Kenny MacAskill and his decision

[campbell]

At the end of the day, it is sooo hard to be objective and sure in all this because not one of us really has access to ANY facts. Do we.

It makes what Tut said recently ring really true. Once upon a time, people had respect for the law (/the Police) in that transgressions were met with a stern ticking off, and in many cases were not repeated because the blighters were truly afraid as a result, and knew "justice would be served". But in our now oh-so-human-righteous world (perhaps necessitated by the frenzied immediacy of media coverage / channels to market these days), the sense of true justice seems to have diminished. As has the sense of fear of true punishment for any wrongdoing..."I'll get off on appeal" etc.

Bah.

[campbell]

Er, Greg...

1. I felt a pang of shame to be Scottish but did not vote in the crackpots in question, actually. As it happens I wore black on the day a Scottish Parliament was approved. Steady on how you generalise

2. As per my post just above, the effect of the amount of time left "outside" is of no consequence, it's about the message this all sends to would be bombers. "I might get jailed but I'll get back to my family before I keel over because my med condition will see me through, those Scots lot are a bunch of weaklings".

[GregR]

Why should it be fear of punishment that stops people breaking the law? What ever happened to obeying the law/moral code (i.e. all things that are illegal aren't necessary imoral ) as it was the right thing to do? Its perhaps that change in attitude, rather than the different way we treat offenders that is to blame.

Another interesting one to throw out there, is prison to punish, or to rehabilitate?

[renmure]

Am I correct in saying that the people that say it was a good decision believe that he was innocent, Kenny MacAskill knew that, hence his decision?

Personally, I don't know if you can catagorise it as a good or bad decision. It was a compassionate decision and you either think they are good or bad. I have no doubt that there will be a large number of prisoners released under the same scheme each year who go well under the public radar. If they are foreign nationals then deportation back to their home country is part of that same process.

Put to one side the nature of the crime, the did he/didn't he aspect, the conspiracy aspect. Start from the basis that the guy was tried and found guilty and was rightly serving a life sentence. He has a terminal illness with a prognosis of 3 months, he falls within the catagory of release in compassionate grounds and (on the face of it) a decision was made on that basis. I don't know if it is one I would have made but it is one I can accept being made.

[kenny]

I think it's impossible to discuss it without questioning whether he is guilty or not.

Touching on what the donkey said, I had heard it mentioned that a 2nd appeal was due to hear evidence not allowed or supressed in the original trial and that in all likelyhood he was going to be found not guilty ensuring much embarrasment for the justice system.
That all might sound as if I require a tin foil hat, but I also used to for friendly witha lawyer who worked on the trial and she said there was absolutely stacks of evidence that couldn't be used in the trial due to various technicalities.


Whatever, I also believe this is the SNP trying to flex their political wings. Wee show to westminster and anyone else that they are not going to bend over for the US or anyone else. Some political gesturing on the world stage, personally I am not sure this was a wise move for the SNP.

If he was guilty, then he shouldn't have been released although I won't lose any sleep over it. He'll shortly die in a Libyan hospital rather than a prison hospital, I don't imagine either is going to be a pleasant experience.

[campbell]

Why should it be fear of punishment that stops people breaking the law? What ever happened to obeying the law/moral code (i.e. all things that are illegal aren't necessary illegal ) as it was the right thing to do? Its perhaps that change in attitude, rather than the different way we treat offenders that is to blame.

Another interesting one to throw out there, is prison to punish, or to rehabilitate?

For obeying moral code all we have left is good parenting and schooling. Good parenting is off down the toilet from what I can tell (though there may be a renaissance coming there), and whilst schooling does its best, the neutering of teachers to be unable to dish out ANY sort of realistic discipline in a classroom renders the social responsibility side of schooling very weak these days IMHO.

As for prison. I was always brought up to understand it was to punish. Hence sh!t scared of landing up there. Had I believed it was to rehabilitate, I may be excited to get there in order to improve my sorry lot and hence become a dab hand at offending in my efforts to land a term.

Flippant maybe but there you go.

[tut]

It does not actually bother me too much that he has been released as long as he very close to death. However I am watching the News live now and he is being acclaimed as a hero in Libya. I know how I would feel if one of my family had been on that flight.

