Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Murder by Screwdriver - Rare, but It Does Happen

Looking worldwide, I found four incidents that appear to be murders using screw drivers.  WORLDWIDE.  I post them here to provide a contrast to how many shootings, including mass shootings, we have reported here just in the U.S. in the same approximate time period of the past two months. It's more than three or four, many many more.

There was this one in Texas, from last month:

FOX San Antonio - TOP STORIES



Second Arrest Made in Screwdriver Murder
A second arrest tonight in the brutal murder of a man last month. Police arrested Patricia Davila. She was wanted for the death of Armando Alvarez. He was found dead at a home on Pace last month with a screwdriver in his head.  Last month, police also arrested Sandra Rivera.  Investigators say Rivera killed Alvarez and stole his van and credit cards.  Davila denies having any involvement.
Friday, December 16 2011, 07:48 PM CST

and this one in the UK, (the report is from last month, but it is not clear that was when the murder by screwdriver took place)  Perhaps Laci will elaborate on it at some point:
iPhone muggers murdered man with screwdriver, court hears


Jury told that Keith Soons died from single wound to his head after confronting two thieves in Cheltenham






Two men have been accused of murder after stealing an iPhone in Cheltenham (above), then stabbing the victim when he 'remonstrated'. Photograph: Martin Argles for the Guardian


A father was stabbed to death with a screwdriver after going to "remonstrate" with two robbers who had stolen his iPhone, a jury has heard.

Keith Soons, 36, who had a baby daughter, died from the single wound to his head after confronting the two thieves, the court was told.

Michael Sexton, 28, and Richard Smith, 27, who are charged with murdering Soons, admit they were at the scene of the attack in Cheltenham, but blame each other for delivering the fatal blow.

Soons was found lying dying in the street at 8am on 5 February this year, five hours after the attack. He died in hospital the same day.

William Mousley QC, prosecuting, told the jury at Bristol crown court on Monday that although the murder weapon was never found, the wound bore all the hallmarks of being inflicted by a screwdriver.

"He lost his life over a mobile phone," he told the jury. "The prosecution cannot say which of the two actually inflicted the fatal injury but they were both together at the relevant time.

"Each accepts that he was there, each blames the other and denies having any part in the killing of Mr Soons. In fact, the prosecution say that both are culpable.

"They had both robbed him, they had both been acting together before and during and they continued to act together after the attack.

"They left Mr Soons seriously injured – neither of them called an ambulance. It is possible that with quicker treatment he might have survived, albeit with significant residual mental problems."

Soons' wallet and a ring he had been wearing were later recovered, the jury was told, but his mobile phone has never been found.

Sexton, of Cheltenham, denies murder but admits robbery. Smith, also of Cheltenham, denies murder and robbery.

The trial continues.
 And this more dubious account from the UK tabloid Daily Mail:
    Screwdriver murder of father - two found guilty Victim Kevin Jackson with his young son Two men were today found guilty of the murder of a father of two who was stabbed through the head with a screwdriver as he interrupted a car theft outside his home. Rangzaiv Akhtar, 20, and Raees Khan, 21, were found guilty at Leeds Crown Court of the murder of Kevin Jackson, 31. Mr Jackson died on New Year's Day this year two days after he disturbed a gang of car thieves who were attempting to steal a Toyota RAV4 vehicle from outside his home in the Copley area of Halifax, West Yorkshire. The jury was unable to reach a verdict on a murder charge against the third defendant Rashad Zaman, 21, and was sent home for the evening. The jury will resume deliberations tomorrow morning. The jury took more than 23 hours to reach its verdicts on the two murder charges against Akhtar and Khan. Akhtar was found guilty by a majority of 10-2, while Khan was convicted unanimously by the jury of seven men and five women. The court was told Mr Jackson was stabbed with a screwdriver on December 30 last year when he went to stop the three men stealing his father-in-law's Toyota RAV4 vehicle. He died two days later in hospital. All three defendants have admitted trying to steal the RAV4. During the trial the court was told that Khan had "poked" Mr Jackson with the screwdriver but had not intended to kill him. Akhtar told the court he hid behind bushes in a garden during the attack. He said when he came out he ran past Mr Jackson lying on the ground but did not realise he was seriously injured. The jury has already found Zaman and Khan guilty of an attempted burglary at a house in Woodside Drive, Cottingley, near Bingley, on December 26 last year with intent to steal the keys to an Audi car. Akhtar has already pleaded guilty to the same attempted burglary. Zaman, of Apsley Crescent, Manningham, Bradford, has already been found guilty by the jury on five charges of car theft in October and December last year. Akhtar, of Salt Street, Manningham, Bradford, denies one charge of car theft. He has admitted another charge of stealing a car He was earlier cleared of robbery involving the taking of a car in January this year. Khan, of Priestman Close, Manningham, Bradford, was cleared of the robbery of a car which took place in January this year. All three were acquitted halfway through the trial on the directions of the judge of assaulting a man with intent to rob him of a Toyota Landcruiser in December last year. 
     
