Nottingham attacks - verdict

[DrunkenElephant]

I live in Nottingham and feel terribly sad reading the news today.

Could these deaths have been avoided if the police and mental health agencies had done more? But then how can more be done when services are on their knees?

I don’t know the answer to either question, but my hearts go out to the families of Barnaby, Grace and Ian.

It may help the families, that is the point.

Yes, that does sound like a plausible account of why the charges were manslaughter and attempted murder, but these considerations are beside the point as the fact that he was not found guilty of murder was not due to any considerations at all around the presence or absence of planning/premeditation. It was down to diminished responsibility, due to his severe illness. Ie his paranoid schizophrenia. He was ill in a way that the law very clearly has to treat as amounting to diminished responsibility.

I keep coming back on to this thread because I feel so saddened by the lack of awareness of the law and of this terrible illness schizophrenia. Some posts (I don't mean yours, pigeonqueen - your summary was a very good one) display such hostility to the very idea of compassion towards someone with this devastating illness (instead of hostility towards the govt for destroying their mental health care).
About one in a hundred people get schizophrenia. It is an appallingly severe illness and a very common one, but because sufferers often don't vote and are so profoundly othered and marginalised by society the govt has no motivation to ensure they are cared for adequately. Even when mental health is talked about, it is always the 'nicer' types of illness (depression , anxiety, etc) that are centred. We need to do so much better.

@GoodOldEmmaNess so true! The ignorant comments make me so sad and feel like we are fighting a losing battle. Thank god for the few people on here that are trying to fight for the people with this awful illness

judiciary needs to be fair and impartial and stick to process and guidance. Understandably the families feel rage grief and loss however it’s not the role of the judiciary to impose a sentence or a punishment because of what families are feeling. Sentencing comes from guidelines and reports that are submitted.

How will this benefit the families if he is discreetly admitted to Broadmoor a few weeks later because he is un-manageable in prison?

Not rtft, but why is it attempted murder for the people he didn’t manage to kill but only manslaughter for the people he did?

How will this benefit the families if he is discreetly admitted to Broadmoor a few weeks later because he is un-manageable in prison?

Exactly right. Also, how is it fair, not only on the very ill man himself, but also on other prisoners and prison officers, to have a prisoner who is being housed in completely inappropriate conditions that are not optimised to treat or manage his illness, or safeguard the people around him.
Prisons are already chaotic, stressful, dangerous places that trigger, create and worsen the mental illnesses of very many inmates. Can you imagine the life of this man, and the people around him, in such an environment? Anyone who wants that should come out and admit that they are in favour of torture.

You’re assuming a verdict of guilt on a murder charge would automatically lead to prison. It wouldn’t. The outcome would have been precisely the same. Your equivalence with Sutcliffe is false because he hadn’t been diagnosed when he committed his crimes.

The families quite rightly want the correct charge on record. In any sane universe those three people were murdered. Not only should justice be done but it should be seen to be done.

At what point do you start locking people up though ? The police officer who was talking on the news last night said there had been no previous indication that he would commit murder. He had episodes of minor assaults on others. We can't go around locking up everyone with schizophrenia based on them possibly seriously attacking someone at some point can we?. I guess closer monitoring of medication taking etc is needed but short of forcibly watching someone take medications each day and monitoring them more closely, I'm not sure how this could have been prevented. I guess the wider inquiry will explore this. Please stop telling people to ' educate yourself'. We are trying to get a better understanding by listening to people posting who clearly have more insight.

In any sane universe those three people were murdered

No they weren't. They were unlawfully killed.

There is a wider issue here though. If you try people for murder when they commited manslaughter because it makes the public feel better you are setting a precedent then that crimes are not based purely on what someone has done and why but are also based on emotional feelings. That will impact other sentencing and ways people are charged and tried.

The justice system has to be impartial from this level of emotion.

@Babyroobs clearly have more insight?! I could not get closer to the illness if I tried unless I had it myself so don't be so rude.

Semantics. They were murdered.

No justice should not be seen to be done. justice is not a performative act of theatre for public and media consumption. The sentencing was a result of the expert witnesses who submitted forensic psychiatric reports. On the basis of this psychiatric evidence, the CPS concluded that there was no realistic prospect of conviction for murder, so accepted the pleas.

If he wasn't sent to prison there would be little point as that's what's wanted as well as the murderer label

Suttcliffe did have a diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia before offending

You are the one being rude.

Absolutely.
Well said.

This is a very valid point about care in the community. You can't just lock someone up because they have a diagnosis if they are deemed not to be a risk in assessment.

Although the system is still failing in that the level of monitoring someone needs who is this ill is very high and that often is not happening at even a basic level. My schizophrenic friend I used to know regularly stopped taking his medication and noone knew because he'd pick up a prescription until months later when he'd be standing in the street shouting about being Jesus. Happened over and over. He barely saw the community mental health team at times. Noone listened to his experience of how the medication affected him physically and tried to address it. That was 13 years ago. I imagine it's much worse now considering I can't even see my psychiatrist in person anymore since the pandemic.

But the soloution isn't just locking people away because they have a diagnosis either. This is a very tricky area of care tbh.

It’s murder to me.

A diagnosis alone isn't enough to get diminished responsibility. You would need to be considered to have been in active psychosis at the time of your crimes. Many people have managed paranoid schizophrenia and would be considered to have capacity if they commited certain crimes at certain times because their illness was managed at the time of committing the crime.

Do people who think this man should be sent to a normal prison think that other prisoners and prison staff who are not trained to deal with this level of illness should have to deal with and house someone this ill among them because society has emotions about it. So other prisoners and prison staff not have the right to be safe in prison? Because someone this ill in a regular prison where they can't get specialist treatment for their illness would not be a safe person

Yes I realise that - and the bar for diminished responsibility is pretty high for good reason

I was responding to another poster about the differences/similarities btwn Suttcliffe and this man

and? You were not privy to the information. you didn’t have to listen to the expert witnesses and you didn’t read the expert reports that were submitted. So actually you thinking something does not make it so

On the point of medication or long term live in facility it reminds me of a book where the development of medication first came about. Prior to that patients were in facilities for life, and it was hailed as such a break through to allow them to live outside them

Of course the issue is he didn’t take it, and how can you force someone. But it was created as a way out of what was seen as more extreme management

This thread is testimony to the horrible populism that is putting so many pressures on civilised society at the moment. Everything is meant to be about validating people's feelings, respecting "their truth". Even the rule of law is meant to roll over and abandon due process, evidence, objectivity.