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Post by Joanna on Jun 16, 2017 19:49:37 GMT -5
Michelle Carter Guilty in Texting SuicideA woman who sent her boyfriend a barrage of text messages urging him to kill himself when they were both teenagers was convicted Friday of involuntary manslaughter in a trial that raised questions about whether words can kill. The judge found that Michelle Carter caused the death of Conrad Roy III, who intentionally filled his truck with carbon monoxide in a Fairhaven, Massachusetts, store parking lot in July 2014.
Carter, who faces up to 20 years in prison, cried and clutched a handkerchief to her face as Juvenile Court Judge Lawrence Moniz detailed her conduct and the circumstances of Roy’s death, but she was stoic when the verdict was formally pronounced. As spectators and members of both the Roy and Carter families left the courtroom, she sat at the defense table, sobbing, with her lawyers trying to comfort her.
The judge focused his ruling on three words Carter said to the 18-year-old Roy after he climbed out of his truck as it was filling with toxic gas and told her he was scared. “Get back in,” Carter told Roy, according to a friend who testified that Carter described the conversation in a text message to her about a month after Roy died.
The judge said those words constituted “wanton and reckless conduct,” adding that Carter, then 17, had a duty to call someone for help when she knew Roy was attempting suicide. Yet she did not call the police or Roy’s family, he noted. “She did not issue a simple additional instruction: Get out of the truck.”
The case provided a disturbing look at teen depression and suicide. Carter and Roy met in Florida in 2012 while both were on vacation with their families. Their relationship consisted mainly of texting and other electronic communications. They met in person a only a few times. Both teens struggled with depression. Carter had also been treated for anorexia, and Roy had made earlier suicide attempts.
The sensational trial was closely watched in legal circles and a hot topic on social media, in part because of the insistent tone of Carter’s text messages to Roy. “You can't think about it. You just have to do it,” Carter texted Roy on the day of his suicide. “You said you were gonna do it. Like I don’t get why you aren’t.” Later that day, she texted Roy again, saying, “I thought you wanted to do this. The time is right and you’re ready ... just do it babe.”
In the end, the judge found that it was not the coercive text messages that caused Roy’s death; it was Carter’s insistence that he get back into the truck. Moniz allowed Carter can remain free on bail, but ordered her not to make any contact with Roy’s family or leave the state. A sentencing hearing is scheduled for August 3.
Carter’s lawyer, Joseph Cataldo, argued that Roy was determined to kill himself and nothing Carter did could change that. He said his client initially tried to talk Roy out of it and urged him to get professional help, but eventually went along with his plan.
The judge said he did not take Roy’s prior suicide attempts into account in his verdict.
Roy’s father said the family was pleased with the conviction. “This has been a very tough time for our family, and we’d like to just process this verdict that we are happy with,” Conrad Roy Jr. said.
Assistant District Attorney Katie Rayburn admitted the case dealt with important societal issues, “but in the end, the case was really about one young man and one young woman who were brought together by tragic circumstances.”
The American Civil Liberties Union denounced the conviction, saying it “exceeds the limits of our criminal laws and violates free speech protections” guaranteed by the Massachusetts and U.S. constitutions. Matthew Segal, the ACLU’s legal director for Massachusetts, called Roy’s suicide tragic but added, “It is not a reason to stretch the boundaries of our criminal laws or abandon the protections of our constitution.”Source: Dennis Lavoie, ABC News, June 16, 2017.
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Post by Joanna on Aug 3, 2017 18:24:56 GMT -5
Michelle Carter Sentenced in Texting Suicide CaseTAUNTON, Mass. – Michelle Carter, a Massachusetts woman convicted of involuntary manslaughter for urging her boyfriend to commit suicide through a series of text messages, was sentenced today (Aug. 3, 2017). Judge Lawrence Moniz sentenced the 20-year-old to 2½-years in jail, but ruled she would be eligible for probation after 15 months and suspended the remainder of her sentence until 2022. He also sentenced her to five years’ probation. Moniz granted a defense motion to stay her sentence, meaning she will not have to go to jail until she exhausts her appeals in Massachusetts. She is now free on supervised release.
Carter’s attorney, Joseph Cataldo, told reporters he believes his client will be cleared. Carter was 17 in July 2014 when she urged 18-year-old Conrad Roy III to “get back in” a truck filled with toxic carbon monoxide gas parked in a Fairhaven parking lot. Carter was convicted in juvenile court bench trial in June and Judge Moniz determined the girl’s final instruction to Roy to get back in the truck caused his death.
