Bernard Goetz interview

[Buzzard]

Anyone catch the Larry King interview (Nancy Grace) with Bernard Goetz last night? Very interesting I thought, as his story and facts of how it happened havn't changed in 20 years. He maintains it was good for NYC, and helped prod civic govt. to clean up the town. Quite believable actually. When asked if he would have done anything different, Goetz stated he wished he would have used the mass amount of publicity received to promote vegetarian ways.
Coincedentally, the town where the baby was stolen from the murdered mother, has a previous history of vigilantism (cue the fata nerds). Also a fascinating story.
http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a38ea729b3278.htm

Should vigilantism be increasingly overlooked or mildly punished in special cases? Or would this put a gun in everyones pocket? Would it lead to anarchy, or a more civilized society? It seemed to have a positive result in Skidmore, Mo. at least.
I'm kind of on the fence on this issue, as I'm not sure what it would lead to as a society. It just seems naive to think you should let our justice systems run their course, and never take the law into your own hands, when our laws and justice systems often times come up short.

[Claeren]

I think there is a case to be made where IF the system fails after having run its course that you should think about taking things into your own hands.

For example, your sister is raped but the guy gets off because police didn't read him his rights or something stupid. If those people start to be murdered then it forces the system to admit there is a problem and to fix it. That their system is being put ahead of justice and that relationship breakdown is having a detrimental effect on victims and society at large.

Call it a "change agent."

The only tricky thing is that people that do it have to be at least remotely justified. If they are biased and are just doing it out of revenge then obviously there is societal breakdown. Likewise when it is done before the justice system has had its chance.

Either way it has to be punished but i have a lot of sympathy in what that punishment should be.


Ironically, if some of these cases had been taken more seriously, and for example bully's and their antics had been cracked down upon and taken seriously, other crimes may have been prevented, like Columbine, which was essentially vigilantism at its core.... ?

Claeren.

[Buzzard]

Good point on Columbine. A classic example of vigilantism, but done to the extreme, with no regard for anyone in the way. One can only wonder what public opinion, as well as media attention would have been, if only the "bullies" had been killed, after school in an empty field somewhere. Being that they all were just kids, it obviously, would still be a somber event. However, would there have been a certain sympathy, even justification for the killers after you subtract all of the murdered bystanders?
If the killers didn't do themselves in, and they had murdered one or two "bullies", as well as, say, injured a a couple, would the system be correct in a lenient punishment? I guess we'd be talking American justice here, as we all know a young offender in Canada would have a very charitable punishment, regardless of what the circumstance.

[CaptainCrunch]

I'm not sure I agree with you on the Columbine thing. They were two outcasts who were being bullied, thier lives weren't in danger, they didn't watch the bullies murdering and raping. These were two losers, with bad parents who had no anchor in reality. The fact that they wanted to take as many people with them as possible innocent or not speaks to the fact that it wasn't an act of vigilantism, but an act of lunacy and stupidity and I hope they're enjoying thier rollercoaster ride through the fires of hell. My gut feeling with these two idiots is that bullys or no, they were already filming death fantasies on tape, and building pipe bombs in thier bedroom, they would have done this bullying or not.

I've often thought about what would happen if someone murdered a member of my family or raped a member of my family, and i have to admit that my first instinct would be to soak the bas**rd in gas and burn him down to the ground. But you have to be really really sure that its the person who did it. And ask yourself this question. Lets say that you murdered the rapist, and the death sentence was passed on you, all the appeals were exhausted because it was considered an act of cold homicide, is the death penalty warranted?

I never really cottoned to Bernard Goetz, IIRC there were a lot of questions about what Goetz did and if he actually over reacted and over reacted badly.

Lets face the facts folks, we're not the police, and we haven't been appointed a member of the courts or a judge jury or executioner.