I can understand the pain and suffering... and the sympathy. I have a relative diagnosed as schizophrenic.
But I also grew up in a town where the state hospital was located, the "outpatients" lived among us, and some of them were violent. :-0 There was one guy who attacked his mother violently and was released again to live in our vicinity.
The way I see it, once someone who is mentally ill has committed murder, that person should be locked up forever. That person should never be released. If that person is truly "sick" and unable to control his or her actions, then we're doing both that person and society some good with a lifetime sentence in a mental hospital.
Also, with so many people being diagnosed with "mental disorders" these days, one day everyone will be able to plead insanity.
I agree, they should be locked away, or a better term would be "under constant supervision".
I drive a taxi in New York city, and because I grew up with a schizophrenic, I can literally tell right away with one look if someone is, I don`t care what drugs they are on or what level they are at, I can always tell.. For example, last year I was driving down Central Park west and this guy hailed me so I pulled over. I can`t explain it, but I knew right away. I think it was the body language. Even though he was dressed neatly and looked like your average everyday Upper West side yuppie, I could just tell and I regretted it right away when I pulled over but it was too late.
When he got in he told me to bring him to 86th and York ave which is on the east side. When we hit the first stop light he yelled out "Mister, you have exactly 2 minutes to get to where I want to go or it will be the last thing you ever do in your life!" So that comment pretty much confirmed what I suspected, and I prepared myelf.
Then we hit another stop light and he started getting very VERY violent! "What the hell are you doing! Why are you stopping! Get your ass f-ing going now or you are f-ing DEAD!" So what I did is simply close the partition (there is a bullet proof partition between the back seats and the front) and I just tried to ignore him. Actually what I did as well was tell him to "stop it" like you would tell a kid to stop misbehaving.
Then we hit another red light, and he started getting violent, very violent. Punching the partition, kicking the doors (I thought he was going to break the the window of his door) and he then started screaming bloody hell, threatening to kill me, stab me, shoot me, strangle me, just every murder method you could imagine.
When I finally got to where he wanted to go, he jumped out (without paying me) and out of curiousity I got out as well and followed him. Do you know where he went? To a video store to return a video. That was his huge emergency. This was someone who if I did not have protection from, could have very well bashed my head in or much worse, and for what? Simply to return a video.
The point is, these are people who should not be left by themselves. On one hand they are not to blame for what they do or say as they are mentally deranged, but on the other hand, they should not be allowed the same freedom that me or you have. These are people who are literally out of control, they have no grasp on basic common sense or logic, and this is what gets people killed.
It happens so often it is sickening, I read about it all the time, pushing people off of train platforms into oncoming trains, or stabbing people for no reason. These are people who should not be jailed, but people who should be under supervision 24 hours a day 7 days a week. But the problem is who pays for that?
There was a guy last month here in NYC who if you can believe it stole a power saw from some carpenters working in the subway and literally power sawed a guys chest. He survived, but the question has to be asked why did this happen in the first place? Why was this lunatic walking around unsupervised? Is it his family refuses to commit him or did he escape? And this was a few weeks after another one went around stabbing people at random!
http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/07/06/D8IMK8H00.html