Do you think Robert Thompson is truly rehabilitated?

[Cheffymcchef]

As we all know, James Bulger was a two-year-old boy from the UK whose tragic abduction and murder in 1993 shocked the world. Taken from a shopping center by two ten-year-old boys, John Venables and Robert Thompson, his death became one of the most harrowing and widely known cases in modern British history. To this day, nearly everyone who hears his name knows the heartbreaking story and the profound impact it had on public consciousness and the justice system.
both boys were released after serving 8 years, when they turned eighteen. John Venables returned to prison twice for possessing CSAM. He is currently still in prison.
I personally think Venables is sick and can’t be “cured” of his attraction to kids. He will always reoffend imo, even if his devices etc are taken away. He needs to stay in prison. He’s also allegedly revealed his identity and needed several new identities costing the taxpayer even more. I know you get all this “stop it now” therapy- I just don’t think pedophiles can be cured. It’s like trying to do conversion therapy on a straight person.
I don’t know how I feel about Thompson- he committed a heinous murder, but did his time in custody. He’s never reoffended and now allegedly lives with a partner who knows who he is. Can’t remember if he has children. From studying this case, it always seems like he was deemed the ring leader, yet he is the one who has cleaned himself up and stayed out of trouble.
both boys allegedly came from abusive households.
I know poor James' mum will never get over his death. I cant imagine the mixed feelings she must have, she likely thinks it was wrong for either boy to be released so young.
I can’t say I’d be too thrilled about Thompson moving into my area if that’s the case, but truthfully I think if he’s done his time he needs to be left alone now to live his life . But that’s probably a wildly unpopular opinion- because James will never get to live his life.
what do you think?

posted in crime but moved here for traffic

I’ve replied to 3 different people who said this. Please read the thread before saying this yet again. It will not let me edit the thread now.

I forgot to add the quote to my post ,also i made the error of calling him Jamie instead of James.

How do you know he is dating a guy though?

The secure children’s home that Thomson was in spoke about this. They said when Thompson was asked by staff or other kids in the home about James Bulger, he would reply ‘It was something that happened and I don’t want to talk about it’.

So he was able to detach himself from the events to an extent.

How do you know so much and with such certainty @Cheffymcchef?

Rather than assuming I wrote it as a lack of respect. I made a mistake.

Let's be honest, if someone was truely rehabilitated and then had the cognitive function and normal range of human emotion, they wouldn't be able to live with themselves and we would frightened of their own actions if they truely understood them.

It is well known that he is now in a relationship with a man who knows who he is.

Like I said I have only read your first post, and was actually appalled at your ignorant start to this.

I think majority would still support their child in custody…. Not forgive. But it’s still your child, even if an adult

I also think many parents blame themselves and look at their own parenting to see where they may have gone wrong

this is based on my personal experiences

I don't believe that any 10 yo, brought up in those circumstances, truly understands the difference.

I'm sure they could say that killing someone is bad and being kind is good, like any 3 yo can, and the same way that we all know some things are bad but still do them, because they aren't really bad, after all, everyone we know does them sometimes. Their bar for "normal" levels of bad was way off.

I think it is fine to discuss things - gosh I had many battles on the Lucy Letby thread lol

However something just seems a bit off about this one but I can’t put my finger on why

The rest I have wrote in my OP is public knowledge most people who know this case will know

A lot of this has been reported extensively in the media. @Cheffymcchef hasn’t said anything that’s not been in the press.

I think the OPs getting a hard time over what is a very emotive and galling case, in spite of it age.

Lots of people have interest in true crime and the psychology behind killers. Look at the success of Netflix docs about Bundy, Dahmer, Chris Watts. There’s a keen interest from millions.

I personally don’t understand why people post on MN about the royal family and analyse every facet of their being. “It’s Catherine who does bedtimes, I bet. She has a gentle nature and I think she’ll be calming for the children, but with George being older, I suspect it’s just a ‘goodnight’ and away. Louis might need a few stories before he goes down”.

That, to me, is odd. However, people can talk about that if they want. I just scroll past that topic, knowing that some people like it.

If crime, psychology, debate etc aren’t for you, then that’s fine too. No big deal.

This is very true. If you had comprehension and guilt surrounding this crime, I’m not sure how you could go living what we call a normal life.

So a thread about Lucy letby is allowed, but not these killers? Why? Is it because they were children?

are the continuous Madeleine McCann threads after the recent news allowed or not?

if people don’t want to be on this thread to discuss a true crime case, they are not being forced

I nearly did my dissertation on child-on-child murder and read a lot of books about them before changing my mind. If I remember rightly Venables had been on a waiting list for MH support for a while before the murder.

Thanks. I really don’t understand why people come on these threads only to complain about them. Too much time on their hands.

I hope so and also hope he wasn't sexually abused in his unit as the other boy was. However I feel his release should be kept strictly under wraps, it does none of us any good to know and we've had enough of hate figures in the media.

This thread is next level weird. Some people are very invested in the details of other people’s tragedies.

I can’t believe how many people are giving it oxygen. I’m simply here waiting to have my faith in humanity restored by calling out the crazy. Luckily one other person seems to see this the same way.

You need to stop saying this is on a true crime forum, it’s Mumsnet chat 🤣

Those on here that would support their child if they did the same, but equally don’t want Thompson to live a life, are hypocrites to the highest degree.

People on this thread are practically salivating over the way this child died by recounting the details over and over and over.

Nobody needs to say that what these children did wasn’t wrong, or the fact that they were children excused or explained their behaviour.

But they were ten year old children.

On here we see countless threads about how “my 14 year old is having sex/my 13 year old has had a drink/my 22 year old has done something stupid. And every single time* people say how they’re too young to comprehend/consent/know what they’re doing. Even down to the fact that society seems to have decided that brains don’t mature now until about 25, a nice way to let adults away with God-knows-what.

And yet because it was a murder, the fact these children were ten is seemingly irrelevant.

You can’t have it both ways. Either a child is too young to do x/y/z or they’re not. You don’t get to pick and choose based on what they did.

No ten year old who kills a child is normal. No child wakes up one morning and thinks “I know, I’ll go out and abduct a toddler and murder him.” There will have been multiple facts which were missed before any of this happened. IIRC the older brother of one of them begged to be taken into foster care.

They weren’t legally old enough to be tried so the law was changed in order to satisfy the baying mob.

They were children but instead they were tried as adults. Even though they weren’t released for another eight years, once they became adults.

They weren’t old enough to vote, have sex, drive a car, drink legally, but society saw fit to see them as adults not because they were, but because society needed to satisfy their lust for revenge.

If a child is older enough to be tried as an adult for a crime then they’re old enough to drive a car, vote, have sex. there is literally no reason why not other than that it’s not what society wants.

Except we all know that’s not true.

She didn’t say this is a true crime forum 🙄

I never said it was a TC forum. I posted IN the TC forum, there is no traffic, someone suggested I move it here. There is absolutely no obligation for you to be here if it’s triggering you.