Police probe race attack by gang at Rajdhani restaurant in Southampton (From Daily Echo)
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Police probe race attack by gang at Rajdhani restaurant in Southampton
6:32pm Sunday 14th February 2010 in
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- By Corey Stephenson » Senior News and Video Reporter
POLICE have launched an investigation into a racist attack after the owner of an Indian restaurant was dragged into the street and beaten up by a gang in Southampton.
Three men walked into the Rajdhani restaurant in Bevois Valley Road in the early hours of this morning and attacked the owner. Dragging him outside where a group of up to six men and one woman continued to beat him and kick him in the head.
The attackers stole the night's takings from the restaurant, thought to be around £900 and made off through Rockstone Place, towards London Road, just after 3.30am The restaurant owner suffered injuries to his head and face, and was taken to Southampton General Hospital for treatment.
A police spokesman said the motive for the attack is not yet known but it is being treated as a "racist incident".
Anyone with information is urged to contact police on 101 or Crimestoppers anonymously 0800 555 111.
Comments(25)
Vconfused
says...
7:19pm Sun 14 Feb 10
working.mummyof2
says...
7:20pm Sun 14 Feb 10
Paramjit Bahia
says...
7:27pm Sun 14 Feb 10
While fully sympathising with the victim of the crime, and the police’s desire to solve it, I find the above quoted part of the news item contradictory.
If our clever cops do not know the motive of the attack why are they treating as ‘racist incident’?
If person has been attacked and around £900 taken away, how come the police can’t work out if it is was a robbery? Any lay person would have thought that for a starter, or do Hampshire Police really need Sherlock Holmes to explain that.
Racism is evil if and when it occurs it needs investigation, but to throw it around every time somebody from certain part of community is involved is irresponsible. It is also a possibility that the item as reported on this site is different from what police already knows, because jurnos also love distorting the facts.
In my own experience Hampshire Police tends to fire the race shot bit too often. Few times when I became the victim of crime, they spent more time trying to get out of me if I was the victim because of my skin colour/race than investigating the crime. On top of that I kept on getting time wasting letters from their Hqs on the same subject. Although I kept on telling them that only race group I belong to is ‘human race’ and am victim of ‘crime’ they just do not give that up and catch the bloody criminal.
The Wickham Man
says...
7:53pm Sun 14 Feb 10
Condor Man
says...
7:54pm Sun 14 Feb 10
The Wickham Man wrote:You obviously don't remember his spell on the city council then!
Paramjit, a good balanced considered post as always. Both Labour and Conservative parties would benefit from your common sense - it is a shame you do not feel able to join with either of them as you could do a lot of good.
southy
says...
9:07pm Sun 14 Feb 10
Condor Man wrote:he was a very good councilor to what i have been told.
The Wickham Man wrote:You obviously don't remember his spell on the city council then!
Paramjit, a good balanced considered post as always. Both Labour and Conservative parties would benefit from your common sense - it is a shame you do not feel able to join with either of them as you could do a lot of good.
Stupideditor
says...
9:17pm Sun 14 Feb 10
Vconfused wrote:Don't forget many black people in London attack whites and asian as part of a racial motive.
Its a racist attack if they made racist comments. And if there are 10 of you, you don't have to drag someone into the street and beat and kick them. So it clearly wasn't just about the money.
Why race comes into it I can't see the logic considering money was taken.
It was clearly agrivated theft but with easy words to come out of these low life scum.
Rob444
says...
9:58pm Sun 14 Feb 10
Condor Man wrote:That was when Labour was a socialist party and before it became NuLab!
The Wickham Man wrote:You obviously don't remember his spell on the city council then!
Paramjit, a good balanced considered post as always. Both Labour and Conservative parties would benefit from your common sense - it is a shame you do not feel able to join with either of them as you could do a lot of good.
Modern Labour, NuLab, does not have the same ideals as the original Labour party, which grew from working class roots.
D.a.v.e
says...
10:01pm Sun 14 Feb 10
ally_m
says...
10:24pm Sun 14 Feb 10
george21
says...
10:25pm Sun 14 Feb 10
As for Paramjit Bahia's stint as a councillor .... well ... that was then and this is now. The Labour Party he served in those times was the party of the working man. Nowadays, it's hard to recognize New Labour as anything but the plaything of the champagne-swilling Labour luvvies, with nothing in common with working people. The bare truth is that the Labour Party of working people was stolen from us by a glory-seeking Blair. Glory-seeking then, just a common or garden war criminal now.
Parmi Bahia on the other hand remains true to his beliefs, like them or loathe them.
Hampshire Hog
says...
10:53pm Sun 14 Feb 10
D.a.v.e wrote:This was going to be my exact point too only to add would it even make the newspaper if such an attack was carried out on a white person. Somehow i doubt it very much. I don't in any way condonne what has happened to the poor chap. Just making a point.
If the restaurant owner was white would this be a "racist" incident? No, did'nt think so........
WalkingOnAWire
says...
10:53pm Sun 14 Feb 10
The Mad Dog
says...
11:05pm Sun 14 Feb 10
WalkingOnAWire wrote:Of course the police have 'targets' ever since Labour came to power under Blair the country has become target obsessed, driven from No 10. Even 7 years olds at school have targets thanks to this Government.
