Bruce Emery gets 4 years, 3 months

I am disheartened at the sentence that Bruce Emery has received for the killing of Pihema Cameron.

Back to the facts of this case as I wrote about December 12th after Emery had been found guilty of manslaughter

Pihema Cameron and a friend were tagging Bruce Emery's fence late one night. Mr. Emery heard or saw what was going on and called out, he then went inside his house spoke to his wife, went down the internal stairs and left the property with a knife. He then took off after Pihema Cameron and his friend and at around 300 meters from Mr. Emery's house there was an altercation.

At the end of this altercations, Pihema had been stabbed, and subsequently died of the injury.

I am not annoyed because of this particular case, but it's another example of the justice system failing the victims and the citizens of this country. 4 years and 3 months is not enough for taking a life, but it seems as that is the approximate sentence for manslaughter in NZ.

Ngatai Reweti - 4 years
Maine Ngati and Teusila Fa'asisila - Non-parole period of 4 years
Morgan Parker, Ashley Moffat, Nicholas Peters - 4 years 6 months

The are some sentences that are longer like 8 or 9 years, and I have found some as short as 18 months, but the 4 years mark seems to be about average.

In my opinion, the lenient sentences in this country are not working and more importantly they are doing nothing to honour the victim and the victim's family.

There is another anomaly. There is a call from many that Bruce Emery should not have received a sentence at all, that his actually did NZ a favour, that he was defending his own property. These are normally the same sort of people who think we should be tougher on offenders, the kinds of people that would like NZ to follow the USA, Thailand or Singapore win what they do with offenders.

If Bruce Emery had run after someone who had committed a minor property crime, and that person ended up dead at the hand of the chaser, I am comfortable in saying he would have been treated much harsher in those countries. I found an example of someone, in the USA, who drove her mother to buy some marijuana, she wasn't a user, she had no prior convictions and she got 12 1/2 years in the states. I found several examples of people in Singapore and Thailand where people where convicted of manslaughter, who didn't have any prior convictions and they all received more like 10 years and a canning.

The silence is also defending from Garth McVicar of the Sensible Sentencing Trust, I wonder if he learnt his lesson when he came out to support the offender in this case in December and ignored the victims. I felt he lost a lot of support from my talkback around that time, maybe he'll play less of a hypocritical stroke in the sentencing.

I also find it interesting that Sensible Sentencing Trust has no file on Bruce Emery as an offender in their website but, for example, Ngatai Rewiti is there...both manslaughter, it would appear neither had any prior convictions...why is this? What is SST's agenda?

Top Gear Photos

Clarkson & Hammond









Car Football









The audience does a 'lap in a reasonable priced car'









Petra and I at the gala dinner (not sure why I am not smiling...probably trying to be cool)









Some of the Top Gear cars...


















But by far and away, the sexiest car there...the Suzuki Swift...









...and my dream car :o)

Top Gear Live

Photos tomorrow from the opening show in Auckland

Here's Stig's first ever press conference...

Matt Watson on Campbell Live

Did you see the Matt Watson fishing story on Campbell Live tonight, he's getting world wide attention after getting an interview The Late Show with Dave Letterman.

Thought I'd look for the original interview and found it on YouTube...enjoy

Virtual Super 14

My username is Pat Brittenden (original huh?) so feel free to add me

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With repsect to the fact that these picks may change as of Monday morning these are my picks for this weekend

Rebel Sport Super 14
Highlanders vs Brumbies
Away team by 12 & under

Western Force vs Blues
Home team by 12 & under

Lions vs Cheetahs
Home team by 12 & under

Crusaders vs Chiefs
Home team by 12 & under

Hurricanes vs Waratahs
Home team by 12 & under

Stormers vs Sharks
Home team by 12 & under

Bulls vs Reds
Home team by 12 & under

'Karen Greenberg' on Guantanamo Bay

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Karen Greenberg

Daily Show Full Episodes
Funny Political Videos

Important Things With Demetri Martin
More Funny Videos

Happy Waitangi Day

I am sick of people telling me that Waitagi Day is not our national day, that it's a day for protest, that it's a day for Maori, that it's THEIR day.

What a load of crap!

As john Key said yesterday, "It's time to get with the programme."

Waitangi Day is our national day, whether you are Maori, Pakeha, Asian, Samoan or anything, this is our only day to celebrate our country and I'll be dammed if anyone will take my day of celebrating New Zealand away from me.

I spoke to 'Val' between 5.30am and 6.ooam this morning, she said she has 'no time' for Waitangi Day, because there's has 'always been trouble'. I told her I felt sad for her and this is why.

Waitangi Day has been a place of protest in the past, and will be in the future for a few people, just like in Australia some Aborigines celebrate 'Invasion Day' on Australia Day. If you got all the people who protested in New Zealand for the past 20 years, and put them in one pile, the number would be so insignificant that why would anyone allow such a minority to take our national day of us? It's ridiculous...why would I let that minority win! They want it to be their day of protest, why would we bow to them?

There is truth in the idea that Waitangi day leads to treaty issues leads to controversy on onwards...fair enough, but here's what I'm going to start doing. I am choosing to own Waitangi Day as my national day, even if it means putting all those connected issues aside for one day, and pick them up again tomorrow

The other thing that I am interested in is seeing what the major networks lead with tonight...if its scuffles and protests I will be saddened as it won't be a fair representation of the day. The media has a huge part to play in how we interpret how the day is received.

