to think they shouldn't send you to prison for taking a picture of a corpse

[pisacake]

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4611862/Man-jailed-posting-Grenfell-Tower-victim-picture.html

Apparently Mr. Mwaikambo, who is of Tanzanian origin or extraction, opened a body bag at the Grenfell Tower and posted the picture on Facebook.

I'm not sure about Tanzania, but I am in Indonesia and it's very common to post selfies with dead (i.e. in the moments after they die) relatives etc. on Facebook. There was a case earlier this year where a Western man died and the local newspaper published multiple shots of him dead, dressed only in his underpants with blood coming out of his nose etc. Those photos remain online.

Obviously this is not the done thing in England, but it seems that someone they have come up with a fairly arbitrary charge (sending obscene materials over the internet) - there's no law against what he did, per se - and whacked a rather stiff sentence on him.

I'm not saying he was right to do it, but it seems that there is an excessive sentence for someone who broadcast to a fairly limited number of people (he has a couple of hundred friends on Facebook), something which inherently is more about outrage at the fire than the fact of what he did.

The law used is obscenity, but the photos are no more obscene than going to Tanzania/other parts of Africa and taking pictures of dead Africans to be broadcast on the news, or photos of the deceased Gaddafi (widely distributed in Western media) or whatever. The obscenity is the fire, but Mr. Mwaikambo is in no way responsible for that.

Yabu.... completely out of order.

"I read he uncovered the body, not that it was in a body bag. If they were in a body bag, why weren't they moved?"

When he uploaded the photo apparently he captioned it "‘Does anyone know this body laying outside my flat for more than two hours?’"

I can't find the actual post; normally you would expect some corner of the internet to have archived it, so it suggests that it was not particularly well distributed (suggesting that the 'greater harm' may not have been satisfied otherwise)

Posting pictures*

I don't care what the man's culture is. He is in the UK and needs to respect UK culture and laws.

Sod his flipping 'culture'!!!!

Despicable behaviour.... prison is the best place for people like that. Even better, deport the twat

The fire was still raging of course they would have removed the body if they'd had the time or space. They were more focused on moving injured, dying and traumatised living victims. The body wasn't covered with a sheet it wrapped up in a body bag so he didn't peek under a sheet he actually uncovered it. I don't think it was wrong for the body to have been left there wrapped and secured while all this pandemonium was going on.

I'm not denying he was out of order, but I think we need to bear in mind that he'd had a random person land in his garden and nobody appeared to be doing anything about it. That is surely upsetting and a mitigating circumstance?

I think they're making an example of him and I think it was a long time coming. I hope they turn their attentions to the media now on the back of this. they won't it's quite sickening what people think is fine to take and publish photos of. Time it was addressed.

Don't tell me you have actually been looking for it pisa. What for, a good gawp. It doesn't matter how widely it was circulated. It was taken and published.

Actually I think this thread is provocative and worrying and am reporting.

I'm still a bit when people take photos of flowers at funerals.

Taking photos of bodies which are nothing to do with you is repellent.

Photojournalism highlighting atrocities is not the same thing. Was he a journalist?

So was a dead person outside his flat now there was a raging bloody fire total chaos and he posted an unidentified person on facebook are you not reading what you are saying Op

Even better, deport the twat

I am mixed race, arab, black and white. I'm also a British citizen, hold another 2 passports. Where would you deport me to?

I wonder if the person's NoK whose body was in the bottom of the stairwell gave their permission for the media to share it. British media will blur faces but others won't.

The family of the deceased hadn't even been told, of course it's right he was charged and locked up.

When he uploaded the photo apparently he captioned it "‘Does anyone know this body laying outside my flat for more than two hours?’

That makes it worse, not better. He knew the body was unidentified and he wanted FB users to identify it?

Imagine desperately posting missing posters of your family on FB only to come across that? And then to learn they'd been left on the floor for some time.

No matter what you culture, that is not okay.

