After she
A former police community support officer who was “obsessed with weapons” has been jailed after she tried to make a gun using a 3D printer.
Zoe Watts, 39, of St Helen’s Avenue, Lincoln, was found with weapons, including knives and a crossbow, alongside parts for 3D printed guns during a raid on her home on 11 December. Watts denied a charge of attempting to manufacture a prohibited weapon, and claimed she was making a “fidget” toy gun as a Christmas present.
Watts, of course, is a large hulking man. This crime is not the crime of a woman; this sentence was not handed down to a woman.
Two days before the raid on
herhome, Watts had done an online search for “Has anybody been killed by a 3D printed gun?”The court was told on behalf of Watts – who was appearing by videolink – that
she“apologised to the jury, toherfamily andherfriends for putting them through this”.It also heard that
she“expressedhersorrow that it may have an impact on how the gay and lesbian community may be viewed”.
No sorrow for the trans communniny?
Judge Hirst said he realised custody would be more difficult for Watts because of
herneurodivergence,herprevious police career andhertransgender identity.
That’s the next to last sentence of the longish article – only at the very end does the BBC admit that Watts has a “transgender idenniny” i.e. is a man. If you heard the story on the radio as opposed to reading it and thus seeing the photo at the top, you would have no idea the perp was a man until the very end. Most people stop reading before the very end. It’s journalistic malpractice on steroids.
Updating to add: Lincolnshire Police are even worse.
Shouldn’t you include the correct pronouns after striking through the wrong ones?
Nah, There’s only one possible alternative, after all, so why bother? Elegant minimalism is better.
I imagine the simple strikes as an English teacher marking a student paper in red ink, and writing See me on top of the first page.
“This crime is not the crime of a woman”
In light of some rather notorious actions by Kristi Noem, I think there are some women who would do that crime, though fewer than there are men, including men who claim to be women.
Jim Baerg, I was thinking of Marjorie Taylor Greene, but yes, I thought the same thing.
Jim, iknklast, doubtless there are women who would commit that crime, but that’s beside the point. In this specific instance it was the crime of a man, regardless of the BBC’s sloppy journalism.
Dave @ 3 – exactly!
Is stating that the perpetrator is “transgender” enough, though? I’m not so sure. The estimable Helen Joyce states that she believes that a full quarter of people unfamiliar with the topic think that “transgender woman” means a woman who thinks she is a man, rather than a man who thinks he is a woman. If that is indeed true, then simply saying that Watts “identifies as trans” or other vague weasel words, hasn’t actually transmitted the necessary meaning required to understand the situation at all.
Wut? Haven’t I yelled at the BBC & Guardian & various “activists” about saying “trans” when they mean male enough times? Of course stating that the perpetrator is “transgender” is never ever enough – where did I say it was?