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You are > Home > Cruel carnage in Cumbria
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Thursday, June 17, 2010
Cruel carnage in Cumbria
BY FINBARR SLATTERY
NO case can be made for shooting dead any person but for such a wrongdoing to make any sense whatsoever there must be a motive for the killing – shooting innocent people for no apparent reason is another matter and that’s what happened in the county of Cumbria on the first day of June.
The county of Cumbria has similarities with Kerry in that it includes the famous Lake District of England. It is the most north west county in England extending along the Irish Sea coast from Morecambe Bay to the Solway Firth.
The county town is Carlisle, a town with a racecourse on which the most famous race run annually there is the Carlisle Bell. The Romans constructed several roads there and also a series of forts. Lead, sliver and iron ore have been mined in the district since the 12th century. So from that description you will gather that Cumbria must be a nice place to live.
Now for a look at the recent shootings that happened there. It all began with Derrick Bird (52) shooting his twin brother David in the early hours of the first of June. After that local solicitor Kevin Commons, who had been engaged by David Brid to deal with their mother’s will. was shot. Both were killed before 5am.
After that Derrick Bird killed three people driving their cars, a retired couple, three retired people, a young estate agent and a rugby league player, 12 in all and outside his twin brother and his solicitor he seems to have no connection with the others.
Why did he do it is the burning question? No answer seems to be forthcoming. Derrick Bird himself was regarded as a nice person by those who knew him.
One of the saddest stories to emerge from the shooting concerns Kenneth Fishburn (71), a retired security guard, who daily visited his local betting shop around 9.30am to read the Racing Post with the occasional bet thrown in.
On the day of the shooting he was late leaving his home, it was around 11am, and as he was leaving his house the killer drove along in his car and shot him.
What comes over a person to commit such dreadful slaughter of innocent people? That’s the burning question for which the world awaits the answer.
The killing in Cumbria is the third such atrocity in the UK – on 19 August 1987, Michael Ryan went on a shooting rampage in Hungerford, Berkshire, shooting 16, including his mother, before killing himself.
On 13 March 1996, Thomas Hamilton, a former scout leader, killed 16 five to six-year-old children and a teacher at Dunblane Primary School in Scotland. All the killings were frightful deeds that sent shock waves around the world.
Derrick Bird’s rampage has left his two sons and his 90year-old mother totally shattered.
He had recently become a grandfather. The litany of his killings makes terrible reading – innocent people enjoying their sojourn in this world sent to their death by a supposedly nice man who had gone totally berserk.
It’s hard to believe and totally impossible to understand how such a frightful event could take place in a quiet, happy and peaceful place.
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