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Captain Corea
Joined: 28 Feb 2005
Location: Seoul
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 Posted: Wed Mar 04, 2009 4:51 pm Post subject: Canadian Decapitator - not criminally responsible |
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http://www.cbc.ca/canada/manitoba/story/2009/03/04/mb-li-trial.html
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Bus beheading trial ends with both sides seeking same verdict
A two-day Winnipeg trial in a case of killing and beheading on a Greyhound bus ended Wednesday with both sides seeking the same verdict � not criminally responsible by reason of mental disorder.
The judge said he will deliver his verdict at 10 a.m. CT on Thursday.
Psychiatrists for the Crown and the defence agreed during the short trial that Vince Li, 40, was suffering from schizophrenia and did not know what he was doing when he killed 22-year-old Timothy McLean of Winnipeg on a bus in Manitoba last July.
The psychiatrists said Li believed he was acting on orders from God when he attacked McLean, mutilating the young man before decapitating him and eating part of the body.
Li had pleaded not guilty to a charge of second-degree murder, but Crown and defence lawyers asked that he be found not criminally responsible.
That verdict would mean he could be sent to a provincial psychiatric facility rather than to prison. He would be placed under the authority of a provincial review board with power to keep him in custody or, if he is no longer considered a risk, discharge him.
Toronto psychiatrist Jonathan Rootenberg, testifying for the defence, told court Wednesday that Li suffers from schizophrenia and was probably psychotic for weeks before the attack.
Rootenberg said Li meets the criteria for an accused person who would be not criminally responsible. "He has a major mental illness that �rendered him unable to know what he was doing was wrong," the psychiatrist said, suggesting Li knew he was stabbing someone but thought it was a demon and didn't understand the nature of his actions.
Earlier, forensic psychiatrist Dr. Stanley Yaren, testifying for the Crown, also gave evidence that Li was diagnosed as schizophrenic and suffered from a major psychotic episode � tormented by auditory hallucinations � at the time of the killing.
Yaren testified that according to Li, God told him that McLean was a "force of evil" who was about to stab Li unless he protected himself.
Killer could one day be rehabilitated, psychiatrists say
Even after the killing, Li believed McLean had supernatural powers and would come back to life unless he dismembered the body and spread the body parts around the bus, Yaren said. Li was not capable of understanding his actions were wrong, he testified.
Both psychiatrists said that Li, although he is very ill, could one day be rehabilitated and returned to society.
The CBC's Marisa Dragani, reporting from Winnipeg, said the trial was unusual for its brevity and lack of conflicting versions of events.
"In a murder trial, you usually hear from witnesses; you usually hear testimony about what happened, when and how," she said. "We didn't hear that.
"There was an agreed statement of facts, filed right off the bat, that the Crown and the defence agreed to, and that was read out in court. It was quite lengthy, and that was done to spare any of the witnesses and the family as well from reliving this horror.
There were about 30 or so passengers on that bus, some of whom might still be affected by what they saw that night, and no one wanted to call them forward, and they didn't want the family to have to sit in court and listen to that testimony for weeks."
In the agreed statement of facts, the Crown and defence said that Li apologized to police when he was finally arrested on the bus, from which other passengers had fled. Li attacked McLean "for no apparent reason" and ignored other horrified passengers as he stabbed the young man.
Li got on the bus in Edmonton and disembarked at a rural stop in Manitoba. He stayed there overnight, selling and burning most of his possessions. He was there 24 hours before getting on the bus again.
Around 8:30 p.m. on July 30, near Portage la Prairie, Li started stabbing McLean. The man's body was damaged in more than 100 places, the Crown said, noting the attack was so unrelentingly violent that some of the victim's body parts could not be found.
'I'm guilty. Please kill me,' Li told police
Li, court heard, was prone to unexplained absences from work and sometimes took long road trips on the bus. Despite the urging of those close to him, he refused to seek medical treatment.
RCMP officers said Li's responses were appropriate and polite when he was finally arrested.
He declined a lawyer at one point, and told police: "I'm guilty. Please kill me."
McLean's family has been lobbying for changes to the Criminal Code that would prevent a person found not criminally responsible for a crime from ever being released into the community. |
So he didn't know right from wrong... but right after the event he knew he did something wrong.
Got it.
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Wed Mar 04, 2009 5:01 pm Post subject: |
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Let's see if I can explain it to CC.
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| He has a major mental illness that �rendered him unable to know what he was doing was wrong," the psychiatrist said, suggesting Li knew he was stabbing someone but thought it was a demon and didn't understand the nature of his actions. |
I highlighted the use of the simple past tense there, to indicate a state of being that occurred but is no longer ongoing. If he truly was insane at the time of the accident, that's what really matters. He's not culpable for later recognizing that something he did at the time was wrong if he could not at the time of the wrong recognize that it was wrong.
