van Hoogstraten

[Lady Whistledown]

I bet the Argus are shitting themselves.

They spent years trying to get him put away, and when he finally did, they gave it to him big time.

Watch them start kissing his arse now.

 

[¤DãŃn¥ §êãGüLL¤]

Conclusive proof that money does = power

 

[Ernest]

Jeez - can you imagine if Van Hoogstraaten ever came knocking at the Albion's door looking for a piece of the action. Doesn't bear thinking about. Pure evil.

Best man for the job, can you imagine what he would do with the Falmer NIMBY's ?

 

[Gerbil]

Complete and utter scumbag.

Goes to prove that money talks.

The justice system in this country is a joke.

Another reason to consider moving abroad.

 

[Robot Chicken]

What about the family of Mohammed Raja? They might want to have a word with Mr Nicholas van Hoogstraten about his death...

 

[Easy 10]

He's got it coming to him.
The blokes made so many bitter enemies of so many people over the years, someone will catch up with him sooner or later. He was probably safer inside.

 

[sully]

Best man for the job, can you imagine what he would do with the Falmer NIMBY's ?

Meathead.

On the basis that he has excluded walkers from rightfully using footpaths across his estate, he is actually the biggest NIMBY in town.

I really can't see him siding with a bunch of football supporters. Having described ramblers as "the great unwashed", his contempt for us "hooligans" must be a given.

 

[ChutneyStirrer]

I bet the Argus are shitting themselves.

They spent years trying to get him put away, and when he finally did, they gave it to him big time.

Watch them start kissing his arse now.

Good call.... see the three page interview with him in the Argus - Samaritan indeed?!

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

I bet the Argus are shitting themselves.

They spent years trying to get him put away, and when he finally did, they gave it to him big time.

Watch them start kissing his arse now.

Oh yes. Today's Argus front page headline, under a typically sour-faced picture of the evil shit, boasts the headline 'The Good Samaritan'.

Have these people no shame?

 

[CHAPPERS]

What the f*** have the Argus said about the MURDERING RASCIST MONEY GRABBING WEASLE ****?

I saw an advert for the Arsegus that said 'My life in jail' or summat, tossers. He should n't even be given the time of day and personally i wish a slow death on the fucker.

 

[Dover]

That Chapmans is why I will not be buyin The Arsegas today.

 

[Sully's Moustache]

From itv.com, this shows how crap our "justice" system is. Three Appeal Court judges think the retrial judge was wrong, but there is f*** all they can do about it! What a load of bollocks!


Hoogstraten 'should face retrial'
2.52PM, 12 Dec 2003


A judge's unchallengeable ruling that Nicholas van Hoogstraten should not face retrial on a manslaughter charge "thwarts the interests of justice", three appeal judges have said.

"Those interests require that Mr van Hoogstraten be retried," said Lord Justice Kennedy, sitting with Mr Justice Curtis and Mr Justice Forbes.

That was what the Court of Appeal had decided last July when it quashed his conviction of the manslaughter of business rival Mohammed Raja and ordered a fresh trial, he said.

But, as the law stood, the court was powerless to entertain an appeal by the prosecution against the decision of the retrial judge, Sir Stephen Mitchell, that Mr van Hoogstraten had no case to answer.

After giving detailed legal reasons for their decision on Monday that they had no jurisdiction to hear such an appeal, the judges questioned "how justice is to be done in similar cases in the future".

Property baron Mr van Hoogstraten, 58, from Uckfield, East Sussex, was freed on Monday after serving a year of a 10-year jail sentence for his alleged involvement in the killing of Mr Raja by two men who are now serving life sentences for murder.

Last year, a jury found him not guilty of murder, but guilty of manslaughter.

That verdict was overturned and a retrial ordered by the Court of Appeal because of a "flawed" direction to the jury by the original trial judge.

He could not be retried for murder, having been acquitted of that offence.

The problem then faced by the prosecution was that, in re-indicting him for manslaughter as an offence in its own right rather than as a lesser alternative to murder, it had to produce evidence that he participated in a joint venture with the killers and foresaw what they might do, even if he did not intend it.

The new trial judge ruled that, even if the prosecution could prove its case on the facts, there was no basis on which a jury could conclude that Mr van Hoogstraten contemplated the act which caused death.

Today, Lord Justice Kennedy said: "It is of some importance for an appellate court to be able to consider whether the trial judge is right in his conclusion because, if he is, it is necessary to consider how justice is to be done in similar cases in the future.

