Guilty verdict in Brianna Ghey case

[RoyalCorgi]

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/dec/20/brianna-ghey-found-guilty-murder

Not a surprise - it felt very clear-cut.

I've got mixed feelings on this. Some of it almost feels like victim blaming, like someone is saying that the huge amounts of time Brianna spent on line contributed to the murder somehow, something I instinctively hate the idea of, even though I think I read [forgive me if this isn't true] that Brianna possibly used social media to find out how to get synthetic hormones in her mid teens and to teach others how to do the same, something which I'd consider to be harmful.

At the risk of stating the blindingly obvious, there's a very clear dividing line between 'social media' and snuff/dark web type content which influenced one or both of the killers. I would be in favour of hard steps taken against the latter. I think there's a fair public interest case for the tech companies to block the onion/TOR browsers or whatever it is that you need to use those.

I think simple limits on screentime of all types can be a useful tool. They're relatively easy for parents to set up.

Re: Eddie's dad - scumbag. It's not difficult to imagine what his parenting style might have been like.

The whole thing is horrifying isn’t it? This man is a serial sex offender and has probably only been convicted for a fraction of his behaviour. If those girls hadn’t had the wherewithal to take the photograph and the bravery to report him these behaviours would never have resulted in a conviction and how then can a risk assessment even take place. The idea that some unsuspecting parent might send their daughter to this man’s house is nauseating.

Same, they turned on Esther so quickly once she started talking about the dangerous of unfettered Internet access and they realised Esther wasn't just talking about the murderers but also what Brianna was accessing

I imagine most on here would share many of Esther's concerns

What she has been saying is so important. How brave she has been to stand up for this in the middle of her own grief. It is dreadful if she has been attacked for it. I did not realise that.

Esther's focus seems to be on websites that encouraged self-harm. Brianna had been accessing those, and was influenced by them.

I thought her process was that it was because the kids who murdered her child had been watching things and learning things from the dark web ?

It's both. She could see the effect the internet had on her child and the effect it had on her child's killers.

Do you have next weeks lottery numbers, by any chance?

And anorexia sites, I think.

There may have been any number of harmful sites she was seeing at the same time as things of help and interest.

Ha ha, it's only because my DH and I had recently been talking about how invested TRAs are in separating children emotionally from their families. I'd recently seen a Tweet referencing the role of TRAs in challenging the child parent relationship and essentially saying that parents parenting their child (in terms of controlling who they associate with online) is a form of child abuse. I found this tweet so chilling that it was the first thing I thought of when EG started going on about restrictions on children's internet access.
They must be fuming.

I see Esther had a zoom call with the prime minister yesterday, so she’s presumably not particularly offended by Sunak’s jibe at Keir Starmer the other week? Or is able to put her feelings aside in order to build a productive relationship…

https://www.itv.com/news/2024-02-29/esther-ghey-meets-with-pm-about-school-mindfulness-and-online-safety

Eddie Ratcliffe to appeal against sentence

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-68502696

I wonder did the judge already know about Eddie's father's crimes against children at the time of sentencing?

Yes, there was a media injunction to prevent them reporting on the father whilst the son's trial and sentencing were taking place.

This also meant that media outlets portrayed his family as a decent family and he a straight-A pupil who turned evil.

I don’t understand this. Did the press not know about the previous convictions? Or did they know and decide to portray a sex offender as a fine upstanding citizen regardless?

As DeanElderberry asked, would the judge have known?

Would it have made a difference? You can't take the father's crimes into account while sentencing the son. The only difference I can think of is if his barrister had tried to say Eddie had been a victim of his father and tried to use that as mitigation.

If the idea that he was from a ‘good’ family - yet still transgressed in this horrific way - was supposed to have a bearing on his sentence, then conversely, perhaps if this was clearly not the case but the opposite, I was wondering about possible mitigation in the form of an order for some sort of psychological intervention or specialist treatment in prison.

I find it hard to think that he wasn't a victim - maybe not the direct recipient of sexual abuse or violence, but witness to a father for whom both were a constant. It has clearly left him disturbed and, at least at present, dangerous, but with proper treatment, maybe he is still young enough to be helped back.

I see what you mean. I always thought the 'from a good family' stuff was a bit thin, given they bought a hunting knife for a child as a holiday present. I've got a 15 year old and I'd be horrified if one of their friends parents let them have that.

Quite.

The press always know a lot more than they are allowed to print. I've seen similar about celebrities and their various scandals that are under injunctions.

The media had a particular slant, in this case it was the dark web that made him do it. It then becomes easier to whip up a moral panic over what the dark web could do to other "normal" children. It's the same-old Biblical trope of good people being seduced by the devil (whether it is in the form of video nasties, video games, music etc) to do evil things.

Trans activists have tried desperately to label gender critical views as the devil, and that normal people turn evil because they heard biological facts such as women not having penises.

It's not such a lurid tabloid story if you hear that a child comes from a bad home with a father having a string of sexual offences, particularly as it no longer becomes a relatable story for the majority of people.

At some point people have to take responsibility for their own actions. There are plenty of people who have also come from traumatic backgrounds, they didn't go and kill someone for fun.

Hearing about his background provides context, but should not be used as an excuse.

Yes, we know that but the context was not reported at the time, we don’t know if the judge knew, and were wondering about that.

In the interests of knowing about the causes of crime, it is always worth knowing as much of what went on before in the criminal’s life as possible. There are plenty of people from traumatic backgrounds who don’t commit terrible crimes; but nevertheless, in a great many cases people who commit crimes have come from adverse family backgrounds.

In the interests of preventing future crime it is worth trying to rehabilitate people incarcerated when they are still young as far as possible.

If the judge had known more about this killer’s background, maybe the judge might have asked for special psychological attention for the criminal while they are in prison. (Maybe he has.)

This young criminal will be out one day, so this is not about altruism or excusing a horrendous murder.