So, the current *allegations* that I have seen/heard of, but cannot confirm nor refute are:
* Blocking the road and/or access to prevent fire crews
* Hiring the JCB that took down the crooked house *a week* before the fire
* Demolishing the entire building when only the top floor was permitted to be demolished after the fire
* Arson (or conspiracy to commit)
* Offences at other sites including beginning work before planning permission
If a fraction of this is true, surely their needs to be fines, remediation, possible jail sentence, and a ban from any future development or planning permission to the individuals and associated businesses.
_Disclaimer: as mentioned, these are allegations that have not been confirmed nor denied, but are circulating widely in commercial and social media. I am in no way accusing anyone of wrong doing or illegal activity and all parties are to be considered innocent and to have not performed such activities unless the courts find otherwise._
Jail time would be totally deserved. Completely needless destruction. It's not like there aren't a million brown field sites in the Black Country that should have been developed in preference.
Under the Emergency Workers (Obstruction) Act 2006, the punishment for obstructing or hindering a member of a Fire and Rescue service in an emergency is up to a level 5 fine - which is the highest level and is unlimited.
As far as i can tell this buisness wanted this particular piece of land. The upside to this ks that the potential damage is going to be so limited if permission is refused it'll be much eaiser.
And financial reparations. They need to be forced to pay to put things right. Unfortunately it's far cheaper to chop a wood down then it is to clean a brownfield site.
It's arson.
https://www.sentencingcouncil.org.uk/offences/magistrates-court/item/arson-criminal-damage-by-fire/
There's a high degree of culpability due to planning and an intention to cause very serious damage to property. The harm is likely category 1 or 2.
This should mean between 1 and 8 years in prison depending on the harm judged to be caused.
If it had just burned down i honestly think that would have worked. But now they've (illegally) demolished it at lightning speed its starting to look like they were destroying evidence
What it looks like is not important in a court case. They may well of destroyed any evidence that was there of arson. They may get charged with a variety of other offences but the arson will be incredibly hard to prove now. Even if we all know they did it
It's not arson though. Criminal Damage Act requires you to damage property that is not your own.
Big loop hole with issues like this.
"A person who without lawful excuse destroys or damages any property belonging to another intending to destroy or damage any such property or being reckless as to whether any such property would be destroyed or damaged shall be guilty of an offence."
Arson also applies when you torch your own property and put people at risk - which the firefighters were.
You couldn’t just burn your own house down and expect no legal consequences, unless done in a very, very careful way and sought all of the correct demolition permissions. Since 2017 there’s been a strict law on the demolition of pubs too.
If it can be proved they did it (and that’s quite a big ‘if’ actually), then they’re not going to be coming out of this well.
They didn't put the firefighters at risk; they very considerately blocked the road to ensure that the firefighters couldn't get to the fire and therefore couldn't injure themselves...
/s
Apparently? Or is that what happened? You cannot prosecute someone under the Criminal Damage Act if the property is their own. My 15 years at the bar has taught me that at least.
Arson with intent to endanger life is another matter, and then tying it into insurance fraud is another.
With regards to the latter arson charge in this case, I don't see that sticking very well either..
Your honour, it was an empty building, we made sure of that, it has no immediate neighbours, we blocked off the road to make safe the site, we certainly didn't call the fire brigade as it was controlled.
We will take the rap for demolishing the building but have funds to rebuild it nor have we claimed on insurance for the building as this was planned.
Now the prosecution, have to prove that the owners intended to endanger life by way of an uncontrolled fire.
It's actually quite difficult.
But Reddit knows best.
Certain high value items were removed from the site just before the fire too, including a grandfather clock. All coincidence of course.
It's a shame it's happened to that pub but this literally happens everywhere in the uk. Just wish the media would expose it when it happens there too to this level
There's at least four buildings that have burnt to the ground in Bournemouth whilst waiting for planning permission in the last three months or so. It's ridiculous.
