Well if the person was legitimately insane then of course it should be a defense. The dificult thing is figuring out whether they are lying or not. But I don't like the way people say this or that criminal "isn't going to jail", as if they are just being let go. Most likely they are going to a psychiatric care facility which could be as bad as or even worse then jail in some cases and could possibly spend a lot longer there then there sentence in an actual jail depending on their mental condition (obviously not in this case as it would merit a life sentence, but it is possible).Beefy_Nugglet said:
Is the Insanity Plea a legitimate defense?
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So he's going to be locked away from the general population for life. So where's the problem?Beefy_Nugglet said:
Although I no longer live in Norway and as such do not know what the current practices are, I did work at Ila Sikringsanstalt (Ila High Security Penitentiary) as an officer a little over 10 years ago.
I am assuming that this is where Breivik is located at this time as that prison is specifically built for individuals like him.
I worked in lukket avdeling (Solitary confinement) (I am pretty sure it's guaranteed that's where he is) and what was then known as Block B where the worst of the worst were placed when they were not in solitary.
I can only say that the impression people seem to be having of Norwegian prisons (At least as I know them) are somewhat disconnected from reality. For example, that one post that had a picture of a prison cell is not the cells we had at Ila. I can tell you that much.
Pretty much room for a bed and a sink and a table. And that was that. No internet. No TV. etc.etc.
I am assuming that the picture and the posters impression is from a low security prison and is in no way representative of the system as a whole.
When they were in solitary they spent 23 hours per day in a cell and 1 hour outside in a very tightly confined space with very high walls all around them. Any prisoner not in solitary are expected to put in 8 hours of work every day. If they do not work they are locked inside their cell.
After work they are allowed out into a common area for each block that would have one TV.
And they do have the opportunity to do some education as well while incarcerated, but again, only as long as they show willingness to work within the system.
I just want to share one more thought. I always thought it was interesting that you could sometimes hear hardcore psychotics break down and start crying alone in the dark when you slammed the cell door closed.
I am assuming that this is where Breivik is located at this time as that prison is specifically built for individuals like him.
I worked in lukket avdeling (Solitary confinement) (I am pretty sure it's guaranteed that's where he is) and what was then known as Block B where the worst of the worst were placed when they were not in solitary.
I can only say that the impression people seem to be having of Norwegian prisons (At least as I know them) are somewhat disconnected from reality. For example, that one post that had a picture of a prison cell is not the cells we had at Ila. I can tell you that much.
Pretty much room for a bed and a sink and a table. And that was that. No internet. No TV. etc.etc.
I am assuming that the picture and the posters impression is from a low security prison and is in no way representative of the system as a whole.
When they were in solitary they spent 23 hours per day in a cell and 1 hour outside in a very tightly confined space with very high walls all around them. Any prisoner not in solitary are expected to put in 8 hours of work every day. If they do not work they are locked inside their cell.
After work they are allowed out into a common area for each block that would have one TV.
And they do have the opportunity to do some education as well while incarcerated, but again, only as long as they show willingness to work within the system.
I just want to share one more thought. I always thought it was interesting that you could sometimes hear hardcore psychotics break down and start crying alone in the dark when you slammed the cell door closed.
Actually psychiatric care hasn't really improved much in the last 40 years. The major change is the medicines we use. He will be medicated after need, but that doesn't change the fact that it's going to be pretty bad in there. Seeing how nice the prisons are he's most likely get it worse there than in prison.xvbones said:
The person should be sent to wherever they can get the proper treatment for possible recovery. I don't believe the prison system works at all at least in how it's handled in North America.
Psych ward seems appropriate for someone with that kind of mental illness. Putting him in jail wouldn't help anyone, it's just a lazy way to say, "we've given up on you, but we won't kill you. This way you can continue to be a burden on society and live a miserable life."
Psych ward seems appropriate for someone with that kind of mental illness. Putting him in jail wouldn't help anyone, it's just a lazy way to say, "we've given up on you, but we won't kill you. This way you can continue to be a burden on society and live a miserable life."
He's not just delusional or psychotic at the time of the attack, he's highly disturbed and has been for years, temporary insanity defense and actual insanity are not quite the same, I wasn't in control of my actions at the time to he has no idea of the real world any of the time and the ramifications of his actions and the ability to rationalise them in his own skewed version of the world .
He needs to be kept away from people and get a lot of help so psychiatric confinement would be the best thing for the public as well as him.
He needs to be kept away from people and get a lot of help so psychiatric confinement would be the best thing for the public as well as him.
Well some people are crazy. And yes they might have done bad things like killing people.. so yeah they deserve to be put away. But to put them with normal prisoners [what is normal anyway?] .. probably not a good idea. Unless you want to thin them out.
