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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

Our justice system

70 replies

ShirleyShirleyShirley · 06/12/2020 04:15

I was reading about the devastating case of Emily Jones and in the comments on the news website people were discussing our justice system.

What are your thoughts? Do you think we’re ‘too soft’? Do you think it needs reform? What would you do to change it?

OP posts:

HerFlowersToLove · 06/12/2020 13:41

[quote lollipoprainbow]@HerFlowersToLove the mental health team who covered up that she had already tried to stab a 13 year old and knew she wasn't taking the correct medication yet deemed it perfectly acceptable to let her out unsupervised. Is that clear enough for you ??? [/quote]
Thank you for clarifying. Bearing in mind your post referred first to the supposed lack of media coverage, second to the incorrect point that the offender shouldn't have been here and only made a final oblique reference to 'being left to her own devices' it really wasn't clear.

Do you think suing the MH team would make any difference to a the family of a child who had been killed? I think I'd probably campaign for a national review of MH services. That might bring about more change than suing for damages from an already impoverished individual NHS Trust.

Autumnblooms · 06/12/2020 13:41

Awful case, just so sad.

I do wonder if she picked a 7 year old on purpose though- did no adults-man or women, walk past her whilst she was on the bench? All sounds deliberate to me.

People who kill children should face the death penalty, I’ll never change my option on that.

x2boys · 06/12/2020 13:50

Clearly you don't have any experience with people who are floridly psychotic@Autumnblooms ? She has a diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia,she was assessed by the team working with her at Ashworth ( I think ) as being actively psychotic , responding to auditory hallucinations ,why she was not given Depot medication rather than oral , particularly as she had a history of being non compliant with medication I don't know ,some people who are psychotic can and do ,do some dreadful things it's rare but it does happen ,and it's because they are unwell usually with no grasp on reality

gypsywater · 06/12/2020 13:51

Death penalty for someone mentally unwell?!?!?!?!

ItsAlwaysSunnyOnMN · 06/12/2020 13:52

There are failings in both our criminal justice system and mental health services (I am not relating this particular tragic case)

I think many people have an idea (that is supported by some in the media) that should someone who has been arrested and assessed to be mentally unwell that they have somehow tricked the system to get off with a lighter sentence

Our mh services are underfunded but regardless you can not monitor everyone who has a mh diagnosis unless they are in hospital constantly. These cases thankfully are very rare. Of course in an ideal world they wouldn’t happen but you can have the most supportive team around someone and this can still happen

ItsAlwaysSunnyOnMN · 06/12/2020 13:55

What about the cases when a member of the family has been attacked or killed (this is far more common)

When the perpetrator has believed they are the devil, of an alien, when they hear voices to tell them they must do so to protect everyone else in the family

The death penalty for being severely unwell ?

Autumnblooms · 06/12/2020 13:56

In a open park on Mother’s Day your telling me that this 7 year old girl was the first person to go past her whilst she was on the bench?
Doubt it. You cross people even at the entrance of parks normally.

She picked this girl because a child is small and not that strong.

Autumnblooms · 06/12/2020 13:58

No, not for being unwell, but to kill a child.

yellowcatss · 06/12/2020 13:59

yes we have a british injustice system and as a rule you can double the sentences given out and make them serve the full length also if you go to prison you should pay more in tax to pay it of and be banned from all forms of benefit!

SchrodingersImmigrant · 06/12/2020 14:03

@Autumnblooms

No, not for being unwell, but to kill a child.

But how do you differentiate between whether it was her ilness causing the whole thing or whether it caused only the killing but it didn't influenece the "choice" of the victim? You can't. Because it's all affected. There is some reason why the victim was that particular child but that reason was most likely conjured up or at the very least influrnced by the ilness.

So yes, in effect you say that even ill people should be put to death IF they kill a child. At lest that's how it sounds, I might have gotten it wrong.

gypsywater · 06/12/2020 14:05

Well obviously not FOR being mentally unwell
But to advocate for the death penalty for a person who killed someone due to being so mentally unwell?! Jesus wept.

SchrodingersImmigrant · 06/12/2020 14:08

Just to add, there is some reasoning sometimes which may sound normal to us, but we must remember there is the ilness driving it. Like in the case I mentioned, the woman said she picked someone who looked like her step mother. Sounds like clear mind, doesn't it? But it really wasn't. Along that though she also thought about, for example, wanting to cut someone open and eat their organs...

Some ilnesses are just that evil in making it look like the person was in control. In reality, they weren't.

ItsAlwaysSunnyOnMN · 06/12/2020 14:08

Autumnblooms

Was that what came up in the trial the reason you give ?

gypsywater · 06/12/2020 14:11

Also worth remembering - severe psychosis can hit anyone, at any time of their lives. Be careful what you wish for.

Autumnblooms · 06/12/2020 14:22

I don’t understand the question sunny, but if your asking what I think you are then yes, in one of the news articles it says she told the nurse she picked her victim.

ItsAlwaysSunnyOnMN · 06/12/2020 14:25

Does it also mention that she was unwell ?

SchrodingersImmigrant · 06/12/2020 14:27

@Autumnblooms

I don’t understand the question sunny, but if your asking what I think you are then yes, in one of the news articles it says she told the nurse she picked her victim.

She was off her meds. The victim "picking process" just isn't a same in person with such severe illness like it would be in you or me with clear minds. She also may have lied. We will never know be I don't think she knows herself what it was and why.

x2boys · 06/12/2020 14:33

She might have told her nurse that she picked her victim. ,but when someone is acutely psychotic ,they can say and do things that don't make sense to others ,who knows why she picked Emily ,in her mind it might have made sense ,but she wasn't in control of her actions due to being unwell.

x2boys · 06/12/2020 14:37

When i was a mental health nurse there was a patient who was convinced he had a wiife called Dawn and two kiddie's,he had never been married or had children that's the thing about psychosis ,it's very real to the person with it even though it's not the truth .

ItsAlwaysSunnyOnMN · 06/12/2020 14:56

I’ve worked with people who have committed terrible violent acts while they have been psychotic

Some continue to be very very challenging to work with, aggressive, hostile unpredictable

Regardless I’m always thankful no matter what I do not live in their head it’s a frightening awful place to be it’s a living hell for many who are extremely unwell even with medication (that comes with a whole loads of side effects)

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