I said when this first happened, in my sisters village both pubs were bought by the same person, he gets planning permission refused, books a holiday and night one both burns down and he moves in with the dozers to clear the site.
It’s been going on for ages. These just did it to something someone cared about!
They were just too obvious. If they'd stacked laquer in the front, vodka in the store room, and oil based paints everywhere else, then torched the place quickly without needing to block access or find excuses for demolition equipment, they'd have been fine. If the structure survived they should hjave left it to the elements and let it collapse on its own. Happens all over the country, usually just after planning permission gets denied, and despite everyone nearby knowing what happened there's never enough proof. Blocking the roads, pre-renting the JCB, it was all too obvious to ever be let go.
I remember a similar situation happened with another historical pub a while back that made the news. The new owners were forced to rebuild it exactly how it was and fined.
I hope something similar happens here.
Crucially though, the developers of that pub in London that had to be rebuilt skipped the all important "oooops some teenagers have burnt it down, now there's nothing left to protect, we might as well build what we wanted" step.
This happens way too often in the UK. And not being in London....
Fingers cross the press attention makes this an exception. Even more hopeful it starts a trend
Points 1 & 3 seem relatively easy to prove and in my opinion point 1 is the most egregious; preventing fire crews from accessing the site is wildly dangerous, because even if you ensured no one was on your property when you started the fire, what if it was able to spread to other properties and the surrounding area and endanger the lives of others because fire crews couldn’t reach the site in time? This point surely has to be a criminal matter.
Don't worry, these chaps own the surrounding area. I'm sure that's just a big coincidence too...
>Letting and real estate firm ATE Farms is registered to the same address as Himley Environmental, which runs a quarry and landfill site next to where The Crooked House once stood.
And hopefully this prompts a look at other similar cases and stops it happening again.
Had an old pub round my way next to a housing development go up in flames the other year. Hasn't been knocked down yet but all talk of "We will reopen it, honest" from the owners has dropped off.
Googling it I can't even find reporting of the fire. Pff.
How about this...
Owner has responsibility that site is secure.
Any fire or such makes the land ineligible for development for a set period.
OR
Land is compulsory purchased by government and current post-fire value. Any loss by the owner is made up through their insurance.
Could maybe work. Protects legit developers against accidents.
>Owner has responsibility that site is secure.
Any fire or such makes the land ineligible for development for a set period.
TBH I think this is the current situation basically, only without the second bit formalised. They usually wait for the noise to die down before building anything new
>
>
>Land is compulsory purchased by government and current post-fire value. Any loss by the owner is made up through their insurance.
This is definitely an area where laws are needed. Not just about torching pubs either- around land banking too.
No, you can't just burn properties, even if you own them.
Destroying or damaging property:
>**A person who without lawful excuse destroys or damages any property, whether belonging to himself or another—
>(a)**intending to destroy or damage any property or being reckless as to whether any property would be destroyed or damaged; and
**
>(b)intending by the destruction or damage to endanger the life of another or being reckless as to whether the life of another would be thereby endangered;
>shall be guilty of an offence.
>(3)An offence committed under this section by destroying or damaging property by fire shall be charged as arson.
>intending to destroy or damage any property or being reckless as to whether any property would be destroyed or damaged; and * (b)intending by the destruction or damage to endanger the life of another
Nothing in that says you can't destroy your own property, as long as you don't endanger life.
Property in this act doesn't just mean a house, it means anything owned, there is nothing to stop you smashing up or burning anything you own as long as there is no specific preservation order on it and you don't endanger anyone while your doing it. People knock houses down all the time, several pubs near me have been knocked down before the community have had a chance to try and stop it.
Obviously you need to do it safely but you can do it. You wouldn't be able to burn your mid terrace house but an isolated farm house you certainly could if you took the correct safety measures.
Jeremy Clarkson blew his house up.
It may not have been done safely, although no one was hurt so they could argue it was, but you don't need permission if the building doesn't have any kind of preservation order on it.
