Breaking: Jared Lee Loughner Found Incompetent to Stand Trial
[Guest post by Aaron Worthing; if you have tips, please send them here. Or by Twitter @AaronWorthing.]
I just got this via Cnn’s breaking news email:
Jared Lee Loughner, accused in the mass shooting that wounded Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, is not mentally competent to stand trial, a federal judge in Arizona ruled.
You have to be pretty far gone, to be found incompetent to stand trial. You have to be either unaware of the charges or unable to assist in your own defense. It’s a very minimal standard, and he failed it.
And it’s important to note that this doesn’t mean he was found not guilty by reason of insanity, and indeed it has nothing to do with his state of mind at the time he committed the crime. He could have been fully sane on the day he carried out those shootings and through some means acquired his insanity afterward, and the ruling would be the same. Still, it seems very reasonable to believe the man was very far gone when he shot Giffords.
So will the left finally admit that he was “just a nut?” Will they finally admit that there was in fact no greater significance to his crime?
[Posted and authored by Aaron Worthing.]
Are you kidding? Will the Left finally admit to the error of their ways? Long answer: No.
Frank (167bb8) — 5/25/2011 @ 1:06 pmfrank
well, hope springs eternal…
Aaron Worthing (e7d72e) — 5/25/2011 @ 1:08 pmHis dad was there in the court … can you imagine? Poor man. That’s so sad.
happyfeet (a55ba0) — 5/25/2011 @ 1:09 pmHe stalked her, for about three years, the community college warned them, about his violent tendencies,
ian cormac (72470d) — 5/25/2011 @ 1:15 pmSo they gave Mubarak the death penalty but not the president of Syria.
Jared Lee Mao deserved the detah penalty but he won’t because these lefturds deemed him incompetant.
DohBiden (15aa57) — 5/25/2011 @ 1:17 pmThis is a ‘can’t aid his defense’ thing, but a ‘didn’t know right from wrong’ thing.
And if he’s freaking in court to the point of being dragged out, I guess there’s some plausibility to it, but I think it would be easily corrected with a straightjacket and some drugs.
Dustin (c16eca) — 5/25/2011 @ 1:17 pmRather, I meant “but NOT a ‘didn’t know right from wrong’ thing’.
Anyway, the judge is a 2003 Bush appointee. I’m not sure, but I don’t think he’s a bad judge from a quick google. I would hope they can deal with people who act like idiots in court just to draw this kind of competency ruling.
Dustin (c16eca) — 5/25/2011 @ 1:19 pmSo will the left thank Bush for appointing a judge who deemed their boy toy incompetant………..somehow I don’t think so.
DohBiden (15aa57) — 5/25/2011 @ 1:21 pmHe did kill Judge Roll, who got in his way, of the murder spree, then again Sheriff Dupnik, he certainly doesn’t have all the oars rowing in the same direction,
ian cormac (72470d) — 5/25/2011 @ 1:25 pmbtw, based on his internet commentary, he seems perfectly capable of explaining himself and understanding the process enough to ‘aid his defense’.
The fact that he’s stone cold guilty without a reasonable defense is not a failure to be able to aid his defense. The fact he’s screaming in his trial doesn’t seem like it either.
Just dope him up and put him on a cart and wheel him into court.
Dustin (c16eca) — 5/25/2011 @ 1:26 pmWait a minute…Paul Krugman implied Palin put him up to this…shouldn’t she be tried in his place?
(sarcasm)
VoteOutIncumbents (bd5def) — 5/25/2011 @ 1:26 pmIf “just a nut” can get access to guns, there IS a greater significance to the story — specifically, we need something to strengthen our gun laws.
Kman (5576bf) — 5/25/2011 @ 1:32 pmArizona Sheriff Dupnik Was Aware of Loughner’s Mental Illness, Did Nothing
Couldn’t that be called culpability?
JP (508ef3) — 5/25/2011 @ 1:43 pmNow THIS guy you can rape, and I won’t complain.
gp (72be5d) — 5/25/2011 @ 1:52 pmPerhaps the Good Sheriff can be held liable in a Civil Trial, much the same way OJ was?
