Killer of Rachel Nickel

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The guy who really killed Rachel Nickell has finally been convicted. You can read the story here. This is good news but I am a bit pissed off about the prosecution's reference that psychiatrists had said he was suffering from "Paranoid Schizophrenia and Asperger Syndrome", lumping the 2 conditions together as if both were equally relevant, and the BBC repeating this without making any clarification that AS does not cause people to stab young mothers 42 times in front of their 2 year old child. I used their contact form to let them know how I felt.

The comment I made was as follows:

"Is it really necessary for the prosecution to state, and the BBC to repeat that the killer of Rachel Nickel had Asperger syndrome?

People with AS have a hard enough time making friends as it is without implications that it can lead to violent behaviour.

If he had for instance, an allergy to eggs would you have said "The killer, who suffers from Paranoid Schizophrenia and an allergy to eggs....."?

No, I thought not. So why the AS reference?"

Just thought I'd bring this to people's attention hoping that some more of you might like to let the BBC know how you feel.

I'm just after watching the report and doing my fair share of cringing.

It irritates me enough that the media play a huge part in stigmatizing mental illnesses, based on a small handful of individuals with Psychiatric conditions who commit violent crimes. The mention of AS just made me shudder.

The journalists I think believe they are simply being thorough but your right in that they especially in recent years are trying harder and harder when something bad happens to point blame at someone and the problems that person has as an explanation as to why it happened.

Hopefully most people are smart enough to know that it wasn't any of his mental conditions that made him kill someone it was simply his choice.

Actually I seem to recall a study that showed that those with mental disorders such as schizophrenia or an autistic spectrum disorder were something like 10 times less likely to respond (intentionally) violently to stimuli than the average population.

I found it irritating too.

We do need to remember though that this person is (thankfully) locked in a high-security hospital for mentally ill people, and if they said that but didn't state what the illness was it would leave questions and wouldn't be good journalism on their part. So they do need to state whatever illness he has. They just should've also made clear that AS is not generally linked to violent behaviour any more so than being 'NT' is, and that it's not a mental illness as such either.

if it isn't right saying a criminal has AS,it isnt right saying they have paranoid schizophrenia either,there should be equal treatment for all,schizophrenia is not a illness which means they are going to go and kill someone just because they got the label.