I know Aaliyah was a hottay and all...

[Maffu]

...but was she really that hot? Hot enough to make you kill someone? Kill yourself, and I'd understand. But this is just stupid.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/3168520.stm

Anyone up norf know this fruitcake?

[Russ]

HEY!! lets all be criminals and hide behind the mental health act

[steve threlfall]

That sicko will probably get off because he claims hes a fruit. Happening in the courts all the time now along with oh man man yeah man i was like so on drugs due so it doesnt count didnt know what i was doing

[Agent]

How'd you know he is not ill though ?

[oddytomtom]

thats messed up, next we will have terminators running around

[DaBeeeenster]

Yeah I dont think anyone can say one way or the other whether the guy is a few sausage rolls short of a picnic. Leave that to the professional psychologists.

The ONLY reason this is news is because the guy was "spoken to" by a mainstream film. If he had been spoken to after reading some obscure novel written in 1932 I doubt we would know about it.

People kill each other every now and then. It's a statistical norm. It doesn't sell papers, unless there's some bizarre connection like the one above.

Personally I wish the press would do a better job of highighting slightly more important issues around the world, rather than these really frustrating little "news farts" that have no real importancec to anyone whatsoever.

[sexeh]

thats scary. he's a right weirdo. whether he claimed insanity or not the fact remains he still did it and thats what scares me the most.

[nichomach]

Originally posted by DaBeeeenster
The ONLY reason this is news is because the guy was "spoken to" by a mainstream film. If he had been spoken to after reading some obscure novel written in 1932 I doubt we would know about it.

Yeah, no-one paid any attention to MY killing spree inspired by Geoffrey Household's 1938 classic "Rogue Male"...

On a more serious note:

"Personality disorder

Defence counsel Donald MacLeod suggested his client suffered from paranoid schizophrenia.

However, that was rejected by consultant forensic psychiatrists Derek Chiswick and Colin Gray.

Dr Chiswick, 58, said he believed Mr Menzies suffered from an "anti-social personality disorder".

But he said it was "extremely unlikely" that he was a paranoid schizophrenic."

An ASPD does NOT mean the guy will get off with it; he may well receive a normal sentence of imprisonment (i.e. mandatory life) and then be transferred to a secure hospital. For him to receive a hospital order at trial the disorder would have to be treatable; there's no evidence that an ASPD is. FYI, ASPD is what Tony Martin was diagnosed with...

[Bunjiweb]

He drank his best mate's blood ffs.... if that doesnt make him worthy of a life jail sentence i don't know what does.

Ok, so he's a nutcase, so what? You can't excuse someone from performing these disgusting acts of barbarianism just because he's got a screw loose...

It's like saying "oh, Hitler can be excused from persecuting the Jews because he was insane!"

Ben

[nichomach]

He'll probably get a jail sentence, like I say. If on the other hand he's found (at the very extreme end of possible verdicts, and unlikely, OK?) not guilty by reason of insanity, he'll still probably be detained for life anyway, just in a secure hospital. Where's the problem?