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JamesWhitehead Piffle Prospector Joined: 02 Aug 2001 Total posts: 5779 Location: Manchester, UK Gender: Male |
 Posted: 21-10-2002 18:18 Post subject: Mad For God: When Deranged Christians Attack |
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[Emp edit: A general thread for people who think God made them kill (this has been split off from the Occult Deaths thread as a recurring theme was emerging).
See also:
www.forteantimes.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=16585 ]
Double Axe Murder Christian Freed
Source
Dad who axed family is freed
A DEVOUT Christian who axed his elderly wife and disabled daughter to death so they would finally be at peace walked free from court today.
Frank Hallsworth, 71, and his 69-year-old wife, Daisy, had devoted their lives to caring for their daughter Fiona, who was virtually confined to a wheelchair due to physical and mental problems.
But as he and his wife grew older, Hallsworth realised that Fiona might have to go into a residential home and she could probably be permanently sedated.
"I couldn't stand the thought of us dying and leaving her," Hallsworth told police. "I didn't want her to go into a residential home because nobody loved that child more than Daisy and me, nobody."
Hallsworth, who has five other grown-up children, decided the only way his wife and 33-year-old Fiona would finally be at peace was to kill them. And one night last May, as Daisy and Fiona were sleeping, he armed himself with an axe, whispered that he loved them then beat them to death.
"It was my way of solving the problem," he said later. "I loved them both and wanted my wife and daughter to be at peace".
Hallsworth wept today when he walked free after admitting the manslaughter of the pair on the grounds of diminished responsibility.
Judge Sir Rhys Davies, jailed him for nine months at the city's Crown Court but because Hallsworth had been in custody since May he was released immediately.
"This is indeed one of those cases properly regarded as tragic," said the judge.
"You could not bear the thought of you and your wife dying and leaving Fiona alone and I have no hesitation in accepting you loved them both.
"That led you to make a terrible error of judgement and although it's accepted your responsibility was diminished there are many people who deal with having to care for someone unable to care for themselves."
The judge was told Mr and Mrs Hallsworth cared for Fiona at their home on Homelea Rd, Droylsden after their other children left home.
Fiona had "immense energy" and strength and weighed nearly 16 stones, but Hallsworth and his wife were committed to her care.
One night last May he rang the emergency services and admitted killing the pair by hitting them about the head with an axe.
Police arrived and Hallsworth, still dressed in his blood-spattered pyjamas said: "I am not a violent person".
Hallsworth, said prosecutor Anthony Morris QC, described his wife as "absolutely solid gold" and said the killings were "his way of solving a problem because he could not see any other way of doing it".
And Roderick Carus QC, defending, said Mr Hallsworth was a man of exemplary character who worked hard for charity and the Church and whose other children were standing by him. |
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| Mighty_Emperor Divine Wind
Joined: 18 Aug 2002 Total posts: 19943 Location: Mongo Age: 42 Gender: Male |
| Posted: 29-03-2004 17:34 Post subject: Another person getting prompting from the Almighty |
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| Quote: | March 29, 2004, 8:17AM
Trial begins for mother who stoned sons to death
Associated Press
TYLER -- Psychiatric experts for both the defense and the prosecution agree that Deanna Laney was legally insane last Mother's Day weekend when she used rocks to bludgeon two of her sons to death and badly injure a third.
But Smith County District Attorney Matt Bingham wants a jury to decide.
Eight men and four women will begin hearing evidence Monday in the capital murder case in district court in Tyler. The jurors, along with two alternates, were picked last week and immediately sequestered amid national media attention on the case. One alternate was dismissed by the judge after an emergency hearing Friday night.
Laney, 39, a deeply religious woman who homeschooled her children in the tiny town of New Chapel Hill, 100 miles southeast of Dallas, called 911 just after midnight May 10 and told a dispatcher, "I've just killed my boys." She said God ordered her to do it.
Deputies found 8-year-old Joshua and 6-year-old Luke lying in the front yard in their underwear, skulls smashed and stones the size of dinner plates atop their bodies. Their 14-month-old brother Aaron was found alive in his crib, bleeding from a broken skull, a pillow over his face. He is recovering.
Laney's husband, who apparently slept through the attacks, has supported his wife, attending several court hearings along with several other family members.
