Mark Duggan’s Chilling Funeral: Lying Daily Mail And Daily Express Defame Mourners As Gangstas

MARK Duggan is dead. He was killed by police in Tottenham. He was buried today. The Daily Mail’s Anna Edwards reports:

It was the send-off he would have wanted – but one which will strike a chill through a country still recovering from the devastating riots which turned British streets into no-go areas.

The headline above her skewed story declares:

“Gangsta salute for a ‘fallen soldier'”

Always good to know what the dead man would have wanted. But what is it about seeing the funeral of a man shot dead by police that sends a chill through Anna’s bones?

…And as his body was ferried to his funeral in a horse-drawn carriage, mourners lined the streets to pay their gang-style respects – arms outstretched in salute to ‘a fallen soldier’.

Did you feel a chill to see hundreds of polite people smartly dressed and demure to their friend and to God paying their respects? No, neither did we. So, then, what of the Mail’s gangsta salute enacted by the hundreds of mourners at the funeral?

Well, the Daily Express’s David Pilditch also feels a chill:

GANG culture was all too visible on London’s streets again yesterday at the funeral of Mark Duggan, the man whose death sparked riots across England. In chilling scenes, youths dressed in black and baseball caps lined Tottenham’s streets with their arms outstretched in a “gangsta salute” to “fallen soldier” Mark Duggan.

The paper goes one better and says that Duggan and not his shooting triggered the riots:

GANGSTA SALUTE FOR ‘FALLEN SOLDIER’ MARK DUGGAN WHO SPARKED RIOT

Want to know the truth? Well, Bishop Kwaku Frimpong-Manson was at the service for the man who never did fire a shot at the police. The Guardian’s Hugh Muir and Diane Taylor report:

As mourners prepared to set off from the house, the bishop called them to stand on the pavement beside the wooden carriage, which was drawn by four white horses with plumes. Around 60 did so. “We come to stretch our hands towards the casket and thank God for Mark’s life as he begins his heavenly journey.” He urged the mourners to stretch their arms towards the carriage as he prayed. Duggan’s mother, Pam, wept, supported by a relative.

David Pilditch, Anna Edwards, the Daily Mail and the Daily Express might send a chill down our spines. Or make us feel hot with anger.

One thing the Mail does get right is this:

Last night, on the eve of the funeral, Mr Duggan’s brother Mr Hall, 42, accused officers of presiding over a ‘shoot-to-kill policy’, questioning why police had blasted him in the chest rather than a non-lethal part of the body.

The police always shoot to kill…