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Sharon Tate murderer Susan Atkins dies
Just days before Roman Polanski was detained by Swiss police, the murderer of his wife Sharon Tate died in prison
By extraordinary coincidence, just as Roman Polanski was being detained by Swiss police on Saturday, the news emerged that Susan Atkins, the cult member who stabbed his pregnant wife Sharon Tate to death 40 years ago, had died in jail on Thursday at the age of 61.
Tate, the 26-year-old actress who had appeared in the movie Valley of the Dolls, was one of seven people murdered in two Los Angeles homes during the Charles Manson gang's bloody rampage in August 1969. She was eight months pregnant with Polanski's child.
During their sensational 10-month trial, all the defendants maintained their innocence. But once they were convicted, the so-called "Manson girls" confessed in graphic detail.
"I was stoned, man, stoned on acid," Atkins testified during the trial's penalty phase. "I don't know how many times I stabbed [Tate] and I don't know why I stabbed her," she said. "She kept begging and pleading and begging and pleading and I got sick of listening to it, so I stabbed her."
Atkins said she felt "no guilt for what I've done. It was right then and I still believe it was right". Asked how it could be right to kill, she replied in a dreamy voice, "How can it not be right when it's done with love?"
She was referring to Charles Manson, the ex-convict who had gathered a "family" of dropouts and runaways to a ranch outside Los Angeles, where he cast himself as their messiah.
Atkins was diagnosed with brain cancer in 2008. Her death comes less than a month after a parole board turned down her final appeal for freedom. She was wheeled into the hearing on a stretcher and slept through most of it.
Manson and three others involved in the murders - Patricia Krenwinkel, Leslie Van Houten and Charles 'Tex' Watson - remain imprisoned under life sentences. ·
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Long live Sharon Tate.
George Vreeland Hill
OK, Ms Scrimshaw, how about three reasons:
1. Unbelievable as it sounds, in the US it can be as expensive to carry out a death sentence as it can to keep the prisoner incarcerated for life!
2. Once the prisoner has been "dispatched" society tends to forget both the prisoner and the crime they committed. Keeping the prisoner alive helps society to be reminded of the consequences of the said crime.
3. Many inmates in US prisons are involved in productive work programmes such as agriculture and licence (tag) plate manufacture and contribute towards earning their keep.
There are many innocent inmates on death row who are there simply because they could not afford a decent defence lawyer. Many others have profound learning difficulties (anyone with an IQ above 70 can face the death penalty in the US) and are incapable of defending themselves. Then there are the children too.
If and when, and only when, the USA has a decent and fair justice system - a discussion on whether "the 'death penalty' would have been unfair" will be pertinent.
Ms Scrimshaw writes: "just think what all that money could have done, in helping the many decent people who find themselves in need ..." Surely, similar arguments could be used for reducing the defence budget, particularly nuclear re-armaments?
If you are a Christian or respect Christian ethics, you might pay some heed to Jesus' injunctions to 'Come, you who are blessed by my father, take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty... I was in prison and you came to visit me.' (Matthew chapter 24 verse 34-36).
Or you might ask yourself: "Would Jesus flick the switch?"
"Makes one think - doesn;t it?" writes Ms Scrimshaw. Yes, it does!
........ just think how much money it has cost to keep these people in prison all these years..... just think what all that money could have done, in helping the many decent people who find themselves in need..... just give one good reason why the 'death penalty' would have been unfair...... makes one think - doesn't it?