A stunning 7900-word New York Times article paints a murderer as a sympathetic victim with little concern for murder victims and their loved ones. The pro-murderer movement hits the big time.
A recent 7900-word New York Times article singularly illustrates the huge gulf between victims of barbaric crime and the zealous rationalizers of their victimizers. Strongly suggesting that a prisoners being sorry for the premeditated murder of both his parents should be enough to free him the article would likely repulse most survivors of violent crime including loved ones of murder victims and others who care about them.
Repulse but not surprise. Pro-murderer fanatics have long manifested the views and tricks employed by the Times. (To avoid misunderstanding or misrepresentation pro-murderer is not pro-murder. These people do not advocate murder. However when murders occur they provide solace for the clearly guilty with none for victims. Indeed to protect murderers they aggressively inflict unspeakable additional torture upon victims.) Having long pretended merely to oppose capital punishment their real goal is to minimize any punishment for murder period. The Times punctuates one more time what has always been realized by capital punishment supporters: the life without parole alternative is a sham. Murderer advocates seek to save not only the lives of their idols but also their freedom. They already have succeeded in prohibiting punishment for additional murders by select convicted murderers.
The Times hero here Gregory Ousley was never sentenced to death. But that is not enough for champions of his cause. What follows is not about a commonplace anti-death penalty screed but opposition to any further incarceration for a still young man indisputably capable of planning and committing multiple murders.
What the Times Cant Ignore
In arguing Ousleys case the Times cannot avoid inconvenient facts. First although he originally lied about his guilt signifying consciousness of wrongdoing he quickly confessed when confronted with his own written words; he can make no false claim of innocence an oft-used pro-murderer ploy. Second although apologists have sought to excuse murderers deeds by asserting that anyone is capable of murder (there but for the grace of God go I) the Times acknowledges that instances of a childs murdering a parent ... are among the rarest of homicides. So this is not a case of everybody does it. Fourteen-year-olds may be immature but they know that murder is wrong. Again Ousley knew that what he did was wrong. Third having planned and carried out a crime so unthinkable ... Ousley is an unlikely representative for sentencing reform.
Translated into honest language sentencing reform means freeing murderers heedless of the certainty that some of them will commit more murders and other violence. Undaunted however the Times uses Ousley to make the case for its notion of reform.
A Pro-Murderer Bag of Tricks
Although the tactics of murderers advocates are well-known to active supporters of what a substantial popular majority deems appropriate punishment for murder it is important to review for the many who are not aware some of the more egregious artifices made use of by the Times -- far from the first time.
First humanize (n357) the perpetrator of monstrous murder. For example the lengthy article never refers to the murderer as Ousley but instead refers to him throughout as Greg. Just an ordinary guy. A real pal.
Second avoid sympathy for victims reserving compassion for the convicted murderer. Written from the perspective of Greg the article tellingly opens by inviting readers to be concerned that the double-murder has haunted and dictated his life because for 19 years he has sought to make sense of it. Lest there be any mistaking where his sympathies lie the writer says that I wanted to understand how a man who had served 16 years for killing his parents made sense of what he had done and what his life could still be.
It should surprise no one if crime victims and their supporters do not share the desire to make sense of murder. And as with so much of what murderer apologists say it is again necessary to translate. For them to make sense of murder really means to rationalize justify and excuse it.
Third we should have sympathy for Ousley not only because he has been haunted but also because of the poor things isolation: To say that he has spent his entire adulthood behind bars doesnt begin to capture the isolation he has experienced. Of course it is not worth referring to the tormented lonely isolation of those who have had their loved ones seized from them by the barbaric acts that the Times thinks can make sense. Some must live alone after losing a spouse an only child or even a whole family. But here it is more important to stress the murderers isolation! The Times worries about what a convicted murderers life could still be while showing no interest in what murder victims lives and the lives of their lonely loved ones could have been but in fact can never still be.