Days after the killings, Laney's pastor and brother-in-law, Gary Bell, urged his congregation to support her. He said he didn't believe the loving, devoted mother they all knew committed such a crime.
Laney is being tried on two counts of capital murder and one count of serious injury to a child.
Her lawyers will try to prove she is innocent by reason of insanity. Prosecutors will try to prove that Laney knew right from wrong and is guilty. Prosecutors are not seeking the death penalty.
State District Judge Cynthia Kent has ordered attorneys in the case not to comment on it.
Attorneys not connected to the case said the nature of the crime will make it difficult for a jury to find Laney innocent.
"You have totally blameless victims who are children," said Tyler attorney David Dobbs, a former Smith County assistant district attorney who has tried more than 20 capital murder cases. "If you were dealing with a situation where it was a drug-induced love triangle, perhaps it's easier for jurors to cross the line. But blameless child victims just make everybody take a deep breath."
The insanity defense is always difficult to prove -- even if experts on both sides, including the country's two leading experts on criminal insanity claims -- say that Laney was insane, attorneys say.
Psychiatric experts concluded Laney had four psychotic episodes before the killings and she probably suffered from delusional psychotic disorder for at least three years.
"The difficulty in this case is getting the jury to go from the position that everybody thinks she's crazy to the position that she is legally insane under Texas law," Dobbs said.
"It's a very hard standard. ... People can be really mentally ill but if they have the capacity to understand that their conduct is wrong, under our law, they are sane," he said.
During jury selection, Bingham, the prosecutor, urged jurors to consider that psychiatric evaluations were "subjective opinions" and suggested that mental health experts could be misled.
"Mental illness does not equal insanity," Bingham told jurors.
Another potential crack in the insanity argument is that Laney called 911 after the killings. Some jurors may see that as an awareness of wrongdoing.
"If you take the position that she was insane, it's a very troubling thing," Dobbs said.
Andrea Yates, the Houston-area mother convicted of the 2001 drownings of her children, also called 911. But her attorney George Parnham said that doesn't rule out insanity.
"An acknowledgment of a person's actions doesn't speak to the mind-set behind those actions," Parnham.
He said Laney's attorneys will have a hard time getting the jurors to focus on her mental illness rather than the graphic images of dead children. The same thing happened in the Yates trial, he said.
"I'm sure the same will be trotted out in this trial in Tyler and that's very difficult to get over," Parnham said. "That's a hurdle and it will always be until we reach a level of sophistication regarding mental health."
Considering publicity surrounding the Laney case, Parnham said the judge's decision to sequester the jury is a good one.
"It sanitizes the process," he said. "It's probably not a bad idea, the fact that the jury will be in a situation that will guarantee no outside pressure from any source."
Dobbs agreed: "You always wonder if jurors are going to be gazing at the camera in the courtroom and affected that their verdict will resound throughout the country."
Laney is not expected to testify, but her husband and his brother, mother and sister are among probable witnesses. |
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/metropolitan/2472770
[edit: More on Andrea Yates who laos gets mentioned in that report:
http://www.crimelibrary.com/notorious_murders/women/andrea_yates/ ]
Last edited by Mighty_Emperor on 12-09-2004 20:26; edited 1 time in total |
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| Anonymous |
| Posted: 29-03-2004 20:26 Post subject: Woman Thinks World Will End - Kills Two Sons |
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(CNN) -- In opening statements Monday, a Texas prosecutor described how a mother smashed the head of her infant son with a rock and then led her two older boys outside and did the same to them, killing the two oldest boys.
Deanna Laney, 39, has been charged with two counts of murder in the deaths of sons Joshua, 8, and Luke, 6, and a single count of injury to a child, Aaron, her 15-month-old who survived the attack.
The prosecution's first witness in the Tyler, Texas, trial was the 911 operator who identified the tape of Laney's dispassionate call saying that she had killed her boys with a rock.
Laney sat through opening statements with her head bowed, crying softly. She has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity.
Prosecutors have chosen not to seek the death penalty in the case.
Smith County District Attorney Matt Bingham told jurors it was their task to determine if Laney was insane or if the prosecution had proved that she knew what she was doing when she bludgeoned the heads of her three sons.
Aaron survived the attack on May 9, 2003 -- Mother's Day -- with critical injuries.
