don't want to talk about how to stop people like the non victim man.
all they want to do is wring their hands at the fact the family took it into their own hands.

where were the police in all this???

I agree with Morloth. I know this isn't popular either but sometimes people only understand one course of action and I have known many a bully throughout my life who has only stopped when they have received a good hiding off the victim or victims family.

everyone on this thread has said that the police shoudl have acted. someone further up, who seemed to be in the know, said that there was legislation to deal with this type of offense (EldritchCleaver, maybe? sorry if not - not going to scroll back and check)

Yup, it was me. And there is legislation to deal with this. There is no impunity to harass and abuse on the internet. Most people know this-go on the bullying section and read all the threads where children have been cautioned or at least spoken to by police for bullying via Facebook. It would also have been possible to get a civil injunction to stop this man.

The problem here was that the police did not seem bothered enough to do anything about it. There are clear statutory prohibitions against this kind of thing and well-known means for getting court orders to uncover the people behind anonymous postings. If the police told the family they were powerless, they lied and the officers concerned should be disciplined. It is absolutely shocking that such a terrible case met with no police response. It is also very sad that the family did not have access to good legal advice, but then most people don't.

Good post Eldritch.

if tehre are no back up actions available pople will feel forced to take it into their own hands, more so when the victim is vulnerable- a child, disabled, elderly etc.

Even more so if they themselves are vulnerable (and carers are classed as that).

You can empower people with a decent criminal justice system, or understand that otherwise things deteriorate. People feel backed into corners. Surely if one of our chidlren was bullied at school we would take action, and take it higher, then higher... if that 'higher' ceased to exist most of us would have words with parents at the least, no? if the only other option ew could see (and vulnerable people may not see clearly) is for the bullying to carry on.

Oh and whilst I wold hope never to hit or become vioent I do think it can change things.

I vaguely remember my Aunt's Dh being out through a window by my dad and unclkes after he beat her up: I know for a fact he never tried it again.

Now I am a peaceable type and really do not advocate violence but I can see why someone would resort to it in extreme circumstances. I hope to god I never would and if I did would expect some intervention from police etc- but I suspect it ends up that way sometimes.

Sorry for getting your name wrong, eldritch

As I said earlier, the travesty here is that the police didnt act. THAT is whst everyone should be shouting about, and that is the angle it sbould have been reported from - family drivwn to act because police act discriminately (or similar)
But I cannot agree that family were right to do what they did.

2shoes - in your case, then, your ds hitting the person who was spouting abuse served just as blocking on fb would do - they moved on to someone else. That is not the answer, beyond your immediate family, either. It has not stopped him doing it (and that was the main argument against the FB blocking - that it would only lead to him doing it to someone else).

We shoulda be shouting.g about the fact the police did not act, when they were clearly able to do so.

Sorry, phone typos

Don't worry about it at all silverfrog. In a sense you didn't-it's a play on words using the name of the American radical author and Black Panther Eldridge Cleaver.

silverfrog I never said he hit anyone, he didn't need to, the threat was enough.
it took 4 years for the police to do anything, then after making an 8 page statement the pc left and it all had to start again!
same with HA, finally had a vist from theirs, only for that person to leave...and it to start again....
it is sad when you end up not caring what happens, if someone else is targeted, you just want it to stop.
the police should act quicker. the onus should not be on the victim, the victim is often vulnerable and unable to fight their corner.