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- Canada - Toronto & Southern Ont.
-- This is Canada for you.


Posted by jester on Jan-21-2011 21:36:

This is Canada for you.

quote:
Ian Thomson moved to a rural homestead in Southwestern Ontario to lead a quiet life investing in a little fixer-upper. Then his neighbour�s chickens began showing up on his property. He warned his neighbour, then killed one of the birds.

The incident began six years of trouble for Mr. Thomson that culminated early one Sunday morning last August when the 53-year-old former mobile-crane operator woke up to the sound of three masked men firebombing his Port Colborne, Ont., home.

�I was horrified,� he said. �I couldn�t believe it. I didn�t know what was happening. I had no idea what was going on.�

So Mr. Thomson, a former firearms instructor, grabbed one of his Smith & Wesson revolvers from his safe, loaded it and headed outside dressed in only his underwear.

�He exited his house and fired his revolver two, maybe three times, we�re not sure. Then these firebombing culprits, they ran off,� said his lawyer, Edward Burlew.

His surveillance cameras caught the attackers lobbing at least six Molotov cocktails at his house and bombing his doghouse, singeing one of his Siberian Huskies. But when Mr. Thomson handed the video footage to Niagara Regional Police, he found himself charged with careless use of a firearm.

The local Crown attorney�s office later laid a charge of pointing a firearm, along with two counts of careless storage of a firearm. The Crown has recommended Mr. Thomson go to jail, his lawyer said.

His collection of seven guns, five pistols and two rifles was seized, along with his firearms licence. Mr. Thomson said he lives in fear that his attackers will return and has taken to arming himself with a fire extinguisher.

�I don�t have enemies,� said the soft-spoken man, who now studies environmental geosciences full-time at Brock University after being injured in a workplace accident. �I don�t know that many people. I�m a quiet man. I just want to go back to my life and be able to live out my days in relative peace.�

Mr. Thomson�s is the latest in a series of high-profile cases in which people have been charged after defending their homes and businesses against criminals. Central Alberta farmer Brian Knight became a local hero after shooting a thief who was trying to steal his ATV. He pleaded guilty to criminal negligence earlier this month. In October, Toronto shopkeeper David Chen was acquitted of forcible confinement charges after he tied up a repeat shoplifter and demanded he stop raiding his grocery store.

Their cases are renewing calls for Canada to introduce a version of the �Castle Doctrine� found in many U.S. states, which allows citizens to defend their property with force.


�I hear some people, some being police officers, some being Crown attorneys, some being ordinary people, say we don�t want vigilantism, to which I can only give an emphatic pardon me?� Mr. Burlew said. �When you�re under attack, it�s not a vigilante act. Vigilantism talks about vengeance and retribution. This is about saving your life and saving your property.

�I�m sure that will be recognized at trial, but why would a citizen, where it�s so obvious that what he was doing was protecting himself during a continued attack, be put to the expense of a trial? It�s demeaning.�

Canada allows people to claim self-defence for using force, including guns, to protect their life as long as the force is reasonable and they believe they have no other options.

�If the public are wondering can you run out of your house and [fire a handgun at an intruder], the bottom line is, according to the laws of Canada, no, you can�t,� said Constable Nilan Dave of the Niagara Regional Police Service, which charged Mr. Thomson. �That�s why the courts are there, to give a person an opportunity to explain their actions.�

Mr. Burlew, a Toronto-area lawyer whose practice mainly consists of firearms-related charges, said he is trying to hire a psychiatrist to prove that Mr. Thomson feared for his life when he grabbed his revolver. A target shooter and hunting-safety instructor, Mr. Thomson had the skill to shoot his attackers if he�d wanted to, Mr. Burlew said, but missed on purpose.

Police said no one was injured in the shooting and the attackers got into a car and sped off. They charged Randy Weaver, 48, of Port Colborne, and Justin Lee, 19, of Welland, with arson in December, alleging the men and a third suspect �intentionally set the home on fire while the homeowner was inside.�

Mr. Thomson�s neighbour, who had received a suspended sentence for uttering threats against Mr. Thomson in 2007, has not been charged in connection with the attack on his house.

Mr. Thomson said he has added extra security to his home after the firebombing and hardly sleeps anymore. The charges, he said, have destroyed him.

�This is just an absolute nightmare, this whole thing,� he said. �People need to know that this is what can happen to you and which side of the victim line do you want to stand on? Lying down dead or in court? That�s the way it seems it has to go.�


Read more: http://news.nationalpost.com/2011/0.../#ixzz1BhxbwrQK

Its funny, the only people with the right to fight back are the police. Yet when it comes to everyone else you are fucked.

