Deirdre Morley v Alan Hawe..

[Matlock]

I don't buy that analogy, she knew she had an on-going illness and knew how affected by it she had been in the past, but she didn't seek counselling, a heart attack is generally an unexpected occurrence.

I'd agree she was seriously mentally ill at the time of the killings but yet this illness did not preclude her from deceiving others as to her intent, everything she did she planned and subsequently formulated this plan so that no one would be in a position to stop her, so a lot of her actions were those of someone fully in command of their faculties. You may not agree but I think there was still an onus on her to seek help when she knew she was going downhill, so I do think she is culpable for the killing, maybe not at the moment she committed the act but certainly in the lead up to it. Should she be punished for this, I think she should.

If that was true then she wouldn't have been found not guilty by reason of insanity.

Not everyone who commits a crime while mentally ill is not guilty by reason of insanity. The criteria is very narrow and it refers to situations where the person is not capable of understanding the nature and quality of the act they are committing.

You are seeking her to be punished as if she was sane when she committed the act, but she wasn't. It isn't a matter of whether or not I agree. This is a matter of fact, not opinion.

Also, she did seek help. Lots and lots of times. She wasn't a criminal mastermind who wanted to kill her children and then "get away with it". She was insane and in that insanity killed her children and then tried to kill herself.

 

[PROCNA2018]

I didn't say she wasn't ill when she did it. She clearly was. What I said was that insanity is a legal rather than a medical term.

She didn't know what she was doing at the time of the act. That's what legal insanity means.

If everything apart from the fact that she killed her children is immaterial then you should also feel that someone who has a heart attack and crashes their car killing their kids is guilty of murder. If intent doesn't matter like.

And I very specifically said a few posts ago that what she did and an accident due to e.g. a heart attack are not remotely related as she deliberately killed her kids.

I understand your view and why you have it and why it prevents you from seeing it any other way. I get it. On that basis we could repeat the same arguments to each other over and over again and neither of us will get anywhere.

She will be released after murdering her kids.
That should be impossible and due to a legal construct it isn't.

Leaving it there

 

[Matlock]

And I very specifically said a few posts ago that what she did and an accident due to e.g. a heart attack are not remotely related as she deliberately killed her kids.

I understand your view and why you have it and why it prevents you from seeing it any other way. I get it. On that basis we could repeat the same arguments to each other over and over again and neither of us will get anywhere.

She will be released after murdering her kids.
That should be impossible and due to a legal construct it isn't.

Leaving it there

But it isn't just a legal construct. It is a legal construct created to deal with a human reality.

You present it as if it is somehow some trickery to allow guilty people to get away with a crime and it isn't.

What she did and a heart attack type accident are very much related in that in both cases the person does something that causes the death of the children, and in both cases they did not have the requisite intent to murder those children.

 

[Harry Boyle]

And I very specifically said a few posts ago that what she did and an accident due to e.g. a heart attack are not remotely related as she deliberately killed her kids.

I understand your view and why you have it and why it prevents you from seeing it any other way. I get it. On that basis we could repeat the same arguments to each other over and over again and neither of us will get anywhere.

She will be released after murdering her kids.
That should be impossible and due to a legal construct it isn't.

Leaving it there

Were they going through the throe of divorce proceedings?

 

[Matlock]

Were they going through the throe of divorce proceedings?

I don't believe so. Why?

 

[Harry Boyle]

I don't believe so. Why?

I wasn't asking your kind self. Somebody mentioned they were.

 

[PROCNA2018]

But it isn't just a legal construct. It is a legal construct created to deal with a human reality.

You present it as if it is somehow some trickery to allow guilty people to get away with a crime and it isn't.

What she did and a heart attack type accident are very much related in that in both cases the person does something that causes the death of the children, and in both cases they did not have the requisite intent to murder those children.

She did. You just said it isn't just a legal construct, it's a legal construct to deal with a human reality. I'd have thought that was obvious but the point being it is still a legal construct.

I present it as nothing more than you just described it yourself. She of course had the requisite intent. Not only did she have the requisite intent she planned it, it was premeditated. The human reality here is her 3 kids were murdered by the one person they are supposed to trust will mind them and love them. Bad enough a serial killer does it but their own mother. Their lives are no more, you understand that. They didn't do anything wrong, you understand that. They were innocent, you understand that.

Their mother deliberately, conceived of the plan, concealed the plan, executed the plan. That's not "I'm having a bad day, I'll kill my kids". If you're mentally ill and you know you are, you check yourself into an institution, did she do that? No. If your mens rea is lacking as you claim, you don't plan to kill murder and murder your kids, the worst you do is kill yourself because the natural protective instinct of a parent to a child overwhelms any notion of harming them. Did that happen? No. Why? Because she didn't do it in a fit of mania. She planned it.

It is unjustifiable. And a legal construct applied at trial should not absolve a murderer because it works in a legal setting. It is Law Abiding Citizen territory.

With respect, as I said, we'll leave it there.

 

[Gregory_Mike]

With respect, as I said, we'll leave it there.

Good luck with that!

 

[Matlock]

She did. You just said it isn't just a legal construct, it's a legal construct to deal with a human reality. I'd have thought that was obvious but the point being it is still a legal construct.

I present it as nothing more than you just described it yourself. She of course had the requisite intent. Not only did she have the requisite intent she planned it, it was premeditated. The human reality here is her 3 kids were murdered by the one person they are supposed to trust will mind them and love them. Bad enough a serial killer does it but their own mother. Their lives are no more, you understand that. They didn't do anything wrong, you understand that. They were innocent, you understand that.

Their mother deliberately, conceived of the plan, concealed the plan, executed the plan. That's not "I'm having a bad day, I'll kill my kids". If you're mentally ill and you know you are, you check yourself into an institution, did she do that? No. If your mens rea is lacking as you claim, you don't plan to kill murder and murder your kids, the worst you do is kill yourself because the natural protective instinct of a parent to a child overwhelms any notion of harming them. Did that happen? No. Why? Because she didn't do it in a fit of mania. She planned it.

It is unjustifiable. And a legal construct applied at trial should not absolve a murderer because it works in a legal setting. It is Law Abiding Citizen territory.

With respect, as I said, we'll leave it there.

To be honest, I don't think it I'd particularly fair to say " let me just say my bit and then let's leave it there".

She did not have intent. That is a matter of fact rather than opinion. You might not like that fact, but that doesn't make it not a fact.

You seem to want to believe that this woman was evil rather than ill. If this is so obvious to you, then why do you think the state didn't pursue a murder charge? Why would any psychiatrist ( not to mind a number of them) state that this evil murderer wasn't guilty of murder? Why is it that you think the entire legal system is conspiring not to punishment her?

 

[Roxetten]

She did not have intent. That is a matter of fact rather than opinion. You might not like that fact, but that doesn't make it not a fact.

Surely the above is based on the opinion of the psychiatrists who interviewed her after the event?

So it's their opinion, rather than an objective fact that can be scientifically verified or proved definitively, that she didn't have intent and more importantly that she couldn't have prevented herself from killing her 3 children.