Fourth the claim is made that Ousley has been a model inmate. Of course no mention is made of the innocent murder rape and assault victims of previously released model inmates. The Times proclaims flatly that Ousley is sorry. If the Times were in the truth rather than the propaganda business it would concede that the most it could say is that Ousley says he is sorry. Violent inmates are often all too eager to accommodate the even more eager gullible; others have paid with their lives. Of myriad examples perhaps the Times were it honest would examine the Jack Abbott-Norman Mailer and Edgar Smith-William F. Buckley duos.
Fifth of course it is very common to demand expressions of remorse as a precondition for forgiveness. Is Ousley sincere as the Times would have us believe? According to the article Ousley now 33 has campaigned since age 30 for his premature release which the Times avidly supports. Alas sometimes the truth slips out despite the worst of intentions. Revealingly Ousley declared: Im really confident its going to happen although I have one aunt who might be a problem. However Ousley magnanimously understands: I really dont blame her for opposing my release. Incredulous victims must wonder exactly what moral authority Ousley has to be absolving of blame a traumatized person he declares to be a problem for him. Is this a truly contrite prisoner or a self-centered narcissistic smooth talker arrogantly thinking of himself?
Sixth in making the case to free Ousley the Times states that he would present low risk of future criminality. Yet again lets translate this. Low risk is not no risk.
One of the oldest demands of so-called death penalty opponents has been for absolute perfection: there must be a guarantee that no innocent person will ever be executed. But they do not demand a perfect guarantee that released convicted murderers will not murder more law-abiding innocents. On behalf of convicted murderers they eagerly put true innocents at risk. The low risk that a particular released convicted murderer will commit additional murder is vastly greater than the risk under current judicial safeguards of executing anyone wrongfully convicted. Moreover as noted it is a 100 certainty that some released convicted murderers will murder again -- the Times shows no sign of caring.
Seventh the Times leaves no doubt about its moral values: Strong or not Gregs case is a telling one in the national debate over just what is accomplished by sentencing juveniles to long prison sentences. What national debate? The public strongly supports severe sentences for severe crimes. The only debate is in the minds of pro-murderer elitists who have a disproportionately dominant influence in the media and with five justices of the Supreme Court who have defied the public by imposing their own values on everyone else in this clearly unrepresentative democracy (made more unrepresentative by Chief Justice Roberts recent assault on self-government). On June 25 the Court abolished mandatory life sentences for convicted premeditated murderers almost 18 years old seven years after abolishing the death penalty for them and two years after abolishing life sentences for nearly 18-year-old non-homicide predators.
Eighth while lacking any genuine concern for victims future as well as past the Times feigns the usual pro-murderer pretense of caring: it is better for society to release convicted murderers in their 30s when they still have the potential of patching together a somewhat-normal life rather than their 40s when their options will be far more limited. Better for society to turn convicted murderers loose on society? The Times omits that younger murderers pose a greater danger.
Finally the Times demonizes those who disagree with its pro-murderer values referring to their thirst for punishment. Having no such thirst the Times has long rejected the obvious connection between incarceration and protection of the innocent against future predations of those with a demonstrated capacity to commit brutality. Nor does the Times recognize that its rhetoric is really disparagement of justice for victims.
Conclusion
Ultimately it is a question of values when it comes to whether murderers deserve the kind of compassion showered upon a double-murderer by the Times. All too often the elite media and elite judges eagerly identify with brutal murderers at the expense of their long-dead victims and the tormented souls left behind. It is safe to say that most people would consider it an obscenity to worry that a murderer might be haunted. Most people would have no trouble reserving the term haunted for murder victims loved ones and survivors not to mention the future victims of released individuals capable of the worst depravity.
The 2012 election will determine whether anti-victim values will be entrenched on the Supreme Court for another generation.
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The original is slightly modified here.
Lester Jackson Ph.D. a former college political science teacher views mainstream media suppression of the truth as essential to harmful judicial activism. His recent articles are collected here.