A judicial comparison with China

[Scheavo]

https://ph.news.yahoo.com/chinese-mother-gets-5-years-killing-twin-sons-025411575.html

A Chinese court has sentenced a mother to a "lenient" five years in prison for murdering her paralyzed twin sons who needed full-time care, in a case that aroused public sympathy, state media reported Wednesday.

The official China Daily newspaper said Han Qunfeng gave her sons water laced with sleeping pills before drowning them in a bathtub in November.

The 13-year-olds had been born prematurely and had cerebral palsy.

Han confessed to the murders at a hearing earlier this month. "I just wanted them to leave quietly. I would not kill them if we could go back in time," Han told the judges, according to the newspaper.

After killing the boys, she dressed them in new pajamas and then attempted to take her own life by drinking a mixture of pesticide and rat poison, the newspaper said.

An official from the Dongguan No. 1 People's Court in southern Guangdong province said Han was sentenced Tuesday.

"The judges believe, having taken care of her two paralyzed children for 13 years, she committed the crime when she was under great depression and despairing of life," said the official, who gave only her surname, Liao, as is customary for Chinese officials.

"By considering that the crime has caused only relatively small harm to society, the judges have given her a lenient sentence," Liao told The Associated Press.

Chinese courts usually deal harshly with murderers, sentencing them to death or long prison terms.

Han, 37, gave up her job as a bank clerk to care for her children when she found it difficult to hire nannies. Han's husband forgave her for the murders because the family was at the brink of bankruptcy after spending all its savings on treating the twins in hospitals, state media reported.

Han's case aroused sympathy from neighbors and former colleagues who wrote a joint letter to the court pleading for mercy.

"She deserved the lenient sentence. The murders resulted from years of mental burden," one of the judges, Xue Fengyan, was quoted as saying by the China Daily.

"Depression is not an excuse for committing a crime," said Hao Xingwang, a law professor at Renmin University in Beijing. "But the mother must have suffered great economic and psychological pressure when taking care of the children. According to laws, it's appropriate for her to get a sentence of between three and 10 years in prison."

We've had a couple of interesting court cases lately, and I thought this one was very interesting. Comparatively, I think it highlights a huge gap between what is viewed as justice in America and China. Especially the part where the judges considered the effect on society as a whole, and not just the individual. The degree to which they examine the circumstances is also revealing. It seems like in America, we care only that a crime was committed, and not why it was committed. We do this to some degree in our society, we admit manslaughter, we use mental "illnesses" as an excuse, etc... but their penalties are still excessive; we throw people away and give them probation for accidentally killing someone, the claim of it being a mental illness comes along with a whole lot of philosophical baggage, and other problems.

I'm not sure if this story is supposed to be shocking to Americans... I personally wasn't, and am found wishing our American courts, and our society, would gravitate towards this philosophy. At first, the sentence seemed light to me, but that impression left me. I may be a little reactionary against what I view our our societies over-incarceration of, well, everything, but I can't help but think this ruling is fairer than anything we'd see in the US. Why double down on a woman who's already at the end of her ropes, and just fuck her for no reason? Seems cruel to me. The ruling makes it clear that her circumstances and it's effects are what are important, meaning copy-cats are pretty much ruled out. Meanwhile, five years in prison is no walk in the park, and that's in America (the only thing I know about Chinese prison is that some of them are forced to hard labor and to farm gold for WoW).

Justice, or not?

[El Barto]

I'm cool with it.  What troubles me is the degree of vindictiveness within our society.  Compassion tends to be lacking. 

You raise an interesting point about punishing a woman already at the end of her rope.  A few years ago, there was a guy (I think in Cali), who sought to off himself.  He parked his car on the train tracks and waited patiently.  I don't recall the circumstances,  but somehow he survived but caused the train to derail killing one or two of the pax.  He was taken into custody and placed on a suicide watch (for obvious reasons).  I recall having a conversation with my profoundly Baptist boss about the fact that they'd go to great lengths to keep the guy from killing himself so that they could have the honor of executing him at a later point.  He though this was absolutely the right thing to do.  He shouldn't be allowed to kill himself, but the state should absolutely kill him in 8-12 years. 

Which raises another issue about the girl in China.  She wanted to die, herself.  Isn't this a similar situation?  I'd be interested to know if she actually expressed any interest in her defense. 

[Scheavo]

I can see some similarities, but also some dissimilarities that actually affected the ruling. The mother targeted her children, for medical reasons, and the circumstances seem much more interesting. I think it begs the question of when, how and if we should be limiting medicine and modern science to increase lifespan. I'm all for living forever myself, but if everyone did that, it would create a host of unanswered questions, and lead to dramatic cultural, political and social changes. Oh, and the fact that it was her own family was actually a reason cited by the judges. I don't know what China would theoretically sentence that guy to, but it sounds like the wider social impact would have played a role

I hadn't heard of that guy before, but that's certainty an interesting case. Guy's a complete douchebag. It's funny, becuase I almost find myself on the other side from the pastor. The guy should be allowed to kill himself, but I don't care for the death penalty (at least in practice).

Found a different source, not a whole lot, but some different information. From the sounds of it, she's no longer suicidal... but I could be wrong.

https://news.in.msn.com/international/article.aspx?cp-documentid=5249261

She then dressed her sons in new pajamas and consumed a mixture of pesticide and rat poison to kill herself. But she threw up some of the poison in a semi-conscious state, was rushed to hospital by her husband the next morning and saved, the court heard.

Han pleaded guilty and regretted killing her twin sons at the hearing on June 2.

Han said she had lost all hope after looking after her disabled children for 13 years. The twins were born premature and suffered brain damage at childbirth.

[Perpetual Change]

It's really tough to parent children with severe disabilities. Actually, it's more than a full-time job. And China doesn't have nearly the types of governmental services available as the United States does. I'd imagine that, in China, if you've got a kid like that you're pretty much crippled from being able to do anything with them aside from caring for them 24/7. It's a tough situation.