Should mentally disabled killers facing death be executed?

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As it concerns a death sentence the mental health standard is more broad.
A light mental health condition won't get you an insanity verdict but could get you life in jail as opposed to death.

Why do you say that?

I don't know, it's just I though if you suffer from mental health issues or have developmental disorders, you have diminished capacity?


I could be wrong.

Yeah that's how the law treats crimes in Australia, Having a diagnosed disorder reduces your sentence or (in some cases) means you are sent to an institution rather than prison). Lots of famous criminal cases of diminished responsibility based on psychiatric reports but it does depend on the crime.

In the case of murder (particularly mass murder) it might just mean reducing a 30 year/life sentence to 20-25 years.

What kind of disablity would make a difference I would think.

Lets say you have dyslexia, or even autism/aspergers. And you murder someone. Why would having dyslexia or autism be mitigating to a sentence? Niether autism nor dyslexia makes you ignorant of right and wrong, and neither causes you to be anymore homocidal than anyone else. So if an NT gets the chair, so would a dyslexic, or an autistic for the same crime. I would think.

It's seems unjust to put anyone with any conditions related to the brain to death just because they were killers

That's true. There's been a number of famous cases throughout modern history where the person's responsibility for murder was diminished due to their disorder.

A couple of famous cases was that of Indian national Prosenjit Poddar who in a fit of jealous rage murdered a girl (Tatiana Tarasoff) whom he considered his girlfriend in UCLA in 1967.

Poddar was famously freed because a psychologist said his severe emotional state impaired his judgement. He went back to India.

Another case was that of Japanese cannibal Issei Sagawa who known for the killing of Renée Hartevelt in Paris in 1982. Sagawa murdered Hartevelt then mutilated, cannibalized, and had sex with her corpse over several days. Again incredibly he was found legally insane and released. In a sick twist of fate he became a celebrity in Japan.

There's plenty of other cases where people have been released after serving minimum sentences due to their mental state due to their diminished responsibility but then in other cases they are sent to death row. The application of the law has never been consistent in this matter as it depends not just on the perpatrator's psychiatric status but also the jurisdiction where the crime takes place.

I never really thought it was only about right and wrong. Take it to the extreme. Let's say someone with an IQ of just 50 killed a family member for making to much noise at night. The person with the IQ of 50 knew it was wrong but did he/she realise the severity of his/her actions and legal penalty for doing so? Probably not. Is the death sentence fair in a case like that? In my eyes no.

Last edited by Nades on 23 Sep 2020, 10:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Judges have sentencing guidelines which follow and this varies from state to state.

They must balance mitigation with aggravating factors.

Any mental health issue,any learning or intellectual disability is fair game as mitigation.But it's balanced with aggravating factors.

Anything sympathetic for the defendant is fair game for mitigation.

Precisely