Canada allows people to claim self-defence for using force, including guns, to protect their life as long as the force is reasonable and they believe they have no other options. BS! Someone trying to kill you and you kill them, you will get charged with murder no matter what this sentence is telling you.

Someone should firebomb the judge, lets see how he takes that.


Posted by Euphorica on Jan-21-2011 21:46:

yup this place is a joke...

and we just let it keep happening


Posted by PivotTechno on Jan-21-2011 22:17:

quote:
�I don�t have enemies�


C'mooooooon...


Posted by Ravist on Jan-21-2011 23:32:

what a sad country we live in. Not able to defend yourself or your property without getting charged. Absolute bullshit.


Posted by Jayx1 on Jan-21-2011 23:35:

law or no law... if someone attacks me im defending myself. There are bullshit laws, and then there is instinct.


Posted by thesauce23 on Jan-22-2011 00:41:

quote:
Originally posted by Euphorica
yup this place is a joke...


its still better than places where random people die when random anti-social people decide to take random lives b/c they were treated badly in high school or their spouse lost their health care coverage, etc.


Posted by Rocco on Jan-22-2011 02:56:

fuck the system... 10/10 times if i see someone trying to take something away from me, I'm gonna react and it won't be pretty.


Posted by Yohan on Jan-22-2011 03:08:

If those 3 punks tried to firebomb my house, there would have been 3 dead punks instead.


Posted by Jayx1 on Jan-22-2011 05:11:

quote:
Originally posted by thesauce23
its still better than places where random people die when random anti-social people decide to take random lives b/c they were treated badly in high school or their spouse lost their health care coverage, etc.


you mean like canada?

Montreal Ecole Polytechnique, Dawson College, and Tabor Alberta come to mind


Posted by infinity HiGH on Jan-22-2011 06:39:

We're getting fucked from all sides. Big telecom, the law, local/provincial/federal government, insurance, hydro...and Canadians are so apathetic that they take it because it wouldn't be very "Canadian-like" to speak up. Or some other stupid shit like that.

Unless it's hockey, of course. You mess with hockey then shit is going down.

Eh?


Posted by Euphorica on Jan-22-2011 06:39:

nah that doesnt happen here. only in the states



this place is like a testing ground for how far people can be pushed...and we are huge pushovers and just bend over...take it with blinders on "OH CANNNNNNAAADAAA"

fucking people


Posted by jester on Jan-22-2011 07:08:

quote:
After receiving threats and two suspicious letters Tuesday, the National Archives of Canada cancelled the screening of a controversial documentary that critiques Iran�s nuclear weapons program, a move that has organizers questioning the national library�s autonomy.


Read more: http://www.nationalpost.com/news/ca...l#ixzz1BkHymq9h

If I was Harper I would tell Iran to get the fuck out of Canada. Lets see how Iran likes having their embassy taken over.


Posted by Xavier Moriarty on Jan-22-2011 08:10:

quote:
Originally posted by Ravist
what a sad country we live in. Not able to defend yourself or your property without getting charged. Absolute bullshit.


defending it from terorising chickens????

chickens dont know better. if somebody killed one of my chickend, id start setting shit on fire too.

lol, defending yer property !!!!

would you shoot a dog if it shat on yer street too???
or a pidgeon???


Posted by jad on Jan-22-2011 11:12:

1. Was he on private or municipal property when he fired the shots?

quote:
�He exited his house and fired his revolver two, maybe three times, we�re not sure. Then these firebombing culprits, they ran off,� said his lawyer, Edward Burlew.


.
.
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2. I find this to be a little bit odd.. what's a soft spoken man with no enemies doing with seven guns + video surveillance? I'm not saying that he doesn't have the right to protect himself with firearms on his own property. It just seems that he was expecting some sort of attack. It would be interesting to find out more about the relationships between Thomson, his neighbour, and the arsonists.

quote:
�I don�t have enemies,� said the soft-spoken man, who now studies environmental geosciences full-time at Brock University after being injured in a workplace accident. �I don�t know that many people. I�m a quiet man. I just want to go back to my life and be able to live out my days in relative peace.�


quote:
His collection of seven guns, five pistols and two rifles was seized, along with his firearms licence.


.
.
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3. Completely off topic, but I'm curious to see what was written on those letters.

quote:
Originally posted by jester
Read more: http://www.nationalpost.com/news/ca...l#ixzz1BkHymq9h


quote:
�There were threats of protest, so they�ve cancelled the movie and these [letters] were delivered two hours ago to the mailroom,� said Sergeant Jeff Pilon.

By 7 p.m., the letters were cleared and considered �not suspicious at all.�


Posted by VDub on Jan-22-2011 14:27:

quote:
Originally posted by Yohan
If those 3 punks tried to firebomb my house, there would have been 3 dead punks instead.


Yup...


