Talk:Tony Martin (farmer)

POV?

This really needs an NPOVing. It's written as a defence of Martin - David Gerard 09:50, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)

It should be a defence, how can you defend a criminal, if someone breaks the law, time and time again, and then they expect to be covered by it when they get shot, LOGICAL?

In any country run by real men, I'm in support of private firearm ownership, like South Africa or the U.S. we wouldn't be having this argument, we'd be spitting on the stupid burglar and be suing his family for making a mess on Martin's carpet, I'm embarrased to say I'm British when I'm abroad, it's silly, if someone comes into your house, you should shoot them until there's no life left in them. 82.14.70.99 22:24, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

What place do the above comments (I refer to the last two paragraphs) have in a discussion page? There are more important problems with this article - such as unqualified statements, which I have flagged - that need to be addressed rather than using the discussion page to voice personal political opinions. Clammage (talk) 22:31, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm giving it a go. Removing the more egregious POV stuff and correcting some points of fact and the numerous omissions. --Minority Report 21:08, 22 Nov 2004 (UTC)

It's rather gone the other way.....

http://www.guardian.co.uk/martin/article/0,2763,214336,00.html says he shot the vehicle of a man scrumping apples, we say (said) that he shot at children. I think we need more sourced material on this one.

12:52, 4 September 2005 (UTC)

That Guardian article is just one long character assassination! It's depressing to see a supposedly "serious" newspaper resort to these hackneyed tabloid cliches, though thankfully they stopped short of saying Martin's eyes were too close together.

It's so biased it's ridiculous - they make him sound like a cross between Dracula and Rambo. "Weird", "eccentric", and a "loner", eh? He lived in a scary house, hated thieves and gypsies? Ooh, better throw away the key!

It worked both ways, of course - many of the pro-Martin papers (Mail, et al) have carried similarly biased "profiles" of burglars Fearon and Barras. All's fair in love and newspaper sales, it seems.

It's also interesting to note that the Daily Mirror (which could hardly be described as a right-wing paper) paid Martin £125,000 for his story. This Wikipedia article seems to imply that support for Martin was limited to right-wingers - in fact, the British public (en masse) was hugely supportive of Martin and I don't think the article emphasises that enough. 217.155.20.163 22:21, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

Nowadays, the Mirror is relatively right-wing. 86.139.237.132 21:14, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

It seems these comments are very dated, and the issue at the core, the right of self-defense of one's home does need to be addressed much more. I'm not British, so to an extent it's none of my business, but I am human, and I believe that all humans have a birthright of being able to defend their life, the lives of their families, friends, and even perfect strangers.

I am new to this whole editing thing, and frankly am not sure how much time I may have to donate, nor whether or not I could just write my own 'Friend of the Court' brief, metaphorically speaking, in defense of defense.

The criminal here is not Tony Martin, it's the bad guy and more critically, the government that ruined his life over a legitimate self-defense use of deadly force. KevyKevTPA (talk) 14:48, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

"these comments are very dated", talk page sections are typically chronological. On an inactive page like this, older discussions haven't be archived. It's normal to see comments 20+ years old at the top. You were replying to someone from 2004.

"I believe that all humans have a birthright of being able to defend their life":

Wikipedia isn't really the place for debating what we think is right, instead it focuses on what did happen based on reliable sources. I remember this case happening at the time, it was quite the furore. The evidence presented did not support his actions as "able to defend their life" like you stated. Notably the deceased being shot in the back when trying to escape made the claim of self-defence tenuous at best.

I hope this helps @KevyKevTPA I see you are still new to wikipedia, it's more than a little confusing at first. BeardedChimp (talk) 01:57, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Dated or not, right and wrong doesn't change over time. Regardless, I'm not trying to start a debate here.

Still, like the media, this is a service that should 'report the news' so to speak, and there's more to news than just this fact happened, and that fact happened.

Had this happened in most of the US not only would he not have been charged, the surviving perps would have been hit with 'Felony Murder', and given sentences theoretically as high as the death penalty, but more realistically something like 25 to life, possibly less depending on dozens if not hundreds of factors well beyond the scope here.

That should be noted, if for no other reason than maybe people in the UK and elsewhere will see the proper way of dealing with thugs like these guys, and learn better. KevyKevTPA (talk) 01:01, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

Burglary trial

Darren Bark must have been released by now; do we know when? Barnabypage 16:31, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Released, then back in jail at least two more times. [1] Izaakb 16:31, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

Title of page

Is Tony Martin (farmer) really the best title? After all, it's not his contributions to agriculture which are notable. I don't think there's a word manslaughterer, and Tony Martin (criminal), while accurate, might be seen as deliberately provocative. Any ideas, anyone? Barnabypage 21:11, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Ha, I was just logging on here to say exactly the same thing.FrFintonStack 17:39, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

How about just Tony Martin with a referral from Anthony Martin. If there is more than one Tony Martin, then put in a disambig page. Some people might prefer Tony Martin (hero) or Tony Martin (vermin exterminator) or any number of silly options. Since the title is merely how to identify him, how about just the name? Izaakb 15:21, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

There are already ten Tony Martins on Wiki, so this one has to be Tony Martin (something). Barnabypage 11:06, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

Good point -- all of the other Tony Martins are categorized by profession, so if this particular Tony is a farmer, then so be it. Izaakb 14:36, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

Bounty?

