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This just In! Greyhound Beheader Not Guilty by way of Insanity

http://www.suntimes.com/news/w...reyhound030509.article

FROM ASSOCIATED PRESS
WINNIPEG, Manitoba ? A Canadian judge ruled Thursday that a man accused of beheading and cannibalizing a fellow Greyhound bus passenger is not criminally responsible due to mental illness.

The decision means Chinese immigrant Vince Li will be treated in a mental institution instead of going to prison. The family of victim Tim McLean dismissed

?A crime was still committed here, a murder still occurred,? said Carol deDelley, McLean?s mother. ?There was nobody else on that bus holding a knife, slicing up my child.?

The judge said Li should not be held criminally accountable for stabbing McLean dozens of times last July and dismembering his body while horrified passengers fled.

Justice John Scurfield said Li?s attack was ?grotesque? and ?barbaric? but ?strongly suggestive of a mental disorder.?

?He did not appreciate the actions he committed were morally wrong. He believed he was acting in self-defense,? Scurfield said.

Both the prosecution and the defense argued Li can?t be held responsible because Li was suffering from schizophrenia and believed God wanted him to kill McLean because the young man was a force of evil.

He will be institutionalized without a criminal record and will be reassessed every year by a mental health review board to determine if he is fit for release into the community.

DeDelley said a yearly hearing is ridiculous, and that Li should be locked up for the rest of his life.

Li?s trial barely lasted two days and only heard from two witnesses, both psychiatrists, who testified he is mentally ill.

That Li killed the 22-year-old carnival worker was never in question at the trial. Li has admitted he killed McLean but pleaded not guilty.

Witnesses said Li attacked McLean unprovoked as their bus traveled at night along a desolate stretch of the Trans-Canada Highway.

An agreed statement of facts between the prosecution and defense detailed how passengers stood outside the bus as Li stabbed McLean dozens of times and beheaded and mutilated his body. Finding himself locked inside the bus, Li finally escaped through a window and was arrested.

Li then apologized and pleaded with police to kill him.

Police said McLean?s body parts were found throughout the bus in plastic bags, and the victim?s ear, nose and tongue were found in Li?s pocket.

A psychiatrist called by the prosecution Wednesday testified that Li cut up McLean?s body because he believed that he would come back to life and take revenge.
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Was anyone truly expecting him to go to prison?
If what he did is not insanity then I don't know what is.
 
Why do we put animals to death if they kill or maim a person (pitbulls and other dogs are prime examples), but the insanity plea allows human perpetrators to skip jail time?
 
Originally posted by: RapidSnail
Why do we put animals to death if they kill or maim a person (pitbulls and other dogs are prime examples), but the insanity plea allows human perpetrators to skip jail time?
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...because they're insane.
 
Originally posted by: RapidSnail
Why do we put animals to death if they kill or maim a person (pitbulls and other dogs are prime examples), but the insanity plea allows human perpetrators to skip jail time?
Click to expand...

I'm pretty sure the answer is "because animals can't afford a lawer."
 
Yea, I don't feel like this is some miscarriage of justice. It's not like the guy is laughing all the way to the bank. He killed a guy and ruined his own life in the process. Now I wouldn't shed a tear if he was given 25 to life or the death penalty, but I'm also not crying over him getting "off."
 
Originally posted by: sandorski
Originally posted by: RapidSnail
Why do we put animals to death if they kill or maim a person (pitbulls and other dogs are prime examples), but the insanity plea allows human perpetrators to skip jail time?
Click to expand...

...because they're insane.
Click to expand...

so what purpose do they serve on earth then?
 
Originally posted by: ric1287
Originally posted by: sandorski
Originally posted by: RapidSnail
Why do we put animals to death if they kill or maim a person (pitbulls and other dogs are prime examples), but the insanity plea allows human perpetrators to skip jail time?
Click to expand...

...because they're insane.
Click to expand...

so what purpose do they serve on earth then?
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to cut peoples heads off and eat them, duh
 
I recall an episode of Quincy, ME in which they are debating the insanity defense.

They proposed the verdict "Not guilty by reason of insanity" should be changed to "Guilty but insane" and be punished like any other criminal.
 
Originally posted by: ric1287
Originally posted by: sandorski
Originally posted by: RapidSnail
Why do we put animals to death if they kill or maim a person (pitbulls and other dogs are prime examples), but the insanity plea allows human perpetrators to skip jail time?
Click to expand...

...because they're insane.
Click to expand...

so what purpose do they serve on earth then?
Click to expand...

Good old eugenics, alive and well.
 
Originally posted by: Iron Woode
I recall an episode of Quincy, ME in which they are debating the insanity defense.

They proposed the verdict "Not guilty by reason of insanity" should be changed to "Guilty but insane" and be punished like any other criminal.
Click to expand...

Yeah, that sounds like a good idea. Maybe "guilty and insane" would mean that someone is obviously so far gone that they cannot be rehabilitated, and they'll be sentenced to life imprisonment except they'd serve their sentence in a mental institution instead of a regular prison.

The other argument I've heard is that if someone is chronically insane, they shouldn't even be considered fit to stand trial and would be placed in a mental institution indefinitely by default.
 
Originally posted by: ric1287
Originally posted by: sandorski
Originally posted by: RapidSnail
Why do we put animals to death if they kill or maim a person (pitbulls and other dogs are prime examples), but the insanity plea allows human perpetrators to skip jail time?
Click to expand...

...because they're insane.
Click to expand...

so what purpose do they serve on earth then?
Click to expand...

What purpose do you serve on Earth?

Many insane iindividuals can be made into productive people. They are not insane 24/7 and with Medical advances can often be made Sane aggain.
 
My understanding of "not guilty by way of insanity" means that instead of a definite prison sentence (ie. 20 years to life, possibility of parole in 15), he'll be committed to a mental institution for an indeterminate amount of time until he is deemed "sane," which will be never. So he's not "getting off," he's just going to spend the rest of his life in a cell with padded walls rather than concrete ones.

-EDIT- Didn't even read the article when I posted. I looked at it for 10 seconds and this is the first thing I saw:

"The public needs to know that when a person is found not criminally responsible, it does not automatically follow that a person will be released into the community," Scurfield said in his ruling "People who are found not criminally responsible but who continue to pose a danger to the community may be kept in a locked institution for the rest of their lives."

He's not getting off folks.
 
Having been on a criminal jury recently, I can understand the verdict. Not everything is as clear cut as we make it seem. The interesting thing I learned about the law is that you have to have committed the crime in the way that the law defines it as being a crime, otherwise there is way too much variability. You have to be guilty of every part of what defines the crime, physically and mentally. I'm not saying that a lot of insanity cases aren't BS, but if certain aspects can't be proved beyond a reasonable doubt then it simply isn't justice to convict that person. My gut instinct in this case tells me anyone who would kill and eat another human is not operating under a normal state of mind.
 
Originally posted by: Atomic Playboy
My understanding of "not guilty by way of insanity" means that instead of a definite prison sentence (ie. 20 years to life, possibility of parole in 15), he'll be committed to a mental institution for an indeterminate amount of time until he is deemed "sane," which will be never. So he's not "getting off," he's just going to spend the rest of his life in a cell with padded walls rather than concrete ones.
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ding ding
 
Originally posted by: barfo
Was anyone truly expecting him to go to prison?
If what he did is not insanity then I don't know what is.
Click to expand...

yet another example that liberalism is a mental disorder.

 
Lets not lose our heads over this. Obviously cooler heads have prevailed and will send someone to some serious head therapy for this.
 
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