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Channel 4’s Dispatches recently screened a jaw-dropping programme called “After School Arms Club” which highlighted several loopholes in UK laws concerning the import and export of torture equipment. Today the BBC is reporting that a UK farmer has a tidy sideline manufacturing and exporting execution equipment… that’s in addition to the pet food, animal bedding, stables and sheds that Eldon Farm sells to its “normal” farm shop customers.

The trade only became public knowledge after an undercover investigation by British sunday paper The People.

The farmer, Mr. David Lucas, argues its fine to sell his English oak gallows, and justifies it as follows:

If you take some of the problems which are happening through the world at the moment this is the only way to control it; there’s no control, as I say, rapes and mass murders, anything to that effect, they just lock them up.

It appears that a very large pile of cash has obscured Mr. Lucas view of the fact that he’s selling his gallows to African countries with poor human rights records, including Zimbabwe which “was suspended from the Commonwealth of Nations on charges of human rights abuses and of election tampering in 2002, including widespread intimidation and violence against supporters of opposition parties”.

Probably not one of the places in the world where you’re guaranteed to find a fair and impartial justice system right now, but that’s not going to stop Mr. Lucas:

We do single gallows, and we do multiple gallows [which are capable of hanging ] … subject to the length of the trailer, five or six at a time.

In June, new EU regulations will outlaw the export of Mr. Lucas gallows. In the mean time he has orders worth half a million pounds.

As Mr. Lucas says: “Business is Business”.

This month Mr. Lucas is going to make a killing. Next month killing will continue, but Mr. Lucas will just have his regular customers; if they still want to do business with him.

Update 10th May

Since yesterday the story has also been covered by:
The Scotsman, The Telegraph, The Independent, The Columbus Dispatch, Bloomberg among others.

Most importantly, the story is being covered by tonight’s local papers in Suffolk and Cambridgeshire (the East Anglian Daily Times, Evening Star, Cambridge Evening News) so Mr. Lucas current and future customers are being dutifully informed that by dealing with Mr. Lucas they may be helping to supress human rights in developing countries.

Update 12th May

In an article from local newpaper Bury St. Edmunds Today, Mr. Lucas turned to “the DNA argument” in an attempt to defend his actions saying:

With modern policing and DNA, the chances of making a mistake are zero.

Mr. Lucas is appears unaware that the chances of a DNA testing error are not zero, and research suggests errors can be as common as 1 in 100 (and possibly higher due to human error in the testing itself and errors in test administration): furthermore, developing countries with unstable, unelected governments with poor human rights records are not well known for their use of forensic science, nor it’s considered application to any criminal prosecution.

Blog Opinion

Brett Lock suggests that Lucas could possibly be an accessory to murder, pointing out that Peter Tatchell previously placed Robert Mugabe under arrest for torture only to be thwarted by British police.

Peter Cooper wonders how Mr. Lucas can live with himself, but also comments on western governments less than perfect record of arms exports.

Boing Boing have just run the story, so a few hundred thousand more people instantly became aware of the story.

Act!

You can make a difference by joining Amnesty International. Amnesty are a global non-government organization that work at all levels to abolish all human righs abuses and help those who are victims. Join here.