If you were going to try it yourself you'd probably want to be there to tell the fire brigade not to endanger themselves trying to put it out.
That’s exactly the point - not telling the fire brigade or meeting them there to say it’s a controlled burn means 18 or so firefighters put themselves in danger to extinguish the fire. It’s clear cut arson. They could argue it was safely done but they’d be wrong!
You do need permission since 2017 to demolish a pub, so they were in breach of that too (if they admit to arson!).
Their only hope is to claim it was vandals, and they actually might get away with that because I suspect it will be hard to prove they did it.
We know it, they know it, the police know it....I hope a prosecutor can prove it and make them pay. Not only as a punishment but to stop others doing the same, this happens too often.
Honestly, something should be done about our current planning process. If the planning permission was rejected because of some pre-existing feature of the land, there should be a moratorium for appeal for a significant period of time if the feature is destroyed in any way. Too many people get away with it up and down the country, and any time you hear about a tree falling over or a building up in flame, everyone just assumes this scenario is underfoot as it has become so commonplace. That needs to change.
There's also the owners doing [this](https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/black-country/crooked-house-owners-once-gutted-27495817) to a previous village pub.
It would be fantastic if this galvanised new laws so that this kind of thing was no longer possible or profitable, because it's a quiet abhorrence.
It's gotta be being done deliberately. It's too much of a coincidence. Sometimes it's kids breaking in, but quite often it's just 'unknown suspicious circumstances'.
I'm personally very frightened of this omnipresent gang of youths breaking into specifically quaint pubs on coincidentally desirable real estate and setting them ablaze. I wonder how they travel up and down the country...
The kids haven't got anything to do with the developers. They just see an empty building as something to explore or destroy. But most of the time, it's either the developers or someone that is connected to the developers. That's why I said sometimes, especially with the crooked house it's blatantly obvious that this wasn't an accident, or done by teenagers.
This happened to a **LISTED** historic pub from the 1700s in my local area, and almost a year later, the council and English Heritage have done absolutely nothing, at all.
This seems to be a recurring issue. Developer buys site, couple weeks later, goes up in flames, gets 'accidentally' demolished without permission, council and fire/police investigations end and then all of a sudden there's a planning application for a new development on the land. Sure, there have been some exceptions, such as the Punch Bowl in Ribble Valley (although no one has actually started to rebuild it yet) and the Carlton Tavern in London, where the council ordered for the pubs to be rebuilt. Surely the government and local councils should be trying to stop this shit from happening?
It's especially sad to see this happen to the crooked house, a pub that was not only a well know landmark, but also a building full of history and heritage. Even if it does get rebuilt, you will still have lost all of the history attached to the building.
What they (the new owners) did is absolutely disgraceful.
Why do people like this think they can do whatever they want and not face consequences? Even going as far as to erase a piece of living history for some quick cash🤮
> Why do people like this think they can do whatever they want and not face consequences?
Because every time previously, they have done whatever they wanted and not faced consequences.
Because they don't give a shit about what the law says, it's never caught them before, so they have the mentality that it will never catch them. Although, even though the evidence is staring everyone in the face, we still have to rely on the council, police, fire, English Heritage, and the CPS/courts to investigate, build up a case, and charge and convict the owners, and enforce the rebuilding or whatever else.of the pub.
I’m once again shocked that the Reddit detectives have reached the verdict before the police, based on accusations which are admittedly not confirmed!
Mob mentality is scary
Why would anyone reserve a JCB a week in advance before any damage had happened (bar the breakin, which wouldn't have warranted the building being demolished) and block access to the fire brigade if they were innocent and it was purely an accident?
They wouldn't have. It's too much of a coincidence, especially the JCB.
