James Holmes Verdict was a foregone conclusion

[Hyperthetic]

Originally Posted by Perryview22

That sounds like judicial activism to me. That is very dark and evil. My god, this is a death penalty case.

Judges don't always act individually as most folks think they do.

They too, "hear voices", and obey them.

[I_Like_Spam]

It wasn't a "foregone" conclusion, as you really don't know the minds of the jury until they come back with the verdict.

John W. Hinkley was found innocent years ago, in spite of overwhelming evidence.

[Hyperthetic]

Originally Posted by I_Like_Spam

It wasn't a "foregone" conclusion, as you really don't know the minds of the jury until they come back with the verdict.

John W. Hinkley was found innocent years ago, in spite of overwhelming evidence.

Hinkley was "connected".

Many think that Holmes, too, is "connected", but not in the same way.

[natalie469]

Originally Posted by Perryview22

I did not see any possibility that a jury was intellectually capable of finding James Holmes as not guilty by reason of insanity. Psychosis is just too confounding for most people to understand. What is clearly evident psycotic, schizophrenia spectrum behavior to the trained eye is not so obvious the most folks, regardless of how intelligent they are.

I expected the guilty verdict, even though I firmly disagree with it - based on my comprehension of schizophrenia and psychosis. What does shock me, however, is that the judge engaged in certain conduct that I consider to be reprehensible.

Judge Carlos Samour actually read the names of the victims to the jury at the time instructions were given to them. That is an inflamatory act that was bound to telescope to the jury the judge's own bias in the matter. If in fact, the accused is so seriously mentally ill that they are deemed to be unculpable for their actions, then the number of the victims, and the horror of the injuries inflicted upon them is not supposed to be the pivotal issue. It would be as if to say...as an arbitrary dictate or statute, that a person cannot be found insane if the number of victims exceeds a specified number, or that the degree of carnage exceeded what our passions can tolerate. So we might expect a medical diagnostic manual to instruct a medical doctor consulting in such a case to base a diagnosis of psychotic illness of a certain severity based on the number of people that were killed and how vilently they were killed- not actual medical symptoms (which in psychosis is predominantly behavioral)

We might just have juries of lay people serving as arbitrators in situations where a second opinion is needed for a complex diagnosis. Why don't I just go to a jury for a second opinion on my cardiologists's diagnosis of heart disease. Schizophrenia spectrum is a far more confounding and complex disease process than heart disease, yet we find juries totally ignoring the testimony of medical doctors - or serving as arbitrators to break a "tie" between competing opinions (with one side in this case likely having a vested interest, i.e. an agenda that is hostile to the insanity defense). That is simply bizarre and illogical.

Another thing that I question is if the instruction to the jurors to avoid media coverage of the case might have been construed as walling themselves off from information about pschizophrenia. Those jurors could not be expected to become educated about a disease so perplexing and complex by sitting in a courtroom. Perhaps the justice system doesn't care if a juror understands schizophrenia. The judge is not expected to understand it, the prosecutors are not expected to understand it... In fact it seems that the law wants these people to remain blissfully ignorant so that they will not be diswayed from going after the gravely sick person with a vengence and trying to put them in prison or to death.

So society's position on mental illness is "Ignorance is bliss".

I hear what you are saying, but this was premeditated so it's hard for people to understand.

[MJJersey]

I do have some sympathy for people who kill during an episode of psychosis and honestly cannot tell the difference between right and wrong, and I think that there is a stigma in society against the insanity defense as being a "cop out" even in the most legitimate cases. But from what I have seen of this case, it was not one of them. Holmes was obsessed with murder from a young age; he wanted to kill people and he knew it was wrong. He did not, for example, kill another person because believed his innocent victim to be a CIA agent trying to kill him first. Here, Holmes wanted to kill people, a lot of people, and he wanted to get away with it. Was he mentally ill? Probably, but that is not a legal excuse for murder.