The newspapers say there is supposed to be a 60,000 pound bounty on Martin's head. Anyone know anything about this? Like who exactly is after him? Or is it just irresponsible hearsay journalism?Tragic romance 10:41, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

Never heard of such a thing, nor in any of the news links about him. I call BS. Izaakb 16:22, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

I definately remember reading about this in a paper (probably the Daily Mirror or Mail). I think it said the bounty was put up by 'Travellers', friends of Fred Barras' family or some such. No proof of any of it, though.Xzamuel 15:05, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Surely you can check in their archives for such a claim? Izaakb 15:22, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Barras' extended family called together a 'Kris' or Romany Gypsy council/court. There, it was decided by some senior figures in the local Gypsy community that a bounty should be put on Martin's head. Apparently the money was to be paid upon Martin's death, but I don't know where they were supposed to have got the money from... You can read about this in the chapter "Trial by Jury and Gypsy" of the book "Tony Martin: A Right To Kill", published by Artnik.

Farmer designation

Is it fair to characterise Martin was a farmer given he has not returned to farm at Bleak House since his release 6 1/2 years ago?

I wouldn't challenge the title of the article because he is Tony Martin the farmer who killed a burglar but the opening paragraph says Tony Martin is a farmer who etc perhaps it should read a 'former farmer' who etc. Dudley25 (talk) 17:32, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Sources and inline citations

Please be sure that all additions to the Tony Martin (farmer) article are verifiable and that any new assertions added to the article should have inline citations for each claim made.

I have temporarily removed a moderate amount of material, all added to the article between 2010-01-17 and 2010-01-29 that had no support from inline citations did not meet WP:BLP policy. Feel free to add back in if you have a verifiable sources you can cite inline. I left the two secondary sources in the References section, but removed the primary source link (potential WP:SYN) and the YouTube video link, which is not considered a reliable source in Wikipedia. N2e (talk) 02:45, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

Brendon Fearon

Would anyone else support merging the Brendon Fearon article into this one? Strictly speaking, it's not a case of WP:BLP1E, as he has received some news coverage since the initial event; but I nonetheless think the spirit of that rule should apply, and I'm not convinced he really needs a separate article. Martin and Fearon could (and probably should) satisfactorily be covered as part of the same article, covering the burglary, the legal cases, and other subsequent events. Does anyone think that would be a good idea? Robofish (talk) 12:32, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

• Agree. Other than the Tony Martin incident, Fearon is a minor felon. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 13:03, 22 March 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose He's a minor felon and not otherwise notable enough for an article. However the subsequent events are already covered and are, I would suggest at risk of some probably huge WP:BLP transgression, a testament to his character and so worth keeping. Yet they don't belong within the Tony Martin article. Per our aspiration "to make the best poissible encyclopedia", I'd suggest that this is worth keeping, and that it's best kept as it is, in a separate article. We don't actually benefit by merging, even if policy would support us if we did merge. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:10, 22 March 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose. I'm not sure about WP:BLP1E, since all of his later reported crimes seem to be notable only through his earlier connection with Tony Martin. But for the sake of clarity I would keep his separate article. It might also be argued that a separate article for one of the victims in Martin's crime shows balance - although, of course, there should only be one set of facts to share between the two, as appropriate? Martinevans123 (talk) 18:03, 22 March 2011 (UTC)
• Tough one, both sides have strong arguments here, but I'll say Agree. The events of notability in Fearon's life subsequent to the Bleak House incident are essentially direct consequences of that incident. His continuing career of minor crime unconnected with Bleak House is not material that the encyclopedia needs or ought to cover. The benefit to the reader of merging the articles is, I'll grant, fairly slim, but it is that they can get a more complete picture of the Bleak House incident and its ramifications all in one place. Barnabypage (talk) 20:38, 22 March 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose If the article was named after the incident and purely focused on that it'd be obvious to put them together. However, both articles are about individual people and are in any case hyperlinked. There is likely to be, if not already, info about the individuals on the pages not related to the specific incident, some time in the future - so I say they are better separate and better to keep them that way to allow for future development of the two unrelated pages. pmailkeey 2013:9:19

'Weird editorialising' ?

I do not see what is so 'weird' about my extension of the lede (deleted 8/2/13), as a summary of public reaction. There was indeed a great outpouring of support for Martin in principle, tempered by growing reservations about the man and his motives. 109.154.26.148 (talk) 23:34, 10 February 2013 (UTC)

PS - the material I added-in was a direct summary of the same topic, as featured in the article. Valetude (talk) 16:14, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

Could you copy what you had added here, where it might be discussed? Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 16:20, 14 July 2013 (UTC) p.s. presumably you have added both of above comments?

There was much sympathy for Martin, and enthusiastic support for the right to defend one's own home. But some people cast doubt on his evidence, and pointed out that he did not have a valid firearms certificate. Valetude (talk) 11:40, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

References