"His vision is impaired, and he will never be self-sufficient," Bingham said. "At best he will always be dependent on someone else.
"The last thing that Joshua and Luke Laney ever saw on this Earth was their Mama holding a rock over her head," he said. "And the last thing they felt was that rock crashing down on them."
After killing Joshua and Luke, Bingham said, Laney telephoned 911, telling the operator, "I just killed my boys. I don't think I did right by Aaron."
When the 911 tape was played in court, Laney closed her eyes and began crying again as she heard the operator try to keep her on the line until sheriff's deputies arrived. Her husband -- Keith Laney, who has been supportive of his wife -- sat two rows behind the defense table, his head in his hands as the tape was played.
Laney's court-appointed attorney, F.R. "Buck" Files, presented his case for an insanity defense during his opening statement.
"You will hear that she was a sick person on a quest to be closer to her Lord," Files said. "The only explanation which any of the witnesses can offer for her conduct ... is that Deanna Laney was legally insane."
Files said Laney believed that God had told her the world was going to end and "she had to get her house in order," which included killing her children.
"The dilemma she faced is a terrible one for a mother," Files said. "Does she follow what she believes to be God's will, or does she turn her back on God?"
Files said he would present witnesses who would corroborate Laney's love of her children as well as her belief "that the word of God was infallible."
"It destroyed her ability to discern the wrongness of her act," he said.
If the jury were to agree with the defense, Laney would immediately go into maximum security for evaluation at a state psychiatric hospital, where she could stay as long as the maximum sentence she would receive if she were convicted -- 40 years.
The jury will not be permitted to hear and consider that information.
http://www.cnn.com/2004/LAW/03/29/children.slain/index.html |
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| Mighty_Emperor Divine Wind
Joined: 18 Aug 2002 Total posts: 19943 Location: Mongo Age: 42 Gender: Male |
| Posted: 03-04-2004 13:18 Post subject: |
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| Quote: | Mom describes on tape how she smashed sons' skulls
Thursday, April 1, 2004 Posted: 2255 GMT (0655 HKT)
TYLER, Texas (AP) -- A housewife said the first sign that God wanted her to kill her three boys came Mother's Day weekend when she saw her 14-month-old playing with a toy spear.
Deanna Laney said she resisted at first, but the signs kept coming. The baby came to her with a rock, and later in the day squeezed a frog, and she believed God was suggesting that she should either stab, stone or strangle her children.
A sobbing Laney recounted in a videotape played at her capital murder trial Wednesday how she smashed her sons' skulls with rocks to prove her faith to God.
"I was telling him no, and each time it was getting worse and worse, the way that it would have to be done," Laney said. "I thought it was the Lord saying to me, 'You're just going to have to step out in faith. This is faith. You can't see why. You just got to."'
The state rested its case and Laney's attorneys were expected to begin presenting evidence Thursday.
Laney, 39, who homeschooled her children in the tiny town of New Chapel Hill, 100 miles southeast of Dallas, has pleaded innocent by reason of insanity in the deaths of 8-year-old Joshua and 6-year-old Luke and serious injury to a child in the beating of the 14-month-old, Aaron.
Five mental health experts consulted in the case agreed Laney met the standard for legal insanity. But prosecutors want a jury to decide, saying other evidence suggests Laney could tell right from wrong.
The defense is trying to convince jurors that the signs from God were actually psychotic delusions caused by a severe mental illness that made Laney incapable of knowing right from wrong at the time of the killings, the standard in Texas for insanity.
Dr. Park Dietz, a psychiatrist who interviewed Laney in the tape, called her a textbook case of insanity, concluding she did not know right from wrong at the time she attacked the boys.
Prosecutors tried to convince jurors that regardless of whether Laney believed she was doing right by God, she had to have known she was doing wrong by state law. Her first call, prosecutors said, was to 911 to summon authorities.
Dietz said Laney wasn't thinking about state law when she killed the boys, but acknowledged that she probably knew her act was illegal at the time.
In the videotape, Laney said she believed she and Andrea Yates, the Houston woman who drowned her children, were chosen by God to be witnesses after the world ends. Yates was convicted of capital murder in 2002 and sentenced to life in prison.
Laney said she awoke just before midnight on May 9 and "I just got this feeling that now's the time."
