12 confirmed murdered and 25 injured after Gunman runs amok in Whitehaven, Egremont and Seascale, Cu

reply to post by jonhplayer


I own guns myself, and not that I'm contemplating anything.. But if I wanted to kill a lot of people, I wouldn't use a gun, they are too loud.

You'd have to be blind not to see the pattern:


5-11-06
Antwerp Street Shooting 2 dead, 2wounded
Belgian lawmakers passed strict new gun control laws in 2006 in reaction to the racially motivated shooting deaths of a toddler and her black baby sitter in Antwerp.

11-7-07
JOKELA HIGH SCHOOL SHOOTING, Tusuula, Finland 9 dead
Such a tragedy in the normally peaceful Nordic nation should make Finland reconsider its campaign against European Union plans to tighten gun ownership laws for youngsters, a senior cabinet member told Reuters.

4-10-09
OAED Vocational College, Athens 1 dead, 3 wounded
"...an unprecedented incident for Greece that fueled debate about laws governing gun ownership..."

11-26-09
Pecs University, Hungary 1 dead, 3 wounded
Justice Minister Tibor Draskovics said that Hungary's laws on the possession of firearms had to be reviewed to see if any tightening is necessary.

There has been an interesting development:


news.bbc.co.uk...
Fellow taxi driver Mark Cooper, a friend of the gunman, said Bird had told him he feared he would be jailed over an undeclared sum of £60,000 in his bank account.
"All he said was that they [the Inland Revenue] had caught him with £60,000 in the bank
"He said: 'They have caught me with £60,000 in the bank, the tax people'. He just said: 'I'll go to jail'.
"He just asked me if he could handle jail. He didn't want to go."

This guy was a cab driver and before that a security guard. He had two children. How did he manage to get such a sum? Did he really think he could hide his money from the government in a bank?

This reminds me of tax protestor Joe Stack flying his airplane into the IRS building in Austin, TX back in February.

----------

The slander machine is really cranking up in this article:

www.thesun.co.uk...

Lethal links to a maniac

GRUDGE gunman Derrick Bird's links to a clutch of victims he massacred were being probed last night - as cops finally pieced together the full picture of the cab beast's trail of horror.
The ex-nuke plant worker, 52 - sacked for thieving from Sellafield 20 years ago - blasted to death at least three men also once employed there. ...
A chum who was a colleague of Bird's at the reprocessing plant told how the killer simmered with rage for two decades at those he blamed for losing his cushy job.
Bird would regularly vent his fury at having to scrape a living at the wheel of a taxi. The friend said: "When I got in his cab he used to say, 'I hate them'."
The madman's brother David - the first to die - was his hated twin. ... Bird, who used to get fellow cabbies to join him on regular sex holidays to Thailand's fleshpots, was said to have been seething at jokes about him falling for one of the hookers.
The friend of the mass murderer, who killed himself in a wood after his orgy of bloodshed, revealed: "It turned out he had become smitten with this woman. He started sending her large sums of cash - thousands of pounds. Then she stopped returning his calls.
The chum said things "came to a head" the night before Bird took his revenge - when he told his smirking fellow cabbies: "There's going to be a rampage tomorrow."

Note these slanderous references are not sourced. Probably because they don't exist.



[edit on 4-6-2010 by starviego]

Just wondering if anyone has heard from woogleuk who lives in the area, knows some of the victims and was expressing concern about some of his family and friends.

And Concept X hasn't posted since the night of the shootings.
He works in a betting shop in Whitehaven just yards away from the taxi rank and knew Bird.

Hope you guys are ok and my thoughts are with you, your families and everyone concerned.

reply to post by Freeborn


I live in this area too, 2 and a half miles from egremont where some of the shootings occurred, even saw him at 11:30 that day he drove very fast down our country road, didn't know what was going on at the time until the police came door to door and said every stay inside.

But yes one thing about this is everyone will know or will know someone who knows a victim of this because were such a close knit community, i knew 2 of the people.

reply to post by Ibex08


Sorry for your and the whole area's loss mate. Did you know Derrick Bird?

The Son's of Bird have released this statement.

