…grayblog…

Month: December 2003

  • Plain wrong

    Yesterday, Nicholas van Hoogstraten was released from prison. It had been found by the High Court that he had no case to answer in the alledged manslaughter of business associate Mohammed Raja.
    In July 1999, following a long-running dispute with Mr Raja, van Hoogstraten allegedly sent two henchmen to Mr Raja’s home with a loaded firearm, with, it is claimed, the intention to scare Mr Raja. These two men shot and killed Mr Raja on his doorstep.
    In his ruling yesterday, Sir Stephen Mitchell agreed with the defence team:

    The test is not whether Mr Hoogstraten was a party to an unlawful and dangerous act, he plainly was. The very act of going to Mr Raja’s home with a loaded firearm which was to be discharged was an unlawful and dangerous act even before any discharge of the firearm.

    But, because there was no evidence that Hoogstraten foresaw that the two men would have deliberately turned the gun on Mr Raja, he could not be prosecuted for manslaughter.
    If, however, Mr Raja had been killed accidentally by Hoogstraten’s two alleged henchmen, he could have been convicted of manslaughter.

    Now, I’m not a lawyer and have no legal training, but doesn’t it seem to you that the law is just plain wrong in this regard? The Court was satisfied that van Hoogstraten sent these men, and that he knew they would carry a firearm. Surely that is enough for some sort of conviction?
    I think there must be several people around who have already packed their bags and left the country.

    BBC News profile of van Hoogstraten.
    BBC News report of the court case.
    Telegraph detailed report of the court case.
    Telegraph detailed profile of van Hoogstraten.

    UPDATE:
    Hoogstraten "will sue" over court case.

  • Footballing monks

    Katy goes to a party.

  • Thank you…

    …to everyone who has sent messages of congratulation to us.

  • A special announcement

    Well, for those of you who have waited patiently for a photo of Hels, here she is with your cheesily-grinning author on the banks of a canal in Copenhagen, with the impressive buildings of the Gammel Strand behind.
    Hels and me, Copenhagen, 29 November 2003
    In my original account of our long weekend in Copenhagen, I left out one thing that took place. On the Friday evening, we walked around Tivoli, admiring the beautiful fairy lights and watching all the happy Danes (and tourists) enjoying the rides, stalls and glögg. Having passed the skating rink and warmed ourselves by a brazier, we turned a corner and found the most breathtaking sight, a weeping willow with simple white lights along every branch arching down and wonderfully reflected in the water of a lake. It was utterly beautiful and we held each other close as we admired it. We stood there gazing at it, and agreed that it was very beautiful indeed. Then there was a pause. I turned to Hels, and said "Will you marry me?" – and without so much as a moment of hesitation, she said "Yes!"

    On Monday, we stopped in a wonderful independent jewellers on the Strøget, where we chose and I purchased a beautiful white gold ring with four princess-cut diamonds, which Hels is wearing as she sits next to me now.

    I am the happiest man alive.

    [with apologies to all those who are reading this before I’ve had a chance to send you a personal message – we’re just so thrilled, that we want everyone to know!]

  • Busy weekend

    Life seems to be incredibly full at the moment – not only do I have a full work schedule, but there is also a packed calendar on the social side. Tonight Hels is coming to Chichester and we are going out for drinks with the usual suspects. Tomorrow morning we are dropping in on the parents for morning coffee before heading to Brighton for a spot of Christmas shopping, followed by dinner with Charlie and Peeet. Next week there are at least two dinners booked in already. And the diary towards Christmas seems to get busier still.

    The thing is, unlike some people who find the whole yuletide social shenanigans to be hard work and a nuisance, I love spending time with friends and socialising – not least because it usually involves a lot of good food and drink. I don’t really understand why people moan about Christmas – even the gift giving and shopping is fun, if a little hard work and sometimes costly. All you have to do is remember that the most important thing is to have a good time with the special people around you, and not get too hung up on the boring stressy elements.