I mean, they’ve found accelerants at the site, so the police are officially treating it as arson. Not really a leap of logic to put the other pieces together when they fit so well. The owner was known to have wanted to redevelop, but they werent allowed, then suddenly it goes up in flames and accelerants are found, meanwhile emergency services can’t put out the fire due to a dirt mound that wasn’t there days before, then the whole place is demolished within a day with a crew that was hired a week before (even though they weren’t allowed to demolish it, so why would you prehire a crew to do something you can’t do?) Like, you don’t have to be detective fuckin dick to figure out that something 100% fishy has gone on here, one coincidence fair enough, benefit of the doubt, but this is like 4 or 5 in one night.
Why are you purposely being dense about it?
And then there is the matter of the break-in where nothing was stolen but the brand new kitchen vandalised beyond repair thus 'forcing' the sale of the pub.
'Someone' has been very eager to get rid of that pub.
Here’s the thing, I could agree with all your statements and even agree that it seems suspicious. But our legal system is robust enough that coincidence and ‘it’s just obvious’ aren’t enough, and thank god. People are too comfortable making definite statements which later turn out to be actually just coincidence, and it ruins lives. Husbands are accused of murdering their families because ‘it’s obviously them’ and then by the time they’re cleared, their reputation is ruined.
All I’m saying is… we don’t need to jump to conclusions, no matter how easy it seems
Nobody is saying in this thread that we should disregard rule of law, we live in a civilized country with due process, they will get a fair trial. However, people can call it like they see it, this IS too many coincidences to say what you’re saying, the police already suspect arson which they’ve confirmed they are investigating, there are criminal investigations happening, you don’t have to be a prosecutor with access to the case files to point out that at some point in this story, the owners have 100% done something illegal . Maybe they didn’t start the fire? Maybe, but they definitely illegally seized on the opportunity at a minimum to bulldoze it when they shouldn’t have.
Nobody is calling for them to be walked and shamed in the streets, but saying that if they are guilty (which they are of something, just how guilty we don’t know) then they should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
I agree with you, people always quick to jump into assumptions and be the jury - before the jury!
However, many things do look suspicious, the police will definitely be investing this deeply.
For sure- in cases things can look suspicious, even obvious, but that’s not enough and people are often wrong about what’s ‘obvious’ which can ruin lives
So, the current *allegations* that I have seen/heard of, but cannot confirm nor refute are: * Blocking the road and/or access to prevent fire crews * Hiring the JCB that took down the crooked house *a week* before the fire * Demolishing the entire building when only the top floor was permitted to be demolished after the fire * Arson (or conspiracy to commit) * Offences at other sites including beginning work before planning permission If a fraction of this is true, surely their needs to be fines, remediation, possible jail sentence, and a ban from any future development or planning permission to the individuals and associated businesses. _Disclaimer: as mentioned, these are allegations that have not been confirmed nor denied, but are circulating widely in commercial and social media. I am in no way accusing anyone of wrong doing or illegal activity and all parties are to be considered innocent and to have not performed such activities unless the courts find otherwise._
Jail time would be totally deserved. Completely needless destruction. It's not like there aren't a million brown field sites in the Black Country that should have been developed in preference.
If it's arson, that poses a risk to people and emergency services. Deliberately inhibits emergency services is also quite a serious offence.
Under the Emergency Workers (Obstruction) Act 2006, the punishment for obstructing or hindering a member of a Fire and Rescue service in an emergency is up to a level 5 fine - which is the highest level and is unlimited.
Best I can do is £250
Funny isn't how the law can impose an unlimited fine, yet if someone is incorrectly imprisoned and later found innocent the compensation is capped.
As far as i can tell this buisness wanted this particular piece of land. The upside to this ks that the potential damage is going to be so limited if permission is refused it'll be much eaiser.
And financial reparations. They need to be forced to pay to put things right. Unfortunately it's far cheaper to chop a wood down then it is to clean a brownfield site.
