Murder by a British Soldier in Kenya

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Fishnut
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Re: Murder by a British Soldier in Kenya

Post by Fishnut » Mon Nov 15, 2021 4:57 pm

Wow, that's horrific.
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Re: Murder by a British Soldier in Kenya

Post by sheldrake » Mon Nov 15, 2021 8:34 pm

plodder wrote:
Mon Nov 15, 2021 2:53 pm
lpm wrote:
Mon Nov 15, 2021 2:46 pm
No, it's not called "progress". It's called "not enough progress".
Define "enough", or perhaps just accept that you're riled because you've been silly and you got caught - we don't really need to end the risk of thermo-nuclear war in order to ensure that fewer women are murdered by British squaddies.

Sheldrake has also been silly agreeing with you although he is typically caught in a forest of psycho-dramatic thorns, whereas you ought to know better.
Yes, that's right plodder.. it must be all those intractable, unreasonable people who disagree with you who are nuts.

LPM made a perfectly reasonable point about how you could reduce the incidence of squaddies raping women in the developing world by not stationing so many squaddies in the developing world. As far as I can tell, you're aware that there's already an RMP criminal investigation but you just want the punishment to be really, really harsh for lots of people, before there's a trial, because that will fundamentally change the way 23 year old trained killers behave when they're out on the piss, or something.

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Re: Murder by a British Soldier in Kenya

Post by Woodchopper » Wed Nov 17, 2021 10:41 am

Millennie Al wrote:
Mon Nov 15, 2021 2:08 am
It's for the Kenyam authorities to investigate crimes in Kenya. We no longer believe in the White Man's Burden.

Compare with the death of Harry Dunn in the UK. British authorities investigated, and an American spy, Anne Sacoolas, was whisked away by the Americans once it seemed the investigation was getting close to her. It is clear that the Americans are not going to extradite her and are going to frustrate any attempt at justice. We do not expect the Americans to take the lead in investigating crimes in the UK comitted by their personnel.

The difference from that case should not be that the UK investigates abroad and takes charge, it should be that the UK cooperates with legitimate foreign investigations and is willing to extradite personnel who have acted in a personal capacity (I think it is too unrealistic to expect any country to hold its own forces to account in their professional capacity). Cover-ups should not be tolerated.
I agree that the best place for the alleged murdered to be tried would be in Kenya. If he is found guilty he should be punished by the Kenyan court.

But that doesn't mean that there shouldn't be another investigation within the British Army. Other people may be involved in wrongdoing, for example it looks as if there may have been a coverup. If so that may have involved people breaking British Army regulations. At the very least there may be a need for the Army to look at changing its procedures, and if so they will need to know what went wrong and why.
Millennie Al wrote:
Mon Nov 15, 2021 2:08 am
Given that the entire purpose of the military is to kill people, it's hardly surprising that some enjoy it. It's like keeping a vicious guard dog and then being surpised when it bites a guest. As they say this time of year, lest we forget.
I agree that it may be impossible to prevent men who want to murder from joining the armed forces. But the environment in which they operate can make it harder or easier for them to commit crimes.

To go back to what fishnut posted at the start of the thread:
One soldier, known as Soldier Y, says that the killer showed him her body on the night of her murder. Soldier Y claims he "told the proper people" but was dismissed as a liar. [Source].

She had been had been beaten and stabbed. Her final moments were spent suffocating in sewage. The identity of her killer is known and yet almost a decade after her murder her family are still unable to get justice.
Soldier Y claims that on returning to base, he immediately told senior officers what he had seen at the hotel.

“I went back to camp, grassed him up [to] everyone, all the lads, all the senior command that were there, everyone. I went to higher up, hierarchy, people that should have dealt with [it]. I told the proper people, [and] I got told to get to f***.” His claims, he says, were treated as “a standing joke”. [Source]
When asked why he thought no action had been taken against Soldier X, [another] source said: “In the army, there is a certain code. You keep your mouth shut. There are some unwritten rules. Stuff does get covered up, you protect your own.” [my emphasis] [Source]
[...]