AD-RtR/OS! (b8ab92) — 5/25/2011 @ 2:08 pmLoughner may not seem sufficiently competent to aid in his defense, but he was sure competent enough to murder 6 people. Which just might qualify him for a spot on Dupnik’s SWAT team.
ropelight (d7d4a2) — 5/25/2011 @ 2:45 pmI would like to see a new verdict added to all states criminal codes. Guilty by reason of insanity, with an automatic life sentence. Then there would be no more not guilty by reason of insanity verdicts with the defendant then petitioning to get out of the mental institution every few months. With the good possibility of some whack job judge agreeing, that lo and behold, they are no longer insane. Also, without the so called insane person being able to get weekend passes ala John Hinkley Jr,
peedoffamerican (ee1de0) — 5/25/2011 @ 2:51 pmdeath penalty*
DohBiden (15aa57) — 5/25/2011 @ 2:54 pmLoughner’s parents knew exactly how dangerous he was. And Sheriff Dumbnik also knew but covered for him because his mother was on the Board of Supervisors. A case of you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours.
PatAZ (96c670) — 5/25/2011 @ 3:58 pmHeadline misspells “incompetent.” (I know you know how to spell it because it’s correct in the body text.)
Mitch (890cbf) — 5/25/2011 @ 4:07 pmmitch, sorry i guess my spelling was… incompetant.
joking aside, thanks, will fix.
Aaron Worthing (73a7ea) — 5/25/2011 @ 4:17 pmUnsatisfying but hardly surprising.
SPQR (26be8b) — 5/25/2011 @ 4:20 pmLiberals[an hijacked word] are bleeding hearts.
DohBiden (15aa57) — 5/25/2011 @ 4:33 pmAaron — under the federal statute, the defense can request that a defendant sent to undergo a medical examination regarding whether they are competent to stand trial, also receive at the same time an examination regarding whether they were competent at the time of the offense conduct.
I don’t know if the defense made such a request here or not. So, it is possible that the Bureau of Prisons’ psych staff at Springfield issued an opinion on both questions. The only opinion that would be public at this point is the opinion involving whether he is currently competent to stand trial.
He is now going to be sent back to Springfield where and effort will be made to restore him to a state of compentency. This will be through drug therapy and pyschiatric counseling. If he is restored then he will be returned to Arizona and a trial schedule will be set.
The more interesting situation involves what happens if he cannot be restored to competency to stand trial. There is a mechanism for civil committment even prior to conviction, if the BOP medical staff deems him unsafe to be released, and a district judge in Missouri agrees.
shipwreckedcrew (58dde3) — 5/25/2011 @ 8:03 pmOf course, he’s competent, he went after Gifford methodically, didn’t let the judge get in the way,
ian cormac (72470d) — 5/25/2011 @ 8:09 pmif he had been less precise, than they might have
a point.
They are saying Loughner doesn’t understand the role of a judge or a jury and he doesn’t understand the gravity of the charges.
This is very difficult for me to believe, given his internet commentary. He knew this was a huge thing he was doing that would horrify a lot of people, and that the penalty was very serious. He knew a lot about government functions. Sure, much of what he said was wrong, but unable to aid his defense on a basic level? I just don’t buy it.
What’s the burden of proof for this kind of ruling? Preponderance?
Dustin (c16eca) — 5/25/2011 @ 8:25 pmHmmm …
Loughner is incompetent to stand trial.
Dupnik is incompetent to run a SWAT team.
Napolitano is incompetent to protect the borders.
Could it be that some variant of Arizona’s “valley fever” affects the brain?
Calvin Dodge (c24b9e) — 5/25/2011 @ 9:33 pmDoes this incompetency ruling affect the case of the People of Arizona v Loughner?
AD-RtR/OS! (e46093) — 5/25/2011 @ 9:48 pmSchizophrenia is a poorly understood disease. We are still not sure what causes it. But it is an illness, something which progresses over time, like cancer. You don’t suddenly wake up one day with end stage cancer. It may very well be that he was competent enough on the day of the shooting but has since degenerated. Regardless, Arizona has the “guilty but mentally ill” standard. So even if he were able to be cleared of federal charges (which don’t need to be filed at all) he would be liable for 6 murders under Arizona laws (and a bunch of other felonies). And he’d be convicted. The death penalty is off the table – fine, dp wouldn’t stop an insane person anyway. But he will spend the rest of his life in a mentally ill prison, and if he recovers his sanity, he’ll be in a general prison.
rbj (9ae8d9) — 5/26/2011 @ 8:45 amYou people want to see a tiny bit of crazy right on Facebook? Take a look at a couple of the comments here…
Scott Jacobs (d027b8) — 5/26/2011 @ 11:35 am