Steven Gallant did a terrible thing. It was a thing so terrible that had he done it prior to 1964, he would have had his life terminated by the hangman. Mr Gallant and others carried out a murderous revenge attack on a firefighter called Barrie Jackson who had shortly before been acquitted of the attempted murder of a 64 year old woman, Rosaleena Capell. The woman had intervened when the firefighter had been seen beating up his elderly father and was then attacked by Jackson leaving her with severe facial injuries. Although the courts had found Jackson not guilty of the attempted murder the jury convicted him of wounding.
Steven Gallant and some of his friends decided to take the law into their own hands and lay in wait for Jackson in order to mete out the justice that in their eyes the courts had not dispensed. The result of the attack was that Jackson was so severely beaten that he died. For his part in an obviously pre-meditated murder Mr Gallant was given a life sentence with a minimum term of 17 years. So far this looks like the usual sort of murder of a sort that I saw dozens of when I worked as a court reporter a murder that today attracts a life sentence but in the past would have, due to its pre-meditated nature and significant degree of planning, resulted in a death sentence.
But this case is different. Unlike so many who kill or carry out other heinous crimes, Mr Gallant has genuinely appeared to reform. Towards the latter part of his sentence because of his rehabilitation he was given day release and on this day release he attended an event for reformed prisoners at Fishmongers Hall at the North side of London Bridge. It was at this point, on the 29th November 2019, that Mr Gallant changed from a run of the mill reformed convict to absolute hero.
When Islamic terrorist Usman Khan, who had been feigning reform but who was still a dangerous and unreformed Islamic extremist, suddenly attacked two volunteers for a prison rehabilitation charity and killed them, Mr Gallant did what many people would fear to do and tackled the terrorist with a Narwhal tusk that was part of a display at Fishmongers Hall. He managed to get Khan out of the building and onto London Bridge where Khan, who was wearing a fake suicide belt, was eventually shot dead by armed police.
Steven Gallant undoubtedly, when he was younger, carried out a most appalling crime, a murder, but by his actions on London Bridge he probably saved the lives of many other people as I have little doubt that had Khan not been stopped and forced out of the building, he probably would have killed more. Whilst it is tragic that two lives were lost at the hands of Khan, without the intervention of Mr Gallant, it’s likely that more would have been killed.
Because of Mr Gallant’s actions at Fishmongers Hall he was given an almost unprecedented Royal Pardon by Her Majesty the Queen which knocked off ten months from his 17 year term and although he returned to prison to continue his sentence, the time has come for the Parole Board to consider whether to release Mr Gallant. The Parole Board has made that decision and it is in my view the correct one and that is to release him from prison on licence (as all lifers are). This decision has been made not only taking into consideration his actions at Fishmongers Hall but also his previous record of rehabilitation.
For me as a person who can see that in some cases the death penalty can be both morally and legally justified it bothers me that here we have a person who if not in the early sixties but certainly prior to the Homicide Act of the 1950s, would have hung, who has shown that rehabilitation can work. Back in the day Mr Gallant would have been executed of that I have little question and there would be no rehabilitation and subsequently no heroic defence by Mr Gallant of innocents from a murderous Islam inspired attack. Mr Gallant is the sort of murderer who can reform who can change and whose reform and change can and should be recognised. The sort of murder that he carried out was also of a completely different type to the sort of murder that I believe should deserve a death penalty. Mr Gallant because of the type of murder that he carried out was reformable whereas other murderers such as Roy Whiting or Ian Huntley or Ian Brady who were driven by lust and a desire to kill for killings sake, or even many terrorist murderers were an dare plainly not reformable and in my view should justifiably have faced a death sentence. Brady was bad to the end I don’t think that he had it in him to either repent or reform and Whiting and Huntley are so thoroughly evil, twisted and lacking in any humanity that rehabilitation will be impossible. Also many of the Islamic terrorists that have been given life terms are unlikely to reform as the violent ideology that they follow is rooted far too deep within them to be excised. Because of that I have grave doubts as to whether there is anything that society gains by keeping these men alive. ‘Normal’ murderers on the other hand who have made piss poor and lethal decisions are a completely different kettle of fish, some of these can be reformed and Steven Gallant proves this.
I can’t forgive Steven Gallant for the murder that he carried out, morally and spiritually only the family of the victim can do that, but maybe it’s right that we recognise that in some cases, cases that would once have warranted death, there is redemption.
