|
Insane, or did she know what she was doing?
By now, most people in the US have heard at least something about the disturbing Laney case. Deanne Laney is a 39 year old woman from Texas who viciously stoned her 8 year old and 6 year old sons to death, before turning and similiarly attacking her 14 month old son, who survived.
I've been doing some reading on it, and one thing bugs me. Her defense team has (of course) put forth a bid for guilty by reason of insanity. They are rather insistant that the woman must have been out of her mind at the time she slayed her oldest two sons. After she killed them, and nearly did in her youngest, the woman calmly picked up the phone, and called 911 to report the murders, and with a voice deprived of emotion, she admitted that she had done the crime herself.
For several weeks afterwards, she showed no remorse for the event which stole the lives of two children. She did not cry for them.
Indeed, it took months before she'd cry for them. Personally, I have to wonder if by then she was crying for her lost sons, or for the convictions which loomed ahead for her. Right now, she sits waiting for a jury to decide if she was insane or not. More accuratly, they need to decide if she understood that what she did was wrong, insane or not.
Her defense rallies that because she showed no emotion, she must have been insane. I feel it would have been the other way. Wouldn't she understnad afterwards, and regret it? Perhaps not, I suppose.
Insane or not, I feel this woman understood fully what happened. If she hadn't understood it, why would she bother to immediatly call 911 about this? Why would she have been found in the backyard, wandering around aimlessly, purposefully away from the dead children laying in the front yard, each with a dinner plate sized bloody rock resting on their small chests?
Why would she place her youngest son back in his crib, and cover her handywork with a pillow if she had no understanding of what had happened?
And most of all, why is it that we even allow these things to go for so long, with the very real possibility that she may only be convicted of child cruelty, which covers a minimum of 5 years in jail?
This woman brutally murdered two children, and attempted to murder a 3rd, and she could very possibly get off with spending 5 years in jail?
This is the same country which allows people to get sent away for up to 2 years for driving drunk, but murdering your children can get as light as 5?
More likely, she'll wind up with more than 5, yes, true, but why is it even an option that in 5 years, the justice system could conceivably see her as clean and clear again?
/rant
I'm sorry, but this whole story pisses me off, and I sincerelly hope that she gets locked away for life with no chance of parole. Why should she get to see the sun when her children are buried in a cold dark casket in the ground?
|