She knew what she was doing was illegal, against the law, and by society’s rules, wrong. When she says that killing them to save their souls was the “right thing to do,” she is not saying what she did was right by legal definitions. That’s what she’s being tried on.
Say you have a friend who’s married to an abusive husband. No matter how many times the police are called, he controlls her so much that she never presses charges, and he continues to abuse her. You can’t take it anymore, and one day, you go to visit him with a baseball bat and beat the bloody fuck out of him. He dies. You knew that killing him was wrong, but you knew what he was doing to her was wrong, and thus, you feel justified. You are still guilty. You’re opinion on what is morally right and wrong and you’re knowledge of what is legally right and wrong contradict. But in a court of law, what matters?
The LAW.
She knew, she KNEW that what she did was legally wrong. She could distinguish the difference between right and wrong when it came to that. Morally, she felt justified, but that doesn’t mean shit when it comes to the law. If, in her mind, letting her kids live to be tormented by Satan was wrong, and murdering them was right, then again, she’s shown she could distinguish between right and wrong. What she had was a conflict between her morals and the law. She chose morals, and is being judged by the law, not on her moral convictions, but on her actions in a society judged by the law.
There goes my 4 paragraph post, and I have neither the time nor the patience to redo it, but I’ll boil it down:
Condescend much? God forbid somebody disagree with you Stoid. A post-partem psychosis diagnosis does not equal insanity. She knew her actions were illegal, and that she knew she was going to be punished. A reasonable jury that heard all the evidence could easily find that she had not met the burden of proving herself insane.
Geez, do I have to do everything for you? Here is the entire entry for malice, since apparently you can’t be bothered to find it yourself:
The fact that they did not consider her insane in no way means that sanity is no longer required for a murder conviction. I really don’t understand how you would think that it does. Does the fact that OJ was acquitted of murder somehow mean that murder is no longer illegal?
It is? Do you know this to be so? Because it looks as though this is exactly the sticking point of the thing. “Can distinguish right from wrong” can be interpreted in different ways. It seems rather unlikely, to me, that the burden of insanity has to be clear knowledge of the law. For my money, (and in fact I may be wrong, I’ve never seen it parsed to this degree, if you have, please share), have no problem connecting the law to their personal situation, because they are sane. Insane people do not.
So, by your definition, are you saying that the only way an insanity defense can prevail is if, during the time a person is supposedly insane you asked them: “Is it legal to kill someone.” the only ** insane ** answer is “yes” or “I don’t know”?
Because if in fact this whole business of “distinguishing right from wrong” comes down to THAT, then my disgust has just been ratched up several notches.
So I am really interested to know if this idea has been dissected in this manner. Because if you are right, then yes, under very stupid, horrible laws that really don’t mean much of anything, she was sane. However if I was right, then she’s insane and the jury deliberately ignored that fact.
Here’s why the concept you have just outlined sucks toe jam in the largest way: it assumes that the state is the highest moral authority, which a quick glance at history will demonstrate is ridiculous. Even if we confine ourselves to our own history! Over the 10,000 years of recorded human history, my own opinion is that MOST of the time the state is the most evil of all, and breaking the rules of an EVIL entity is a good thing.
Therefore, in the mind of an INSANE person, they may passionately believe that The State itself is EVIL, and therefore following their own internal moral code and taking the heat is worth it. And if we were talking about sane people in an insane world, (The protectors of the Frank family. for instance) we applaud it. Well, INSANE people see our perfect cough legal system as something less than perfect and choose to follow * their * internal moral code. Well, of course we can’t applaud it, but we can understand that it springs from the same (good) impulses and recognize that it means the crazy person is crazy, not evil, and therfore should be treated differently than an evil person.
Who said sanity was not required for a murder conviction. I wrote that Andrea Yates was convicted of murder because the jury found that she was sane.
Let’s back up and take it slowly, so you’ll understand.
The law requires that a person appreciate the difference between right and wrong and that they understand the consequences of their acts.
This jury, in this case, found that Andrea Yates was sane by the legal definition, which was no doubt supplied to them by the judge. On that basis they found her guilty of murder. In Texas, according to that jury, at this time, Yates is guilty. Period.
Your comment that OJ’s acquittal makes murder legal, or that anyone might think so, simply makes no sense. The OJ case only proves that a jury may be biased and disregard evidence because they like the defendant or because they want to get even for what they think were past wrongs. In any event, the one trial has nothing whatever to do with the other.
If you want to argue the Andrea Yates was actually insane, you’re too late. Those arguments were made in court by experts, refuted by other experts and rejected by the jury.
If you want to make an impassioned statement for the insanity plea, that’s really fodder for another thread. (Fodder for a mother of a thread, as it occurs to me. )
Just to bring all this to a stopping place: The jury said Andrea Yates was guilty. You think she wasn’t. Some others think her husband should be the one on trial. There will no doubt be an appeal of her conviction, at which time you can contact Andrea’s attorney and weigh in with your devestating logic. In the meantime, let’s move on to something else.
WHAT? Go back and read that, first. Now, can you see something wrong there? What I get from that is that if someone dissagrees with the state, then they can do whatever they “feel is right,” and if it goes against the laws of the state, that’s fine and they should be alowed to continue. If you mean something else, please, tell me, because otherwise that’s one of the stupidest statements I’ve read in a long time.