She said she went into Aaron's room and bludgeoned his skull with a rock she had hidden under his crib, but he wouldn't quit breathing.
"I told the Lord, 'You're just going to have to do the rest. I can't do anymore,"' Laney said. She said she put a pillow over his head to mute a gurgling sound.
She killed the older boys next, one at a time, guiding them outside and hammering their heads with a heavy rock. She dragged Luke by his feet across the yard so that Joshua wouldn't see him.
"I don't remember seeing their faces at all," Laney said in the tape. |
http://edition.cnn.com/2004/US/Southwest/04/01/children.slain.ap/index.html |
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| Renigirl Joined: 12 Nov 2001 Total posts: 265 Location: At the top of a hill, Tri-State, W.Va., USA Age: 33 Gender: Female |
| Posted: 04-04-2004 00:11 Post subject: |
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One would think that the fact she struggled with the "instructions" she received would prove she had some handle on right vs. wrong.
This whole thing just strikes me as really odd... she's gotten complete support from her husband and congregation for one thing,... It's really just made me quite emotional for some reason.
Not quite how I'd imagined returning to the boards either. (Not a prolific poster at the best of times, I know, but I'd sort of imposed a ban for myself as I was not getting work done). |
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| Renigirl Joined: 12 Nov 2001 Total posts: 265 Location: At the top of a hill, Tri-State, W.Va., USA Age: 33 Gender: Female |
| Posted: 04-04-2004 02:06 Post subject: UPDATE |
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This just came across the wires here, no story yet:
| Quote: | | TYLER, Texas — Housewife who said God told her to bash her sons’ skulls with rocks acquitted of murder, all other counts. |
More from the first lede:
| Quote: | TYLER, Texas — A woman who claimed God ordered her to bash in the heads of her sons was acquitted Saturday of all charges after a jury determined she was legally insane during the killings.
A jury found that Deanna Laney did not know right from wrong when she killed her two older sons in the front yard and left the youngest maimed in his crib. Laney, 39, was found not guilty by reason of insanity of charges of capital murder and serious injury to a child.
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Last edited by Renigirl on 04-04-2004 02:20; edited 1 time in total |
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| PeniG Proud children's writer Joined: 31 Dec 2003 Total posts: 2920 Location: San Antonio, Texas Age: 52 Gender: Female |
| Posted: 04-04-2004 03:16 Post subject: |
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This is a really sticky one, and I think the judge passed on the decision to the jury because he knew he could get crucified whatever he did and he wanted to spread the guilt.
Tyler is in far east Texas, practically in Louisiana. I did a school visit there some years ago (until I found out the ages of the victims, I was horrorstruck at the possiblity that a kid I'd signed a book for might have met such a fate - it's horrifying enough without it happening to someone I had personal contact with), and though I wouldn't characterize it as the sticks, it is a small, Southern town with certain value sets assumed.
One: Faith in God is Good. Faith in God = Protestant Christianity, every man his own priest and all that. Equating following what you believe to be the Lord's word with insanity would be a very hard intellectual and emotional hurdle to get over - and face it, there was that whole Old Testament business with Abraham coming to the verge of sacrificing Isaac before being let off at the last minute. A number of people in Tyler are at this moment gazing (or refusing hysterically to gaze) into that pit of possibility: Could I have done this? What if it really was God?
Two: The Death Penalty is Good. Killing murderers is the only appropriate response.
Three: Religious Women are Good. You can't kill a religious woman! These are the kind of people who rallied to save Karla Faye Tucker a few years back. (She got religion on Death Row after killing a man with a pickax. She told a fellow-inmate she had an orgasm while doing it - the murder, not the conversion.) Male death row inmates get religion all the time and only hardcore anti-death penalty people rally to save them; but religious women are different. Actually, women are different. You don't often see a woman executed in Texas.
You see the problem. My guess is that the jury took the route that would allow them to stop thinking about it the fastest, as a conviction would have set off years of appeals even if the death penalty weren't assessed against her.
