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Brooks pleaded not guilty by reason of mental disease earlier this year but withdrew the plea before his trial began with no explanation. Days before the trial started, he dismissed his public defenders, electing to represent himself despite overwhelming evidence against him. Police officers and paradegoers testified they saw Brooks behind the wheel of the SUV. District Attorney Susan Opper presented several photos of Brooks driving the vehicle to the jury. Brooks’ main defense theory appeared to be that he was a sovereign citizen, echoing a conspiracy theory that every person is a nation and isn’t subject to government restrictions. He refused to recognize the court’s jurisdiction over him, refused to answer to his own name, launched into meandering cross-examinations, and muttered under his breath that the trial wasn’t fair.
Doesn't sound sane to me.
>Brooks pleaded not guilty by reason of mental disease earlier this year but withdrew the plea before his trial began with no explanation. Days before the trial started, he dismissed his public defenders, electing to represent himself despite overwhelming evidence against him. Police officers and paradegoers testified they saw Brooks behind the wheel of the SUV. District Attorney Susan Opper presented several photos of Brooks driving the vehicle to the jury. Brooks’ main defense theory appeared to be that he was a sovereign citizen, echoing a conspiracy theory that every person is a nation and isn’t subject to government restrictions. He refused to recognize the court’s jurisdiction over him, refused to answer to his own name, launched into meandering cross-examinations, and muttered under his breath that the trial wasn’t fair.
Doesn't sound sane to me.
Stupid and arrogant is not insanity for a legal defense, as any number of members of the Sovereign Citizens Movement in the USA who have interacted with the criminal justice system have learned. Of course, most of them don't try an insanity defense, they just keep parroting their 'you have no jurisdiction over me because I don't recognize your government' argle bargle, even as they are convicted and led away to prison. There are unfortunately those of them who haven't gotten convicted due to prosecutorial incompetence (Bundy et al) but I will always hope that their next crime will have a good prosecutor in place.
Stupid and arrogant is not insanity for a legal defense, as any number of members of the Sovereign Citizens Movement in the USA who have interacted with the criminal justice system have learned. Of course, most of them don't try an insanity defense, they just keep parroting their 'you have no jurisdiction over me because I don't recognize your government' argle bargle, even as they are convicted and led away to prison.
There are unfortunately those of them who haven't gotten convicted due to prosecutorial incompetence (Bundy et al) but I will always hope that their next crime will have a good prosecutor in place.
I mean the thing with mental health used as a defense, it's only valid if it's full blown psychosis that they don't know what they are doing, not a failure of ethics. Still by these accounts this man doesn't sound stable. Did he really know where he was when he was topless or built a fort out of paperwork?
I mean the thing with mental health used as a defense, it's only valid if it's full blown psychosis that they don't know what they are doing, not a failure of ethics. Still by these accounts this man doesn't sound stable. Did he really know where he was when he was topless or built a fort out of paperwork?
Did he really know where he was when he was topless or built a fort out of paperwork?
He was assessed by four psychologists and was deemed mentally competent to face trial and serve as his own counsel.
I think his weird behavior was a "fuck you" to the judge and the female prosecutor because he hates women and hates even more when he can't dominate us. It also was probably a (likely failed) strategy to get a mistrial or to be able to appeal his conviction later on. Appeals courts generally don't throw out trials due to defendant misbehavior because otherwise functionally all defendants would behave like assholes to escape consequences.
>Did he really know where he was when he was topless or built a fort out of paperwork?
He was assessed by four psychologists and was deemed mentally competent to face trial and serve as his own counsel.
I think his weird behavior was a "fuck you" to the judge and the female prosecutor because he hates women and hates even more when he can't dominate us. It also was probably a (likely failed) strategy to get a mistrial or to be able to appeal his conviction later on. Appeals courts generally don't throw out trials due to defendant misbehavior because otherwise functionally *all* defendants would behave like assholes to escape consequences.
The issue of mental state at the time the crime was committed is what matters in the case - did he know what he was doing was wrong - and no evidence to show he didn't was presented. And, yes, sovereign citizens really do believe they are not subject to the laws and penalties of a government they do not consider legitimate so his acting out in court was a display of his disdain for the judicial proceeding he considers illegitimate.
The issue of mental state at the time the crime was committed is what matters in the case - did he know what he was doing was wrong - and no evidence to show he didn't was presented. And, yes, sovereign citizens really do believe they are not subject to the laws and penalties of a government they do not consider legitimate so his acting out in court was a display of his disdain for the judicial proceeding he considers illegitimate.
/o/NameTheProblem NSFW
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This is a radical feminist circle dedicated to recording and exploring the global phenomenon of male violence.
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While we acknowledge that violence perpetrated by trans-identified males is male violence, these incidents are more appropriate for o/thisneverhappens.
FACTS
- It is estimated that there are 650 million women and girls in the world today who were married before age 18.
- At least 200 million women and girls aged 15-49 have undergone female genital mutilation.
- Approximately 15 million adolescent girls (aged 15 to 19) worldwide have experienced forced sex (forced sexual intercourse or other sexual acts) at some point in their life.
- Twenty-three per cent of female undergraduate university students reported having experienced sexual assault or sexual misconduct in a survey across 27 universities in the United States in 2015.
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RECOMMENDED READING
If you are experiencing/at risk of male violence you may find these books useful:
Why Does He Do That?: Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men by Lundy Bancroft
The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals That Protect Us from Violence by Gavin de Becker
Coercive Control: How Men Entrap Women in Personal Life by Evan Stark
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Domestic violence against women by men is “caused” by the misuse of power and control within a context of male privilege. Male privilege operates on an individual and societal level to maintain a situation of male dominance, where men have power over women and children. Domestic violence by men against women can be seen as a consequence of the inequalities between men and women, rooted in patriarchal traditions that encourage men to believe they are entitled to power and control over their partners.
Perpetration of serious violence and crime is in fact the most distinctive sex difference there is, cross-culturally.
The male-female difference in perpetrators of violent crime is about 10 to 1, consistent across every state in the United States, and true of every country for which such data are available…The overwhelming maleness of violence is so pervasive in every human society that it is typically not even recognized as such; it is the ocean in which we swim.
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Brooks is as good an example of any of how men who abuse and exploit girls and women are ultimately a danger to everyone.