So a psychiatric prison sounds like a better place. 77 People? He is in that a long long long long long time! Not to mention that I do not have insight how they define treatment. It could indeed be very very very harsh medical treatment.
I self don't like medicines that do nasty things with the mind. I have seen what shit they can do... the stuff they give these days is light compared to some of the older pills. The older stuff? If they give him that.. well its hell!
So a psychiatric prison sounds like a better place. 77 People? He is in that a long long long long long time! Not to mention that I do not have insight how they define treatment. It could indeed be very very very harsh medical treatment.
I self don't like medicines that do nasty things with the mind. I have seen what shit they can do... the stuff they give these days is light compared to some of the older pills. The older stuff? If they give him that.. well its hell!
Hey guys, I have an idea! Let's not waste a bunch of money on this guy. Instead, we could incase his feet in cement and throw him in the ocean.
*Enter Penn & Teller*
"But by doing this you're killing a HUMAN BEING!"
In my mind he lost his humanity after what he did. This isn't a human being, this is an abomination.
"But if we have death penalty there's a chance that innocent people get killed before we can prove their innocence!"
There's like, NOTHING that suggests it wasn't him. He's clearly the one who commited these murders. I don't want the death penalty to be a standard penalty like it is in the US, but I'd like it to be reserved for people like this.
Of course, I'm not living in Norway so my opinion means less than shit. Still, Norway shouldn't waste time and money on someone like this.
*Enter Penn & Teller*
"But by doing this you're killing a HUMAN BEING!"
In my mind he lost his humanity after what he did. This isn't a human being, this is an abomination.
"But if we have death penalty there's a chance that innocent people get killed before we can prove their innocence!"
There's like, NOTHING that suggests it wasn't him. He's clearly the one who commited these murders. I don't want the death penalty to be a standard penalty like it is in the US, but I'd like it to be reserved for people like this.
Of course, I'm not living in Norway so my opinion means less than shit. Still, Norway shouldn't waste time and money on someone like this.
Well... yeah.
Someone who does something like this is clearly psychotic.
As for 'insanity defence is the light option' this isn't Gotham City, and psychiatric institutions are not Arkham Asylum. They are actually far harder to get out of than a prison in most cases. Also, you will be there for life, unable to convince anyone that you should be allowed to leave because you are sane.
When you're in a prison, once you've undergone a sentence which is prescribed in years by a judge, and possibly a mandated rehabilitation course, then you are out.
when you're in an Institute, you don't have a number of years until your release, you don't have rehabilitation programmes, you have therapy, and the doctors decide when you are fit to be released. And the overwhelming evidence is that you will not be.
There was a rather famous study done about it, in which a group of volunteers went into various Psychiatric wards claiming symptoms conducive with schizophrenia, and were admitted. Once they were admitted they found it impossible to convince anyone that the symptoms had abated, and they were kept incarcerated until the lead researcher ended the experiment.
He will be locked away for life, with no chance of ever being released.
No, the insanity plea isn't a legitimate 'defence.' Because it leads to far worse consequences than a simple guilty plea.
Someone who does something like this is clearly psychotic.
As for 'insanity defence is the light option' this isn't Gotham City, and psychiatric institutions are not Arkham Asylum. They are actually far harder to get out of than a prison in most cases. Also, you will be there for life, unable to convince anyone that you should be allowed to leave because you are sane.
When you're in a prison, once you've undergone a sentence which is prescribed in years by a judge, and possibly a mandated rehabilitation course, then you are out.
when you're in an Institute, you don't have a number of years until your release, you don't have rehabilitation programmes, you have therapy, and the doctors decide when you are fit to be released. And the overwhelming evidence is that you will not be.
There was a rather famous study done about it, in which a group of volunteers went into various Psychiatric wards claiming symptoms conducive with schizophrenia, and were admitted. Once they were admitted they found it impossible to convince anyone that the symptoms had abated, and they were kept incarcerated until the lead researcher ended the experiment.
He will be locked away for life, with no chance of ever being released.
No, the insanity plea isn't a legitimate 'defence.' Because it leads to far worse consequences than a simple guilty plea.
Yes, but if I've understood it correctly, Mijailo Mijailović was not mentally fit when he committed the murder, but is today. So far, there have been no signs that he's being released anytime soon. Just as an example.Sealpower said:
Even if you cannot take full responsibility of your actions while in a delerium, it still doesn't mean that you are completly free of consequences once you are considered "cured". And in Breivik's case, it seems extremly unlikely that would happen.
