Friday, March 21, 2014
Suicide voyeur acquitted on free speech grounds
The conviction of an American ‘‘suicide voyeur’’ who encouraged a British man and Canadian woman to take their own lives in an internet chat room has been overturned on free speech grounds.
After the Minnesota Supreme Court ruling, a lower court must now decide whether to bring fresh charges against William Melchert-Dinkel, a former male nurse who was convicted on two rare counts of assisted suicide in 2011.
He was found guilty of aiding the suicide of Mark Dryborough, 32, who died in Coventry, UK, in 2005, and of Nadia Kajouji, 18, who took her own life in 2008.
In the original trial, the court was told that Mr Melchert-Dinkel, who is married with two children, posed online as a compassionate female nurse to prey on depressed individuals, but then gave them advice on how to suicide.
He allegedly told police that he acted for the ‘‘thrill of the chase’’ and wanted to watch his targets die via a computer webcam.
But in a ruling eagerly awaited across the United States by both sides in the assisted suicide debate, the state supreme court has ruled that a state law prohibiting ‘‘advising’’ and ‘‘encouraging’’ suicide broke the constitution by restricting freedom of speech.
However, it upheld the part of the statute that outlaws ‘‘assisting’’ suicide and sent Mr Melchert-Dinkel’s case back to a lower court.
County prosecutors must now decide whether to appeal against the ruling in the US Supreme Court or to bring fresh charges against Mr Melchert-Dinkel for assisting suicide.
Source
While I am pleased that free speech was supported, I am a little surprised. Incitement to violence is normally held not to be free speech yet suicide is surely violence.
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Incitement to violence is normally held not to be free speech yet suicide is surely violence.
That was exactly my thought as well. It's interesting that with this ruling, murder via psychology is protected "free speech", but simply exposing what a death cult (Islam) actually says is "hate speech" and thus not protected.
Once again the leftist double-standards come down on the side of "kill and destroy". Isn't it fascinating how that works?
We are all vulnerable to psychologial pressure, whether locally from family, school, church, etc. but with the quite recent access to literal global exposure to the world's advice and opinions, that makes vulnerability virtually infinite re all kinds of malevolent as well as beneficial influences. Of course some people are more impressionable than others (so maybe another form of darwinian selection going on!).
The guy used fraud to get people to take their own lives for his sick amusement. There has got to be a crime here. He sought out or hunted people he could victimize. Lied to them about who he was and convinced them to take their lives all for his own sick pleasure. Sounds to me like a new way to be a serial killer and not go to jail.
First, "Incitement to violence is normally held not to be free speech yet suicide is surely violence."
No. Just flat out no. Cutting a tree down on your property is "violent" yet no one would ever say that you should not rely on the opinion of an arborist who says "cut the tree down." Burning bras or a flag or is a "violent act" but that too is legal and allowed. Crushing a car at a junk yard is violent yet a supervisor is not guilty when he tells an employee to crush the car. Demolitions of abandoned buildings (including implosions) are clearly "violent" but most certainly legal despite someone saying "blow the thing up."
The prohibition is not "incitement to violence" but "incitement to illegal violence." (In fact, incitement to commit any illegal act is against the law.)
A person can advocate cutting a tree. They cannot advocate punching someone in the face.
In this case, the victims were in England and Canada. Both countries have laws allowing suicide. William Melchert-Dinkel's home state of Minnesota allows suicide as well.
Therefore, since the act of suicide was legal in these jurisdictions, Melchert-Dinkel could not be convicted of inciting to commit an illegal act because the act of suicide itself wasn't illegal.
The second hurdle is that the incitement must be immediate. "Let's go out and beat people up now!" is incitement that is immediate. In these cases, the victims took their lives days after last speaking with Melchert-Dinkle.
The requirement that the incitement be "imminent" is clearly not met.
The guy's behavior was not "fraud" either. "Fraud" requires an enhancement or material gain. That did not happen. Melchert-Dinkle was not paid nor did he receive any material gain for his part in this. By definition, his conduct cannot be fraudulent.
The lower court convicted Melchert-Dinkle on the basis of whether he incited the people to commit suicide and whether he acted in a fraudulent manner. Being that there was no illegal incitement or fraud, the Minnesota Supreme Court sent the case back to see if Melchert-Dinkle was guilty of "assisting" suicide, which is illegal in all three jurisdictions and specifically in Minnesota.
Melcher-Dinkle is a slime. There is no doubt about that. But there is a saying of "what is moral may be illegal and what is legal may not be moral."
Melcher-Dinkle acted in a manner that most people would find immoral.
His conduct was not, however, illegal (within the narrow reasons of his conviction.)
Luke, I have to ask when "hate speech" became non-protected speech if directed at Islam. Myself, I have suffered no ramifications for stating loudly and publicly that Islam (as well as any other religion based on the Old Testament) is barbaric and violent. It also seems real authors like Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris, Dan Dennet, Richard Dawkins, and Ayaan Hirsi Ali all seem to be able to do it without government sanction. Trey Parker & Matt Stone over at South Park studios have pretty much had a go at every single religion, even the ever-litigious $cientology and have yet to face jail time, or even a lawsuit. Prey explain how the government is failing to preserve your right to express your disdain for Islamists.
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