  • Contrails

    I don’t think that there is any doubt that aircraft contrails affect the weather – it can be noticably cooler in our part of Sussex when the US Air force are running concentrated supply missions to the Middle East, as their flight path passes overhead and an aircraft can pass as frequently as once every two or three minutes. As a result, the whole sky can become covered in a thin milky white cloud.

  • Drunk and disorderly

    Hels has just called me from Charing Cross station. She’s been to a lunch organised by one of her clients, along with one of the girls from her office. It seems that she’s had one or two margueritas.
    How come I never get invited to lunches like that? I’m clearly in the wrong industry.

  • Advent calendar

    Hels bought me a Marks and Spencer chocolate advent calendar. So far I’ve had chocolates shaped as a snowman, a cracker, a stocking and a penguin – all closely related to Christian symbolism, undoubtedly.
    I’m also mildly disturbed by the image on the front of the calendar, which shows the portly bearded chappy in his red outfit admonishing the onlooker to be quiet whilst, through a doorway, a young boy sleeps in his bed. Frankly, I think he should be reported to the authorities.
    Not that I’m ungrateful for the chocolates, I hasten to add.

    When we were in Malmö, we went into a department store where there was a long queue of children (and parents) waiting to sit on Santa’s knee. Clearly the over-zealous child protection lobby that we have here and in America has not yet reached southern Sweden, as the children actually were sitting on the besuited fella’s leg. But the one thing that I did notice was that this particular Santa had a notebook and pen for writing down the requests of the children. I was very disappointed to see this, as I always assumed that he could remember all these things without notes. After all, he is able to visit all the children of the world in one night, and also knows whether they’ve been "good" or "bad" as well. My illusion has been shattered.
    I also noticed that he was left-handed.

  • Mars attack

    To hell with Christmas (if you’ll pardon the pun), this isn’t so much the festive season as the Martian season.
    Next week, the Japanese probe Nozomi will either go into orbit or be flung off into space – or, disastrously, crash into the planet’s surface, contaminating it with microbes from Earth. Nozomi has had a troubled life with fuel problems and damage from a solar flare. It seems unlikely that it will succeed, but if the Japanese do manage to make everything work, I think it will go down in history as a major feat of interplanetary engineering.
    Mars Express is already at work, having sent back its first image. Really this is something of a calibration exercise, and the real work won’t begin until it goes into orbit on Christmas Day, just a few hours after Beagle2 has touched down on the surface. If you’re anything like me, you’ll probably be all misty eyed if it works, and horribly upset if it doesn’t.
    The British media hardly give any time at all to the other two probes that are on their way to Mars, NASA’s twin probes Spirit and Opportunity. Spirit lands on January 4th and Opportunity on January 25th, on opposite sides of the planet. Billed as twin "robot geologists", Spirit and Opportunity will be looking for geological evidence of water, as well as increasing understanding of the planet’s surface – and have a big advantage over Beagle2 in that they are mobile, travelling around 40 yards each day during their 90-day mission.

    However you look at it, this is really exciting stuff. I remember everyone at work being crowded around the PC as I downloaded fresh images from Mars Pathfinder and its Sojourner rover in 1997 over a 28.8kbps connection – it was amazing to see almost-live images from Mars, only a few minutes old. And don’t forget that Mars Odyssey has been sending back data for two years up until it was knocked out during October’s massive solar flare, and Mars Global Surveyor has sent some amazing pictures too.
    This is an exciting time – I think I’m likely to be attached to my laptop and broadband over Christmas!

  • GHC and radio grayblog

    I’ve just listened to the archived Global House Connection programme for 23 November, which is excellent. If you don’t already listen to GHC each week, then you are missing out.
    If you don’t have a fast enough connection, don’t forget that radio grayblog is still broadcasting 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. I’ll see if I can spend some time over the Christmas holiday uploading some new tunes – it’s a long time since the playlist was changed, but I still think it is good. And it only needs a 28k connection.