Not having seen the evidence, I have no opinion about her sanity. All I know is, that if the most religious mother I know heard God telling her to bash in her kids' heads with a rock, she'd tell God to take a flying leap. My observation is that it's not what you believe that matters; its who you are. |
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| Mighty_Emperor Divine Wind
Joined: 18 Aug 2002 Total posts: 19943 Location: Mongo Age: 42 Gender: Male |
| Posted: 04-04-2004 04:09 Post subject: |
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| Quote: | BREAKING NEWS: Deanna Laney -- NOT GUILTY
KTRE Latest Headlines
Jurors deliberated seven hours before returning the verdict in the capital murder and serious injury to a child trial. Laney broke into tears as the verdict was read. Her husband, Keith Laney, sat emotionless. A few jurors cried and struggled to maintain their composure.
May 10th, 2003, just over ten months ago, Deanna Laney called police saying she had killed her sons. The scene was horrific. Two children, Luke and Joshua beaten to death with rocks. The youngest, Aaron Laney was in his crib covered in blood. He barely survived. Neighbors said the Laneys were normal, church-going people, and that there was absolutely no explanation. |
http://www.ktre.com/Global/story.asp?S=1759789&nav=2FH5M1qY |
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| Mighty_Emperor Divine Wind
Joined: 18 Aug 2002 Total posts: 19943 Location: Mongo Age: 42 Gender: Male |
| Posted: 04-04-2004 13:31 Post subject: |
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Longer reports:
| Quote: | Mom who said she killed on God's orders acquitted
Jury rules she was insane when she bludgeoned her 3 children
Sunday, April 4, 2004 Posted: 0412 GMT (1212 HKT)
(CNN) -- A jury acquitted a Texas mother of killing two of her sons and seriously injuring the third after determining she was insane at the time.
As the verdicts were read, Deanna Laney's face quivered, but the 39-year-old shed no tears.
Laney would have received an automatic life sentence had she been convicted of capital murder.
Instead, she will immediately be taken for evaluation to a maximum security state psychiatric hospital, where she could stay as long as 40 years.
Laney admitted bashing her three children in the heads with rocks. She said God told her to do so.
Laney was charged with two counts of murder in the deaths of 8-year-old Joshua and 6-year-old Luke, and a single count of injury to a child for 15-month old Aaron, who survived the attacks on Mother's Day 2003.
Prosecutor Matt Bingham has said Aaron's vision is impaired and he will never be able to live on his own.
Bingham chose not to seek the death penalty in the case.
"I don't think anybody in this room or anybody in that courtroom wasn't touched by the evidence in this case," the Smith County district attorney told reporters after the verdicts.
"For the rest of my life I'll remember Aaron, I'll remember Joshua, I'll remember Luke. I'll never forget what happened to them that day," he said.
Laney's court-appointed attorney, Buck Files, said he felt a sense of relief.
"We have believed as strongly as we could believe that our client was insane at the time of the events," Files said.
Files said in court that Laney believed God had told her the world was going to end and "she had to get her house in order," which included killing her children.
"The dilemma she faced is a terrible one for a mother," Files told the jury. "Does she follow what she believes to be God's will, or does she turn her back on God?" |
http://edition.cnn.com/2004/LAW/04/03/children.slain/index.html
| Quote: | Laney Acquitted of All Charges
Saturday, April 03, 2004
TYLER, Texas — A woman who claimed God ordered her to bash in the heads of her sons was acquitted of all charges by reason of insanity Saturday after a jury determined she did not know right from wrong during the killings.
A jury found that Deanna Laney (search) was legally insane May 9 when she killed her two older sons, ages 6 and 8, in the front yard and left the youngest, now 2, maimed in his crib. Laney, 39, would have received an automatic life sentence had she been convicted of capital murder.
Laney broke into tears as the verdict was read. Her husband, Keith Laney (search), sat solemnly with his head down. A few jurors cried and struggled to maintain their composure.
State law allows Laney to be committed to a maximum security state hospital. Medical evaluations will dictate when she will be released. She will remain at the Smith County Jail until a hearing regarding her transfer.
Defense attorney Tonda Curry (search) said the verdict doesn't mean Laney escaped punishment.
"Now and for the rest of her life, the punishment and torment that's going on in her own head is more significant and more damaging to her than anything the criminal justice system could have done, other than death," Curry said.
All five mental health experts consulted in the case, including two for the prosecution and one for the judge, concluded that a severe mental illness caused Laney to have psychotic delusions that rendered her incapable of knowing right from wrong during the killings — the standard in Texas for insanity.
Smith County District Attorney Matt Bingham (search) said had no regrets about taking the case to trial.
