Newton on alert after triple homicide (Warwick: price, bars, health)

[msRB311]

There was the woman in Duxbury who killed her 3 kids this past year. Also hard to imagine whether you're postpartum psychosis, bipolar or whatever. She is still in a mental hospital, but I wouldn't be surprised if she is let out at some point.

Both situations are awful but the 41 yr old guy doing this to 3 people in his neighborhood is just as scary if not more so. I hope I don't have any mentally ill neighbors that might lose their mind one night and come after me.

[simplexsimon]

Originally Posted by msRB311

There was the woman in Duxbury who killed her 3 kids this past year. Also hard to imagine whether you're postpartum psychosis, bipolar or whatever. She is still in a mental hospital, but I wouldn't be surprised if she is let out at some point.

Both situations are awful but the 41 yr old guy doing this to 3 people in his neighborhood is just as scary if not more so. I hope I don't have any mentally ill neighbors that might lose their mind one night and come after me.

Is there talk of the woman being set free?

[redplum33]

Originally Posted by simplexsimon

I agree that it's strange to say with certainty that the suspect(s) don't know the victims unless they're omitting information.

There are now rumors that he was already in custody on Sunday night.

Strange. All the reports through Monday said the suspect was still at large...and urging Newton residents to lock their doors and windows.

[Iced_Coffee]

Originally Posted by redplum33

There are now rumors that he was already in custody on Sunday night.

Strange. All the reports through Monday said the suspect was still at large...and urging Newton residents to lock their doors and windows.

I know several people from that area and I heard the same - that he was hospitalized Sunday night and the authorities essentially had him in "custody" at that time. Maybe technically they waited until he was treated/stabilized before placing him officially in custody or under arrest? Either way, it feels like the public was being told something that wasn't fully truthful.

I've also heard rumor that he DID in fact know the victims or at least had a connection to them. That they were the family of an ex-girlfriend. But I don't actually know any of this for certain, so take it with a massive grain of salt.

[msRB311]

Originally Posted by simplexsimon

Is there talk of the woman being set free?

She is to remain hospitalized for the next 6 months. No talk of her being released but she is in her early 30's. I'd be surprised if liberal MA didn't release her at some point. Even Andrea Yates in TX can leave if she'd like now but she has chosen to stay in the facility.

[htfdcolt]

Originally Posted by Iced_Coffee

I know several people from that area and I heard the same - that he was hospitalized Sunday night and the authorities essentially had him in "custody" at that time. Maybe technically they waited until he was treated/stabilized before placing him officially in custody or under arrest? Either way, it feels like the public was being told something that wasn't fully truthful.

I've also heard rumor that he DID in fact know the victims or at least had a connection to them. That they were the family of an ex-girlfriend. But I don't actually know any of this for certain, so take it with a massive grain of salt.

I guess it's human nature that we don't want to believe that such awful events are totally random.

[msRB311]

Originally Posted by htfdcolt

I guess it's human nature that we don't want to believe that such awful events are totally random.

They lived in the same neighborhood so my guess is it wasn't totally random. Maybe he had underlying hate towards these people for whatever reason. Maybe they once looked at him the wrong way and he assumed they're racist. I'm speculating but unfortunately race is often a factor in situations like this.

[lrfox]

Originally Posted by msRB311

She is to remain hospitalized for the next 6 months. No talk of her being released but she is in her early 30's. I'd be surprised if liberal MA didn't release her at some point. Even Andrea Yates in TX can leave if she'd like now but she has chosen to stay in the facility.

There's a litany of clinical criteria that influences those decisions and it's hard to know if she'd ever be able to meet all of it, but she'd also have to no longer be considered a threat to herself or others. Speculating - I can actually see a scenario where it's determined that her condition that lead to the murders was short-term (psychosis typically is), and was triggered by criteria that she's not likely to encounter again (birthing and caring for 3 kids). The crimes were not random, and she's paralyzed, so the risk to the public could be fairly limited. But that's hardly imminent and the likelihood that she's ever not a high risk for suicide is pretty low. So I wouldn't bet on her getting out any time soon.

The case in Newton appears completely random. It would be pretty hard for even the biggest advocate to convince anyone that he's not a threat to repeat something similar in the future. I think he's done forever, mental illness or not.

[msRB311]

Originally Posted by lrfox

There's a litany of clinical criteria that influences those decisions and it's hard to know if she'd ever be able to meet all of it, but she'd also have to no longer be considered a threat to herself or others. Speculating - I can actually see a scenario where it's determined that her condition that lead to the murders was short-term (psychosis typically is), and was triggered by criteria that she's not likely to encounter again (birthing and caring for 3 kids). The crimes were not random, and she's paralyzed, so the risk to the public could be fairly limited. But that's hardly imminent and the likelihood that she's ever not a high risk for suicide is pretty low. So I wouldn't bet on her getting out any time soon.

The case in Newton appears completely random. It would be pretty hard for even the biggest advocate to convince anyone that he's not a threat to repeat something similar in the future. I think he's done forever, mental illness or not.

My guess would be Lindsay Clancy is not a threat to society, wont kill again and had some mental blip that caused her to do what she did. However she killed 3 children so I would say she deserves to be punished. Just because someone isn't a threat doesn't mean they deserve freedom after taking the lives of 3 people.

The guy in Newton seems scary in that he took 3 random people's lives (not to mention elderly people) . He could easily do that again. Keep him locked up.

[lrfox]

Originally Posted by msRB311

My guess would be Lindsay Clancy is not a threat to society, wont kill again and had some mental blip that caused her to do what she did. However she killed 3 children so I would say she deserves to be punished. Just because someone isn't a threat doesn't mean they deserve freedom after taking the lives of 3 people.

The guy in Newton seems scary in that he took 3 random people's lives (not to mention elderly people) . He could easily do that again. Keep him locked up.

That's what's tough about this stuff. Personally, I think that if I killed the people I cared about the most in the world because of a momentary "mental blip," a lifetime of living with that (not to mention that I'd be publicly shunned for life) would be as bad or worse than any amount of time behind bars. Hard for me to call that "freedom." But there are a lot of people who feel like the only way someone can be punished is jail.