SAS soldier imprisoned for possession of *gasp* a gun
Sgt Danny Nightingale was given a 9mm Glock by allies in Iraq for his outstanding service there. he’d planned to donate it to his SAS regiment as a trophy of their time there. But the deaths of two of his friends caused him to escort their bodies back to the UK and his team mates packed his remaining gear, including the Glock, and shipped it to him. In the interim, Sgt Nightingale, who suffers from severe memory loss for got about the gun.
Last week, he was court martialed for possession of the handgun and sentenced to 18 months imprisonment ending his 17-year career, according to a link in the UK’s Telegraph sent to us by Andy;
Patrick Mercer, the Conservative MP for Newark and a former infantry officer, said he planned to take up the case with the Defence Secretary. Simon McKay, Sgt Nightingale’s lawyer, said: “On Remembrance Sunday, when the nation remembers its war heroes, my client — one of their number — is in a prison cell.
“I consider the sentence to be excessive and the basis of the guilty plea unsafe. It is a gross miscarriage of justice and grounds of appeal are already being prepared.”
You’d think that if anyone in that country could be trusted to own a handgun, it’d be someone who had been a counter-terrorism expert for 11 years, but apparently, the military justice system doesn’t think that’s true. As Andy said, the sun had finally set on the British Empire.
Category: Dumbass Bullshit
Interesting to note that since the UK banned possession of handguns, knife attacks have increased substantially.
Screw that. Just pack the guy up and ship him over here. I don’t think we’d mind one more immigrant. Especially one with a counter terrorism background.
Just remember folks–Dear Reader wants to turn the good ol’ US of A into another neo-Socialist Western Europe “democracy” as well, with all the bells, whistles, free ponies, and creeping Sharia one can take, and then some.
Sparky, no kidding…I hope for a change to normalcy but I doubt we will see it over the next four years….
The Brits have truly lost their legendary common sense on this case….
oh, they lost that a long time ago…. pretty much every means of self defense are either illegal or illegal to use. There was a fella a while back who was attacked by a burglar – discharged his shotgun in self defense, yet still went to jail for it. In support of AW1 Tim: last time I was in Scotland, the paper had a large front-page article on the escalation of “knife crime” and showed a large collection of confiscated knives. Most were small Swiss Army knives, paring knives – out of 50 pictured the maybe 40+ had blades less than three inches long.
Thanks for this one. There is a petition out of England in support of this Sgt.
http://www.change.org/en-GB/petitions/judge-advocate-alistair-mcgrigor-military-justice-overturn-the-decision-to-jail-sgt-nightingale-for-18-months?utm_campaign=autopublish&utm_medium=facebook&utm_source=share_petition&utm_term=27492934
Do I think this will change the courts mind? Probably, not, but this Global War on our Troops is beyond insane and we need to speak up.. (My 2 cents worth….lol)
@5 That’s why it’s good to keep some unusual items around. I have an old video camera in my car…I keep the battery in a tube sock, the ability to drill someone in the head with a 1lb battery in sock that extends your reach can be quite handy in the coming zombie apocalypse….it’s quiet enough to keep the rest of them from hearing you.
NHSparky, unfortunately you’re preaching to the choir here…..the leftists in this country would be just as happy to see people locked up for 18 months for possessing a sidearm, they just haven’t gotten the laws changed in their favor. Yet. And if it’s a highly-decorated operator fresh off a combat deployment, all the better–after all, that’s just one more potential domestic terrorist behind bars, according to the Obama Administration.
And the sheep will happily go along with it, provided they continue to get their Obamaphones.
This is why, years ago, we kicked all the miscreants out of our country and sent them back to England.
I guess we need to do it again. Plenty of people in the US who enjoy this kind of thing and they should go live in Europe so they can feel “safe” and protected. Yeah, not gonna happen because they enjoy the hypocrisy of abusing the liberties of the US, while trying to destroy them at the same time…
@8: As someone actually ON the left, I have no problems with people possessing sidearms and clearly don’t have any desire to see people with one locked up. Especially not highly decorated operators fresh off a combat deployment.
@7…. due to the strong possibility of over-tight lug nuts being more than the usual auto company supplied lug wrench can break loose, I keep a socket to fit the lug nuts in the glove box and a minimum 18″ flex bar handy by the driver’s seat. Sure don’t want to have to walk home…that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.
@10, more power to you and I hope more like you come to the forefront in the Democratic party, but unfortunately you’re the exception rather than the rule among those on the left in the US.
@11 Nice, my grandfather would have loved that story…back in the ’70s he kept an ice axe in his car, when he was pulled over for a bad tail light and the police saw it on the front seat he told the police it was in case he drove into the river to get out of the car quickly, and if needed, for taking care of punks trying to steal his social security check…the police officer sent him on his way with a chuckle and a warning to get the light fixed.
@11 I keep a folding, lock-blade knife in my glovebox. It’s for the seatbelts, in case I’m ever caught in a car-fire.
I read crap like this and I wonder how on earth do morons like these get elected/appointed … then I remember what happened last week.
@6 brat
“Beyond insane” is DEAD on! It’s like Western Civilization has a Death Wish, or something!
Apparently the British no longer believe that, “We sleep soundly in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm.” According to Wikipedia, Winston Churchill said that. If the 22nd Special Air Service cannot bear arms on their behalf then HM Government has lost its way and the British empire has slipped quietly beneath the waves.
An absolute disgrace! How can a Conservative Prime Minister allow this sort of thing to happen…
His wife was on the radio the other day telling their side (and no doubt there is another side to it), it seems that some of the facts may of been overlooked or just ignored.
Brave woman, and I think any decent person who reads about this will support these people.
The ones who sent him down should hang their heads in shame and be removed from their places of power.
[…] Nightingale was jailed last year for possession of a handgun that he been given by Iraqi allies for the work he did with them. The handgun had been shipped to […]