    and this one, in the Caribbean , which might possibly be considered self-defense...:

UWI student accused in screwdriver murder bailed

By TANESHA MUNDLE Observer staff reporter mundlet@jamaicaobserver.com
Monday, December 12, 2011
A University of the West Indies student who allegedly used a screwdriver to stab the mother of his child to death was on Friday offered $200,000 bail when he appeared in the Corporate Area Resident Magistrate’s Court.
The accused, Nesseine Mardners, 20, of Bedward Gardens, August Town, Kingston 7, allegedly murdered his girlfriend, Kemesha Matthews, a 24-year-old entertainer, during a dispute over the welfare of their six-week-old baby.
Mardners is also accused of assaulting the complainant’s mother following the incident which occurred at her home on December 1, about 1:20 am.
Police reported that the accused, who went to visit the complainant, was inside her room when the argument developed. It is reported that Mardners then pulled a screwdriver from his pocket and inflicted wounds to Matthews’ head, after she threatened to have him killed by her friends and family if he did not support their child.
The mother, who was reportedly alarmed by screams from her daughter, rushed to her rescue but found her lifeless body lying on the bed.
She then reportedly confronted the accused who allegedly attempted to choke her.
The mother raised an alarm and she was assisted by her neighbours in accosting the accused who was taken into custody by the police.
On Friday, Mardners was granted bail by Senior Magistrate Judith Pusey on condition that he surrender his travel documents.
Mardners, who is represented by Oswest Senior Smith, is to return to court on February 9.


27 comments:

  1. you may need to revise the title of the post below this as you stated that this "never" happens.

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  2. http://articles.chicagotribune.com/keyword/screwdriver

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  3. http://arkansasmatters.com/news-fulltext?nxd_id=463917

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  4. http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/life-sentence-for-murder-by-screwdriver/article_f4d6b42c-8e02-11df-9c55-00127992bc8b.html

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  5. Murder through a house wall as part of a random, unintended screw driver murder?

    NO, THAT never happens. You need to read more carefully. Screw drivers need to be used up close; there are no random drive by accidental screw driver murders to children inside a house where the murderers are OUTSIDE the house.

    My point.

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  6. http://www.norwalkreflector.com/content/accused-screwdriver-stabber-could-face-death-penalty-wifes-slaying

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  7. I want to thank you for posting the constant barrage of shootings, beatings, murders, hacksaw jobs and the like; it re-enforces the importance of being armed at all times because you never know what could possibly happen at any given time. This is a great pro-arms site.
    Again, thank you.

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  8. http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23817250-boy-charged-over-screwdriver-death.do

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  9. http://www.niuzer.com/San-Antonio-TX/Second-Arrest-Made-in-Screwdriver-Murder-8977385.html

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  10. http://www.pottsmerc.com/articles/2011/09/13/news/doc4e6f524de81af655353627.txt

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  11. all of those examples were in the first 5 pages of a simple google search. I find it hard to believe you could only find 4 incidents when looking "worldwide"

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  12. Check the date - July 2010:
    http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/life-sentence-for-murder-by-screwdriver/article_f4d6b42c-8e02-11df-9c55-00127992bc8b.html

    Try comparisons in a similar time period.
    Closer - this was September of this year, but then you have to compare the number of gun murders reported here back to that date - and if I recall we had a few of the larger mass shootings in that time period.
    http://arkansasmatters.com/news-fulltext?nxd_id=463917

    and this one you had to go back to 2009, and no one was murdered, much less murdered while on the other side of the wall of a house.

    http://articles.chicagotribune.com/keyword/screwdriver

    If you compare gun violence in the same period, even if you just use the ones we reported here, it will be clear that they are hugely dissimilar in terms of how lethal the screwdrivers are, particularly when it comes to bystander victims, compared to firearms.

    Firearms kill many; screwdrivers almost never do.

    There is the occasional screwdriver accident as well; it was part of what got me thinking about this as a topic. Even serious accidents with screwdrivers aren't as deadly as firearm accidents:

    http://www.insideedition.com/news/1189/screwdriver-to-brain.aspx

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  13. But shockingly, neither my screwdrivers nor my guns have killed or injured anyone in the time that I've owned them.

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  14. You know what the gun connection is right? Anyone who is dangerous enough to kill with a screwdriver, can easily buy a gun on Craig's List. That's thanks to you gun-rights guys protecting our freedoms.

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  15. Assnonymouse wants to compare numbers.

    Fine.

    Assuming that there were FOUR murders committed with screwdrivers on Christmas Day, in Texas--they would still be three short of the total in the one house that the cops found SEVEN bodies in, all killed* with a handgun.

