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Serving Neither Justice Nor Mercy
Scotland freed the terminally ill Lockerbie bomber last week so he could die at home in Libya. "Our beliefs dictate that justice be served, but mercy be shown," a Scottish official said. Did Scotland do the right thing? Should we have any mercy for mass murderers who are terminally ill?
An unrepentant mass murderer doesn't need to be released from prison to be shown mercy. I don't know the kind of treatment that terminally ill prisoners receive in Scotland, but as far as an effort to show mercy, perhaps he could have been given better treatment within the confines of his imprisonment. But sent home to die out of mercy -- were his victims allowed this same treatment?
Beyond that, you start a precedent -- where is the mercy for the other incarcerated convicted criminals who die every year of illness? Where is the mercy for the families who have been plagued with horror because their loved ones were snatched away from them?
I would question that the reasons for government involvement in the release of a prisoner who has been incarcerated has little to do with mercy or true justice but rather that it is politically or corporately motivated.
By
Matt Maher
|
August 24, 2009; 6:20 PM ET
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Posted by: jeannietomlin | August 30, 2009 3:52 AM
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I'll say it again. Why do ignorant people have to post?
"where is the mercy for the other incarcerated convicted criminals who die every year of illness?:
In exactly the same place the mercy and clemency for Mr. al-Meghri was. In the Statutes of Scotland which have freed 24 other convicts in the last decade on the same grounds of compassionate release. Scotland does not keep dying people in prison.