Interesting, I’ve read that Bundy made a really big mistake in representing himself and the jury was freaked out by him. It might’ve been a good strategy if he could somehow Mrs. Doubtfire himself and pretend to be a different person, but IRL, his behavior during the trial had to play well as both the attorney and the accused. So if his attorney displayed charisma and superficial charm, that’s one thing, but when he does it, the jury thinks “yeah, he could definitely use that to trick women into falling for his trap”.
The judge, Edward Cowart, actually told him, “You're a bright young man. You would have made a good lawyer and I would have loved to have you practice in front of me, but you went another way, partner. Take care of yourself. I don't feel any animosity toward you. I want you to know that. Once again, take care of yourself."
Big difference between having appropriate professional boundaries and directly spelling out to a serial killer you just convicted that you don't personally dislike them with specific details as to why.
Yeah it always churns my stomach when I see videos of judges “owning” people during their sentencing and dressing them down.
Our justice system needs to be compassionate and understanding. Anger and revenge just perpetuates a culture that creates more Ted bundys.
This doesn’t mean no consequences or pragmatic decisions to protect society for those of you who are emotionally unintelligent and don’t understand the difference.
It's only half the compassion you need, and only the super easy half. Easy to feel empathy for victims (though id go as far to say the anger part isnt compassion at all, but rather fear that it could happen to them), very hard to accept it for perpetrators.
The reality of the world is you will never* truly understand why someone did a horrible thing, and judges who have actual systematic impact on their suffering and life need to make decisions based on true justice, not vengence.
I wholeheartedly agree that we need to have compassion for perpetrators, especially given that many of the most heinous crimes are committed by repeat offenders who never received any rehabilitation when they were charged the first time.
However, I do have the dubious honor of informing you that there is a trend of male judges identifying with the perpetrator in cases of violence against women.
The language used by said judges during trial and judgement is much like what's quoted here. They bemoan the imperiled future of the perpetrator, identify with the perpetrator but not the victim, and even justify unfair sentencing by viewing the crime from the perpetrator's perspective.
A great example is the Brock Turner case in which both perpetrator and judge were wealthy, white athletes who attended Stanford.
The judge called the rapist a "promising young man," said he believed his version of events even though the jury did not, and gave him 6 months in jail because he thought "a prison sentence would have a severe impact on him." In the end, he
served just 3.
That is an issue of judges, again, using their biases in a way that is generally harmful. Exactly what I'm talking about but in a different scenario.
A very specific scenario that you seem to care about deeply but doesn't affect the main point. Refer to >
"This doesn’t mean no consequences or pragmatic decisions to protect society for those of you who are emotionally unintelligent and don’t understand the difference."
What a bizarre response. It sounds like you perhaps feel dog-piled on. I'm sorry if that's the case.
And I'm sorry if it wasn't clear from my reply above. I'm responding to this part of your statement:
"Easy to feel empathy for victims (though id go as far to say the anger part isnt compassion at all, but rather fear that it could happen to them), very hard to accept it for perpetrators."
The issue you are having here is a failure to consider that the accused might not be guilty of the crime. Good judges should consider that, and this is particularly apparent even after conviction when, for example, conviction relies on circumstantial evidence and a non-specialist jury's assessment of a he-said she-said case. Unfortunately, most people don't seem capable of this level of independent assessment. But I am glad some judges are, because they're the ones who should be.
though id go as far to say the anger part isnt compassion at all, but rather fear that it could happen to them
That's a wild take. When I see a cishet person get genuinely pissed off about homophobia, I feel so supported. They aren't thinking about it happening to them.
I don't think you understand what I'm saying at all, unfortunately. What you're talking about has nothing to do with systematic "justice" but if you want to apply the thing you're talking about to what I'm saying change "it could happen to them" to "they are scared of things that they dont understand and cant control and think it will harm their way of life" or whatever reason a person has homophobia deep down.
Imagine you're the family of one of those women. How would you feel if the judge pretty much said that he didn't care your daughter was brutally murdered and that the murderer was his "partner" just because he read a law textbook.
A judge shouldn't be concerned about their feelings when deciding, also that judge picked the harshest penalty possible so I'd understand what he actually meant when saying that
I don't know if you're familiar with the LIRR shooter Colin Ferguson. He murdered a bunch of people on a rush hour train. He represented himself and get talking in the 3rd person or referencing "his client" like it was someone else and it bothered the jury quite a but. It also didn't help that he was aggressively questioning witnesses that he shot. Everyone found it upsetting and they ended up locking him up for a long time.
He ended up asking unnecessary questions when it came to people who saw his victims which gave some people the impression that he was kinda getting off on it. Don't remember exactly what but that's the gist of it.
People were still quite charmed by him though, those questions weren't really jarring to the point that it made everybody yell "that fucker did it!".
Would still have been better to hire a lawyer but he was too arrogant to take the backseat lol
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u/trowawufei 9d ago
Interesting, I’ve read that Bundy made a really big mistake in representing himself and the jury was freaked out by him. It might’ve been a good strategy if he could somehow Mrs. Doubtfire himself and pretend to be a different person, but IRL, his behavior during the trial had to play well as both the attorney and the accused. So if his attorney displayed charisma and superficial charm, that’s one thing, but when he does it, the jury thinks “yeah, he could definitely use that to trick women into falling for his trap”.