The trial of Ronald Shanabarger is starting soon in Franklin, Indiana (Aug 29) He is the father who purposely killed his infant son to get back at the baby’s mother because she had not cut her European vacation short when his(Ronald’s) father died. They became engaged and married soon after her return, Ronald admits he fathered the child with the express purpose of killing him before the year was out, and wanting to do it on Father’s Day, he wanted his wife to ‘know how it felt to lose someone’.
‘Heinous’ is 'grossly wicked, or reprehensible, abominable, hatred. But all of these are moral descriptions aren’t they??
This is certainly first degree murder, but many times punishments are based on the ‘heinousness’ of the crime itself. Is there a legal basis for what constitutes how ‘despicable’ something is? Is that interpreted by the prosecutor or charged to the jury by the judge?? What’s your opinion of what is ‘heinous’?
My take is this is determined by the judge at sentencing. If the guy is found guilty (sounds like he will be, and this is definately 1st degree murder) the judge can give him the harshest possible sentence depending on the heinousness. (Probably the Chair, but I dunno if that state has capital punishment.)
For “less” heinous crimes, the guilt party may get life in prison without parole, life in prison with parole, etc.
Simply put, “heinousness” is “Oh my God” level. Punishment varies directly with perceived heinousness, which in turn varies directly with however much the judge’s mind reels with the unconscionability of the crime. I agree with friedo inasmuch as judges are considered totally within their rights to determine this. No real system to deriving it.
Heinous; Hei"nous (?), a. [OF. ha’8bnos hateful, F. haineux, fr. OF. ha’8bne hate, F. haine, fr. ha’8br to hate; of German origin. See Hate.] Hateful; hatefully bad; flagrant; odious; atrocious; giving great great offense; – applied to deeds or to character.
Just think of how much hate and spite went into this crime. Planned for over a year, creating a life and watching a mother and son bond only to make someone suffer.
Hateful, odious, atrocious…all these things apply.
What constitutes how crimes are catagorized oon the heanous (or any) scale?
Why, we do, of course.
And we choose the punishments as well.
Yer pal,
Satan
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I don’t know about assuming guilt, per se, but the OP did say: “Ronald admits he fathered the child with the express purpose of killing him before the year was out, and wanting to do it on Father’s Day, he wanted his wife to ‘know how it felt to lose someone’.” AP reports I located say that he had walked into the police station and turned himself in and confirmed:
"Shanabarger, 30, told police he had planned the murder since before his son was born in order to settle an old grudge against his wife.
He said when his father died in October 1996, he asked Amy to be with him but she was on a cruise and did not return. They were not married at the time.
‘Shanabarger said he planned to make Amy feel the way he did when his father died,’ the probable cause affidavit states. ‘He married her, got her pregnant, allowed time for her to bond with the child, and then took its life.’."
So, it doesn’t sound like the facts of the crime are much in question, but he’s pleading innocent, so who knows?
. And yet, he’s pleading innocent, so who knows?
If in effect, you mean the ‘we’ as a society, is the basis for ‘heinousness’ a sliding scale based on the times? We have to have an absolute to decide from, don’t we?
** matt-mcl ** short and to the point!
** friedo, spoojie, and nevermore ** you all got the point of what degree one would have to sear your own conscience to attempt this kind of revenge. I don’t think I’ve ever heard of anyone getting the death penalty for killing their own child, which to me IS the epitomy of my own definition of ‘heinousness’.
** Thanks, pldennison, ** for furthering the explanation of the crime. It was big news last year, and the trial was moved and put so far ahead as to lose some of the attention it garnered at the time. And yet, it struck me so much that one could plan something like this so far ahead of time, and miss the obviousness (to anyone normal) he wanted his wife to know the pain he had been in when he lost his father, and yet he seemed so detached at killing (and thereby ‘losing’) his own son.
And I think I’ve always understood pleading ‘not guilty’ only meant, ‘Go ahead and prove it’.
Well Anti Pro, we have no set scale for a lot of legally relevant terms. Like “heinous” we have “obscene, socially redeeming, mitigating circumstances” and other terms I am sure that are almost wholly subjective. Really, there is no way to quantify certain attributes other than subjectively. On the one hand, that means there is no uniform application of the law; you are at the mercy of the sensibilities of the judge/jury that you get. On the other hand, an obscenity law written in the 20’s can still be used today, even though we may have a very different standard of what constitutes a breach of that law.
**
I think, and this is just my impression/WAG, that people are reluctant to believe that anyone capable of doing this is sane. They don’t want to believe that anyone can be this evil without being all the way around the bend. Guy shoots a bunch of people in a McDonalds, ok. That’s evil, but on a plane people can understand or cope with. But the strongest bond most people will ever experience is their love for their children. That is the most sacred of relationships, and anyone who murders their child just has to be deeply ill.
This is what I really wanted to know, ** Ptahlis, ** ‘there is no uniform application of the law.’ part. How ‘heinous’ something would have to be written as part of an absolute sense of right and wrong, and the degress thereof.
**
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It WOULD be easier to grasp that the person was insane, but there is a far cry from the Mark David Chapman who * still holds to the ‘Catcher in the Rye’ theory * for murdering John Lennon and for parents who either aren’t bonded to their kids or are just plain evil. My parents weren’t nuts, they just saw their children as extensions of themselves with no thoughts or feelings that the ‘adult’ didn’t feel, if THEY didn’t feel it, then it didn’t exist.
It’s an ironic society that claims to want to protect its most innocent, and then would rather give ‘treatment’ and lesser sentences for people who prey and use kids because it’s own sensibilities are too offended to grasp the realities that stare up at us from the newspaper pages every day.