Could the State be taking the wrong course here by seeking for a guilty by reason of insanity verdict? Possibly. But in any case, it seems to me that if the prosecution has done its research and investigated the case, and come away with the impression that he was insane at the time, then seeking that verdict is the most responsible way to discharge their ethical obligations. |
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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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| Posted: Wed Mar 04, 2009 5:22 pm Post subject: |
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This thinking...
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So he didn't know right from wrong...but right after the event he knew he did something wrong.
Got it. |
Seems overly simplistic and lacking all sense of nuance.
Re: this thread: old but still very interesting issues: personal accountability and free-will in criminal law. It was not always as it is today. We may thank nineteenth-century psychiatry and its worldview and politics for this, at least according to M. Foucault.
Read this sometime. Very interesting legal case, with armies of competing experts... |
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Captain Corea
Joined: 28 Feb 2005
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Wed Mar 04, 2009 5:36 pm Post subject: |
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| Kuros wrote: |
| Let's see if I can explain it to CC. |
Gee thanks - I never would have figured that out without your help.
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| Seems overly simplistic and lacking all sense of nuance. |
I'm at least glad that you've decided to end the name calling. Forgive me if I'm not as nuanced as you would like - not everyone writes to please you.
I personally find it abhorrent that this individual could be walking the streets in a very short time (possibly). I believe that you have to be a little out of your mind to commit murder in the first place, so my sympathy for those that do so under the influence of a mental condition is a little limited.
I'm curious as to where the knife came from as well. If he brought it on the bus, did he do so because he was expecting a demon to be there?? |
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VanIslander
Joined: 18 Aug 2003
Location: Geoje, Hadong, Tongyeong,... now in a small coastal island town outside Gyeongsangnamdo!
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| Posted: Wed Mar 04, 2009 5:56 pm Post subject: |
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| so he will be locked up indefinitely ... good |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Wed Mar 04, 2009 6:44 pm Post subject: |
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| Captain Corea wrote: |
| I believe that you have to be a little out of your mind to commit murder in the first place, so my sympathy for those that do so under the influence of a mental condition is a little limited. |
I believe that punishing the innocent is futile.
Be that person innocent by:
a) not having actually committed the wrongdoing
b) not having been cognizant of what he/she was doing at the time of the wrongdoing
There are other schools of thought, such as the Eye-for-an-Eye school. |
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bacasper
Joined: 26 Mar 2007
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| Posted: Wed Mar 04, 2009 6:49 pm Post subject: |
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| Captain Corea wrote: |
| I personally find it abhorrent that this individual could be walking the streets in a very short time (possibly). I believe that you have to be a little out of your mind to commit murder in the first place, so my sympathy for those that do so under the influence of a mental condition is a little limited. |
The man might be appropriate for discharge if at the time of the murder, the man was suffering from a treatable mental illness (e.g. paranoid schizophrenia) which caused him to become violent. Treat the illness, and you no longer have a violent patient.
That being said, no psychiatrist is going to discharge him from the hospital tomorrow with merely a prescription. He will certainly spend a very long time (years to decades) locked up for "observation" before any psychiatrist or panel risks their careers by allowing him back into the community, and even then only into some supervised living arrangement in which medication compliance and subtle behavioral changes can be strictly monitored. |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Wed Mar 04, 2009 7:55 pm Post subject: |
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| Psychology is not an exact science and may never be. At this point in time I favor 'guilty but insane' where a person is criminally guilty and will never be free to walk the streets again. |
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Captain Corea
Joined: 28 Feb 2005
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Thu Mar 05, 2009 12:07 am Post subject: |
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| Kuros wrote: |
| Captain Corea wrote: |
| I believe that you have to be a little out of your mind to commit murder in the first place, so my sympathy for those that do so under the influence of a mental condition is a little limited. |
I believe that punishing the innocent is futile.
Be that person innocent by:
a) not having actually committed the wrongdoing
b) not having been cognizant of what he/she was doing at the time of the wrongdoing
There are other schools of thought, such as the Eye-for-an-Eye school. |
I tink that B) is extremely hard to prove. |
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blaseblasphemener
Joined: 01 Jun 2006
Location: There's a voice, keeps on calling me, down the road, that's where I'll always be
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| Posted: Thu Mar 05, 2009 2:49 am Post subject: |
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| Clifford Olsen's still in jail. This guy aint never seeing the light of day, I guarantee it. |
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riverboy
Joined: 03 Jun 2003
Location: Incheon
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| Posted: Thu Mar 05, 2009 3:27 am Post subject: |
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CC my man. The only thing I can say is that it was terrible what happened to the poor boy on the bus, but I grew up with a guy who developed schizophrenia. It was a sad trajic thing to see.
He was a provincial record holder in the javelin, discuss and shotput. He was major league baseball caliber. At fifteen, he could hit a ball as far as most grown men on the senior baseball team.
He went out west one winter, worked seismic and was never the same guy. He just changed, it was a sad, sad thing. All but two or three friends turned their backs on him and he lost all of his ability to rationalise things. He just could'nt bring his thoughts together. It took the guy years and years of medication and therapy to begin to even hold down a seasonal job again.