Listening to MacAskill churning out his compassion speech just disgusted me. As I said, I believe in Capital Punishment, in the old days they sometimes got it wrong, but nowadays that is extremely unlikely. If it were still in place we would not be having this discussion, the Country would be a safer place, ie they could never be let out to commit again, and it would cost us the price of a few feet of rope as opposed to multi millions.

tut

[meatball]

Its a nosense for McAskill, in a quasi-judicial role to have made the decision political. I have precious little respect for him nor his administration, so all of the 'ashamed to be Scottish' twaddelers can give yourselves a big pat on the back, as if you're so small minded to think that after today's decision you're small minded enough to have voted them in in the first place.

I cannot actually believe that you posted that.

[Lazydonkey]

As I said, I believe in Capital Punishment, in the old days they sometimes got it wrong, but nowadays that is extremely unlikely. If it were still in place we would not be having this discussion, the Country would be a safer place, ie they could never be let out to commit again, and it would cost us the price of a few feet of rope as opposed to multi millions

Strangely i feel it is more likely that we will get it wrong now, such is the importance placed on scientific evidence such as DNA or high tech tools such as lasers, gatso etc. The arguments dragged out in favour of such devices (if you've nothing to fear, the computer is never wrong etc etc) sound strangely similar to those trotted out when fingerprinting was the darling of the prosecutor.

[meatball]

Another interesting one to throw out there, is prison to punish, or to rehabilitate?

Both

[Lazydonkey]

As an aside someone on another forum pointed out....

The fact that the families are reasonably equally split (interestingly split is geographical as well) is profound.

The americans are calling for heads on stakes, but on the whole the Uk based relatives are remarkable calm and unemotional about it.

[GregR]

As I said, I believe in Capital Punishment, in the old days they sometimes got it wrong, but nowadays that is extremely unlikely. If it were still in place we would not be having this discussion, the Country would be a safer place, ie they could never be let out to commit again, and it would cost us the price of a few feet of rope as opposed to multi millions

Strangely i feel it is more likely that we will get it wrong now, such is the importance placed on scientific evidence such as DNA or high tech tools such as lasers, gatso etc. The arguments dragged out in favour of such devices (if you've nothing to fear, the computer is never wrong etc etc) sound strangely similar to those trotted out when fingerprinting was the darling of the prosecutor.

I give you sir the post-of-the-day coconut

[D50]

All I can say is that the victims did not get to die with their families.....why should he, guilty or not - all we can go on is what we have been told and if he IS guilty, then why should he be allowed home to die with his family when the victims died in such terrible circumstances.

my heart goes out today to all the victims families - NOT Magrahi

D50

[meatball]

As I said, I believe in Capital Punishment, in the old days they sometimes got it wrong, but nowadays that is extremely unlikely. If it were still in place we would not be having this discussion, the Country would be a safer place, ie they could never be let out to commit again, and it would cost us the price of a few feet of rope as opposed to multi millions

Strangely i feel it is more likely that we will get it wrong now, such is the importance placed on scientific evidence such as DNA or high tech tools such as lasers, gatso etc. The arguments dragged out in favour of such devices (if you've nothing to fear, the computer is never wrong etc etc) sound strangely similar to those trotted out when fingerprinting was the darling of the prosecutor.

I give you sir the post-of-the-day coconut

So forensics are more likely to lead to an innocent person being convicted?
The foreign secretary was involved in this big conspiracy.
MacAskill let him go to correct a wrongful conviction
.....and Greg applauds you!

[pete]

Another interesting one to throw out there, is prison to punish, or to rehabilitate?

Both

Yes both but also rehabilitate (def: To restore or repair, to make habitable again; To rescue from a state of decadence or decrepitude) has another more philosophical point.

One is sent to prison for punishment, ie to show society that there is a price to pay for wrong doing.
One is also sent to prison not for rehabilitation, that is a means to an end. The end is to ensure the crime is not repeated. We (society) elect to remove you from said society to ensure the crime is not repeated. With a certain criminal (psychopaths) this can not be achieved, so they are locked away indefinitely. Others are taught the errors of their ways and relesed - no longer a threat.
Political prisoners are similar to psychopaths (in this sense), the causes of their crimes may not rely on themchanging but on society itself changing until their actions are considered acceptable or justifiable.

In this case the crime will not be repeated so can he not be said to be fully rehabilitated?

What would be achieved by keeping him in prison? Right wing Christian, Old Testament style retribution???

Please, we're bigger than that. He's been punished, no-one is going to see his release as an encouragement to commit similar rimes, that incentive lies elsewhere.
Why not take the high ground and simply say
"He's been punished. He is rehabilitated. Send him home to die."

I didn't know what I thought until I started writing (no surprise there).

Send him home.