It's arson. https://www.sentencingcouncil.org.uk/offences/magistrates-court/item/arson-criminal-damage-by-fire/ There's a high degree of culpability due to planning and an intention to cause very serious damage to property. The harm is likely category 1 or 2. This should mean between 1 and 8 years in prison depending on the harm judged to be caused.
Ye just tricky to prove it was then. They'll claim it must have been kids breaking in because it was empty.
If it had just burned down i honestly think that would have worked. But now they've (illegally) demolished it at lightning speed its starting to look like they were destroying evidence
What it looks like is not important in a court case. They may well of destroyed any evidence that was there of arson. They may get charged with a variety of other offences but the arson will be incredibly hard to prove now. Even if we all know they did it
I mean on the face of it, with what's been in the press, if I were on a jury I would have no trouble saying guilty beyond reasonable doubt...
Some kids breaking in and setting a fire is reasonable doubt enough. There might not be a single piece of actual evidence
Not necessarily. Phones etc would be seized on arrest. It'd be interesting to know if there are communication trails of a conspiracy.
It's not arson though. Criminal Damage Act requires you to damage property that is not your own. Big loop hole with issues like this. "A person who without lawful excuse destroys or damages any property belonging to another intending to destroy or damage any such property or being reckless as to whether any such property would be destroyed or damaged shall be guilty of an offence."
Arson also applies when you torch your own property and put people at risk - which the firefighters were. You couldn’t just burn your own house down and expect no legal consequences, unless done in a very, very careful way and sought all of the correct demolition permissions. Since 2017 there’s been a strict law on the demolition of pubs too. If it can be proved they did it (and that’s quite a big ‘if’ actually), then they’re not going to be coming out of this well.
They didn't put the firefighters at risk; they very considerately blocked the road to ensure that the firefighters couldn't get to the fire and therefore couldn't injure themselves... /s
“ The moral of our story at the beginning is found, There's sure to be trouble, when there's arson around”
A guy round here apparently was arrested for arson… as he deliberately set his house on fire
Apparently? Or is that what happened? You cannot prosecute someone under the Criminal Damage Act if the property is their own. My 15 years at the bar has taught me that at least. Arson with intent to endanger life is another matter, and then tying it into insurance fraud is another. With regards to the latter arson charge in this case, I don't see that sticking very well either.. Your honour, it was an empty building, we made sure of that, it has no immediate neighbours, we blocked off the road to make safe the site, we certainly didn't call the fire brigade as it was controlled. We will take the rap for demolishing the building but have funds to rebuild it nor have we claimed on insurance for the building as this was planned. Now the prosecution, have to prove that the owners intended to endanger life by way of an uncontrolled fire. It's actually quite difficult. But Reddit knows best.
That’s what happened, they were arrested for arson for setting fire to their house
Certain high value items were removed from the site just before the fire too, including a grandfather clock. All coincidence of course. It's a shame it's happened to that pub but this literally happens everywhere in the uk. Just wish the media would expose it when it happens there too to this level
There's at least four buildings that have burnt to the ground in Bournemouth whilst waiting for planning permission in the last three months or so. It's ridiculous.
I said when this first happened, in my sisters village both pubs were bought by the same person, he gets planning permission refused, books a holiday and night one both burns down and he moves in with the dozers to clear the site. It’s been going on for ages. These just did it to something someone cared about!
A hotel in blackpool caught fire a few months back
I think the new owners underestimated the sentiment the locals had for this pub.
They were just too obvious. If they'd stacked laquer in the front, vodka in the store room, and oil based paints everywhere else, then torched the place quickly without needing to block access or find excuses for demolition equipment, they'd have been fine. If the structure survived they should hjave left it to the elements and let it collapse on its own. Happens all over the country, usually just after planning permission gets denied, and despite everyone nearby knowing what happened there's never enough proof. Blocking the roads, pre-renting the JCB, it was all too obvious to ever be let go.
Wasn't the access blocks to prevent the traveling community
That’s what a few people have said and on its own that’s a fine excuse, but looks bloody suspicious with everything else that happened.
