We Are All Potential Murderers

We Are All Potential Murderers
(About the Punishment of Defendants of Recent Children’s Murders)
Emadeddin Baghi
These days, the news of the issuance of the indictment of intentional murder for the accused in Benita’s case has been brought to the media. When the news of the killing of Benita and before that, Atena and Setayesh were published, all of the people flared up and cried for death of the murderers. There appeared such an atmosphere that nobody dared to oppose it, and in the event of any disagreement with this emotional atmosphere, you will be labeled as a heartless human being who has no sensitivity towards Benita’s horrific crime.
On the other hand, it is difficult to bring up any rational discussion about these sensitive topics in an article. The Basics principles and supports of the position taken in this article have already been explained in detail in several books and essays by the present author, and of course, some topics, though purely rational/scientific, cannot easily be published at this time, and they should inevitably be overlooked.
Responses to the grievous death of Atena and Benita are sacred in that they indicate that public conscience is alive, but they should not prevent critical debate. No doubt, the offender must be punished and his punishment is just as justice, but proportionality of crime and punishment is another part of justice. If we put ourselves in place of Benita’s mother just for a moment, we might think like her and do not consent to anything but the death of murderer of her innocent suckling. That is precisely why in such crimes the thread of judgment and decision making should not be in the hands of those who only think of revenge, because justice may be breached.
In our society, the fastest and easiest solution to every dilemma is to clear the problem and eliminating the offender is one such solution; but; in a developed society, they search for scholar causation and pathology. After the incidence of some murders in the United States, the theory of broken window was proposed, though some criticism have been made to this theory, the crime statistics in major American cities, including New York, has been decreasing since the early 1990s.
The Broken Window Theory shows how external factors and the physical environment prepare the ground for crime and how it decreases as those factors change.
These days that the waves of death-request for those responsible for the death of Benita did not allow any other word to be heard, I remembered the note I wrote after the execution of Saddam Hussein in Shargh daily of December 18, 2003 titled” We are all a potential Saddam: How to avoid the recurrence of Saddam’s phenomenon?” Today, once again I say” We are all a potential murderer”, because we consider the entire responsibility to the perpetrator without asking “Why in most countries that imprison such offenders rather than remove them, these types of crimes are less than ours where we promptly demand for the elimination of the offenders? Why a married man with two children in Parsabad, Ardebil, raped Atena Aslani, 7, and then killed her? Why a young man left the 8-month-old Benita in the stolen car and the child dies of heat, hunger and thirst? Is the young burglar or the murderer suffering mental disorder? Have they themselves been victims of child abuse as a child? If we were exactly in the same educational, economic and social conditions, were not we a criminal? What is certain is that a healthy and natural person does not commit such terrible crimes. It can be said that in any case, such a perpetrator should be killed whether he is healthy or sick, because the result is the same. In this case, a new question arises as to whether the culprit should be killed in case his sickness is established? Is the problem then eradicated?
In the case of the defendants in the Benita case, the lawyer can claim that he has reported to the police after the car has been dropped and the police have failed. As it has been announced and the police have confirmed that a call has been made. I have nothing to do
with such legal evidences and how it is possible that the police have failed to find the stolen car in six days of kidnapping the child and what weaknesses have there been. But sociologically, nobody thinks that the offender was an unemployed person, and unemployment has been so destructive that has paralyzed his reason and affection. The main accused has a history of several robberies caused by poverty and unemployment in the Pakdasht deprived area. . Frustration, failure, and poverty can create antisocial elements out of individuals who otherwise under other circumstances may had become a genius, a writer or one of us who are protesting this crime. It’s enough for any of you who read this article to lose your job for several months and be in need of night’s bread, or just imagine that such situation may happen. Can you be sure that you will be the same person again? Of course, there are some great people who can still maintain their humanity, but how many percent are they? These people prescribe the same medication against painful events such as the murder of Setayesh, Atena and Benita that for years judicial authorities and law enforcement forces have prescribed and finally, they, themselves have admitted that this method has not been an obstacle to the repetition of crimes (A list of the documentations for this comments of the law enforcement forces and judicial authorities have already been cited in other articles and I do not repeat them again).
When we only want death and become thirst for revenge and give no opportunity to do any research, from one point, we look like the same killer and perhaps more dangerous. Because our work is more justified and defensible. Just as we normalize killing and prescribe the killing of a human being by another one, we have cultivated the seeds of this mentality in the unconscious minds of the individuals that killing is possible. Why some of Indian tribes do not kill any animals and live with them? Because they have been trained so from the very childhood and are shocked if somebody kills an animal.
Undoubtedly, Atena’s murderer is the perpetrator and the crime of the perpetrator, that is the direct agent, is heavier. But in the law, we have a discussion called combination of perpetrator and accessory and “cause is more responsible than principal” that in penal code, the individual applicability is purported rather than general and social accessories. It is true that the killer of Setayesh, Atena, as well as Benita ‘s murderer, with some negligence, are in person perpetrators of the crime, but the society, the state which is the principal responsible for poverty and unemployment and each and every one of us who institutionalize the killing permit in the spirit and lives of our children, are causes more responsible than the principal.
In December 2012, a footage of the bullying of two teenagers was released on social networks and angered the viewers. One of them in the court explained that he is an orphan. ” My mother was ill, when we took her to the hospital, they had said they would not do the surgery, unless we first pay the fee”, and he inevitably had committed this criminal act, because he has had no money for her ailing mother’s medications. The head of the judiciary announced that extortion with a melee weapon is as infringement of public security and its penalty is death penalty. Finally, these two young offenders were executed.
Now in the same judiciary, prosecutor of Pakdasht states that the perpetration of deliberate or quasi-intentional murder regarding Benita case is in need of more investigations, but in virtual media networks they wrote:”ِDoubt of the prosecutor in deliberateness or quasi-intentionality of Benita Murder. Does Benita’s killer escape from death! “In other words, if a judge or a judiciary authority wanted to have a legal and cautious attitude, they would be attacked, saying, ” The prime defendant of the death of the 8-month Tehrani baby has had 130 records of theft and has been released by bailment of salary slip”. This news is officially denied by the
spokesman of the judiciary by saying: ” He has been detained for a file with 12 cases of robberies, he has been in custody for 14 months and then he has been released on a bail of 160 million tomans.
Are not we making the ground for violence-cycle by our non-legal responses on social networks by making obstacles for observing caution and justice?
Published in: Ebtekar daily, issue: 3774 Tuesday, August 8, 2017, Page 3 Society
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