Airline bomber getting out of prison

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Should this man be released from prison on compassionate grounds? Or should he die there? I can certainly understand the outrage from the families of the victims.

Should a person who has shown no compassion for his victims, expect to be shown any themselves?

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Airline bomber getting out of prison
Vancouver/CKNW(AM980)

8/19/2009

A man convicted of bombing Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988 is being released from prison on compassionate grounds.

57 year old Abdelbeset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi is terminally ill with prostate cancer.

Families of victims in the United States are outraged, while the majority of British public opinion supports the move.

A majority of the passengers on flight 103 were American.

The bombing killed all 259 people on the plane and 11 people on the ground.

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Is this the new standard, then? Every murderer who gets a terminal disease will be given compassionate release, regardless of how many people he killed or the circumstances of the crime? Putting a bomb on an airliner is about as low as one can get.

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TRIPOLI — U.S. Republican Senator John McCain praised Libya's leader Muammar Gaddafi for his peacemaking role in Africa and said Congress would support expanding ties, Libyan state news agency Jana said on Friday.

U.S.-Libyan relations have dramatically improved since Tripoli's decision in December 2003 to give up its weapons of mass destruction programs, with diplomatic ties resuming in June 2004 after a break of more than two decades.

"McCain and the delegation accompanying him confirmed the importance of expanding further the relations between Libya and the United States. The Congress would back the measures to be taken to achieve this aim," Jana said. It gave no details.

Since Washington (George Bush) ended its major sanctions on Libya, U.S. energy companies including ExxonMobil and Chevron have been active in Libya.

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I'm trying to imagine if a loved on of mine died under these circumstances how I would feel. I'd be outraged, but I wouldn't fight in any way. The guy is about to croak, regardless of his heinous crime. Remember how Pope John Paul forgave his would-be assasin?

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@Gala,

Gala wrote:

I'm trying to imagine if a loved on of mine died under these circumstances how I would feel. I'd be outraged, but I wouldn't fight in any way. The guy is about to croak, regardless of his heinous crime. Remember how Pope John Paul forgave his would-be assasin?

We're not the Pope. Are you asserting that every convicted murderer who gets a terminal disease should be released? In this case, the crime was the deliberate, pre-meditated murder of hundreds.

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@Brandon9000,

We may not be Il Papa but he does set an example. I'm not asserting anything. The decision has been made. As I said, I don't know how I would react if a loved one of mine had been killed. What I do know is there is a lot to be said about forgiveness.

Another point-- the former Nazi soldier who killed 29,000 people who was living in Ohio? They certainly rounded up his ailing 80+ years ass and hauled him back to the Motherland.

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@Brandon9000,

I don't think that every convicted murderer whi gets a terminal disease should be released - in our state, the main prison hospital has a hospice ward (well, at least something very similar to it).

However, it's general practise by the courts/prosecution here, to release foreign terminal ill prisons to their homelands.

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@Brandon9000,

I don't really feel strongly either way on this one. I see Brandon's point on punishing someone commensurate with the crime, but if the guy is going to die soon anyway I don't feel the need to make sure his last minutes are as bad as possible. It's just not worth any emotional units on my part. Hopefully, the families of the victims have moved on to the point where this guy's impending death and how he lives his last days is not of consequence to them.

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@Gala,

Well, he is born Kiev/Ukraine, did his crimes as a guard at the Sobibór and Majdanek camps in occupied Poland and at the Flossenbürg camp in Germany.

He's charged with at least 27,900 counts of acting as an accessory to murder; the trial will be in Munich/Germany (Munich regional court II [Landgericht München II]).

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@dyslexia,

ha! that might explain why John Kerry and Ted Kennedy are against the release

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@Reyn,

I don't know that it makes one bit of difference where this guy dies as he's about to cash in anyway.

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@Merry Andrew,

Merry Andrew wrote:

I don't know that it makes one bit of difference where this guy dies as he's about to cash in anyway.

And the deterrent to future mass murderers?

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@Brandon9000,

Quote:

Merry Andrew wrote:

I don't know that it makes one bit of difference where this guy dies as he's about to cash in anyway.

And the deterrent to future mass murderers?

Are you actually serious?

Keeping a dying man in prison is supposed to act as some sort of deterrent to would-be terrorists? You been on this planet long?

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There is no death penalty here in the UK, and even those sentenced to life imprisonment get their sentences commuted (unless they are criminally insane or otherwise still a danger to the public.)

Also, there is a strong feeling here that this man is not guilty of the crime, that he was fitted up and scapegoated. He's certainly not acted alone, if indeed he took part in the plot. The feeling here is that the main players were not identified.

I think the act of clemency is the correct one in the circumstances.

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@Merry Andrew,

Merry Andrew wrote:

Quote:
Merry Andrew wrote:

I don't know that it makes one bit of difference where this guy dies as he's about to cash in anyway.

And the deterrent to future mass murderers?

Are you actually serious?

Keeping a dying man in prison is supposed to act as some sort of deterrent to would-be terrorists? You been on this planet long?

Treating the cold-blooded, absolutely pre-meditated murder of hundreds of people, including children, as a very serious infraction which precludes any future consideration is appropriate for a society which is committed to deterring such behavior.

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@McTag,

McTag wrote:

...Also, there is a strong feeling here that this man is not guilty of the crime...

If he's not guilty, he should get a new trial, but as long as his conviction stands, he should be treated as though he did what he was convicted of. Who do you suppose put the bomb on the plane?

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@Brandon9000,

Mass murderer thought process...

"I wasn't going to bomb that building because they were talking about putting me away for life, but now that I know I can get out right before I die, what the heck, I'M GOING FOR IT!!"

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My solution would be to transfer this man to a prison hospital or infirmary to live out the balance of his time. I feel that's a fair compromise.

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@Reyn,

tempest in a teapot. for whatever reason, we here in the USA will go to great lengths to keep a convicted murderer (on death row) alive regardless of medical intervention just so he/she won't die waiting for execution so that we (the state) can execute him/her.

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@McTag,

McTag wrote:

Also, there is a strong feeling here that this man is not guilty of the crime, that he was fitted up and scapegoated. He's certainly not acted alone, if indeed he took part in the plot. The feeling here is that the main players were not identified.

I've had serious doubts about the conviction in the first place for years.

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Airline bomber getting out of prison

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