"This is a case that the citizens of this county needed to make the decision on," he said.
Jurors deliberated about seven hours before reaching their verdict in the deaths of 8-year-old Joshua and 6-year-old Luke, and the beating of Aaron. The baby was found bleeding in his crib while the other two were found with their skulls smashed in the front yard.
Defense attorneys argued that insanity was the only reason why a deeply religious mother who homeschooled her children would kill two of them and maim another without so much as a tear.
"There was no crying," Curry said. "She was insane. There is no other answer."
Psychiatrists testified that Laney believed she was divinely chosen by God — just as Mary was chosen to bear Christ — to kill her children as a test of faith and then serve as a witness after the world ended. In a videotape played at her trial, Laney said she saw her youngest son play with a spear, hold a rock and squeeze a frog, and took them all as signs from God that she should kill her children.
In closing arguments earlier Saturday, prosecutors portrayed the killings last Mother's Day weekend as deceptively planned and coldly executed.
"It was graphic, it was horrific and it was brutal," Bingham told the jury.
Bingham pounded his fist in his hand as he recounted Joshua's killing: "He got strike after strike after strike on his head to the point that his brains were coming out of his head like liquid."
Prosecutors said that even if Laney believed she was doing right by God, she had to have known she was doing wrong by state law. Her first call, they pointed out, was to 911 to summon authorities.
The 911 tape was among the evidence jurors reviewed during deliberations. Jurors also had asked for psychiatric testimony to resolve a disagreement over why Deanna Laney stopped beating Aaron, then 14 months old, but they reached a verdict before receiving the transcript.
Psychiatrists testified that Laney couldn't finish killing the baby, and that she told God, "You're just going to have to do the rest." Prosecutors said that action indicated Laney knew right from wrong and that if she chose to disobey God's orders by not killing Aaron, she could have disobeyed his orders to kill the other two.
Bingham said Aaron, who lives with his father, suffered permanent injuries in the attack. |
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,116066,00.html |
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| Mighty_Emperor Divine Wind
Joined: 18 Aug 2002 Total posts: 19943 Location: Mongo Age: 42 Gender: Male |
| Posted: 10-04-2004 14:28 Post subject: |
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| Quote: | Laney Believed Son Would Rise From Dead On His Birthday
Woman Found Not Guilty By Reason Of Insanity In Deaths Of 2 Sons, Beating Of Third
POSTED: 9:57 am CDT April 9, 2004
UPDATED: 10:18 am CDT April 9, 2004
TYLER, Texas -- An East Texas mother who killed two of her sons said she refused anti-psychotic drugs after her arrest until her son Joshua didn't rise from the dead on his ninth birthday as she had expected.
Deanna Laney (pictured, left) also said she felt embroiled in spiritual warfare, considered killing herself after her arrest and worried how her surviving son would cope, according to a transcript of a pretrial psychiatric interview obtained by The Dallas Morning News for a report in Friday editions.
Laney, 39, was found innocent by reason of insanity on Saturday of all charges in the deaths of 8-year-old Joshua and 6-year-old Luke and the severe beating of Aaron, now 2. Aaron's eyesight is impaired, and doctors say he will never live independently.
The jury found that Laney suffered from a severe mental illness that caused her not to know right from wrong -- the standard in Texas for insanity -- when she bashed her sons' skulls with rocks on Mother's Day weekend. She was transferred Thursday to Vernon State Hospital.
In the transcript of a psychiatric interview conducted in December with prosecution psychiatrist Park Dietz, Laney said she refused the medication until after Joshua's birthday in late July. She told a psychiatrist who visited her weekly that she was smelling sulfur in her cell and thought it a sign that the devil was near.
Laney said she didn't mention that earlier because she thought everything happening to her "was spiritual warfare, and I didn't think he would understand any of it," the newspaper reported.
"I didn't want to kill my kids at all. ...I felt I like I had no choice," she said in the transcript. "Because God told me to do that, and I was taught you obey God."
Laney said she saw divine signs and signals in everything from the wrinkles in her underwear to the legs of jail tables.
She said she once thought about killing herself by banging her head on the corner of a metal trunk.
She thought the urge came from the devil, "and it was like he was saying, if your eye offend you, pluck it out; if your hand offend you, cut it off, a verse in the Bible. It was my head that was offending me, and I need to bash my head in."
