More On Donny Dumbo

I've noticed that the media seems to be taking Donald Trump seriously, and why shouldn't they.  He is, after all, leading the Repug field, that is if early polling is to be believed.  Everything he says gets parsed for meaning and how it will influence voters.  My question: Why hasn't anyone questioned his sanity.  We're so used to his publicity mongering that we're overlooking the very real possibility that he's clinically insane.  Let's face it, put Donny on a street corner, and people are crossing the street to avoid the crazy guy.

Crazy In L.A. An Update

On June 17 of this year, I wrote a brief piece about a homeless woman in my neighborhood.  I wondered if she had started off sane but was going crazy from being separated from the greater community.  Yesterday, she was arrested by the LAPD.  I don't know why.  Yes, she had become a bit of a shouter, but from what I've seen of her behavior, she wasn't dangerous, just irritating.  Yet another example of dealing with social problems with a term in jail?  Probably.

Crazy In Los Angeles

We all know that mental illness can cause homelessness,  but can homelessness cause mental illness?  There is a woman who wanders the streets of my neighborhood.  I first saw her about a year ago.  She was well dressed, clean and dragging around one of those wheeled suit cases.  A few days latter, I saw her again.  This time she was getting thrown out of a store.  She was yelling that it wasn't her fault that her boyfriend had thrown her out and she had no place to go.

As the year has passed, she's gotten dirtier,  shabbier, and crazier.   This afternoon, I saw her at her usual spot, yelling at no one in particular, in what sounded like Italian.   As a homeless person, she is isolated.  She may see hundreds, perhaps even thousands of people every day, but she has little or no contact with any of them.  She just sits there, alone, surrounded by people.  I've read that prisoners held in isolation for long periods of time go slowly, irreversibly nuts.  I doubt this woman has had a real conversation with another person for the year she's been wandering around the streets.  For all I know, even though things seemed normal, she had emotional problems when her boyfriend gave her the boot.  But there's no doubt, that things have gotten far worse in the last twelve months.  At what point will her descent into madness be irreversible?

Bang Bang, Shoot 'em Up

Let me get this straight.  Jared Lee Loughner strolls into a super market parking lot with his legally acquired arsenal,  opens fire, kills six and wounds thirteen including Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords.  He gets hauled up before Judge Larry Burns who decides he's too bat shit crazy to stand trail.  So Burns orders Loughner to a federal prison hospital to be forcibly medicated.  A couple of years latter, with his schizophrenia under control, he returns to the Burns court, now cured, so that he can plead guilty and avoid a death sentence.

Okay, I admit it.  I'm not a big time lawyer or a distinguished judge.  But shouldn't the issue be whether or not Loughner was nuts when he pulled the trigger rather than now, after two years of forced treatment?  Ah, but we have to worry about the feelings of the victims.  If feelings are what's important, than perhaps we should just take a poll.  Thumbs up, treatment and release when no longer a danger to society.  Hand held on a level plane, then life in prison and hope the guy doesn't get shived in the shower.  Thumbs down, then a quick visit from the needle.  Ah Rome, what we can learn form your barbaric ways.

Once again, I'm making the unpopular point that the insane should be treated rather than imprisoned for their crimes.  I ran across an interesting study from the U.S. Justice Department in 2006.  (From the Bush Justice Dept, not those socialist hippy Obama guys.)  It seems that over half of  the prison population was suffering from some sort of mental illness a way back in '06.   Forty-five percent in the federal system.  Come on guys, wouldn't it be cheaper to treat people with mental illness before they end up in jail?  Goodness, that might require a national health care system.  Can't have that.

Meanwhile back in the cesspool, also Known as Texas justice.  The lone star state has executed a man with the lofty I.Q. of 61.  Didn't the Supreme Court rule that you can't execute the mentally retarded.  Ah shoot.  He weren't no retard, he was fakin' it.  Remind me to avoid Texas if I can ever afford another vacation.

A Boy and His Gun

Every so often, circumstances require us to ask a very simple question about our judicial system:  Is it about vengeance or is it about justice?

There is not doubt that James Holmes opened fire in a crowded movie theater, and that he did kill twelve people.  There is no doubt that he booby trapped his apartment to kill the first person to enter.  If our system is about vengeance, then why even the pretense of a trial.  Pass the necessary amendments, and take him out behind the building and put a bullet in his head.

If our system is about justice, however, then like it or not, we have to accept the possibility that he is not guilty by reason of insanity.  It is a long established concept in both English and American law that a person has to be sane to be responsible for his or her actions.  We know that Holmes has been under the care of a psychiatrist and that Dr. Lynne Fenton has done research on schizophrenia.  She has also been part of a team that analyzes students at the University of Colorado who might be a danger to others because of mental illness.  Dr. Fenton may have been off the mark in regard to Holmes, but that doesn't mean he wasn't insane.

I'm writing this because the chorus of those who say Holmes is trying to get away with murder by pretending to be crazy is getting louder.  And not just among law and order types on the right.  There are lots of liberals who are saying the same thing.  I admit my prejudice.  I believe Holmes is mentally incompetent.  I don't want him to walk free  with a  prescription and best wishes, although I also think that one day in the future that could and should happen.  What I want is a fair trail where his possible insanity is taken seriously.

But what about the families of the victims?  Shouldn't they have closure?  Shouldn't they feel the relief of knowing that the killer of their loved ones is punished?  No, they shouldn't.  The justice system should not be about the feelings of victims and their families.  The justice system should be about the arrival at an objective  truth, (Or at least as close as we can get.) followed by an appropriate action by the courts system.