Who will speak for Raoul Moat now he's dead?

One could be forgiven for thinking that there are more concerning things in life than the death of Raoul Moat recently after a week on the run. You could argue as some have already done, that he 'was a killer who got what he deserved'. You could perhaps even agree with David Cameron when he referred to Raoul Moat as a "Callous killer, end of story", as you sit there pontificating from your moral seat above it all, far removed from the actual events which took place last week that saw a man being hunted by police for a week, and resulted finally in his death near the river in Rothbury.

Yet there are an awful lot of people sending their respect to Mr Moat as well as dozens who attended the place he died with flowers and messages as a mark of their respect for a dead friend.

I never knew the guy so I'm detached. I didn't know the guy he is said to have killed with a shot to the stomach, or the policeman in Newcastle he is said to have shot at and blinded. Nor do I know his family or his friends or his ex-partner, so I can hardly reckon with how they actually feel about Mr Moat's death, or about the relationship his friends had with him when he was alive. Indeed I can see he actually had friends and that tells me he couldn't have been 'all bad'.

All I do know, is that as a result of Mr Moat having died, he cannot be deemed to have been anything other than an 'accused' person, whether that be for murder or any other charge they would have laid on him because without trial, he can not be guilty of anything at all, and all we know beyond that is what we read in the papers.

He was in fact as is every other person under British Law, 'innocent until proven guilty', and that's the point I'd make to people such as David Cameron who would have the rest of us believe, (without trial and without knowledge of the facts, the circumstances, the case against him or knowledge of the mitigating circumstances, and without the defence, or any measure of knowledge as to Mr Moat's psychological state), that we should believe David Cameron when he branded him to be a 'callous murderer'.

All he is to me is a dead man who was accused of murder, nothing more and nothing less, and as an innocent man, not found guilty by trial, and not brought to a court where he could hear evidence, he is deserving of the same respect we would give any man as disrespect for him can only ever really be an attributable feeling from those who knew him.

I think the law is pretty clear here and as to the law, Raoul Moat was still innocent when he died.

That's not to dismiss the accusations against him you understand, but simply to put things into context here. As I say, I never knew the guy so I cannot say whether I believe if he had still been alive, whether I would have had grounds to say he was 'callous' in the act of killing. He was alleged to have killed his ex-partners boyfriend Chris Brown but whether Moat may have said 'the gun just went off when he lurched at me'. or used some other claim in his defence, is now a complete unknown.

The plain fact is, I don't know what Moat would have said in his defence because he's no longer here to tell us. All we have is what the police are telling us, and what the newspapers want to say about him, but there are questions remaining about how he died, just as there would have been questions if he'd lived, about why he carried a shotgun, went on the run, 'allegedly' shot and killed a guy, shot his former partner in the stomach and a policeman in his face through the windshield of his police patrol car. i.e. He is alleged to have done those things and that doesn't make him GUILTY. In fact, consider that he wasn't even charged with those alleged crimes, so how on earth can he be anything other than a dead man who had been accused. But nor do I think he should be made a martyr or canonized either, and of course sympathy also lies with those who are said to be his victims.

I await the results of the inquiry into the events of his death and into the circumstances beforehand including the actions of police officers on the night he died.

But I have to say I have some difficulty interpreting matters myself when all I saw were media reports of a man on the run who had finally been cornered by police, and although posing no immediate threat to anyone but himself, I have to question why he was then Tasered after only 6 hours of what police called negotiations. Is that a long time in such grave matters? I don't know, but it seems a pretty short amount of time to me when a mans life is at stake.

Again, my own personal understanding of what that means is that it is an intention to bring him in.

Surely negotiation is to reduce the risk of death by making him feel comfortable about giving himself up. A situation where conversation takes place with a hope that a peaceful outcome would prevail and that Mr Moat could be arrested, charged and stand trial for his alleged offenses. As one comment I read recently said: "How do we know it wasn't one of the other ten guys they arrested, who shot the policeman".

I imagine there are many questions and that's the point too. There will always remain questions unless some are answered, and of course the comment is right. How do we actually know anything beyond what we are told to believe unless we see the evidence ourselves?

But that isn't to be the case now with Mr Moat, because for whatever reason, the police decided to Taser him. The question remains also as to whether that was their only or last option, and why police Tasered a suspect who held a gun to his head/neck?

Are the public to believe that despite police had him surrounded, despite that offers by some relatives and friends to talk with Mr Moat had been refused, and despite that the man was said to be holding a gun only to threaten himself. That 'Tasering him' was in essence an essential thing to do. Or are we to believe it was preemptive police work on their part, and wholly unnecessary (at that particular moment) to fire at Mr Moat with Tasers which they knew would cause an involuntary muscle reaction and which could 'foreseeably' have lead to him pulling the trigger of the sawn off shotgun which he was holding underneath his throat and thus kill himself?

Certainly the police have not described him as having been threatening them with the gun, but have only said he held a gun to himself. So why the urgency to fire at him rather than permit others to speak with him to talk him round?

Again. What was it about that specific moment, that made two police marksmen fire simultaneously two 'shot gun Tasers', at Mr Moat other than a decision to do it, and the question why they shot him must be answered. Would they not suspect he might pull the trigger involuntarily?

I can speculate but I prefer to await the outcome of the inquiry whenever that will be. But Meanwhile, I have more questions about the police than I do about Raoul Moat.

I'd like to know for instance how the acting chief constable was strolling around town without body armour, looking like she was out shopping for a new pair of shoes, whilst at the same time she was telling the media that Moat had threatened to kill civilians. Why was she not ordering protection measures for herself as well as the general public.