But as she hit her head, she felt God "stood there watching with the last string of hope -- so I didn't," Laney said in the transcript the newspaper said it obtained after the verdict was returned in the case.
Laney said that after beginning the medication, she lost her certainty that the beating of her children was God's will.
"I started realizing that he wouldn't do something like that."
Laney also told Dietz that she wished she had taken the medication sooner and would never stop taking it.
She also said she would never consider trying to have another child and wished that churches and schools taught people like her how to recognize mental illness and get help. Of her surviving son Aaron, she said she worried that he would inherit her illness and worried about him having to live with what she did. |
http://www.nbc5i.com/news/2989409/detail.html |
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| TheQuixote Joined: 25 Sep 2003 Total posts: 4085 Gender: Female |
| Posted: 30-07-2004 21:38 Post subject: Urged to kill by Txt Msg Frm God |
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| Quote: |
Pastor jailed for murderous text messages
Fri 30 July, 2004 15:57
By Simon Johnson
STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - A Swedish pastor has been jailed for life for faking text messages from God to get his nanny-lover to murder his wife and try to kill the husband of a second mistress.
The case has fascinated Sweden with its intoxicating mix of sex, death and the workings of an obscure religious sect.
The court found Helge Fossmo, a Pentacostal minister in the town of Knutby, north of Stockholm, guilty of inciting Sara Svensson, his childrens' 27-year old nanny, to kill his second wife and his next-door-neighbour, Daniel Linde.
He was having an affair with the nanny and Linde's wife.
The nanny admitted to the January murder of Alexandra Fossmo and to shooting Linde, who survived the attack. The same court has ordered her to be sent to a psychiatric institution.
"Helge Fossmo ruthlessly made use of Sara Svensson's love for him and her dependency on him as a religious leader," read Friday's verdict of the court in the town of Uppsala.
The trial painted a picture of a bizarre religious community, far removed from the liberal and secular society most Swedes would recognise. Life in the sect, an off-shoot of the Lutheran Church of Sweden, was controlled by a woman known as "Christ's Bride" after she got engaged to Jesus in a ceremony.
COVET THY NEIGHBOUR'S WIFE
The community's ministers also exercised a controlling influence in the lives of their flock. In Fossmo's case that included using the latest technology to get his nanny to commit murder. Svensson testified she received anonymous text messages, which she believed to be from God, urging her to kill.
A technology company traced erased messages on her phone to Fossmo, who admitted sending them but said they were intended only to guide the nanny in her faith.
Svensson also said the pastor told her that killing his wife and neighbour was the only way she could please God.
The confessions of the nanny led the police to reopen the investigation into the death of Fossmo's first wife.
She died in 1999 after apparently falling over in the bath, hitting her head on the tap, according to Fossmo. At the time, her death was treated was an accident. The court on Friday cleared him of any responsibility for her death.
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http://www.reuters.co.uk/newsArticle.jhtml?type=internetNews&storyID=5830413§ion=news |
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| Stormkhan Disturbingly familiar Joined: 28 May 2003 Total posts: 5330 Location: Robin Hood country. Gender: Unknown |
| Posted: 31-07-2004 08:35 Post subject: |
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I've always been of the opinion that all the claims of "outside" influence on weak-minded murders are only an excuse to pass the blame for aberrant actions.
The only novelty is the methods by which Heaven or Hell transmits it's outrageous instructions for murder. Once apon a time it was visions and voices. Now it's the mobile phone?
Codswallop! |
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| Mythopoeika Boring petty conservative
Joined: 18 Sep 2001 Total posts: 9109 Location: Not far from Bedford Gender: Unknown |
| Posted: 31-07-2004 20:21 Post subject: |
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| Indeed. The 'voices made me do it' ploy has been used by countless criminal types so they'll get softer treatment. |
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| Anonymous |
| Posted: 31-07-2004 22:08 Post subject: |
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This case have been headline news for months here in Sweden. It's a relief to finally have it over and done with. It even had it's own t.v.show with running news, expert guests and discussion panels...