I think it's reaching trying to turn this into a cultural thing. It's not the same thing at all. No culture takes pictures of people unknown to them, who've died in tragic circumstances and posts them publicly.

but is it usual procedure to put someone in a body bag and then leave them where they are?

Probably not but this wasn't a normal incident was it? I dare say anyone from the emergency services on the scene was a little busy at the time. Doubt they had the man power nor was the area particularly secure for stationing people on guard.

Apparently it's unreasonable to expect people not to go poking round corpses whilst there's an inferno raging.

Im at a loss as to why your defending him? 3 months is nothing in the scheme of things and imho entirely appropriate. Given the mood of the local community it's probably best he's out of their sight at the moment.

^When he uploaded the photo apparently he captioned it "‘Does anyone know this body laying outside my flat for more than two hours?^

Ok let's just say he isn't some sick mind and he was concerned about how long the body bag had been there. Why the fuck did he post pictures and a video online after he UNZIPPED the bag? From the link OP has posted it says "'He uploaded photographs and video of the deceased inside the body bag and then five photographs of the upper body and the face and the blood that had drained from the body"

Why would he do that? This person hadn't even been identified yet, the family don't even know this loved one is dead imagine seeing that on Internet?

Dress it up how you like that behaviour is unacceptable and there is NO excuse for posting them photos online

tbf i'm coming at this from a completely different angle, but here goes

really deliberately vague and long here so i don't out myself,

a while ago (years- i was still a young child) a family member was caught up in a really tragic event- not an attack or anything of the sort- and lost their life. a witness at the scene went round and took photos of my relative, as well as probably about 2 or 3 others, and posted them on the local fb group to help identify them (fb was only about 2 years old at this point- so literally about 2 people on the group!)

but it did bring a lot of comfort to our family knowing that at least someone was around at the scene when my relative lost their life, in fact the direct relatives of my dead relative are still in touch with the photo-taker, still brings them comfort to this day

Last paragraph was aimed at the OP by the way

Vlad if you go about taking pictures of corpses I don't really care where you go or what happens to you.

" Im sure indonesians are not opening random body bags and posting on facebook"

Yes they definitely are. There have been a couple of cases here I have personally witnessed, the bodies (of Western tourists) are first taken to the local Puskesmas (health clinic) before going off to the city. People (random people, not journalists or something) literally open up body bags and take photos. And then upload them to Facebook. And nobody says 'oi that's wrong'. Because for them it isn't.

There is a local shop selling 'perlengkapan mayat' (supplies for burying corpses). Funerals are DIY and a regular thing, you bury your own. In some parts of Indonesia they dig up the bones a year or so later and the surviving relatives talk to the bones. In others they put the skeletons in caves where they live. Children play there.

There is no universal human aversion to photographing corpses. Even in Europe I think in Catholic countries the concept of memento mori in the form of catacombs and what not is much more common, not to mention open caskets at funerals.

Obscenity is for me rather a dangerous thought crime because it is so arbitrary. If there had been some more appropriate legislation, perhaps interfering with emergency services or some such I would be a bit more comfortable with this.

Yes, this isn't Indonesia though.

"I think it's reaching trying to turn this into a cultural thing. It's not the same thing at all. No culture takes pictures of people unknown to them, who've died in tragic circumstances and posts them publicly."

Do you need me to link to the numerous social media posts here in Indonesia where people do exactly that? Why are people so insistent that their perceived norms are human absolutes???

I don't condone his actions - tbh it sounds sick and very twisted. I can't imagine what sort of thought process it must take. BUT, I don't understand why so many people on MN are so so so racist, xenophobic and down right rude about those who are not white, British (or of variation). It's been especially bad over the past few days in light of the tower block disaster. I know people have come a long way since the days of praising gollywogs but it still rankles.

It doesn't matter what they do in other countries though does it? He didn't do this in another country where it's acceptable he done it in the uk where it's not.

We don't unzip body bags and put unidentified bodies on the fucking internet