    Guns make two things easier for some folks; killin' other folks and bein' a MAN.



    * Six murders, one suicide.

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  16. I googled "stabbed with screwdriver".

    About 262,000 results (0.17 seconds)

    I googled "Murdered with screwdriver"

    About 2,370,000 results (0.16 seconds)

    I googled "Shot with handgun in the U.S."

    About 652,000,000 results (0.19 seconds)

    I googled "Murdered with handgun in the U.S."

    About 286,000,000 results (0.25 seconds

    Isn't google fun?

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  17. Democommie,

    And likely many of those sites were irrelevant to the search in question. Google is useful, but not for producing the kind of number that you want.

    Mikeb302000,

    I've looked for guns on Craig's List from time to time. There aren't many. This is a small matter that your side likes to inflate out of proportion. As we've all discussed here, gun sales without a licensed dealer across state lines are already illegal I cannot legally drive up to Missouri and just buy a gun. I'd have to have it sent to an FFL here in Arkansas and then pay a transfer fee. (It is true that blackpowder guns can be sold on-line--that's how I got mine--but are you really worried about drive-by hogleg shootings?) The only way that a gun sale on Craig's List would be legal is between private parties in the same state, and we can do that in person already. (Well, not in a few gun grabber paradises. . .)

    Besides which, let's say that private ownership of guns is illegal. That might reduce the number of violent crimes in public, but as Dog Gone has pointed out, that threat is going down. What would happen at home, though? Do you really think that a man who commits acts of domestic violence against his wife will restrain himself because he can't legally own a gun? There are screwdrivers and claw hammers and plumbing parts and bottles of lye and so forth that would still be available. We might not see seven dead in a night, but that kind of event is an outlier. Many forms of violence have been with us since long before firearms were invented. That's not to excuse the violence. It's to say that we won't solve violence simply by eliminating guns.

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  18. "I've looked for guns on Craig's List from time to time. There aren't many."

    What a putz.

    You've looked on Craig's list? Craig's list prohibits its users from selling firearms (not that it stops some of them from doing so); this site:

    http://www.armslist.com

    and a lot of others offer PLENTY of gunz for the insecure boy in all of you.

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  19. Democommie,

    Are you going to call Mikeb a putz for mentioning Craig's List multiple times?

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  20. Greg Camp:

    Umm, gosh, no. I would first of all have to see the comments (you may feel free to produce them) and then check to see if he was saying that alltehbadgunzpeople buy their gunz there. I doubt that's the case.

    Mikeb 302000 might want to weigh in on this so I don't want to say anything more about it until he has a chance to do.

    On the other hand, you have, for lack of anything substantive to say, put your foot in your mouth AFTER stepping in the shit. Bad from, really bad form.

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  21. Democommie,

    Here:

    http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=6314891743204395487&postID=3286443639082834365

    for example, but embarrassingly for you, he also referred to Craig's List on this very comment page.

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  22. "You know what the gun connection is right? Anyone who is dangerous enough to kill with a screwdriver, can easily buy a gun on Craig's List. That's thanks to you gun-rights guys protecting our freedoms." quote from Mikeb from this line of comments alone...

    Damn DC I have heard of lazy but you take the cake.

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  23. Greg Camp:

    And?

    As I stated previously, there ARE people who move their gunz through Craigslist. But, there's LOTZ more of them moved through other sites.

    You want to argue that or are you going to sit atop what you think is your WIN? You're fucking pathetic.


    "Damn DC I have heard of lazy but you take the cake.

    December 29, 2011 1:33 AM'

    Oh, gosh, it's at moments like this that I just wish I had a GUN so I could get even with people who make fun of me!! Oh, wait, no I don't, that would be the province of Greg Camp and the gutless fucks that won't id themselves.

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  24. Please substitute "Craig's List" for "the internet" or "on-line."

    Didn't you get the point Greg?

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  25. "Didn't you get the point Greg?"

    What? and ruin his world's record duration for holdin' on to the burnin' stoopit? Not gonna happen.

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  26. Actually, Democommie and Mikeb, I'm in favor of allowing gun sales on the Internet. I don't object to private sales, even across state lines. Freedom is the ability to act without seeking permission. I'm also in favor of prosecuting anyone who commits a crime with a firearm, but I don't presume that a citizen is a criminal in advance.

    Democommie,

    You called me a putz for looking on Craig's List for a gun, despite Mikeb's statements that such is possible. Now, you're furiously backpeddling.

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  27. I don't see any backpeddling, Greg. This is an example of your unreasonableness. You focus so much on what you call freedom, which is really self-centered convenience, that you would have private sale exceptions to the background check system. This is one of the main sources of leakage into the criminal world, and one which could easily be plugged.

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