6 years for a life??

oneeyedsnake

So in summary you believe someone who suffers a mental episode/breakdown is incapable of redemption?

Sometimes they are sometimes they are not,it depends on the individual and the circumstances surrounding and causes of their episode.

There is nothing that can be done to eliminate/diminish the likelihood of a further episode/breakdown?

After commiting such a horrendus crime anything less than elimination of the likelihood of a further episode is unacceptable.Is this realistic or achieveable?I have no idea I do not have the required qualification nor enough information about the murders mental history to answer this question and I doubt you do etheir.

That no system can be put in place to monitor their mental stability?

Yes,keep him in a mental institution,forever or until the likelyhood to reoffending is eliminated.

he should be placed in a secure psychiatric unit for a much longer period of time (although for life, I don't know)

I completely agree,When I mentioned life sentence in my previous posts I ment life in a mental institution not a prison.Whatever chance you have of salvaging the poor guys sanity your not going to acheive it in prison full of gougers

andrew

Nermal wrote:

In respect of their guilt, they should be the same, because they committed the same act. That the odd neuron was misfiring should not have a bearing on their sentence. If you wish him to spend the rest of his existence in a padded box rather than a box, that seems acceptable. So long as he never exits it.

The law can't be applied equally in every case, context has to be taken into account. A completely sane person, completely in control of all their faculties, who premeditates and carries out a murder, is not of the same order as a person with mental problems who has an episode and ends up killing someone. They aren't under their own control anymore - for example, if someone slipped you LSD and you went crazy and killed someone, would you believe that you were fully responsible for the crime committed? Its the same in this case - the guy simply couldn't control himself, and so his responsibility is deminished. I think he should be put into a psyc unit for a time (until he has been rehabilitated/can be controlled, if possible), and agree 6 years in prison is too leniant.


[edit] yup pretty much agree with you in your other post

RoundyMooney

Dudess wrote:

I think there's a little confusion here. I agree that the sentence is too short. In my humble opinion, it appears he should be placed in a secure psychiatric unit for a much longer period of time (although for life, I don't know). What I have a problem with is people saying that those with mental illness should be treated the same way as those who are sane. I'm shocked at that attitude.

Agree++

This is the nature of the beast when it comes to After Hours though, [Yoda]AH'ified, this thread has become[/Yoda]

Probably why it's one of my fave boards fora

oneeyedsnake

andrew wrote:

The law can't be applied equally in every case, context has to be taken into account. A completely sane person, completely in control of all their faculties, who premeditates and carries out a murder, is not of the same order as a person with mental problems who has an episode and ends up killing someone. They aren't under their own control anymore - for example, if someone slipped you LSD and you went crazy and killed someone, would you believe that you were fully responsible for the crime committed? Its the same in this case - the guy simply couldn't control himself, and so his responsibility is deminished. I think he should be put into a psyc unit for a time (until he has been rehabilitated/can be controlled, if possible), and agree 6 years in prison is too leniant.


[edit] yup pretty much agree with you in your other post

So what your saying is someone who is drugged with one of the most potent psychoactive drug known to man should be treated the same as a person with a history of mental illness and violent outbursts?

No you can't compare a person being drugged with LSD with someone whose brain chemistry had jacked it in, they are completely different scenarios. By and large once the LSD has passed though the drugged person system then they will be free of the psychotic tendencies and therefore they no longer posses a threat to society but with someone with shot brain chemistry the chances are they will never recover or at the very best the road to recovery will be a long one.

You say the context must be taken into account yet you go on to support this point with an example where the context is blatently ignored.

You are correct however that in both cases highlighted above the individuals responsibility has been diminished, if this was the only factor in sentencing then both guys would receive the same sentence, however the fact that one of the individuals is mentally ill then surely he must be committed to a mental institution while the other should be given a suitable manslaughter sentence.

andrew

I was using LSD as an example only to show how a person's responsibility can be deminished due to mental problems out of their control

oneeyedsnake

andrew wrote:

I was using LSD as an example only to show how a person's responsibility can be deminished due to mental problems out of their control

Sorry I see that now but just for the record the drugged guy would probally walk away with a suspended sentence wouldn't he?

Boggles

This guy was proper crazy!!

http://archives.tcm.ie/breakingnews/2005/02/23/story190728.asp

Dudess

And what the guy in the above article was experiencing perfectly demonstrates what people with an extreme mental illness can go through. Completely off-the-wall shít and there is clearly not enough of an understanding.

walshb

Nermal wrote:

Gibberish. So I can kill anyone, so long as I don't plan it, and claim it was just a bit of a 'mental' episode?

The concept of 'diminished responsibility' is a cop-out. We are all fully responsible for our own actions, no matter what our mental state. He should be in a box for the rest of his life.

