Should Ian Brady be declared sane.....

I think it's the right one as well, mollie. He's not been allowed to have HIS wishes fulfilled. Good.

It's been announced that he's still mentally ill and will stay at Ashworth. I think that's the right outcome...

Seems to me he's still playing his manipulative games. What kind of person kills children to prove he's better than everyone else?

That was my (totally unfounded and uneducated) suspicion, Iam64 - leopards and spots etc.

I have often wondered if locking someone away for life is any better in terms of human rights, than execution : we obviously have to protect society from people like Brady ,and there is absolutely no doubt that he committed the crimes , so if he wants to die , let him. As some have already said he probably has no idea where the child's remains are. It would be like the proverbial needle and haystack.

Discussing Myra Hindley seems inevitable given the fact that Ian Brady is so much in the news currently. There are those who argue that she was vulnerable, and led into committing these truly dreadful crimes by her involvement with Brady. Those who knew Myra Hindley in prison generally agree she remained a manipulative, unempathic, cold individual, who ensured her own needs were met, a user of others.

Something that will never be known now, gracesmum.

Poor Lord Longford, he truly looked for the good in people like Hindley didn't he? I could never make up my mind whether she truly regretted what she had done and repented or whether she was merely exploiting his good nature.

alanthetiler, I'm glad you like being here on the forum with us.
Did you perhaps mean do-gooders like Lord Longford/Myra Hindley?

I haven't noticed any 'do gooders' being on his side - only people saying we should observe the ethical and legal standards of Britain when dealing with all criminals.

I think anybody who can kill children in cold blood without any remorse should in my opinion be executed, that cant happen so he should be put in a dark cell and be totally ignored, if he wants to kill himself so be it. But I dont think he would, he is a coward really. Dont give him the pleasure of being noticed. The problem is all the do-gooders will be on his side. And the papers are probably doing well out of sales? So the pantomime will carry on.

Ps I like this forum, wished we had found it sooner.

I hadn't made the connection but apparently he and Hindley were on trial /sentenced just as the death penalty was being abolished in the UK and there were moves to reverse or delay the implementation so that it could apply to them. Not wishing to get into a discussion on the death penalty, so all I would wish for is for the remaining relatives of the victims to know their final resing place so that they can achieve some sort of closure. Brady should not be allowed the publicity he is enjoying (and I do use the term advisedly)

We get some bits and pieces of British news from time to time (lots of it royal but also other stuff). I was surprised to see a news report about this loathsome man on New Zealand television and think we could have done without it. He strikes me as being as insane as ever, if not more so.

Yes, Stansgran and Charleygirl I'm with you there.

I never was one of the flog 'em and hang 'em brigade but this is one exception.

I agree we should be fair and ethical and then hire a helicopter to deposit him gently on Saddleworth Moor one foggy November night with some toast and packet soup. Just dreaming about natural justice. Never happens.

Nightowl - I agree totally with your last couple of sentences. As a society we have to treat everyone with humanity and within the law. He is rightly locked up for life but his legal challenge to incarceration in Ashworth has to be allowed. We'd all prefer the money it's costing to be spent on improving life for children for example, but we are at least working within the legal and ethical framework. That's something Brady wouldn't understand at all.

From what we have heard of his ramblings in Court he seems to be exactly the same manipulative sadist he always was. He complains about having no control over his life, but can't see that that is the point. The worst thing for someone like him is to have his whole life run by other people, and I for one am quite happy for that to continue for as long as possible. When you think of the tape recordings that were played at his trial and compare them with his comments about the murders being like Wuthering Heights you know that hanging was too good for him.

Has it not occurred to him that if he gets to prison, someone may well end his life for him?

Incredible that heis given so much respect even down to him eating toast and soup,and nurses not wanting to embarrass him on 'hunger strike'

Would that he had shown any remorse to his victims.

I will not Want to Read the biography his long term visitor is intending to publish after hs death too macabre for words

Let him carry on - they're paying out the rope for him to tie himself up in knots with. He sees himself as superior and highly intelligent. Obviously not that bright, as the psychiatrists he is so scathing about will all go home to their families every night, whereas he has wasted his life.

He killed, he says, for the existential experience! The arrogance is unbelievable!

Listening to The World at One, I too felt he was manipulating both the media and the system. My flesh creeps when I think of his arrogance and how people are bending over backwards to be fair to him. He is totally delusional IMHO, an arrogant self-seeker who is probably sane in the exaact sense of the word but not like any normal person. I think Nightowl has summed it up perfectly in her last 2 sentences. But how I wish he could just be left to fester in some oubliette somewhere.

I agree with you Hilda he should not be given all the publicity he craves. Imagine how he would feel if none of this were reported.

I'm sure we all find Brady's crimes repugnant and deplore the fact that he is being given a platform to air his disgusting views, but the matter at hand is very clear cut. The tribunal's only responsibility is to determine whether he has a treatable mental disorder. No other matters can be considered nor can any bargains be struck such as asking him to reveal the whereabouts of Keith Bennett's body in exchange for his transfer. If he is deemed to be sane then he can no longer be force fed and he would in theory be able to starve himself to death. However, like others I have no belief that this is his intention.

I think it does us credit as a country and a society that we treat him with the respect he failed to show to his victims. That is what makes us better than him.