Posted by Ravist on Jan-22-2011 17:17:

quote:
Originally posted by Xavier Moriarty
defending it from terorising chickens????

chickens dont know better. if somebody killed one of my chickend, id start setting shit on fire too.

lol, defending yer property !!!!

would you shoot a dog if it shat on yer street too???
or a pidgeon???


I'm not talking about chickens, i'm talking about that case mentioned by the OP, tell me if someone was throwing molotov cocktails into your home, what would you do?


Posted by GGM on Jan-22-2011 18:27:

Sorry but that article is written with an extremely biased opinion that is both sugar coating facts and leaving things out. You don't kill a chicken and get your house firebombed the next day, there's tons of stuff in between they're leaving out. For all we know he has a big criminal record and cops charged him based on that. Hard to form any accurate opinion on this without the whole story and history from both sides.

And like Jay was saying, no normal person with "no enemies" has full video surveillance and a bunch of guns. Killing something that crosses onto your lawn isn't exactly a neighbourly way of interaction. This guy is a lunatic just look through the biased massaging of the facts in this article and it's pretty obvious...


Posted by GGM on Jan-22-2011 18:33:

quote:
Originally posted by Euphorica
this place is like a testing ground for how far people can be pushed...


That's all I could think during the G20. It's like they were doing research for "How to Enforce Martial Law in a Modern Day First World Nation".


Posted by Brennen on Jan-24-2011 03:19:

A cop once told me, if you defend your house with a firearm its better to kill the person. Otherwise you could be in more trouble than the criminal. Dead man dont talk.


Posted by VDub on Jan-24-2011 03:28:

quote:
Originally posted by Brennen
A cop once told me, if you defend your house with a firearm its better to kill the person. Otherwise you could be in more trouble than the criminal. Dead man dont talk.


Problem is that if you kill him, it's a done deal...

If you injure him, you're paying his ass for the rest of his life...


Posted by Nobbie Q on Jan-24-2011 06:43:

I'm sure if this guy got involved no one would complain about vigalantism


Posted by love_child on Jan-25-2011 19:21:

yeah Canada is totally like living in iraq


Posted by RobbyG. on Jan-28-2011 06:24:

totally RIDICULOUS!!!!

Hopefully the "amended" law will help those who decide to protect themselves OR their property...


PS:....yea its been a LONG time since I've posted


Posted by Shankar on Jan-28-2011 23:35:

Heh,
a buddy of mine went with his girlfriend for a week to Dominican Republic to visit friends (NOT to a resort). Their friend picked them up from the airport and they hit the road. Halfway through the journey, a black SUV pulls them over. Inside the SUV, several men with guns signal them to stop.
When they stopped, the men jumped on them, handcuffed them and showed them into the SUV.
They drove them out of the city to the middle of nowhere (some abandoned cemetery), took all of their belongings ($4000 worth), left them their passports and IDs and told them to run.
The next day, my friends went to the Canadian Embassy. The Ambassador, who graced them with his presence, first greeted them with "what do you want?" After my friends explained the situation, he simply chuckled and told them "well, there is nothing we can do to help you. You can only call your family for free so that they can send you money. Otherwise, you are on your own!" In other words, he told them to F*** off. The fact that Canadian citizens left penniless in the middle of nowhere doesn't bother our Canadian reps abroad. They are more concerned about "living the dream" than help us in trouble.


Posted by Jayx1 on Jan-29-2011 00:35:

quote:
Originally posted by Shankar
Heh,
a buddy of mine went with his girlfriend for a week to Dominican Republic to visit friends (NOT to a resort). Their friend picked them up from the airport and they hit the road. Halfway through the journey, a black SUV pulls them over. Inside the SUV, several men with guns signal them to stop.
When they stopped, the men jumped on them, handcuffed them and showed them into the SUV.
They drove them out of the city to the middle of nowhere (some abandoned cemetery), took all of their belongings ($4000 worth), left them their passports and IDs and told them to run.
The next day, my friends went to the Canadian Embassy. The Ambassador, who graced them with his presence, first greeted them with "what do you want?" After my friends explained the situation, he simply chuckled and told them "well, there is nothing we can do to help you. You can only call your family for free so that they can send you money. Otherwise, you are on your own!" In other words, he told them to F*** off. The fact that Canadian citizens left penniless in the middle of nowhere doesn't bother our Canadian reps abroad. They are more concerned about "living the dream" than help us in trouble.


Its not their responsibility to help you. An embassy is there to represent the Canadian government to that nation's government. They If anything, they are there to help you evacuate in case of war or natural disaster. They are also able to put political pressure on a government if you are being unfairly treated. If they had had their passport taken, they would have facilitated a new one. If they were to help yor friend get home in that situation it would have been at their personal expense, not the government's. The government is not your babysitter.



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