Mentally ill Briton could be executed on Tuesday

[Rat]

Personally, if I don't see pictures of the tumours, and preferably hear the accompanying cries and see the medication roster, then I think he's guilty.

 

[Drudgewire]

Here's something new. Don't know the details behind this diagnosis however:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8433704.stm

Best I can tell from googling, a "consultant forensic psychologist" is basically a profiler. Can't swear to it, but I'd willing to bet that diagnosis was made without ever so much as a face-to-face meeting. And considering it comes from an advocacy group, China's still not lying when they say he had no history of mental illness.

 

[I Ratant]

So due to his manic depression/bipolar disorder, he was optimistic about not getting caught trafficking 4kg of heroin into China?
Drug smugglers around the world are, by their very nature, "optimistic" about not getting caught.

Are they all "overly optimistic" too and therefore could be considered mentally ill?

What makes him special?

.
He could apparently navigate to and around China without a "caregiver", which pretty much demonstrates an awareness of society and its rules and methods.
Pleading some sort of retardation due to a diagnosis of bi-polarity has little weight compared to what he had shown himself capable of doing.
The decision to smuggle was his.
Tough for him.
Possibly a retardant to other adventurers trying to play fast and loose with the unsympathetic Chinese.
Did he rat out his sources? Getting to those is something worth doing.

 

[Alt+F4]

Personally, if I don't see pictures of the tumours, and preferably hear the accompanying cries and see the medication roster, then I think he's guilty.

Good for you.

 

[shuize]

Perhaps his widely reported execution will serve as a lesson to other British drug traffickers to reconsider. If so, that's one step closer to his (wacky) goal of world peace through rabbit song.

Of course, to admit that, his supporters would also have to admit the death penalty does in fact have a deterrent effect.

In a way, in publicizing news of his sentence far and wide anti-death penalty advocates were actually doing the work of the Chinese government for them.

Clever people the Chinese.

 

[Alt+F4]

My God, can it get any more tasteless? Hovering over a cancer victim complaining that he isn't dying quickly enough?

He was only diagnosed in September 2008.

Rolfe.

I'm hovering over no one. I doubt Mr. al-Mergrahi reads the posts on this forum or cares about my opinion. He is a convicted mass murderer. He was granted a compassionate release based on the fact that "medical experts" said he had less than three months to live in July 2009. He has lived for almost six months beyond this.

What am I posting that is incorrect?

 

[Soapy Sam]

I see the man's family is making much of his apparent mental illness.
While they may have a case, I can't help feeling they might have done more to keep him out of this mess by keeping an eye on the man before he got himself in trouble.

 

[Darth Rotor]

I see the man's family is making much of his apparent mental illness.
While they may have a case, I can't help feeling they might have done more to keep him out of this mess by keeping an eye on the man before he got himself in trouble.

Ya think? But where's the drama in that?

 

[Rolfe]

I'm hovering over no one. I doubt Mr. al-Mergrahi reads the posts on this forum or cares about my opinion. He is a convicted mass murderer. He was granted a compassionate release based on the fact that "medical experts" said he had less than three months to live in July 2009. He has lived for almost six months beyond this.

What am I posting that is incorrect?

He was released on 20th August, with the three-month prognosis. That, being pedantic, would have taken us to 20th November. So, just over a month beyond the prognosis so far.

Since when was predicting the exact date of death of a terminally ill person an exact science? Ronnie Biggs was released a few weeks before Megrahi under exactly the same legislation, and he isn't dead yet either.

Now if it were to transpire that he wasn't terminally ill after all (like the guy who pretended to have Alzheimer's to get out of jail) then I'd agree with you. But carrying on about a few weeks here or there at the very end of anyone's life seems merely ghoulish.

Rolfe.

 

[Alt+F4]

He was released on 20th August, with the three-month prognosis. That, being pedantic, would have taken us to 20th November. So, just over a month beyond the prognosis so far.

Come on now Rolfe. You know August 20th was not the date the three month prognosis was made. That was determined weeks or maybe a month earlier by "medical experts".

Since when was predicting the exact date of death of a terminally ill person an exact science?

It's not, that why a compassionate release based on a 3-month life span should not have been done in this case.

But carrying on about a few weeks here or there at the very end of anyone's life seems merely ghoulish.

Then why wasn't he given a compassionate release in 2008 when his cancer was determined to be terminal? It was the Scottish government that ghoulishly determined that he would live only three more months and felt that was an appropriate life span for a compassionate release.

 

[Rolfe]

I note you left out the bit about Ronnie Biggs. He's been alive post-compassionate-release longer than Megrahi has, and by all accounts he's in better nick.

It happens. So what?

Rolfe.

 

[Alt+F4]

I note you left out the bit about Ronnie Biggs. He's been alive post-compassoinate-release longer than Megrahi has, and by all accounts he's in better nick.

It happens. So what?

Rolfe.

