To question the jail sentence for the mum who stabbed her 4 year old?

[Liketochat1]

There's such a sad story of a mum who stabbed her 4 year old daughter in the news at the moment.www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/9510938/Nurse-who-stabbed-her-four-year-old-to-death-gets-12-years.html.
She looks like such a broken woman. She not only killed her daughter but also tried to kill herself leaving herself with some brain damage and confined to a wheel chair with other physical disabilities. At the time of the attack she was depressed and facing charges for malpractice and had been left by her partner that day.
She has just been sentenced to 12 years in jail. Do you think she should be jailed? I can't help help but feel she's suffered so much already. Am I unreasonable?

GhostShip its not about sympathy and its not about depression per se, its about the ability to judge and control your conduct at the critical time. She is not insane because the there is not a permanent / enduring problem with her ability to judge her actions etc. Diminished Responsibility applies where her state of mind at the time she performed the action was so abnormal that it affected her ability to judge and control her behaviour.

If that were the case most murderers could get off with 'diminished responsibility' because I doubt many people are in a normal state of mind when they murder someone.

Would you feel the same way if a male schizophrenic beat his wife to death?

'She may well have thought her daughter was dead. I sincere doubt she deliberately left her to suffer.'

She was a nurse! She would have known how to tell if someone is dead. The child had defensive wounds, and she still stabbed her and it took her hours to die. Then she changed her out of her bloody pajamas and put them by the washing machine and dressed her in clean ones.

She sent her partner a number of vindictive texts.

She could have stolen some morphine and medazolam from work if she didn't want the child to suffer. And she was found to be sane and answerable to the crime of manslaughter with diminished responsibility.

I agree, GhostShip.

ghostship I am with you on this one having suffered moderate/severe pnd after my first baby.
Plus your mother dealt with bereavement of her partner (bereavement of partner/parent/sibling/child is the most stressful thing anyone can endure)

Good post, Chaz

GhostShip it is really difficult to prove DR its a tough test. It is open for all people accused of murder to raise it as a defence but most don't because they will not meet the criteria. It actually quite difficult to demonstrate that you were so disturbed you incabable of exercising rational judgment or self control.

If the male schizophrenic met the criteria for DR then he should have his murder charge reduced.

did Fred and Rose west have diminished responsibility too? or Ian Brady? Peter Sutcliffe? You could say all people who murder are not in a normal mental state at the time its utter shit that people give you sympathy for brutally murdering a 4 year old on those grounds.

incapable not incabable...doh!

chaz I'm talking more about people here banging on about compassion and how we should feel it and show her sympathy. 'diminished responsibility' or not, it's wrong. And I refuse to show compassion.

MissPerception please stop posting as if you are speaking for me.

The taking of someone's life is inexcusable. I don't think anyone would disagree. That's why nobody gets away with it if found out. Nobody here is making an excuse for what this woman did.

However, I really don't think this situation can be compared to the likes of the Wests and Brady etc. Completely different.

Ghostship I've suffered with mental disorders my whole life - I've had so many kinds. Thankfully I've never wanted to kill my child. I've wanted to hurt myself though. I starved myself for years. As you know, mental illness can take many forms. Neither you nor I know the details of this case. I realize that. But I'm still able to feel compassion for this woman.
Her note to the child's father was apologetic, not vindictive. As far as I know even he thinks her sentence is too harsh
And please don't call me 'love'. It's rather patronising isn't it?!

Ian Brady has been judged insane which is why he is in Ashworth. IIRC Peter Sutcliffe was orginally deemed sane but later found to be insane which is why he was sent to Broadmoor. Fred West didn't face trial so that issue was never put before the court. Rose West was jailed for murder so she either didn't bother to raise DR or didn't meet the criteria.

I doubt FW or RW would have met the legal criteria for DR because they were fully aware of and in control of their actions at the time. Just because most of us will never murder someone doesn't mean that a murderers thought patterns are so abnormal at the time of the murder as to mean that the no longer understand or can no longer control what they do.

I apologise for the 'love'. I did it without thinking to be honest!

'Her note to the child's father was apologetic, not vindictive.'

Her texts to her ex-partner, who was not the child's biological father, were quite vindictive.

Ian Brady is in Ashworth because he has a very dangerous personality disorder which means he can never be released. I done my training there quite a few years ago now. Brady is not insane, read up on his diagnosis.

thebees
Ian Brady was declared criminally insane in 1985. From a medical perspective I assume you are correct, the legal definition is not quite the same.

He is a drain on tax payers hard earned cash yet I hope they keep him alive so he has to live with what he done. I love the fact that he wakes every day and his first thought is why he is in ashworth.
life is a way harsher sentence for people like him than the death penalty.
its a very emotionally charged topic when kids are involved. pedophiles, child killers etc rot in prison its the best place for them.

It is an awful case. I understand that anybody stabbing a child must be in a very strange and abnormal mental state. And I'm sure she will suffer every day with the knowledge of what she did, which is just terrible to imagine, that guilt.

However, I save my pity for the child, not the mother. I'm sorry if that makes me seem callous to you OP, but I feel that... the mother made her choices, somewhere along the line, to take her to that place.
She is responsible.
Her daughter was a completely innocent victim.

"She could have stolen some morphine and medazolam from work if she didn't want the child to suffer. And she was found to be sane and answerable to the crime of manslaughter with diminished responsibility. "

My thoughts too. Even if she was insane and thought the child must die, the sheer brutality of how she killed her DD says a lot about her cruel and heartless character. For this she can rot in hell as far as I'm concerned.

Some mentally ill killers I could have sympathy for, not this one.

Sorry, I don't know if this has already been discussed but did she say it was cruel to leave her with no money or no mummy? I have read both, on different websites. Thanks.

i think she did say that, which could suggest premeditation. can you have diminished responsibility if its premeditated or was that her reasoning after the fact?

No mummy, not a Londoner.