Setting a Young Man on Fire and Thus Causing His Death

Steve Simpson-- a gay college student with Aspergers, a seizure disorder, and a speech disorder-- had anti-gay slogans written on his body and after being doused with suntan spray was set on fire .  The accused and now convicted, one party crasher by the name of Jordan Sheard received only three and a half years in the lock-up for the death of Steve Simpson.  Sheard ran away instead of helping.  A neighbor Sean Banner doused the flames which makes him a true hero in my book.  Banner burned himself in the process.  Simpson's body was covered with the burns-- sixty percent of his body.  The judge, one Roger Keen, used the phrase "good-natured horseplay" to describe everything before the ignition of Simpson's groin.  

radical sapphoq says:  I don't know much about the U.K. and next to nothing about the legal process over there.  Perhaps the judge was correct within the laws over there.  I really do not know.  What I do know is that a young man lost his life.  There are no words to express the horror inherent in the circumstances surrounding the death of Steve Simpson.

And yes, Sean Banner, you are a hero.





http://www.thestar.co.uk/news/local/barnsley-teen-burned-to-death-on-his-18th-birthday-1-5521116

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-21887535

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2297053/Yob-killed-autistic-gay-teenager-Steven-Simpson-setting-18th-birthday-party.html