Thursday, August 20, 2009

Misplaced Compassion.

The decision of the Scottish government to release the man convicted of the Lockerbie bomb is disturbing at least if their reasons are truthful. The SNP's justice minister, Kenny MacAskill, claims that Megrahi has been released on compassionate grounds, but if a man responsible for the murder of 270 people is eligible for release on compassionate grounds then how can they possibly justify not releasing anyone on compassionate grounds after this?

If the real motivation for his release is that they believe Megrahi is innocent- or at least that there is insufficient evidence for his guilt- then they should be open about saying so because that at least doesn't create a precedent that would allow anyone to walk out of prison regardless of the severity of their crimes.

9 comments:

wonderfulforhisage said...

An interesting point.

Say the 'powers that be' (whoever they may be) have been tipped off, and, realise that the Appeal Court may be about to come out with some very embarrassing info. Then maybe, it would be better (for the powers that be) to kick the whole thing into the long grass.

Call me a cynic if you will. I am one.

Mark Wadsworth said...

What WFHA says.

There is so much more to this than meets the eye, it's called 'international law' aka 'making it up as you go along in the national interest', which is quite distinct from 'criminal law' aka finding out what happened and punishing people.

henry young said...

What, all we all of a sudden giving out FREE Lunches? Since when??? Under what premise? Did this guy learn his lesson? Who knows, right? Well I guess we’ll have to find out the hard way, maybe???

Ross said...

If the decision were taken by the UK government I could see why it might part of a stitch up but who in their right mind would involve the SNP in something like that. They would have every incentive to blow the whistle.

Letters From A Tory said...

Yup, I agree with other commentors who suggest that he is about to be proved innocent. I've read a lot of material suggesting that the original conviction was an utter sham and I'm sure it could be easily overturned if the government wasn't so afraid of a public backlash.

JuliaM said...

As ever, the 'Daily Mash' plays a blinder:

http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/business/yorkshire-ripper-to-dig-for-oil-200908201999/

Anonymous said...

'making it up as you go along in the national interest', which is quite distinct from 'criminal law'

Except that in this case there are at least two distinct national interests: the interests of the UK (for example as regards the US) and the interests of the Scottish Nationalists (viz their relationship with Labour - their opponents in Scotland)

I think the Scottish Nationalists will have taken advantage of the the fact that few outside the UK will clearly understand the division of responsibilities between Scotland and Parliament and released him knowing full well that any embarrassment would fall on Brown, not the Scottish executive.

Canny!

Ross said...

Julia- good link. Of course given that Sutcliffe killed fewer people than Megrahi is believed to have killed then by the stated reasoning he should be released if he becomes ill enough.

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