And regarding the nanny: it's not as much a case of God-made-me-do-it as pure simple brainwashing done by the pastor. If that she says it's true (as the court just ruled it was) she's nuts and totally in the hands of that man. |
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| Mighty_Emperor Divine Wind
Joined: 18 Aug 2002 Total posts: 19943 Location: Mongo Age: 42 Gender: Male |
| Posted: 05-08-2004 13:55 Post subject: God made me do it!! |
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| Quote: | 'MESSIAH' KILLED HIS BROTHER FOR GOD'S LOVE
GORDON LYON
09:00 - 04 August 2004
A Farmer who believed he was the second Messiah killed his brother by running him over with a tractor because he thought he had to prove his love to God.
Michael Clark was insane when he killed his brother, Billy Clark, at Auchnabo Farm, near Ellon, on April 17.
He had been a patient in Aberdeen's Royal Cornhill Hospital in 2001 and 2002, and was deemed to be well at a review in February.
Consultant psychiatrist Lindsay Thomson, of the state hospital at Carstairs where Clark is held, confirmed he has a history of mental problems and was insane at the time of the incident.
She told the High Court in Stonehaven that Clark is "a considerable risk to the public and in particular to members of his family".
Dr Thomson said he suffers from a mental illness, probably bipolar affective disorder.
Clark claimed to have killed his brother "to prove to God that he loved him".
He believed his brother would come back from the dead, she added.
NHS Grampian declined to comment last night because of patient confidentiality rules.
Mr Clark, 45, a veteran of the Falklands and Northern Ireland, was married with three children when he died.
His family released a statement through police which said the "tragic" incident "could and should have been avoided".
"No matter the outcome of today's judgment in court, nothing will ever replace the void left by the tragic loss of Billy, a loving and most cherished husband and dad," the statement read.
"Hopefully, lessons will be learned to ensure that nothing like this can ever be allowed to occur again."
His wife, Alison, said: "Unfortunately for me and the children we have to live with the consequences of that night forever."
Michael Clark, 44, pleaded not guilty to murder and to a further charge of attempted murder and lodged a special defence of insanity at the High Court in Stonehaven.
His defence team and the Crown agreed the facts prior to the case being dealt with.
They were that Clark had run over his brother, was insane at the time and therefore not responsible for his actions, the court heard.
The 44-year-old was working as a labourer for agricultural firm Charles Esson and Sons, which rented the farm, when the incident took place.
On the day of the tragedy, one of the firm's directors, Charles Esson, found a job had not been done and went looking for Clark.
He found his tractor in a field at Auchnabo, with Clark inside - but he resisted Mr Esson's attempts to open the door.
Further attempts to communicate with him failed and Mr Esson drove to his home nearby, where he contacted Billy Clark, 45, for assistance.
When the pair returned to the farm the tractor was in the same position, but Clark was nowhere to be seen.
Mr Esson then left to attend to other business.
At 10pm Billy Clark telephoned his wife from the farm and asked her to contact the police.
When Mr Esson returned he found Billy Clark at the gate of the field.
The tractor's headlights were on and its engine was being revved. Michael Clark drove round the field in circles before driving at his brother and Mr Esson, forcing them to run to safety.
At this point two police constables and a sergeant arrived at the farm.
Clark later shouted "Billy" from the tractor and as his brother approached, drove round the field before heading towards him at speed.
Billy Clark began to run towards the gate but was struck and thrown into the air.
Mr Esson and the police officers were forced to dive out of the way, leading to the attempted murder charge.
He was then taken from the cab by the police who used CS gas.
Police told him they were there to help him but he told them: "How can you help me? I've murdered my brother."
The jury was directed to accept Clark's not-guilty pleas by judge Lord Osborne.
He told them: "In the circumstances you have no option but to return a verdict of not guilty on account of the accused's insanity."
Although Clark has been responding to medication, Lord Osborne accepted Dr Thomson's opinion that he requires ongoing care and treatment in a high-security psychiatric setting.
Lord Osborne returned Clark to the state hospital, where he will remain indefinitely.
Detective Inspector Mark Cooper, who led the investigation, said Clark was an ill man who suddenly lost control.
"On the night of his death, Billy was trying to help Michael. This makes this tragedy all the greater," he said.
"In this case, perhaps more than most, today's hearing will not bring an end to the suffering for Billy's family.
"Our thoughts are with them at this difficult time." |
Source
Last edited by Mighty_Emperor on 20-02-2006 15:16; edited 1 time in total |
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