Is murder mental illness? Answering that question eventually leads to politics because there are different ways to answer and attend to murderous outcomes.
Watching excerpts of the Jodi Arias trial is about as gruesome and explicit as court television can get. The descriptions of the murder and the crisp reaction to recollections by Arias is astonishing at a minimum. As I watch the prosecutor drill the accused with her own misstatements, and as she appears cool and calculating while fallible in facts, it occurred to this viewer that she is mentally ill.
A sane person cannot shoot her lover and sex partner in the face, stab him 21 times, and cut his throat from ear to ear without being crazy. She admitted that she committed the crime, so what is the point of putting her through the court proceeding and making her dance through the legal process?
If Jodi Arias had been properly analyzed by a psychiatrist, would not the professional have declared the person mentally ill. Once that the condition is established, would not the court determine that she is unfit for trial?
Then, would not a psychiatrist seek to commit Jodi Arias to lifelong incarceration in a mental institution for the safety of society and for her own well being?
It seems to me that putting a murderer like Jodi Arias through this process is a waste of court resources. With insertion of the proper psychiatric evaluation, the criminally insane could be fast tracked to incarceration with proper medical treatment. The intent is not to relieve the criminally guilty of responsibility, but to free the system from being in the position of torturing the criminal with a process that consumes undue resources without adding value in the end.
More resources need to be applied to prevention, intervention, and treatment where the return on cost is greater.
Not all situations are alike. Not all criminally insane persons are alike. In the end, once they have committed murder or severe abuse, they must be removed from society so they cannot do that again and they can pay for damage they have inflicted.
As for the “death” penalty in such cases, if murderers are mentally ill, there can be no justification for compounding the crime with a death sentence.
"Jodi Arias Murder Trial Resumes With More Sexcapades
Posted: 02/05/2013 9:33 pm EST | Updated: 02/07/2013 12:51 am ESTJodi Arias' murder trial has featured a string of steamy revelations about her sex life with ex-boyfriend Travis Alexander, who was shot and stabbed in 2008. The lurid details continued to surface on Tuesday, day 14 of the trial -- the second day of Arias' testimony in her own defense.
Arias testified she met with Alexander in September 2006, at a California coffee shop in the weeks following their initial meeting in Nevada. During this California meeting, Arias said they retreated to her car, where things got heated.
Alexander was "horny," Arias testified, and wanted oral sex.
"I felt an attraction to him and the feeling was mutual and I wanted to, I just wanted to, I don't know. I wanted to do what he wanted to do," Arias said.
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Arias said after Alexander ejaculated, he pulled his pants up and they parted company."He refused to kiss me because he said it was gross ... maybe because I had been performing oral sex, but he kissed me on the cheek and then left," Arias testified.
Arias, a 32-year-old photographer, is accused of shooting Alexander in the face, stabbing him 27 times and slitting his throat from ear to ear in the shower of his Mesa, Ariz., apartment on June 4, 2008. She testified on Monday that Alexander "attacked me and I defended myself." Prosecutors allege she was a jealous and vengeful ex. New details have been released regularly during the trial, requiring The Huffington Post to revise the initial timeline of the case."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/05/jodi-arias-murder-trial-sexcapades_n_2626842.html
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