In a further twist, a day later the number one suspect Maurice Clemmons had his house surrounded by armed SWAT teams while a negotiator tried to coax him out without any shots being fired. Unfortunately, that plan seems to have failed with the news that the suspect was shot and ‘possibly killed’ in the stand-off. Why they cannot confirm the status of the suspect is a bit strange to me, but maybe they have good reason.

No motive has been made public, but it is known that the shooting of the four police officers, among them one female officer and a sergeant, was most likely planned and carried out with accuracy – detectives have been quoted as saying that the bullets “hit their targets” and that collateral damage had not occurred. Whatever happened, it seems this guy held a grudge against the police doing a bit of work outside of the office on a quiet Sunday morning, with fatal consequences.

Just going to show how mindlessly violent they are, Mercer has attacked and stabbed Fahri in a fight whilst a 3rd convict held Fahri down. The weapon was a pair of tweezers, sharpened to a point and taped up to act as a makeweight shiv. Not that I’m all that bothered – they all deserve whatever they get.

What this does highlight though is that there is no concept of rehabilitation for people like this. They murdered two young people who had done nothing wrong and with Rhys Jones, didn’t even have any contact with the attacker – he was just going home after football practice. They’re violent through and through, and no amount of hand-wringing and social work will make them better people.

Of course, crimes like these are very out of the ordinary, thankfully, and the murderers in both cases were brought to trial and convicted, even though they got vastly reduced sentences compared to what they should have received (i.e. a life sentence). Still, at least they’re locked up for now, and tearing strips out of each other.

Long may it continue.