I can tell you from experience, becuae I refused to turn my back on him and would engage him regularly and even have abeer with him from time to time. A schizophrenic goes through hell and suffering you will never know. they lose their ability to reason. They lose they abiltiy to concentrate on simple tasks. They hear voices that are very real to them and they know they are sick at the same time. It's quite clear that this is a very very sick individual who would be much better off in a mental institution than in jail. |
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Captain Corea
Joined: 28 Feb 2005
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Thu Mar 05, 2009 5:59 am Post subject: |
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| riverboy wrote: |
CC my man. The only thing I can say is that it was terrible what happened to the poor boy on the bus, but I grew up with a guy who developed schizophrenia. It was a sad trajic thing to see.
He was a provincial record holder in the javelin, discuss and shotput. He was major league baseball caliber. At fifteen, he could hit a ball as far as most grown men on the senior baseball team.
He went out west one winter, worked seismic and was never the same guy. He just changed, it was a sad, sad thing. All but two or three friends turned their backs on him and he lost all of his ability to rationalise things. He just could'nt bring his thoughts together. It took the guy years and years of medication and therapy to begin to even hold down a seasonal job again.
I can tell you from experience, becuae I refused to turn my back on him and would engage him regularly and even have abeer with him from time to time. A schizophrenic goes through hell and suffering you will never know. they lose their ability to reason. They lose they abiltiy to concentrate on simple tasks. They hear voices that are very real to them and they know they are sick at the same time. It's quite clear that this is a very very sick individual who would be much better off in a mental institution than in jail. |
Thanks for sharing this personal story riverboy. I've never had anyone (that I know of) close to me with schizophrenia, so it's good to hear a story with a personal touch.
I'm still carrying a certain amount of doubt with me on this one though. I mean, the guy had a massive knife with him on the bus... if he was so mentally out of it (during a certain period of his life - like your friend), could not his wife or someone reign him in? Also, your description sounds nothing like that of this man. All reports seemed to indicate that this guy was a functioning dude prior to this.
So, can schizophrenia come on in an hour... and then leave just as quick? |
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Jake.K
Joined: 17 Oct 2008
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| Posted: Thu Mar 05, 2009 6:38 am Post subject: |
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CC, I have a close friend who had a mild case of schizo. It isn't that the insanity would just come on and off like a switch but rather like a little voice is giving you commands non-stop.
At first when you are told to kill a total stranger for no sane reason, you know it's just craziness. But after being told 1000 times or more, it becomes very convincing. At the same time you try to hold on to your sanity but there is a moment where you simply lose it and obey the voice. It is also notable that the voice he heard, in my friend's case, was his own voice. Just like the one you hear when you speak in your mind.
There would be times when you are strong and be able to silence the voice but there are also times of weakness when the voice takes control. In my friend's case, it was either late night or early morning.
My guess is that the man in the article finally obeyed the voice and prepared the knife as he was told.
Those people need help and control, not punishment. |
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ontheway
Joined: 24 Aug 2005
Location: Somewhere under the rainbow...
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| Posted: Thu Mar 05, 2009 8:19 am Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
| Psychology is not an exact science and may never be. At this point in time I favor 'guilty but insane' where a person is criminally guilty and will never be free to walk the streets again. |
Yes. We need some kind of guilty verdict for those who happen to have had a mental condition of some kind while committing the offense. They should recieve the same penalty as they would without the finding of mental incapacity.
To be released, they would have to serve the required time and they would undergo treatment for their condition while incarcerated. |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Thu Mar 05, 2009 8:40 am Post subject: |
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| Captain Corea wrote: |
| Kuros wrote: |
| Captain Corea wrote: |
| I believe that you have to be a little out of your mind to commit murder in the first place, so my sympathy for those that do so under the influence of a mental condition is a little limited. |
I believe that punishing the innocent is futile.
Be that person innocent by:
a) not having actually committed the wrongdoing
b) not having been cognizant of what he/she was doing at the time of the wrongdoing
There are other schools of thought, such as the Eye-for-an-Eye school. |
I tink that B) is extremely hard to prove. |
Yes, which is unfortunate for the genuinely insane. Juries are usually unsympathetic to the legally insane as a principle of excuse.
The following data comes from the National Commission on the Insanity Defense, Myths and Realities 14-15 (1983); and Borum and Fulero, Empirical Research on the Insanity Defense and Attempted Reforms, 23 Law & Hum. Behav. 375 (1999).
Colorado had an average of 1 insanity plea for every 5,000 arrests (44% success rate); 1 to 480 in Michigan (7% success rate) and 1 to 200 in Wyoming (2% success rate). California and New York had only 63 and 88 successful insanity pleas per year, a ratio of 1 for every 27,000 arrests in California and 1 for every 11,000 arrests in New York. Insanity acquittals probably represent no more than .25% of terminated felony prosecutions, and these have not varied from the 1970s to the 1990s. |
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