James Bulger, a Mother`s Story

I am sure neither of us will lose a lot of sleep over that. Words wound deeply, which is why we need to be careful how we use them. Read your comment again and reflect on how it came across.

I will leave it there. Have a good evening.

For those of us who know Annie ,we know she meant no malice whatsoever by her comment. She was simply saying Denise has to live with that awful knowledge that if she continued to hold Jamie's hand it would never have happened. Likewise the McCann case. Not blaming these parents. We have all been a little lax at times. I expect Cuchulainn you are new to this site and don't yet know Annie from her posts.

Words wound deeply, which is why we need to be careful how we use them
Perhaps you need to ponder on that yourself, Cuchulainn as your posts do come across as very harsh.

We have all been a little lax at times.
It does only take a few seconds and I'm sure it has happened to us all at some time or another.

I think you are being very unfair to Cuch. She only repeated what ab did actually post. How is she supposed to understand that that is not acceptable?

Thank you mumofmadboys and Jalima, I have read my post over and over , cannot understand how it caused such a vicious attack.

Me thinks something rather nasty is going on

Sorry Anniebach but my reading of your post was that you were blaming James' mother for letting him "run around the mall", when in fact she had only let go of his hand to pay in a shop. It is possible to misread an intention in the written word and I think Cuch has offered an adequate apology for misinterpreting your meaning.

Annie, I'm sure it is just a matter of how your words could be interpreted, with no hurt intended on either side.

I'm sure we've all experienced that feeling of dread when we lose sight of a child. My DS and I were happily waving at each other through a shop's plate glass window as I paid at a counter. I glanced down for a second to put my purse away and he was gone. No sign of him up or down the street. He'd opened the door that led to offices above the shop and was hiding. I have never in my life been so terrified. I couldn't watch this programme, or read the details of what happened to James. Denise's agony and her feelings of guilt are heartbreaking.

Maggie, I can accept words can be interpreted incorrectly but surely a full explanation given cannot be interpreted incorrectly, I did this , had no need to, yet the reply was IF

Annie, I believe if you read my posts you will see that I have apologised if I misunderstood your meaning. I stand by my original point that your post was uninformed and very poorly worded. There is nothing nasty going on. On an Internet forum people will have different opinions and will clash. That is the wonder of it all. If you feel offended then again I apologise. I won’t apologise for defending Denise Fergus, her family and the memory of her little boy. His name is James Patrick Bulger. He was abducted, tortured and murdered. He and his family deserve respect at all times.

There was nothing to defend Denise Fergus from , your post was a vicious verbal attack,

My post was poorly worded ? Strange, even when i put an exclamation mark in a post or mispell a word in swoop the forum police to pull me up . Coincidence ? I think not.

I will not say anymore on this, a thread on the murder of a child, the suffering of his mother is not a thread to be used for critcising wording of a post or continuing with any disagreement .

Cuch You’ve done nothing wrong and have been firm and polite. FWIW I really do not understand why people watch these programmes and start ill informed rabble rousing threads.

Message deleted by Gransnet. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

I vividly remember this dreadful case. Three victims in my opinion. Nowhere else in Europe would such young children be prosecuted in an adult court. It was all horrible. I have memories of seeing 'lynch mobs' attempting to overturn the police van in which these youngsters were taken to court. Adults screaming 'let us have ,em' Some of these 'adults' even had their own children with them. These were very frightening.
No-one would ever try to excuse what these two boys did, a horrible, horrible crime - BUT they were children. Indeed if it had happened just a few months earlier they would not have been able to be named and prosecuted in this way. I do not understand why child killers seem to incur more hatred from the public than adult ones. At least with such young killers there is a chance of total rehabilitation - and in this case it seems as if 50% successful. Mary Bell was, of course, the other one that people remember and I believe she did go on to lead a good life and had her own children. These two youngsters were allowed to slip through every safety net for ten years. Had they been picked up for their neglect, etc. earlier than little Jamie would be alive today. It should be society that is on trial.

Well said Franbern

I thought the programme was really interesting particularly in relation to the research done into children's maturity.

Justice can sometimes seem harsh to the victims but it is not them that justice is there for not even in this "all about me" time we live in. It is there for society. Justice is blindfolded to show the objectivity of the law. We should not be swayed by our natural revulsion that not only was a child killed, but killed by children. We have to let justice take it's course or we will be reduced to anarchy and the dangerous consequences of people taking the law into their own hands.

It is simply not true that they were not punished. The punishment our society imposes is loss of liberty - they lost theirs for some considerable time. As some have said in other societies they would not have been tried as adults. Those societies, often seen by the red-tops to have laws and treatments that are seen as "soft on crime", actually have lower crime rates and many, many fewer in prison. One day we may grow up as a society too and stop behaving in this antediluvian way towards crime and particularly towards children involved in crime but sadly, I don't see it happening yet.

Sorry Franbern, I am a slow typist and did not see what you had written until I posted but very much in agreement with what you say.

I hope my deleted thread was read before it disappeared. Deleting it does not change my view that no one should constantly turn thread into a thread about them.

post not thread

I didn't read your deleted comment. As I related a personal experience, I'm guessing it could have been about me, so would like to hear what you have to say.

It was about me Maggie,

Well I'm sorry to hear that, Annie. Threads drift, posters have personal memories that they may think are relevant and yes, disagreements arise occasionally and have to be resolved. The only arbiter of what is acceptable should be GNHQ, in line with forum guidelines, which you didn't breach.

GNHQ are right in that I shouldn't have mentioned any names. However, it still stands that I believe it is very wrong, especially on such a difficult thread as this is, for someone to turn the post to be all about them.

It was not about personal experiences Maggie.

GracesGran, I saw your thread, thank you.

I agree completely with the posters who make reference to the background of the boys who committed the crime, they were let down by every agency that had contact with them up until the 12th Feb 1993 & they should not have been tried in an adult court or by the media. Society failed all the children in this case.

I need a coffee: posts not post.

If truly believe that if we just started treating those with addictions (often as a result of mental issues) raise the equality of education and put more into the agencies that help families and children we would start a virtuous circle and the money saved on sending people to prison could be recycled into the services that keep them out Cuchulainn. Other countries do it and it works. It sounds to me as if these children were also the victims of society and that James was the victim of our lack of care towards them.