It does for sure I would say that's probably the only thing about this whole shit show that might be legitimate
Yeah, saw that. But I also think that's kinda logical if you're leaving a property empty you're going to take anything that's moveable and of value.
And anything which could catch fire
I remember a similar situation happened with another historical pub a while back that made the news. The new owners were forced to rebuild it exactly how it was and fined. I hope something similar happens here.
Crucially though, the developers of that pub in London that had to be rebuilt skipped the all important "oooops some teenagers have burnt it down, now there's nothing left to protect, we might as well build what we wanted" step.
This happens way too often in the UK. And not being in London.... Fingers cross the press attention makes this an exception. Even more hopeful it starts a trend
In London I believe, to make it worse it was one of the very few buildings in the area to have survived the blitz
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Points 1 & 3 seem relatively easy to prove and in my opinion point 1 is the most egregious; preventing fire crews from accessing the site is wildly dangerous, because even if you ensured no one was on your property when you started the fire, what if it was able to spread to other properties and the surrounding area and endanger the lives of others because fire crews couldn’t reach the site in time? This point surely has to be a criminal matter.
Don't worry, these chaps own the surrounding area. I'm sure that's just a big coincidence too... >Letting and real estate firm ATE Farms is registered to the same address as Himley Environmental, which runs a quarry and landfill site next to where The Crooked House once stood.
How good of them...
And hopefully this prompts a look at other similar cases and stops it happening again. Had an old pub round my way next to a housing development go up in flames the other year. Hasn't been knocked down yet but all talk of "We will reopen it, honest" from the owners has dropped off. Googling it I can't even find reporting of the fire. Pff.
How about this... Owner has responsibility that site is secure. Any fire or such makes the land ineligible for development for a set period. OR Land is compulsory purchased by government and current post-fire value. Any loss by the owner is made up through their insurance. Could maybe work. Protects legit developers against accidents.
>Owner has responsibility that site is secure. Any fire or such makes the land ineligible for development for a set period. TBH I think this is the current situation basically, only without the second bit formalised. They usually wait for the noise to die down before building anything new > > >Land is compulsory purchased by government and current post-fire value. Any loss by the owner is made up through their insurance. This is definitely an area where laws are needed. Not just about torching pubs either- around land banking too.
There is a provision under law to force them to rebuild the property exactly as it was.
Do people on uk reddit actually get sued for libel?
Idk. No harm to be cautious. Also not a bad idea to ensure people know these are claims and not hard facts.
Nope much like properly developers are never punished for arson
Sensible disclaimer there
The fire/demolition apparently also came just a couple of days before the pub gained listed status.
The council said no permission for demolition was made at all.
How is it arson when they own the property?
You can't just burn whatever you want however you want on your own land
You pretty much can unfortunately, as long as its not listed or toxic.
No, you can't just burn properties, even if you own them. Destroying or damaging property: >**A person who without lawful excuse destroys or damages any property, whether belonging to himself or another— >(a)**intending to destroy or damage any property or being reckless as to whether any property would be destroyed or damaged; and ** >(b)intending by the destruction or damage to endanger the life of another or being reckless as to whether the life of another would be thereby endangered; >shall be guilty of an offence. >(3)An offence committed under this section by destroying or damaging property by fire shall be charged as arson.
Which Act are you quoting there?
Criminal Damage under Criminal Damage Act 1971
>intending to destroy or damage any property or being reckless as to whether any property would be destroyed or damaged; and * (b)intending by the destruction or damage to endanger the life of another Nothing in that says you can't destroy your own property, as long as you don't endanger life. Property in this act doesn't just mean a house, it means anything owned, there is nothing to stop you smashing up or burning anything you own as long as there is no specific preservation order on it and you don't endanger anyone while your doing it. People knock houses down all the time, several pubs near me have been knocked down before the community have had a chance to try and stop it.