"It may be that, when a retrial is ordered in the case of an appellant who has been convicted of manslaughter on a charge of murder, the prosecution should be entitled, if they choose, to seek again a conviction of murder.

"Otherwise, as this case and other cases have shown, the prosecution is likely to be neutered by the partial acquittal.

"But that is a matter for Parliament and not for this court."

 

[Lady Whistledown]

I'd like to think today's headline was in fact the Argus's idea of being ironic but who knows?

Imagine being at your lowest point and ringing the Samaritans to find that on the other end of the line.

Desperate person "hello? I'm at the top of Beachy Head and I'm about to jump, my life isn't worth living"

Good Samaritan Hoogstraten "come now, would you like to talk about it? Things probably aren't as bad as you think. I'm sure you have many caring family and friends. Try thinking about all the things you love to do in life and hold on to those happy thoughts"

Person: "well, I love to spend my weekends taking long walks through the countryside with my local ramblers society and..."

GS NvH "Really? In that case you can f*ck off and jump, you filthy, unwashed, stinking scum of the earth"

Click.

 

[US Seagull]

So let me get this straight, he's defense was that he only hired these thugs to "rough-up" the other guy, not to kill him. So, is it legal to hire people to "rough-up" somebody then?

Still, this case doesn't beat this one from my side of the Atlantic:

Robert Durst

This guy admitted to killing his 71-year old neighbor, cutting up the body, dumping it in Galveston bay and then doing a runner. The verdict: NOT GUILTY!!!!

 

[marvin]

His defence was that he did not (or could not reasonably foresee) foresee the eventual outcome of his actions.

Asking someone to go "rough" someone up is different to "go kill". The latter means he could foresee that they would kill the other that he mearly wanted them frightened.

Although the former is a crime I don't think he was ever charged with the crime the DPP preferring to go for the Murder charge instead. Hoping to clean the streets of this piece of shit for a very long time.

This legal decision has already lead to the DPP not prosecuting the 16 yo who set-fire to the Forward statue in Birmingham last year. As they did not feel they could prove that the 16 yo who was lighting fires at the bottom of the statue could reasonably foresee that doing so would lead to the entire fibreglass and steel structure catching fire.

 

[magoo]

He terrorises women and the elderly.

He is a spineless, psychotic scum and if i ever saw him in the street i would spit in his face!

But he would never have the guts to walk in the street without protection.

I hope his life ends soon.

 

[London Irish]

I have to disagree with the anti-Argus drift of this thread - I thought the interview today by Adam Trimingham was a fine piece of journalism that scooped many in the national press.

Far from the Argus "shitting themselves" at this scumbag's release, it is clear that the Argus knew a long time ago that this day would come and so Trimingham has put a lot of time and effort in trying to build up a relationship with Hoogstraten while he was banged up in Belmarsh. The fruit of that work was the interview today.

What is the job of a newspaper? It is not to act as policeman, judge, jury or vigilante. It is to report news and provide information to its readers, and getting this scumbag to speak and answer questions is part of that.

That we know he is such a scumbag is partly down to how well the Argus in the past has done its job in covering his activities. A lot of other news media have also been involved in unmasking him, it is true, but the Argus can hardly be accused of pulling its punches.

I can remember a year before he was jailed the Argus ran a superb series of articles detailing Hoogstraten's megalomania by a reporter called David Edwards, who is now moved on to work for the Daily Mirror.

Edwards used the same technique that Trimingham is now employing - get him to speak, because Hoogstraten is so vain and arrogant that he will often convict himself out of his own mouth.

The collapse of the case against Hoogstraten seems bizarre, but the fact is that the prosecution had no proof that he hired the two thugs to kill rather than rough up Raja, hence no verdict of manslaughter was possible. (Presumably there is a lesser charge to manslaughter but not one that would give him a sentence longer than the 2 years he served, so he is now a free man.)

All this is in the Argus today, which may have its faults, but did a good job on this story.

 

[Gwylan]

I have to disagree with the anti-Argus drift of this thread - I thought the interview today by Adam Trimingham was a fine piece of journalism that scooped many in the national press...

...All this is in the Argus today, which may have its faults, but did a good job on this story.

Totally agree. The Argus can be shite a lot of the time but I thought that this was a pretty good exclusive.

And that Good Samaritan headline is loaded with irony. I can imagine the discussion on the subs desk about that.

 

[Sorrel]

Asking someone to go "rough" someone up is different to "go kill". The latter means he could foresee that they would kill the other that he mearly wanted them frightened.

But how many people really believe that he said "just rough him up a little"?

The murderers used a gun, and I can't believe that Van H didn't know they were going to.