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This specific claim appears to be the product of Chinese whispers; Millennial Woes's exhaustive account of the entire incident can find no evidence for it.
Damn what an infuriating read. I'm torn though, everything the murder and his family did is beyond evil. However is there any evidence that Novak was accosted without any provocation on his part? It sounds like he was drunk and drunkenly his called out to the non-drunk guy with a big fucking sword, and tried to banter with him in an insulting way. Like does he have any survival instincts? You do not insult the guy with the sword. You don't acknowledge them, you just keep fucking walking, silently. I've seen people with guns, knives, or just general dangerous dispositions while drunk, out and about, you better believe I don't engage, interact or acknowledge them. I definitely don't try to be funny and insult them.
Maybe brits are just stupid and coddled to the point that they can't survive in a world filled with non-coddled, tribal savages. Maybe its an American thing to have at least some danger sense and self awareness. Assume everyone is carrying, be nice, and ignore them.
EDIT: This is the part I'm talking about, like dude just shup up and keep walking.
It's clear to me Digwa is a malcontent, angry at the world, angry at society, and not in a good mood. Some drunk white guy starts talking shit and he just snaps, right to murder, torture, gaslighting, etc. Novak is the effigy for all his hate at the world.
It seems obvious to me that Nowak was probably somewhat drunk and belligerent, and probably in some way taunted Digwa. Of course I am wholly on the side of the right in this incident; in any case, whatever Nowak did ought not to be used to justify a death sentence.
But, let’s be real, violent criminals of the non-homeless-schizo type (and Digwa wasn’t in that group, if anything heralding from a moderately competent minority, probably average IQ) don’t randomly murder people with zero provocation.
Digwa was caught on video previously in a road rage incident in which he seemed to be threatening the other driver with his weapon out. He was reportedly obsessed with bladed weapons, and had gotten in trouble (charges dropped, obviously) for stealing some from his local Sikh temple.
"He's from a moderately competent community" seems less relevant than "He seems like a wannabe violent asshole". There were a few guys I knew when I was younger, where if I heard they'd done something like this, my response would be "Yeah, I can see Dale doing that." Talking about the low crime rate in our town in general would be silly.
Sure, normal people don’t murder strangers (or indeed anyone), every murderer is an extreme outlier by the very fact of their crime. This is true even for “violent assholes”.
But I don’t think this is an unprovoked random killing. I don’t think he sees this kid walking by himself from a distance and decides “I’m going to kill him”. The nature of the crime, the time, and the perpetrator don’t match that.
Where young men obsessed with weapons do just go out and use them (some school shooters, for example), they usually plan their “mission” extensively. They either go for huge impact / publicity / casualties and/or plot some kind of escape route (Digwa’s strategy was clearly thought out after the event). The same is true for most racially and/or religiously motivated attacks by angry young men.
To me by far the most plausible type explanation is that this was some young white ‘frat bro’ (the UK equivalent are probably these university sports teams) type who taunted Digwa (who probably had some racial prejudice given his immediate reaching for that excuse) and he reacted extremely violently, seeing it as a ‘just’ response. This lines up with eg Nowak filming the interaction (probably not out of fear), “what are you gonna do little guy, stab me?” style.
You can’t say things like this without people thinking you’re justifying the killing, which I’m most definitely not, but I find it extremely implausible this was a completely random (or random racially motivated, in that he picked a white guy at random) attack. The outrage is the police response, and maybe more broadly mass immigration in general (although the Southport murders were more impactful there).
I remember reading a satire article (which I'm unable to find now) where the title was something like "'What Are You Looking At?!' Says Man Who Has Been Trying to Get Your Attention for the Last Fifteen Minutes".
I routinely encounter ferociously angry and frustrated people like this who are clearly spoiling for a fight and actively looking for any pretext, no matter how feeble, to start a fight with someone smaller than them. My guess is that Nowak said something utterly innocuous that a more level-headed person would have responded to with good humour, but he had the poor fortune to pick the most mentally unstable young man in Southampton.
The quoted bit from the article/videos sounds like he essentially was telling Digwa, "What a right proper gangster you are, I bet you think you are such a naughty boy and all the bollocks". How innocuous you think that is up to you, but that would start shit across the pond in America if you said it to some inner-city wannabe gangster too.
The question is, where those words the opening, or was there previous interaction that didn't get caught on camera?
Because that seems to me like a strange thing to say to a random passerby, but a natural thing to say to someone who's been trying to intimidate you/picking a fight with you.
I'm entirely speculating, but if you read between the lines a bit, Digwa (not overly trustworthy) says something about Novak shoulder checking him on the street. They likely both bumped into each other and both refused to give way. This increasing seems to be two wannabe tough guys except one of them has a shortsword.
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