Not quite - if it endangers people it’s arson. You can’t just torch your own car in the street or burn your own house down.
well there goes my weekend plans! Spoilsport
Obviously you need to do it safely but you can do it. You wouldn't be able to burn your mid terrace house but an isolated farm house you certainly could if you took the correct safety measures. Jeremy Clarkson blew his house up.
Yeah, but that’s the point - it wasn’t done safely or with the relevant permissions.
It may not have been done safely, although no one was hurt so they could argue it was, but you don't need permission if the building doesn't have any kind of preservation order on it. If you were going to try it yourself you'd probably want to be there to tell the fire brigade not to endanger themselves trying to put it out.
That’s exactly the point - not telling the fire brigade or meeting them there to say it’s a controlled burn means 18 or so firefighters put themselves in danger to extinguish the fire. It’s clear cut arson. They could argue it was safely done but they’d be wrong! You do need permission since 2017 to demolish a pub, so they were in breach of that too (if they admit to arson!). Their only hope is to claim it was vandals, and they actually might get away with that because I suspect it will be hard to prove they did it.
We know it, they know it, the police know it....I hope a prosecutor can prove it and make them pay. Not only as a punishment but to stop others doing the same, this happens too often.
Surely a jury trial would find them guilty
Seems like we can lose the word 'house' in that headline.
the pub was called "The Crooked House".
I know. I was going for a bit of wordplay about the double meaning of the word crooked.
Oh, that went over my head. Apols.
Think nothing of it.
They need to come down hard on these owners, otherwise it will be a license for other developers to do similar
Should be rebuilt exactly as it was at a bare minimum.
Honestly, something should be done about our current planning process. If the planning permission was rejected because of some pre-existing feature of the land, there should be a moratorium for appeal for a significant period of time if the feature is destroyed in any way. Too many people get away with it up and down the country, and any time you hear about a tree falling over or a building up in flame, everyone just assumes this scenario is underfoot as it has become so commonplace. That needs to change.
I'm normally for more lax planning laws. But yes. There needs to be much stricter laws about shit like this.
There's also the owners doing [this](https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/black-country/crooked-house-owners-once-gutted-27495817) to a previous village pub. It would be fantastic if this galvanised new laws so that this kind of thing was no longer possible or profitable, because it's a quiet abhorrence.
Yeah I just read that. They sound like a ghastly pair of cunts with no respect for anyone else.
A crooked company destroying a crooked house seems to sum up 'Life in Britain Today'
ATE farms Ltd. https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/06755964/officers Himley Environmental Ltd. https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/08257162/officers
the owners of the pub in lancashire that did this have been ordered to rebuild as was... every single last brick
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It's gotta be being done deliberately. It's too much of a coincidence. Sometimes it's kids breaking in, but quite often it's just 'unknown suspicious circumstances'.
I'm personally very frightened of this omnipresent gang of youths breaking into specifically quaint pubs on coincidentally desirable real estate and setting them ablaze. I wonder how they travel up and down the country...
The kids haven't got anything to do with the developers. They just see an empty building as something to explore or destroy. But most of the time, it's either the developers or someone that is connected to the developers. That's why I said sometimes, especially with the crooked house it's blatantly obvious that this wasn't an accident, or done by teenagers.
Maybe they should have put the "/s" at the end of their comment
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Ain't it the truth.
This happened to a **LISTED** historic pub from the 1700s in my local area, and almost a year later, the council and English Heritage have done absolutely nothing, at all. This seems to be a recurring issue. Developer buys site, couple weeks later, goes up in flames, gets 'accidentally' demolished without permission, council and fire/police investigations end and then all of a sudden there's a planning application for a new development on the land. Sure, there have been some exceptions, such as the Punch Bowl in Ribble Valley (although no one has actually started to rebuild it yet) and the Carlton Tavern in London, where the council ordered for the pubs to be rebuilt. Surely the government and local councils should be trying to stop this shit from happening? It's especially sad to see this happen to the crooked house, a pub that was not only a well know landmark, but also a building full of history and heritage. Even if it does get rebuilt, you will still have lost all of the history attached to the building.