But on his return to the UK, rumours had started. “There was a lot of talk among the soldiers that a soldier had killed her [Agnes]. “I heard there was a soldier boasting about killing a prostitute in Nanyuki.” [Source]
Despite this all these rumours,
...the British Army has held no inquiry, and none of the soldiers present have been questioned by their superiors. Even after an inquest in 2019 — in which a judge, Njeri Thuku, ruled that Wanjiru was “murdered by British soldiers” and ordered two criminal inquiries — no action was taken by the army. [Source]
It appears that someone tried to report the crime, but they weren't taken seriously. There was a general 'code of silence' and no attempt to investigate what happened.

That is the kind of environment in which people can get away with murder. There are similar issues here to what we've discussed about the Metropolitan Police.

Every organization or community could contain people who want to commit murder, assault, rape, etc. The victims are usually women. Unfortunately an easy way out is to dismiss or ignore people who say that they have been victims, or are witnesses. Its easy to argue that people who make reports shouldn't be taken seriously because they are out to damage the organization, community or movement. Its easy to discredit people who say they are victims or to undermine witness testimony. That's what the Catholic Church did for decades.

All reports of violent attacks, sexual exploitation or coercion, and other abuses should be taken seriously. If they aren't then there is something wrong.

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Re: Murder by a British Soldier in Kenya

Post by sheldrake » Wed Nov 17, 2021 10:45 am

The investigation people keep asking for has already started, being conducted by the RMP. There isnt much more we can do unless people actually want people punished without investigation or trial.

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Re: Murder by a British Soldier in Kenya

Post by plodder » Wed Nov 17, 2021 11:01 am

sheldrake wrote:
Wed Nov 17, 2021 10:45 am
The investigation people keep asking for has already started, being conducted by the RMP. There isnt much more we can do unless people actually want people punished without investigation or trial.
This needs to be an investigation into what happened and why there wasn't an investigation first time round. Let's see how well they do on the second bit. The thing people can do is keep an eye on the second bit.

https://archive.md/JqtDv#selection-2209.0-2213.156

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Re: Murder by a British Soldier in Kenya

Post by Bird on a Fire » Thu Nov 18, 2021 12:43 am

sheldrake wrote:
Wed Nov 17, 2021 10:45 am
The investigation people keep asking for has already started, being conducted by the RMP. There isnt much more we can do unless people actually want people punished without investigation or trial.
I think people are more shocked at the long delay between the crime being reported and being investigated, which if the reports are even roughly to be believed sounds like a deliberate cover-up, which is unacceptable.
We have the right to a clean, healthy, sustainable environment.

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Re: Murder by a British Soldier in Kenya

Post by sheldrake » Thu Nov 18, 2021 12:53 am

Bird on a Fire wrote:
Thu Nov 18, 2021 12:43 am
sheldrake wrote:
Wed Nov 17, 2021 10:45 am
The investigation people keep asking for has already started, being conducted by the RMP. There isnt much more we can do unless people actually want people punished without investigation or trial.
I think people are more shocked at the long delay between the crime being reported and being investigated, which if the reports are even roughly to be believed sounds like a deliberate cover-up, which is unacceptable.
Do not be surprised if the answer involves the Kenyan police (that could simply be a false claim about the Kenyan police which nobody ever gets to the bottom of).

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Re: Murder by a British Soldier in Kenya

Post by Woodchopper » Thu Nov 18, 2021 10:08 am

Bird on a Fire wrote:
Thu Nov 18, 2021 12:43 am
sheldrake wrote:
Wed Nov 17, 2021 10:45 am
The investigation people keep asking for has already started, being conducted by the RMP. There isnt much more we can do unless people actually want people punished without investigation or trial.
I think people are more shocked at the long delay between the crime being reported and being investigated, which if the reports are even roughly to be believed sounds like a deliberate cover-up, which is unacceptable.
Yes, indeed.

