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Topic: bipolar Nazi sympathizer murderer to be executed (Read 855 times) |
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Fritz
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bipolar Nazi sympathizer murderer to be executed
« on: 2011-02-16 15:01:48 » |
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The wheels of justise so often elude me. I wonder what Scary Dave would say to this story ?
Cheers
Fritz
US state ready to execute college campus killer of 3 despite his mental illness claim
Source: New Glasgow News
Author: Canadian press
Date: 2011.02.16
COLUMBUS, Ohio - The state prepared to execute a condemned killer Thursday, a Nazi sympathizer who shot to death two men and a teen more than a quarter century ago on the campus of Cleveland State University in a shooting spree over several months that evolved from "hunting parties" that targeted blacks.
If put to death as scheduled, Frank Spisak would set the Ohio record for the longest time on death row before execution, at more than 27 years.
He'll also be the last Ohio inmate to die from a dose of sodium thiopental, the scarce drug the state is giving up in favour of a more readily available substitute.
Spisak, 59, blamed the 1982 shootings on his hatred of gays, blacks and Jews and also claimed his crimes were sparked by mental illness related to confusion about his sexual identity. Spisak identifies himself as a woman and refers to himself in correspondence as Frances Spisak, a name his attorneys also use.
Spisak was calm and reserved as he arrived at the death house at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility in Lucasville Wednesday morning, said Carlo LoParo, spokesman for the Department of Rehabilitation and Correction.
Spisak met with his daughter over the weekend but had no visitors scheduled in Lucasville, LoParo said. Spisak selected spaghetti with light tomato sauce but no meat, salad, chocolate cake and coffee with cream and sugar for a special meal to be served at 4 p.m.
Last month, Spisak's attorneys asked the Ohio Parole Board to spare his life, saying Spisak suffers from a severe bipolar disorder that was not diagnosed until years after he was convicted. Spisak was housed in a prison unit reserved for death row inmates being treated for mental illnesses.
The lawyers argued the information could have led jurors to consider a different sentence.
"To go forward with this execution would represent a departure from the strong societal consensus that the death penalty should be reserved for the worst of the worst, and that we arguably demean ourselves when we impose it on the severely mentally ill," Spisak's attorneys, Alan Rossman and Michael Benza, told the board.
During his 1983 trial, Spisak grew a Hitler-style moustache, carried a copy of Hitler's book "Mein Kampf" during the proceedings and gave the Nazi salute to the jury.
Both the parole board and Gov. John Kasich, making his first decision on a condemned killer's request for mercy, rejected Spisak's plea.
"Spisak killed three people, tried to kill at least one other, and shot at a fifth in his admitted plan to kill as many African-Americans as possible and start a race war in Cleveland," the board said in its Jan. 21 ruling. "His victims were innocent, unsuspecting strangers."
Spisak had a final appeal pending Wednesday before the U.S. Supreme Court, asking for a delay so he could argue the death penalty's constitutionality based on recent comments by a state Supreme Court justice criticizing capital punishment in Ohio. Two lower courts have rejected the appeal.
Cora Warford, whose son Brian Warford was just 17 when Spisak shot him in the head on Aug. 30, 1982, says she's making an exception to her opposition to capital punishment after much thought and discussion with her pastor. She said Spisak's latest attempts to avoid execution by pleading mental illness were the final straw.
"Justice has to be done, that's all," said Warford, 75, now retired in Cincinnati. "He didn't care about the lives he took, and now it's time for him to go to rest."
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Where there is the necessary technical skill to move mountains, there is no need for the faith that moves mountains -anon-
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Blunderov
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"We think in generalities, we live in details"
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Re:bipolar Nazi sympathizer murderer to be executed
« Reply #1 on: 2011-02-16 15:28:25 » |
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[Blunderov] He certainly is eccentric but crazy? Not by McNaughton standards if I'm any judge. He does know the difference between right and wrong - he does not respond to those who address him 'incorrectly' for one thing.
The McNaughton rule states that "it must be clearly proved that, at the time of the committing of the act, the party accused was labouring under such a defect of reason, from disease of the mind, as not to know the nature and quality of the act he was doing; or, if he did know it, that he did not know he was doing what was wrong."*
Not that I am in favour of the death penalty but given that it is applicable here, I do not see why it should not be carried out.
That said, there have been many, many instances where persons have been executed whilst manifestly insane at the time of the commission of the offence.
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