People can not just decide “I don’t like the way the government is running things, so I’m going to live by my own rules” and expect to not have the state interfere when they start to threaten or infringe upon others. How many people agree with the local speed limit? I find it ridiculous that the highway near me has a 55 mph speed limit and the feeder road has a 50 mph speed limit. Thus, I speed. I feel comfortable driving around 75 mph on the highway. If I get pulled over, I can’t say “It’s a stupid law and I don’t have to listen to it, I’m not paying my speeding ticket” because I will get arrested when they find out I haven’t paid my ticket and issue a warrant for me. And that defense will NOT hold up in court. We’ve had a couple of instances where people haven’t agreed with the state and tried to “live how they wanted to live.” I believe River Ridge is a perfect example. If you live in a state, you live by that state’s laws. It’s not an option. The only option you have is to leave for a place where you can live in a state of government you prefer, or live the way you want as best you can within the constraints of the state’s laws. The state IS the highest moral authority, unless you bring religion it the fold, and we here in the US have a separation of the two. Most of our state laws are the same as those moral laws (such as MURDER IS WRONG), but in the US, the state supersedes religious laws and moral justification.
First of all, do you have an answer one way or another to the first part of my post, wbout whether we know what the law actually intends or not, or whether it is still open to interpretation?
Secondly:
No, that is not what it says. I wrote it, I read it several times. I may not have done a great job of expressing myself, but it actually does say what I mean it to, and what I mean it to is not what you are getting from it.
But I’ll try a couple of ways to make it clearer: if you lived in a country where it was legal to, let’s say, beat your wife…would that mean that it was RIGHT to beat your wife? I hope you agree that it certainly would not. So in such a case you must turn to your internal moral code to determine right from wrong, yes? Again, certainly, or at least one hopes.
Does this help you see my point? “Right from wrong” and “legal” are not the same thing. Those of us who are sane understand true right and true wrong, and we also understand legal vs. illegal. An insane person may understand legal vs. illegal and be in lalaland on the whole right/wrong thing.
Try reading it again, as a whole idea, because it is an argument about how we arrive at the idea of sanity via the “right/wrong” standard, not a call for anarchy.
stoid
I said that sanity and malice are required for murder. You quoted that statement, and said that I was wrong. The only interpretation that makes sense is that you think that one of these is not required.
I never said anything of the sort. I clearly implied that I don’t think so. My point was that saying that murder is no longer illegal because of OJ makes as much sense as saying that I’m wrong because Yates was convicted.
Cheesesteak, the thing is, he didn’t do the actual acts of murder. However, after thinking about it and reading some of the news reports, his behavior as a parent and a husband are deplorable, and he should definitely be charged with neglect.
Okay, I understand a bit more, but look at it this way. Say you live in a country where it is illegal to beat your wife, but you feel that as a man and the breadwinner of the family, you essentially own her, and if you want to beat her or force her to have sex whenever you feel like it, that’s your poragative and you feel morally justified and anyone who tries to stop you is wrong. That’s a bit more in touch with this case. What about that?
Stoid, lemme see if I’m understanding you. Basically, you’re saying Andrea Yates couldn’t distinguish between right and wrong. Is that correct?
Because, if that’s your point, the testimony of Resnick would indicate AY knew what she was doing was wrong. He said that she knew what she was doing was a sin, which, to a devout Christian, is the whole basis between right and wrong. Sin = wrong.
So even taking away society’s interpretation of murder and/or insanity, AY knew she was committing a sin in killing her children. Perhaps she didn’t know she was committing murder, but she did know she was doing something wrong.
Yes, Andrea Yates should be in jail. If only to protect her from her husband, who would undoubtedly try to knock her up again because she’s a really kind person aside from this murder thing and besides, he’s always pictured himself with a house full of kids.
What does him always wanting to be in a household full of children have to do with anything? I want a big family, does that mean all women should stay away from me (hmmm, maybe that’s my problem). I admit, he’s got a few screws loose as well, but she shouldn’t be locked up to be protected from him. She should be locked up to prevent her from murdering others the next time “Satan” tells her to.
And don’t give me this “she was a nice person before this whole murder thing” crap. It’s not a “murder thing,” like it’s some “Punk thing,” it’s a serious crime. It’s MURDER. She killed five children. Don’t pass that off as though it’s nothing. And it doesn’t matter. What is it everyone says about mulitple murderers?
That’s just too damn bad for Asshole Wifebeater Boy, because the insanity portion of our show is missing. I’m not saying that * because * one’s morals are outside the norm they are * therefore * insane, I’m saying that a person who is already insane sometimes also has lost touch with the ability to distinguish true right and wrong.
Uh, Elvis, her insanity was very specifically brought about by pregnancy and childbirth. Chemical changes occurred in her body which scrambled the signals in her head. It isn’t permanent, it isn’t who she is at her core.
** Sauron **
I take your point, but my overall understanding of this is that one time, to one question “did you know it was a sin” she said yes. Everything else she has said tells us something different, and consistent. Keeping in mind that she is nuts (a point upon which everyone agrees, whether she fits the legal definition notwithstanding) the utterance of the word “yes” to one question when everything else she says refutees that strikes me as grasping at straws. After all, she never denied knowing that society would disapprove, and she may have assumed he was saying “sin” rhetorically, rather than literally.
I don’t know and I don’t think anyone does. I just look at the “preponderance” of the evidence, which overwhelmingly points to insane, by any measure.
I just hope this same jury that was determined to convict will allow compassion to guide them in the sentencing. Even though it probably won’t matter since it’s a good bet that someday she will probably kill herself.
)