I was reading some of the comments last week on The New York Times Magazine article about their July cover story about the killer Greg Ousley, who killed his parents at age 14 because they were emotionally cold and mean (yet nothing extremely terrible) because he felt so alienated and unheard. It showed him as a nice young man about my age (I just turned 30 last week) who is a model inmate, seemingly nice guy, completed college via Internet, the Prison staff had nothing but glowing things for say about him etc.
Reading it, my heart went out to him so much. I really fealt a profound sense of sympathy. When I was about 15 or 16 I was briefly psychotic and I remember hearing voices telling me to kill all kinds of loved ones including my parents (either because they were "evil" or "for their own good"). Yet I recognized that these voices and hallucinations weren't real and contacted my psychiatrist who placed me on anti-psychotics (Mellaril, much like Thorazine) and I was treated at home because he felt I had too much anxiety to hospitalize me. After about 8 months the symptoms stopped and I recovered never to look back, which I hear is pretty rare. I wonder if it is normal to treat such a sick patient completely as an outpatient? (though I certainly feel it was the right thing for me).
But even more I agree with the Times that says this young man should be let out of jail now while in his thirties and has more oppurtunities in life rather than wait instill he is older when he has less, he will complete his sentence at age 74.
The reaction to this article was that it was "pro-murderer" and that it was rationalizing his crimes. So is my judgement overly sympathetic? (I feal he should be released as this is the opinion of the Prison Authorities).
The exception was foreign readers who feal that in any "civilized" country he would have been let out in his 20's.
What is your opinion?
The original article is here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/22/ma...pagewanted=all
You can read opinions about aricle here: http://www.cncpunishment.com/forums/...New-York-Times