Thing is, a prison is not the only way to stow someone away. High-sec loony ward is also a way to stow them away, so what's the difference? The only difference is the "uniform".henritje said:
It's not like in the movies where insanity defense gets you off scot-free. It only puts you in a different institution, but you're out for life.
I don't really see much of a difference myself. "stone walls do not a prison make, nor iron bars a cage." life spent in a loony bin isn't that much different than life in a prison. Hell, here in the USA, it might be more of a punishment, with how well prisoners are treated.
But fundamentally I do agree with it. I don't think that we should punish people who were crazy for acting according to their delusions, but we should definitely make sure they never get out into the real world again. the Safety of the public is the first concern.
But fundamentally I do agree with it. I don't think that we should punish people who were crazy for acting according to their delusions, but we should definitely make sure they never get out into the real world again. the Safety of the public is the first concern.
What kind of service do you think they have in psychiatric wards? It's the same as prison except they make you take drugs that fuck with your head. It's not like he escaped punishment or anything.
Probably just as insane.Rex Dark said:
People are confusing 'guilty' with 'he did it.'
Guilt requires two things in western law: actus rea and mens rea. Actus rea is the 'guilty action' and Mens rea is the 'guilty mind.'
Most successful defenses are based on actus rea: "He didn't do it." "He wasn't there." "You can't prove he was there." The insanity defense instead goes "He doesn't have a working brain."
Premeditation doesn't play into it; if his premeditation was under the 'crazy' than he's insane. "Temporary insanity" doesn't happen as often as you'd think, because "insanity" is rarely temporary. This would require a situation with such emotional and physical stress that the person is no longer cognizant.
A lot of the outrage comes from a misunderstanding of what legal insanity entails. Yes, you gotta be crazy to kill someone, but legal insanity is a specific, special sort of insanity where the individual truly is incapable of controlling their actions or being aware of what they're doing. Being driven to rage by anger, on the other hand, certainly is not legal insanity.
I'm not sure that it does make sense. It depends on the specific extent of a mental illness.
If you think about it, he had all these motivations from the start. His intentions were probably the same regardless of whether he had psychotic delusions. He actively planned to kill and bomb hundreds of people. And he knew he was killing people, not demons out to get him. At that level of high-functioning, he had at least some capacity to account for his actions, whether he believed himself the leader of the Knights Templar or simply an individual terrorist.
I believe he should have been executed. Unfortunately, Norway abolished the death penalty out of a misguided rehabilitation-orientated policy.
If you think about it, he had all these motivations from the start. His intentions were probably the same regardless of whether he had psychotic delusions. He actively planned to kill and bomb hundreds of people. And he knew he was killing people, not demons out to get him. At that level of high-functioning, he had at least some capacity to account for his actions, whether he believed himself the leader of the Knights Templar or simply an individual terrorist.
I believe he should have been executed. Unfortunately, Norway abolished the death penalty out of a misguided rehabilitation-orientated policy.
That's also not what I was saying at all. I was saying that he wouldn't be much different in regard to crime-severity in whatever prison he's put in. Ergo, as far as prison function goes, he would just be one more inmate.xvbones said:
I was focusing more on your "He will never be treated or cured" remark, because I'm positive that even if he's a lifer, they're still going to try and help him because that's the entire point of a mental institution.xvbones said:
And that excludes him from being insane because...?Octogunspunk said:
Criminal insanity is, in its broadest definition, the inability to distinguish right from wrong. You don't have to think that you're Richard the III being aided by the ghost of John Paul II to be legally insane.
Misguided? They've got a 20% relapse rate when it comes to released prisoners (meaning 20% end up back in jail after their release). The US has around a 60% relapse rate. And if someone manages to get the evidence tested using modern tech, we might be discovering that the state of Texas just executed an innocent man.Octogunspunk said:
Yeah. 'Misguided.' Sure.
You hit the nail on the head. Although temporary insanity is usually used for the things you mention in the last paragraph, often classified as 'crimes of passion.'DracoSuave said:
There are a lot of remorseless psychopathic murderers who don't know right from wrong. Doesn't exclude them. ABB had massive delusions of grandeur, but it remains that he knew what he was doing, especially in the act of bombing and killing. Society is just better off without monsters who go around mass murdering others, sane or not. ABB can never be rehabilitated into society. Executed murderers have a 0% relapse rate.Char-Nobyl said:
Norway had a lower crime rate in the first place. It's a generally more cohesive society. So maybe they can afford to go soft on crime.
Also you're not saying that there's the slightest chance ABB could be innocent, are you?
Of course you can't send insane people to prison, it wouldn't be justice. If someone didn't have the capacity to control their actions or fully understand their actions, it is not right to punish them for it. Instead we send them to an institute where they can get psychiatric help, that's how these things work people.