What the difference between Biggs and al-Mergrahi? I can think of 270 differences.

And no, I don't think Ronnie Biggs should have gotten a compassionate release either.

 

[Rolfe]

Since compassionate release does not take account of the gravity of the crime the prisoner has been convicted of, frankly that's neither here nor there.

Rolfe.

 

[The Atheist]

I won't resurrect the other thread as this one's still alive, but it seems to me that the very worst thing was Brown making a fuss about the death penalty.

If the family had appealed directly to the government, there may have been some point, but with China's stroppy new attitude - seemingly born out of the asset bubble crash - Gordon Brown becoming involved was a seal on the penalty. China is determined to be seen standing up to international pressure, and just like the dead Buddhists, Uighurs, Burmese and many, many others, nobody's about to risk the Sino chequebook by trying to stop them committing atrocities.

 

[commandlinegamer]

Breaking news:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20091231/wl_asia_afp/chinadrugscrime

 

[Alt+F4]

If the family had appealed directly to the government, there may have been some point, but with China's stroppy new attitude - seemingly born out of the asset bubble crash - Gordon Brown becoming involved was a seal on the penalty. China is determined to be seen standing up to international pressure, and just like the dead Buddhists, Uighurs, Burmese and many, many others, nobody's about to risk the Sino chequebook by trying to stop them committing atrocities.

That's a very good point. I also think if Mr. Shaikh's family and supporters had dropped the farce that he was mentally ill, it would have helped his case. If the death penalty is wrong....then it's wrong, period. It's wrong even if you're not mentally ill, it's wrong even if you're a drug smuggler.

I hope the "do-gooders" who bungled this case learn something for the next time, cause there is gonna be a next time.

 

[cwalner]

I find the whole mental-illness argument to be curious. At most he may or may not have suffered from Bi-Polar disorder. Is there any country in the world where that particular mental illness would have rendered him to be declared legally insane? My understanding is that it does not render one incapable of distinguishing between right and wrong, and while it may (in its manic phase) cause somebody to disregard the potential consequences of one's actions, it does not render one incapable of understanding them.

That being said, he knew he was committing a crime in a country that applied the death penalty for that crime. China had every right under thier law to execute him, even assuming a clear diagnosis of Bipolar disorder. Whether or not the death penalty is an appropriate penalty for the crime he committed (or any crime whatsoever) is a completely seperate issue and one that will continue to be debated.

I agree with those that have observed that the claim of mental illness is from those desperate to stop the execution because of an absolute opposition to it as a punishment and are only using the mental illness claim to try to get more support for thier case.

 

[commandlinegamer]

I agree with those that have observed that the claim of mental illness is from those desperate to stop the execution because of an absolute opposition to it as a punishment and are only using the mental illness claim to try to get more support for thier case.

There was more likelihood of getting him off due to his mental illness and that in theory is recognised in China, rather than trying to stop the death penalty there entirely; that's a fight for another day.

 

[cwalner]

There was more likelihood of getting him off due to his mental illness and that in theory is recognised in China, rather than trying to stop the death penalty there entirely; that's a fight for another day.

Yes and no. Lets assume that he was accused of the exact same crime in the UK. That the type of quantity of drugs he was caught with are identical to what happened. Let us also assume that he had a known diagnosis of Bipolar disorder.

Would a UK court have found him not guilty by reason of mental defect because of the diagnosis? If the answer is either no or maybe then the issue is not that China executed a Briton with a mental illness, but that China executed a Briton for a crime that is not considered a capitol offence in the UK (since the UK does not have the death penalty).

Even as some people like to bash the US for using the death penalty, he would not have been executed in the US either, since drug smuggling by itself is not considered a capitol crime in any jurisdiction that I know of. Most jurisdictions would still have likely found him guilty and would have offered little leniency due to Bipolar disorder, as it is generally not considered a mental illness that is considered to cause diminished capacity, much less legal insanity.

 

[GlennB]

Yeah, the guy that's been about to die of cancer any day now since at least mid 2008. I don't need to propound my theory, the fact he's still alive says it all.

Assuming that Wiki has it right in saying:

"On 19 September 2008, armed police escorted Megrahi from prison in Greenock to Inverclyde Royal Hospital, where he was expected to undergo medical treatment. A month later, it was announced that Megrahi had advanced prostate cancer, prompting calls for his second appeal to be heard promptly.
......
On 19 August 2009, it was divulged that MacAskill had reached a decision on the bomber's fate to be announced the following day. The following day, MacAskill granted his release on compassionate grounds, stating that Megrahi was in the final stages of terminal prostate cancer and expected to die within three months."

... then you are wrong in factual respects. The '3 months' starts on 19 Aug 2009. Megrahi is doing about 50% better than the prediction. A close relative of mine outlived his very similar terminal prostate cancer prognosis by some months, so it doesn't surprise me that Megrahi is still alive. These things are not very accurate.