| Hateland -
Articles |
19/07/00 - Nailbomber's dad
in net attack on jurors
The Mirror
THE father of Nazi nailbomber David Copeland yesterday
launched an internet website slamming the jury that
convicted his son of murder.
Stephen Copeland, 51, branded jurors "spineless
puppets" for deciding his son was not insane when
he bombed a gay pub killing three people and injuring
79.
On the website he also attacked a prosecution psychiatrist,
The Mirror and even his son's victims.
He said: "In my opinion, the jury's verdict is
clearly wrong as they have acted like spineless puppets
by pandering to public opinion and succumbing to the
understandable pressure from the victims and also to
appease all the ethnic minority groups by making an
example of David." He added: "Anyone who sat
in the court and heard all the evidence and was unbiased
would have no doubt in coming to the conclusion that
David's mind was substantially impaired at the time
of the offences. Therefore David is mad, not bad."
Twisted loner Copeland, 24, brought carnage to the
streets of London with three explosions in 13 days which
targeted blacks, Asians and homosexuals. The white supremacist
worshipped Adolf Hitler and told police he wanted to
spark a race war.
When his trial began at the Old Bailey, he pleaded
not guilty to murder but guilty to manslaughter on the
grounds of diminished responsibility.
The jury of eight men and four women rejected the evidence
of six psychiatrists and decided he was "bad, not
mad" when he planted the bombs.
When the verdicts came in the victims - some of who
lost limbs, were blinded or scarred by shrapnel - broke
into applause.
One person shouted "Nazi scum" and another,
"I hope you rot in hell".
Engineer Mr Copeland, 51, of Yateley, Hants, said the
reaction "did them no justice at all as they only
lowered themselves to the same level as the person they
were criticising.
"I certainly can't support that kind of lynch
mob mentality".
His son was given three life sentences for the murders
and three more for causing the explosions.
Mr Copeland, whose website is on freespace. virgin.net/steve.copeland,
even attacked The Mirror for bringing vital evidence
before the court.
While on remand, Copeland wrote to a pen pal who used
the name Patsy Scanlon.
He boasted how easy it had been to fool doctors about
his mental state.
Scanlon was a pseudonym for someone working on behalf
of The Mirror.
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