I suspect this is a result of poor journalism, which hasn't made all the facts clear - let's face it, that should be no surprise. However, I was once a witness to an incident in a Southampton supermarket when a black security guard was attacked by two drunken customers. Once of them shouted a term of racial abuse during the attack. The police arrived and were not particularly interested, but when I mentioned the term of abuse, the officer's ears suddenly pricked up and he kept urging me to make a formal statement so he could achieve a conviction. He then badgered me on the phone a couple of times afterwards - he showed far more interest in this than the poice ever did on the occasion I was burgled! This might suggest that there are police targets to achieve in getting convictions for this kind of incident - not necessarily a bad thing, but perhaps leading to the wrong police behaviour at ttimes.
The police's targets are there for the sole purpose of showing that, under labour, crime is falling, when all you have to do is spend a day at either the Magistrates or the Crown court to see that it is going up, they've never been so busy. Its called 'spin.
It is possible that this group went with the intention of assaulting the owner, then realised the restaurant was closed and no-one else was about, saw the takings were still there and took them as well. So the motive IS possibly unclear and the robbery was just a byproduct???
Quite Frankly
says...
11:59pm Sun 14 Feb 10
.........
george21
says...
12:11am Mon 15 Feb 10
Quite Frankly wrote:Couldn't agree more. Comments here betray a worrying undercurrent of low-level racism. Even more worrying is that the people who make these excuses for violent racist thugs and thieves probably don't even realise how their comments appear to give encouragement to other racist thugs.
Worrying how many of you are willing to pass this off as something other than a racist attack. And, Echo, you really should be ashamed of "spot-body".........
.........
clausentum
says...
12:34am Mon 15 Feb 10
Then there's the subjective, non-legal, definition of what is and what is not racist behaviour.
"Subjectivity" is perilously unreliable in terms of accurately and unemotionally defining people's behaviour.
It comes down to an individual and highly personalised attitude on a person's part when they identify or comment on what they perceive to be racist or non-racist behaviour.
Make up your own minds when reading posters comments and decide for yourself wether they express an underlying racist attitude or not.
Good luck in getting your findings correct!
bemused26
says...
9:14am Mon 15 Feb 10
Hampshire Hog wrote:If the restaurant owner was white and was dragged outside, robbed and beaten by 6 or 7 non white people then I guess it would be considered a racist attack.
D.a.v.e wrote:This was going to be my exact point too only to add would it even make the newspaper if such an attack was carried out on a white person. Somehow i doubt it very much. I don't in any way condonne what has happened to the poor chap. Just making a point.
If the restaurant owner was white would this be a "racist" incident? No, did'nt think so........
You lot are so quick to make comments like this but of course the Echo won't have been told all the details.
down to earth
says...
10:30am Mon 15 Feb 10
(I wonder if they were neanderthal Pompey fans left over from the game.)
sotonboy84
says...
11:20am Mon 15 Feb 10
Sounds to me like it was an attack. Like many of the comments on here, people are too quick to pull out the racism card. I remember a few years back when racism seemed to mean anything directed from a white person to any other race. It seems that things haven't changed...
As far as the robbery, poor man to be beaten but the people there are a right crooked bunch. Forgot the amount of times people have been ripped off in there. Convenient the attack happened on a night when the takings would be quite high...
But then I guess that was just a coincidence, I wouldn't want to be accused of being a racist.
sooey
says...
12:50pm Mon 15 Feb 10
A group of people go out drinking hard, when the pub chucks out they are hungry and go for a curry. (Lots of people do this.)
If they were a large noisy group they may have been too loud and offended other late night customers, and he may have asked them to tone it down a bit. This may not necessarily have been the same night, it might have been a few nights previous. This might have made them angry and made them want to 'teach him a lesson'. Taking the cash may have been part of the 'lesson' rather than a premeditated robbery, after all 900 quid is not a huge amount, especially between such a large group.
Like I said conjecture only, but hopefully the police will be exploring all motives, not just the stated one.
Hope this fella makes a full & speedy recovery :)
thesouth
says...
4:25pm Mon 15 Feb 10
the echos story is just that, a story. they don't exactly get a full copy of the incident, yet you assume what you read is the full factual nothing missed out report !! maybe the attackers said a racist word during the attack ...making it a racial incident
some of you are very ignorant
Henna18
says...
8:04pm Mon 15 Feb 10
gazdance
says...
12:23pm Tue 16 Feb 10
A robbery is any incident of theft in which force or the threat of force was used; therefore this is a robbery.
A racist incident will be investigated as such by the police if the victim or any other person (witnesses etc.) perceives it to be racially motivated. That is how the legislation in relation to this type of thing is laid out, in black and white.
If any racist language was used at the time of the incident, then, in law it is classed as a racist incident. This isn't stated in the article, so how anyone can claim this isn't a racial incident is beyond me. Perhaps they know something about the incident that isn't stated in the article?
If a white person were to be attacked by someone (white, non-white) and called 'a white b*stard', for example, it would be investigated as a racist incident.
The race card is used an awful lot these days, thanks to laws and legislation making people far more aware. It's designed to protect people but, like anything, can be misused; look at Ali Dizai.
Facts not speculation.
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My View from the Hill says...
7:04pm Sun 14 Feb 10
The fact it was an Indian restaurant make's it a racist attack. Why?
Who want's an Indian meal at 3.30am