"We are utterly devastated about the death of our father Derrick Bird. To us, he was the nicest man you could ever meet. He was a loving dad and recently became a grandfather.

"We would like to say that we do not know why our dad committed these horrific crimes. We are both mortified by these sad events. "Dad was a loving and cheerful character and was well-known throughout the local community and in the areas where he worked. He will be missed by us, his family and friends.

"We would ask that we be allowed to mourn the loss of our father. We would also like to send our condolences to all the other families and people involved in this tragic incident. Our thoughts are with them."

And from Bird's brother.

"My family and I are extremely saddened by the events on Wednesday. The loss of both my brothers is devastating. "They were both very caring, family people. They were well-known and respected in their local communities.

"My family and I are saddened at the loss of life and woundings and can only offer our condolences to the families concerned. "We appreciate what they are suffering at this time. We cannot offer any reason why Derrick took it upon himself to commit these crimes. We are in shock and dismay."

www.guardian.co.uk...

reply to post by Peruvianmonk


They must be feeling so mixed up having lost a loving father so suddenly but also knowing the pain and suffering he has also caused to so many other people, many of them their own family and friends.

Hello, just a quick heads up.

Panorama on BBC One tonight at 20:30 will be on the subject of the Cumbrian Shootings, and will also be on the BBC Iplayer "shortly afterwards", although with it being less than a week since the events i doubt there will be anything earth shattering on the program but its certainly worth a watch.

Im just posting this quickly as i am about to go to work, i will post a full and decent reply to various things when im home so around 10pm ~ gmt.

reply to post by Concept X


The media is quite clearly trying to tar the Cumbrian Police. Especially the T.V. media, going on about how 3 police officers in Whitehaven saw Bird but did not stop him.

They have not been directly crictizing the Police on this but the fact it has been the main story all day does suggest they are attempting to indirectly question the Police response.

They were unarmed! And did the best they could in following him. Leave it out BBC, ITV and SKY.

reply to post by Peruvianmonk


I am the first one to criticise The police normally but I genuinely feel for them here.
Anyone who knows the UK will know that this is the last area within the UK whee anyone would have thought that something like this may happen so I can fully understand why there aren't many armed response units in West Cumbria.
Having visited the area several times over the years I also understand the difficulties the officers cocerened would have had trying to track Bird.

Typical of the British media to look for scapegoats and to sensationalise things.
The responsibility for these shootings lie firmly and solely at the feet of the person who committed them.

Another twist on the money angle:

www.youtube.com...
ITNNews
According to a friend of his, Cumbria gunman Derrick Bird was embroiled in a major tax investigation into a mystery 60,000 pounds deposited in his bank account.  Mark Cooper has told the media that the Inland Revenue was investigating Bird for the undeclared money.... .   Mr. Cooper... said he wasn't sure where Bird got the cash from.

We have heard of Birdy's forays to Thailand, but they aren't talking about his journeys to Russia.  Why not?

www.timesonline.co.uk...
Derrick, for all his advancing years, enjoyed the life of a single lad, with holidays to Russia and Thailand.

We are led to believe that Birdy was worried about an unpaid tax bill on the 60k mystery money.  But maybe what we should focus on is what he did to get this money.  Maybe that is the real reason Birdy was sure he was facing prison time.

Come to think of it, if he spent time a'whorin in Russia, he could have made a perfect candidate for a FSB 'honey trap' operation. Though he didn't have access to classified information himself, he may have been asked to pass messages to and from agents in the UK. Nearby Sellafield nuclear processing plant would certainly be a priority target for Russian intell.  

reply to post by starviego


If he had never registered as self-employed and thus not paid any tax whilst working as a self-employed taxi driver then he could quite easily have saved that sum of money up.

