to be annoyed with myself for defending them

[smoggii]

my family had a discussion last week basically ripping the Philpots to shreds really more about them courting publicity and the usual comments of the DM reader about benefit scroungers etc.

I jumped in with a 'they are clearly devastated and it doesn't matter which walk of life you're from you love your kids and everything else is irrelevant when you have endured such tragedy'

Don't I feel a bit silly?

I just can't get my head around it. I know they haven't been found guilty but to be charged means that the police are satisfied that they (at the very least) can make a case against them and the CPS believe there is enough evidence.

We dont know how they are feeling.

I think that some people still have questions about the baby at Uluru, her mother is trying to get an official ruling that her death is believed to have been cause by a Dingo, but I think that is still ongoing.

The dingo case divides people in Australia even now. I asked about it because it interested me that some people were so vehement that a dingo wouldn't hurt a child even though there had been a child death caused by a dingo earlier that week.

frontpaw it's not a news blackout as such, but once someone's been charged you are not allowed to publish any details in case it prevents a fair trial later on.

That's what I think I was trying to say!

The media in general have been very quiet on this for days now - just the bare facts "parents charged, remanded in custody".

There has been none of the usual commentary or speculation that follows other shocking crimes, which makes me think the media know there is much more to this story, but they have been asked not to report or comment, either to make sure these people get a fair trial, or to stop the abuse of the community that would follow, (as it did in the Shannon Matthews case)

I always remember turning to someone and saying how odd it was when Ian Hartley, the school warden and his partner (forgotten name) was being interviewed about the two missing schoolgirls it turned out he had already murdered. He said 'they were lovely girls' . I bet that didnt go unnoticed by the professional ears.

He was all over sky news like a rash, Huntley. I was sure he did it from about the third time he was on tv. I think the police use the media in that way if they can.

Mindyourownbusiness exactly, it was that sort of thing covered in the programme I mentioned.