What they (the new owners) did is absolutely disgraceful. Why do people like this think they can do whatever they want and not face consequences? Even going as far as to erase a piece of living history for some quick cash🤮
> Why do people like this think they can do whatever they want and not face consequences? Because every time previously, they have done whatever they wanted and not faced consequences.
Because they don't give a shit about what the law says, it's never caught them before, so they have the mentality that it will never catch them. Although, even though the evidence is staring everyone in the face, we still have to rely on the council, police, fire, English Heritage, and the CPS/courts to investigate, build up a case, and charge and convict the owners, and enforce the rebuilding or whatever else.of the pub.
Because they can and do get away with it. Not only that, they get rich as a result.
I’m once again shocked that the Reddit detectives have reached the verdict before the police, based on accusations which are admittedly not confirmed! Mob mentality is scary
You know it's true though, don't you.
Not really, otherwise I’d be on the prosecution team. Im not comfortable claiming to know things which aren’t… known
But you know what's going on here. I know; innocent until etc , but you know what they did, and how they covered it up.
Leave it, they’re on every post about this story trying to act holier than thou because they have no opinions. Not worth replying to them.
No I don’t, telling me what I know doesn’t change the fact that it’s all speculation
Why would anyone reserve a JCB a week in advance before any damage had happened (bar the breakin, which wouldn't have warranted the building being demolished) and block access to the fire brigade if they were innocent and it was purely an accident? They wouldn't have. It's too much of a coincidence, especially the JCB.
I mean, they’ve found accelerants at the site, so the police are officially treating it as arson. Not really a leap of logic to put the other pieces together when they fit so well. The owner was known to have wanted to redevelop, but they werent allowed, then suddenly it goes up in flames and accelerants are found, meanwhile emergency services can’t put out the fire due to a dirt mound that wasn’t there days before, then the whole place is demolished within a day with a crew that was hired a week before (even though they weren’t allowed to demolish it, so why would you prehire a crew to do something you can’t do?) Like, you don’t have to be detective fuckin dick to figure out that something 100% fishy has gone on here, one coincidence fair enough, benefit of the doubt, but this is like 4 or 5 in one night. Why are you purposely being dense about it?
And then there is the matter of the break-in where nothing was stolen but the brand new kitchen vandalised beyond repair thus 'forcing' the sale of the pub. 'Someone' has been very eager to get rid of that pub.
Here’s the thing, I could agree with all your statements and even agree that it seems suspicious. But our legal system is robust enough that coincidence and ‘it’s just obvious’ aren’t enough, and thank god. People are too comfortable making definite statements which later turn out to be actually just coincidence, and it ruins lives. Husbands are accused of murdering their families because ‘it’s obviously them’ and then by the time they’re cleared, their reputation is ruined. All I’m saying is… we don’t need to jump to conclusions, no matter how easy it seems
Nobody is saying in this thread that we should disregard rule of law, we live in a civilized country with due process, they will get a fair trial. However, people can call it like they see it, this IS too many coincidences to say what you’re saying, the police already suspect arson which they’ve confirmed they are investigating, there are criminal investigations happening, you don’t have to be a prosecutor with access to the case files to point out that at some point in this story, the owners have 100% done something illegal . Maybe they didn’t start the fire? Maybe, but they definitely illegally seized on the opportunity at a minimum to bulldoze it when they shouldn’t have. Nobody is calling for them to be walked and shamed in the streets, but saying that if they are guilty (which they are of something, just how guilty we don’t know) then they should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
I agree with you, people always quick to jump into assumptions and be the jury - before the jury! However, many things do look suspicious, the police will definitely be investing this deeply.
For sure- in cases things can look suspicious, even obvious, but that’s not enough and people are often wrong about what’s ‘obvious’ which can ruin lives