Once on his case The Inland Revenue would have been quite uncompromising and unyielding in their pursuit of him and a jail sentence would have been a likely prospect.
That would have been a frightening prospect for a man like Bird.

reply to post by EyesWideShut


I totally agree with you here, EWS! I have ACCESS, to HUNDREDS of loaded firearms. I also, have SELF-CONTROL. Most of the anti-gun crowd, apparently judge others, by their own measure.
The US, has a "gun culture". We DO NOT have "cowboy & Indians, and wild west". THAT is an insult to America. BTW- I am of SCOTT descent (mostly)- so, if the English don't want guns, fine. But- I have a DIVINE RIGHT, to own/carry one.
I'm NOT saying that my country is perfect- far from it- I am one of the GOVERNMENT'S most vocal critics! However- I do believe that our FOUNDING DOCUMENTS, the U.S.Constitution, is one of the finest documents, EVER written by humans.
The "Magna Carta, doesn't hold a candle to it.

Thought you all might like to know some latest local news on Derrick Bird.

It turns out that only a matter of weeks before the incident he was driving a couple of lads up to Moor Row and they jumped taxi, Derrick gave chase and he ended up getting a severe beating. They broke his teeth and fractured his skull amongst other things.

After that he seemed to go noticeably go downhill, one bloke said he seen Derrick bouncing off walls one night shouting obscenities whilst steaming drunk, which was unusual for him.

Also........

The night before he went on his rampage, the other drivers on the rank were winding him up by stealing his passengers, something they all did to each other in the past, but that night it wound him up more. One of his victims, Darren Rewcastle, also a driver, was winding him up the most, he stormed off saying "you wont see me again after tonight".

That must have been the firing pin, on top of the inland revenue, the "supposed" will, and the beating he took (fractured skull, serious head injury, might have caused the main problem).

I attended Garry Purdhams funeral, and also the rememberence service in Whitehaven, it was a emotional few days to say the least. After the minutes silence in Whitehaven town centre all the taxi drivers started pipping their horns in a sort of salute.

Originally posted by woogleuk
It turns out that only a matter of weeks before the incident he was driving a couple of lads up to Moor Row and they jumped taxi, Derrick gave chase and he ended up getting a severe beating. They broke his teeth and fractured his skull amongst other things.

That happened three years before, not weeks before.

reply to post by starviego


Your right, I meant to come back and change it, 2007, either i've misheard the craic, or the person I was chatting with, who happens to be a driver, got it wrong. (feel a bit silly now)

I still stand by what I said about it adding to the build up though.

Theres a lot of different storys flying about over it though as well, it's hard to keep track.

The bit about what happened the night before, the fair stealing, thats correct, thats been confirmed by one of the drivers that was there.


[edit on 24/6/10 by woogleuk]

Whoops.

I'll fix this soon



[edit on 24-6-2010 by Concept X]

Did Birdy whack Swedish Prime Minister Olaf Palme?

In this link, the author says that Birdy feared being tried as a war criminal, not as a tax cheat:

www.cods h i t.blogspot.com/2010/09/why-damaged-covert-operator-derek-bird.html

... When it came time to start the showdown with the Soviets, the trial assassination of Bradley on February 18, 1986 in preparation for the one in Stockholm ten days later, Hayward led the ambush squad, and Bird apparently did the actual killing. ....
When Bradley started doing so, he was gunned down by a barrage of gunfire, the first one apparently from Hayward, aka Soldier 'A' wihch hit Bradley's in the buttocks, and the last ones by Soldier 'C' apparently aka Derek Bird, a burst of fire..."into the young man's stomach which proved fatal."
It seems that Bird suffered a similar fate - since he might well have been one of the assassins stalking (Olaf)Palme too, given his role in the Bradley trial run - forced out of the Army, and given essentially a new identity by becoming Derrick Bird, what he was known as when he was given a joiner's job at Sellafield's nuclear site around this time. ...


/

[edit on 7-9-2010 by starviego]

[edit on 7-9-2010 by starviego]

[edit on 7-9-2010 by starviego]

[edit on 7-9-2010 by starviego]

its a shame he did it over there if he waited a couple of months and did it in my neck of woods he would probably been picked off at range by somebody with a deer rifle shot guns are devastating at close range but at 250 feet not so much. and guns don't kill people people kill people

reply to post by starviego


I have officially just read the biggest pile of bollocks I have ever had the misfortune to read, I really do hope that you do not believe that.