Spot on!!! This premeditated scenario apllies in some cases, but not all.
As far as I am aware a murder can occurr without it being premeditated or planned days or weeks in advance. We could easily say this boy premeditated it seconds before the first hammer blow if that's how perfect you want to be.

So If I am having a friendly arguement or debate and I suddenly snap and beat my friend or sister or brother to death and stab them 90 bloody times with a scissor, I can claim I didn't plan it, I just snapped??

Absolute crap. He murdered her because he was mad and bad. Planned, premeditated or whatever, it was an unprovoked attack on a girl miding her own business. That's nothing but murder.

The_B_Man

if he suffered from a moment of madness, would that not indicate hes unstable? he may seem fine but theres always that possibility that he can relapse and kill someone else! i wouldnt want someone passin me by on the streets who is capable of doing sometihing like that. if a person kills someone while of sound mind, then they're obviously not wanted on our streets due to the level they can sink. if someone kills someone while not of sound mind, and are unable to control themselves, then thats as bad, if not worse! they sound mind person might have some restraint, or at worst, only use their "murderous powers" to get something, like in a robbery. The unstable person of unsound mind would have no control of when and where this happens, so could conveivably kill at random in the streets, where there are more ppl. am i making sense?

with regards to "curing" or rehabilitating these killers: how do we know they'll ever be 100% cured? Its more of a hit and hope job tbh!

johnnyskeleton

oneeyedsnake wrote:

The guy is a complete psycho:he smashed his own sister to death with a hammer!There is no way this guy can ever be let loose on the public again.

I think you are imposing your view of the case over the jury's view. While you are perfectly entitled to say what you think, when a jury makes its decision that decision is for all intents and purposes fact (or as near to fact that we can ascertain). So the jury found that he is not a psycho and not a murderer. To gainsay the jury in this way seems to me a knee jerk reaction. The commonly expressed views that he is a psycho or a murderer is what people want to believe, it is not necessarily a reflection of the reality of the situation. It is hard for people to accept that normal people can flip and have a psychotic episode. But that is what happened. People don't want to believe that, they want to believe that anybody who does such a thing is insane or a murderer (i.e. someone different than themselves). You can look for someone to blame as long as you want, but that has more to do with you than it does with the facts of the case.

oneeyesnake wrote:

The sentence is a disgrace and is just another example of how this country is going to complete pot

I don't think it is a disgrace. I think the judge had a very difficult decision, one which would never get the full support of Evening Herald readers no matter what he imposed. But he recognised on the one hand that a sentence must be served (and 6 years is a long time - it only seems short when you read about it in a vitriolic newspaper article) and on the other that this was an unpredictable and unavoidable killing. It is more tragedy than villany.

By the way, what sentence would not have been a disgrace? Would a life sentence be fit and proper and make everything right in the world? I mean, how would a longer sentence make this country better?

walshb

johnnyskeleton wrote:

I think you are imposing your view of the case over the jury's view. While you are perfectly entitled to say what you think, when a jury makes its decision that decision is for all intents and purposes fact (or as near to fact that we can ascertain). So the jury found that he is not a psycho and not a murderer. To gainsay the jury in this way seems to me a knee jerk reaction. The commonly expressed views that he is a psycho or a murderer is what people want to believe, it is not necessarily a reflection of the reality of the situation. It is hard for people to accept that normal people can flip and have a psychotic episode. But that is what happened. People don't want to believe that, they want to believe that anybody who does such a thing is insane or a murderer (i.e. someone different than themselves). You can look for someone to blame as long as you want, but that has more to do with you than it does with the facts of the case.



I don't think it is a disgrace. I think the judge had a very difficult decision, one which would never get the full support of Evening Herald readers no matter what he imposed. But he recognised on the one hand that a sentence must be served (and 6 years is a long time - it only seems short when you read about it in a vitriolic newspaper article) and on the other that this was an unpredictable and unavoidable killing. It is more tragedy than villany.

By the way, what sentence would not have been a disgrace? Would a life sentence be fit and proper and make everything right in the world? I mean, how would a longer sentence make this country better?

And what sentence did this innocent girl get. Her life is gone, finished. So I'm sorry, but he still has his life and better still, it begins in a couple of years.
How is this justice. The guy is a complete lunatic. I am not denying this, because to do what he did, he has to be. But I do not agree that he can use this as a plea and basically say that it was a moment of madness, it will NOT happen again......Oh thanks mate, OK then 6 years and best of luck to you. It's not good enough. Whatever spin is put on it, mad , bad, evil, premeditated, the devil told him to do it etc etc etc, he battered an innocent girl to death without motive, provocation or otherwise.

So in a word, YES a life sentence is the only sentence he should receive. Not for revenge, but for purely the safety of society and to possibly prevent this person from ever harming another human being again. I certainly would not be surprised if I am reading in the papers in a few years that this lunatic has killed again....