Subsequent to the show here's an email I got...

From: Graeme & Yoli [mailto:yoliandgraeme@xtra.co.nz]
Sent: Friday, 6 February 2009 9:49 a.m.To:
Pat Brittenden
Subject: waitangi day
Hello

Your expletives regarding the above mentioned day and your enquiry as to why so many New Zealander's didn't embrace this maori crap as a day of celebration had us enfuriated. We cannot understand how someone so naive could end up on talkback radio, you're an idiot.

Our country (or is that cuntry) is top heavy with a politically correct bias toward a bunch of illiterate cannibals that used to eat each other 200 tears ago. We, NZ born Europeans have had a gut full of pandering toward maori needs.

Our country is multicultural now with Chinese, Korean, Philippine (to mention a few) that have instilled far more civilized culture into New Zealand than maori could ever dream of.

Oh! for a true New Zealand Day! When will it ever happen?

People like this always spout off about Maori being 'victims', I think is is a clinical example of being a victim and as I said to 'Val', I am sad for them.

For this to be our national day, and it's the only option right now, then we need to choose to own it, to celebrate it and get over our victim mentalities and over sensitivities and have fun....doesn't sound that difficult does it....let's choose to have a fun national holiday.

Or we could continue to instil into the next generation hatred and resentment towards the day our nation should be celebrating its birth.

John Key's cast hits $10k

Who da man? JK is the man...what a great idea to raise money for the Fred Hollows Foundation

Follow the auction here

Montgomery Versus Dalton

Let me first state that this post is very ‘opinion’ based, what I am about to mention has not been told to me first hand, it is rumour…but with a significantly good source.

Grant Dalton hates Peter Montgomery. I have contacts in TVNZ that told me that there was a ‘high level management’ meeting with Grant Dalton prior to the last Americas Cup, where Dalton told them that there would be no way that Peter Montgomery would be allowed on the Team NZ boat, and interviews would not be given to him. As I have been told there was talk about not sending Montgomery to the event then.

We now get a story in the Sunday papers saying the there is ‘no bad blood’ between them but Dalton doesn’t want PJ to commentate the Louis Vuitton racing in Auckland at the moment, he thinks it's time to have new blood there...but both commentators they Dalton has 'authorised' are over 50...new blood?

Question…why the hell would a member of a sporting team, be able to influence a broadcaster on who they use to commentate? Imagine All Black management saying…”Sorry no Grant Fox on SkyTV thanks”…it just wouldn’t happen.

If the rumour that I have mentioned earlier is true…surely this is more than just a conflict of interest…it’s down right childish and vindictive.

Judith Collins pontificating and grandstanding

The idea of crushing cars is ludicrous. Yes there is a huge issue with a small section of young men and women when it comes to street racing, burnouts, dangerous driving and ‘boyracing’ but the idea of crushing cars with such a simplistic wave of the Ministerial fringe is just plain grandstanding.

The are many reasons I believe this but let me give you 4 simple ones as to why this is a bad idea.
1. The offences that lead to a possibility of such a final result rest with the driver, not the car. So Master X, 19, is on his last warning and takes his parents car out one afternoon, the parents don’t know of his offences, and the young fella spins the wheels, get’s pulled over and mum and dad’s car get’s crushed.
2. If it is the boyracer’s car, he may have finance on it, so when it gets crushed the finance company/bank is out of pocket…and they recover losses from the rest of us in subsequent deals.
3. Lots of boyracers drive beat up old $500 cars, they get crushed, then the next night they have another $300 car on the road…what’s the point?
4. If a car has a worthwhile value, it is a resource that could be used by the police, cruching it is a waste of a resource that could benefit all of us…for it’s dollar value, or as some departments in the USA do, used as an undercover car.

I think that there are easier, immediate solutions to this issue…how about a curfew in Christchurch? Under 20, you can’t be on the road anywhere after 11pm. How about for the future limiting CC ratings for certain age drivers? How about raising the driving age?

As I said earlier, there is a problem here…especially with the latest incident in Christchurch, I’d like my ministers to come out with useful suggestions and solutions, not emotive, pontificating, grandstanding suggestions from a new minister seeking headlines

Personality Test

Just 3 questions and the answers will surprise you. This is fun to do, but you have to follow the instructions very closely. Do not cheat. Get pencil and paper to write your answers as you go along.

Put the following 5 animals in the order of your preference:
· Cow
· Tiger
· Sheep
· Horse
· Pig
Write one word that describes each one of the following:
· Dog
· Cat
· Rat
· Coffee
· Sea
Think of someone (who also knows you and is important to you) that you can relate them to the following colors. (Please do not repeat your answer twice. Name just one person for each color.)
· Yellow
· Orange
· Red
· White
· Green

Answer interpretations:
This will define your priorities in your life.
· Cow: signifies "career"
· Tiger signifies "pride"
· Sheep signifies "love"
· Horse signifies "family"
· Pig signifies "money"

· Your description of dog implies "your own personality"
· Your description of cat implies the "personality of your partner"
· Your description of rat implies the "personality of your enemies"
· Your description of coffee is how you interpret "sex"
· Your description of the sea implies "your own life"

· Yellow: Someone you will never forget
· Orange: Someone you consider your true friend
· Red: Someone that you really love
· White: Your twin soul
· Green: Someone that you will remember for the rest of your life.