John Hogan

[Pawsitive Thinking]

What are your thoughts?

I can't help but feel sorry for the man, I know what he did was too awful for words but.........


http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article...338895,00.html

[Grace]

They should have let him finish the job, thus saving a lot of time and money by eliminating a trial.

Harsh - yes. He wants to be dead - let him.

[lizbud]

They should have let him finish the job, thus saving a lot of time and money by eliminating a trial.

Harsh - yes. He wants to be dead - let him.

I felt the same way after reading the story. Just take him back to the
building and let him try it again. Sounds harsh,but hey, he didn't give his
children any choice, did he?

[dragonfly]

I'm not sure of the back story on this but it really sounds as if this man has some type of mental illness. I do think it's horrible that he jumped with his children but if there is a mental condition here he deserves to be treated and not allowed to harm himself. Being ill doesn't make someone less of a person.

[Pawsitive Thinking]

I'm not sure of the back story on this but it really sounds as if this man has some type of mental illness. I do think it's horrible that he jumped with his children but if there is a mental condition here he deserves to be treated and not allowed to harm himself. Being ill doesn't make someone less of a person.

He has a history of depression, both his brothers committed suicide and his father died recently........


http://comment.independent.co.uk/com...cle1311228.ece

[mugsy]

I say let him kill himself if he's so intent on it. I know here in the U.S, that they can't execute a mentally ill person, so just do the world a favor...sorry, harsh as it might be, let him do it...he just wants attention anyway and he did murder his kid and tried to kill the other....sick #@$^@%#

[dragonfly]

It does sound like he has severe mental issues going on. Wow, I feel bad for everyone him, the kids, all the extended family and the people who will have to oversee his trial. It sounds as though he might not have been getting all the treatment he needed. Very sad all the way around.

For everyone who thinks he should be allowed to kill himself, imagine someone you care about who suffers from depression in this mans place, now how do you feel about it? It's so easy to think in black and white when it isn't someone you know but it gets a bit grayer when it's someone you care about.

[lady_zana]

I'm not sure of the back story on this but it really sounds as if this man has some type of mental illness. I do think it's horrible that he jumped with his children but if there is a mental condition here he deserves to be treated and not allowed to harm himself. Being ill doesn't make someone less of a person.

Well said, dragonfly!

I couldn't agree with you more. He needs help; what happened was horrible but people need to understand he is not a monster - much like Andrea Yates, he's a sick person who needs help. Condeming him as 'monster' will do no one any good and is nothing but harmful to all invovled.

[Cataholic]

For everyone who thinks he should be allowed to kill himself, imagine someone you care about who suffers from depression in this mans place, now how do you feel about it? It's so easy to think in black and white when it isn't someone you know but it gets a bit grayer when it's someone you care about.

I chose to put myself in the position of the mother that lost her little boy. I imagine she cared deeply about her little son, and her daughter. Every story has three sides, but, depression or not, I can't get over the image of him jumping with his children.

[Pawsitive Thinking]

I chose to put myself in the position of the mother that lost her little boy. I imagine she cared deeply about her little son, and her daughter. Every story has three sides, but, depression or not, I can't get over the image of him jumping with his children.

Much as she loves her children she has insisted that he was a good and loving father....

[mugsy]

Much as she loves her children she has insisted that he was a good and loving father....

Then she's a psycho too...how could he possibly be a good father when he kills one of his kids and almost kills the other one (and who will most likely be traumatized for the rest of her life)? OY! What a moron.

Oh well, I'm off my soap box now....I truly do wonder about a lot people any more!

[lady_zana]

Then she's a psycho too...how could he possibly be a good father when he kills one of his kids and almost kills the other one (and who will most likely be traumatized for the rest of her life)? OY! What a moron.

Oh well, I'm off my soap box now....I truly do wonder about a lot people any more!

I'm sorry and I don't want to start a fight but I have to say something: Neither the mother or the father in this case is a "psycho". He is a sick man who suffered from severe depression. When he was well, he was perhaps a wonderful father and a wonderful man.

The mind of a person with mental illness is not a rational mind. I have had clinical depression my entire life. I'm very lucky that mine is no where near the level his was and that mine is able to be kept in control by medicine. However, not understanding mental illness and labeling those with it as "pyscho" is one of the great causes of shame for the person with it and leads them not to seek help until it is much too late.

I could stand up here on my soapbox all day but I won't. I'm not defending him; what he was terrible. What I'm trying to say is you cannot put rational action on an irrational mind. If you don't understand mental illnessess, or suffer from one yourself, it is hard to understand how a person could do such a thing. Instead of condeming his action, people need to first try to understand and educate themselves about depression and other mental illnesses.

[mugsy]

As a victim of depression myself, when I say psycho, I mean that she wasn't making sense to me by defending the man that killed her child and saying he was a great father. I have a problem with that. I don't want to fight either and I understand that not everyone is going to share my opinion and that's fine with me...everyone is entitled to their opinion and I will respect it as long as they respect mine.

Hope that helps as a way of an explanation.

[Pawsitive Thinking]

I mean that she wasn't making sense to me by defending the man that killed her child and saying he was a great father

I don't think that she was defending what he has done - maybe she didn't wanted him to be vilified as an evil man when he was clearly very unwell, who knows........................