Another question I would like answered is why the police took no action to stop children from attending a nearby school, as well as the area where they suspected Mr Moat to be, where people were allowed to 'play', when police were warning of a man with a shotgun who had allegedly threatened to kill the public.

Another question I'd like answered is why, given that the police had said Mr Moat had made threats against the public 'if the media reported lies again', why the police then chose to read out a letter live on air, which branded Mr Moat to be a 'nutter'. I mean did they not consider his likely reaction to this at all or are they complete nutters themselves.

Is there any answer to this other than my own allegation that we have a rank full of clots in charge of our police service or am I alone thinking this.

When I think of the action of Tasering Mr Moat I think there could only be one of a few reasons why they did it too. For only by accident, by order, or by prerequisite action could police have thought it 'best practice' to fire two Tasers at the time at a man who held a gun to himself.

Accidental discharge of the Tasers is ruled out because two officers fired together, and thus it was a purposeful action. But whilst this would rule out incompetence on the part of the two officers it would not rule out an incompetent order to fire having come from their superior. Question: What were the rules of engagement?

The question as to whether police might not have known that firing a Taser would cause an automatic involuntary muscle reaction which could lead Mr Moat to have pulled the trigger on the gun he held to his own head or neck, is also unbelievable if that's the line they'll take, because they are after all trained marksmen and even a complete dunderhead would know what would happen to a person who received an electric shock. Yes, they'd 'jump with shock' naturally.

Even I would know if I stuck my finger in a light socket, that I would 'jump with shock', and I ask anyone who doesn't believe me to try it whilst holding a gun to their head to see what happens.

If you are still around to give us the results then I'll believe it possible that police were unaware or inadequately trained in the use of Tasers to know the likely result of firing them at a man holding a gun to his head, and until then, I'll carry on believing what I do that Mr Moat would naturally jump with shock like the rest of us.

Finally, I would also like to read the letters Mr Moat is said to have written, because I feel at this point he may well have given away clues as to his real intentions. I feel (without knowing what the letters contain), that I can reasonably assume they would have likely been letters which mitigated his actions because such a thing is normal unless you are a 'callous killer' and don't care. i.e. A psychopathic killer which plainly he was not else we'd have known about it already. In Mr Moat's case, he had a week to go around killing the public indiscriminately but didn't, so I wonder whether David Cameron read the letters before branding an otherwise innocent man or a terribly upset man who had not been charged or tried to be a 'murderer', or whether he is as stupid as the policewoman who called Mr Moat a 'nutter' when she knew Mr Moat's inner feelings were what she says. i.e. She alleged that Mr Moat had indicated, 'If you tell any more lies about me then I'll start killing the public.' - Hello stupid officer?

The police had undoubtedly read his letter, which again was reported as 'rambling'. So where are the letters and what do they say. I like to form my own opinions as opposed to listening to idiots who call innocent people callous murderers, shout 'nutter' to a person with a gun, and tell police officers to fire electrified darts at people who they want to arrest and bring to trial, whilst simultaneously knowing that they are holding a gun to their head and would in all reasonable probability be likely to spontaneously jump with shock and pull the trigger. - Again, hello stupid officers. Were we not told they shot him in an attempt to stop him killing himself?

How do trained police marksmen account for this when even a child would be able to understand that a person would jump if given an electric shock. Further, how exactly does one prevent a split second pull on a trigger, and when does one decide it is about to happen. What changed from the moment Moat threatened to kill himself, to the moment police fired at him, to make it so urgent at that time to deliver two Tasers at him. - Didn't his friend (who had spoken with him), not say that the gun was not loaded?

There's the matter of the message Moat left on his dictaphone too. Can we the public not hear this so we the public can measure for ourselves whether we have policemen who are ready to kill suspects who happen for whatever reason to be causing them a bit of a problem, whether senior police are just stupid like Cameron, or whether they actually felt they had just cause to Taser him regardless of the probability that his involuntary reflex action would pull the trigger of his gun. - and as a result that he would die? - We don't employ police officers to take out suspected criminals do we and regardless of what he is accused of, we have courts to deal with it as opposed to police marksmen and women deciding who does and doesn't 'get Tasered' in a country where a man is supposed to be innocent until otherwise proven guilty.

We hear from the media that the dictaphone carried an ominous message of threats against the public, yet we had seen the acting chief constable walking around town, and we even had witnesses saying they'd seen him. One woman said 'when he saw the police car pull up with 4 armed officers, Moat placed the gun to his own head and walked away. - I find this strange if wanting me to believe he posed a real threat to public lives albeit that we are told he made threats, and I wonder whether the tapes can back up what we are told by the media.

Will the public get to hear those tapes or will they just be told to forget these things because these and other questions by me and others pose more questions about what kind of government and police force we have than they do about a suspected murderer who was threatening (allegedly), to only commit suicide. - i.e. Where is the evidence to support the policewoman's assertions that Raoul Moat posed a threat to the general public?

Who will speak for Raoul Moat now he's dead?

This is a taped conversation which friends released to ITN News, which also confirms that he had sought the assistance of a psychological assessment with a psychiatrist before his life sadly kicked off the events which ultimately led to his own death, a man hunt, the death of another and two maliciously wounded victims. But do we actually know why this man turned into what some describe as a 'monster' despite not knowing him, despite he's not here to defend himself, wasn't charged with any crime, and all we have is stories in the newspapers and sad twats like Cameron who is apparently willing to brand someone a callous killer before he's seen any of the evidence or even before an investigation into his death has reached its conclusions.