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Re: Murder by a British Soldier in Kenya

Post by jimbob » Thu Nov 18, 2021 10:11 pm

bjn wrote:
Sat Nov 13, 2021 8:48 pm
I’ve got nothing to add to this thread apart from reporting my disgust at the act and my disgust at the actions of the British Military in ignoring it completely.
Likewise. And whataboutisim is obvious.
Have you considered stupidity as an explanation

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Re: Murder by a British Soldier in Kenya

Post by Fishnut » Thu Nov 18, 2021 10:37 pm

Woodchopper wrote:
Thu Nov 18, 2021 10:08 am
Bird on a Fire wrote:
Thu Nov 18, 2021 12:43 am
sheldrake wrote:
Wed Nov 17, 2021 10:45 am
The investigation people keep asking for has already started, being conducted by the RMP. There isnt much more we can do unless people actually want people punished without investigation or trial.
I think people are more shocked at the long delay between the crime being reported and being investigated, which if the reports are even roughly to be believed sounds like a deliberate cover-up, which is unacceptable.
Yes, indeed.
I keep seeing the claim that the RMP is conducting an investigation but am unclear of its source. The only investigation I've seen the British Military publicly discuss is the one being conducted by Kenyan authorities, which they have said they will "cooperate very closely with". I've not seen anything to suggest they are currently running their own investigation. I very much think they should so would appreciate some evidence that this is happening.

As to the cover-up, John Healy, Labour MP for Wentworth and Dearne, asked Minister of Defence Ben Wallace on 15 November about why the MoD had not launched an investigation into it and was told,
While I have not opened a formal investigation, I have absolutely asked the question of the Army to get the bottom of what happened with the original allegations and where we got with that. At the same time, I am respecting the judicial process. The right hon. Member and I will know that we can comment only so far on what is ongoing with that incident and others that appear in the service justice scheme, or indeed on any foreign assistance required.
A generous reading of this could be that they are going to wait until the judicial process is complete before examining why it took so long for that process to be allowed to take place. A more cynical reading is that they are hoping that everyone will forget about it.
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Re: Murder by a British Soldier in Kenya

Post by Woodchopper » Thu Nov 18, 2021 11:09 pm

I think the source is this report in The Mail from 5 November: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... urder.html

I haven’t found an earlier source reporting an ongoing UK investigation.

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Re: Murder by a British Soldier in Kenya

Post by Fishnut » Thu Nov 18, 2021 11:17 pm

Ah, thank you!
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Re: Murder by a British Soldier in Kenya

Post by sheldrake » Fri Nov 19, 2021 9:32 pm

Woodchopper wrote:
Thu Nov 18, 2021 11:09 pm
I think the source is this report in The Mail from 5 November: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... urder.html

I haven’t found an earlier source reporting an ongoing UK investigation.
The centre for military justice said an rmp inquiry had been launched in an article on october 24th

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Re: Murder by a British Soldier in Kenya

Post by Fishnut » Sun Nov 21, 2021 9:16 pm

Not Kenya, but southern Nigeria. And not now, but in 1889. But still the rape of a woman by British soldiers that was covered up by the British establishment.

George Annesley was British Consul in Old Calabar for 18 months from 1889. He was quietly pensioned off following a series of atrocities he commited, which the Prime Minister Lord Salisbury called "very bad indeed". In a letter written by George Turner, a Sierra Leonean consular clerk, to the prime minister in 1891, he recounted that Annesley would “imprison all those who were obnoxious to him”.

Research by historian Paddy Docherty, which will be published next month in his book Blood and Bronze: The British Empire and the Sack of Benin, has revealed that Annesley was also responsible for the gang rape of a woman, Ekang, who was accused of taking a soldier's cap.

Turner reported that he heard a sergeant announce,
“The consul says, whoever feels inclined to cohabit with a woman must come upstairs.”

Turner also said: he heard: “the poor girl dragging herself down the stairs, crying bitterly”. “The soldiers came down and made it a matter of talk and laughter how [they] actually cohabited with Ekang, the consul himself assisting to hold her down.”
The documents analysed by Docherty include many from British officials complaining about Annesley's conduct. Yet nowhere was there any suggestion that he should be prosecuted.

Plus ça change
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Re: Murder by a British Soldier in Kenya

Post by Fishnut » Tue Mar 29, 2022 8:16 am

The family of Agnes Wanjiru can sue the soldier after a Kenyan court declared foreign soldiers have no immunity.
The judge said the United Kingdom government had waived its state immunity for the soldiers and the army corporately when it signed the Defence Cooperation Agreement (DCA) in 2016.
Hopefully this means the family will be able to get some justice at long last.
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