In dozens of text messages, Carter urged Roy to follow through on his talk of taking his own life. “The time is right and you are ready ... just do it babe,” Carter wrote in a text the day he killed himself.
Prosecutors alleged Carter pushed Roy to commit suicide because she was desperate for attention and sympathy from classmates, and wanted to play the role of a grieving girlfriend. Cataldo countered that Roy was intent on killing himself and took Carter along on his “sad journey.” A psychiatrist testified Carter, too, was “very troubled” and at first tried to talk Roy out of it, but became convinced she needed to help Roy “get to heaven” only after he convinced her there was nothing she could do to stop him.
Cataldo had asked the judge to spare his client any jail time and instead give her five years’ probation and require mental health counseling. He said Carter was struggling with mental health issues of her own – bulimia, anorexia and depression – during the time she urged Roy to kill himself. “Miss Carter will have to live with the consequences of this for the rest of her life,” Cataldo said. “This was a horrible circumstance that she completely regrets.”
Prosecutor Maryclare Flynn called probation “just not reasonable punishment” for her role in Roy’s death and asked for a sentence of 7 to 12 years.
Moniz repeated a statement by one of the prosecutors which he called “perhaps the most poignant comment in the trial” – “This is tragedy for two families.” In handing down his sentence, he cited that Carter was a juvenile at the time of the crime, but denied her age or level of maturity or mental illness had any significant impact on her actions. However, he conceded the young age of youthful offenders offers a greater promise of rehabilitation. Moniz continued, saying the “people may wonder why all of this has happened” and that he used a compilation of best practices for sentencing juveniles in his decision. He also cited the impact on Roy’s family members and took into account their emotional statements to the court.
Carter wiped away tears as she listened to the victim impact statements. Roy’s sister Camden Roy said her brother was the “best friend and best role model any little sister could ask for. Not having that one person I've been with every day since birth is a pain I'll always keep with me for the rest of my life.” Ms. Roy also testified that she was “haunted” by the realization that she will never see her brother wed or be an aunt to his children.
Conrad Roy Jr., Roy’s father, called his son his “best friend” and “first mate” and said, “Although he did have some psychological troubles, we all felt he was going in the right direction and over the worst of it.” He continued, saying Michelle Carter “exploited my son’s weaknesses and used him as a pawn in her own well-being” and that she hadn’t shown any remorse for her part in what happened. “Where is her humanity? In what world is this behavior okay and acceptable?” Roy implored.
One of the prosecutor’s read a statement by Roy’s mother Lynn Roy: “There is not one day I do not mourn the loss of my beloved son,” the grieving mother wrote. “I want him to be proud of me and how I am handling everything – I am trying to be there for his sisters in all of my pain we will carry with us for eternity.” In a June interview on 48 Hours in the episode “Death by Text,” Mrs. Roy said she didn’t believe Carter “has a conscience” and told Erin Moriarty: “I think she needs to be held responsible for her actions ‘cause she knew exactly what she was doing and what she said.”
Carter was tried as a youthful offender, giving Moniz several sentencing options. He could have committed her to a Department of Youth Services facility until she turned 21 on Aug. 11. He could also have combined a DYS commitment with an adult sentence, or sentenced her as an adult to a maximum of 20 years. Carter’s family urged Moniz to consider a term of probation, while Roy’s family petitioned the judge to hand her the maximum sentence.
In a letter written to Moniz last month and obtained by the Boston Herald, Carter’s father, David Carter, wrote: “I pray to God you will take into consideration that Michelle was a troubled, vulnerable teenager in an extremely difficult situation and made a tragic mistake.”
But in another letter obtained by the Herald, Roy’s aunt, Kim Bozzi, asked Moniz to hand down the maximum sentence of 20 years. “I’m unsure when [Michelle Carter] decided to set her sick plan into motion or why, but when she did, she did it relentlessly; it was calculated and it was planned down to a T,” she wrote. “She preyed on his vulnerabilities, he trusted her, which in turn, cost him his life.”
The sensational trial was closely watched on social media, in part because of the insistent tone of Carter’s text messages. “You can’t think about it. You just have to do it. You said you were gonna do it. Like I don’t get why you aren’t,” Carter said in one text.
Source: CrimeSider, August 3, 2017.
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Post by kitty on Aug 3, 2017 20:15:36 GMT -5
I don't know how I feel about this. Just because someone tells you to do something doesn't mean you have to do it. People have free will. But she was his girlfriend, so what she said would have more of an effect than a stranger telling someone to jump off of a bridge, or something. Also, if it's true that she wanted the attention as the grieving girlfriend, that's just sick.
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Post by pat on Aug 4, 2017 13:12:47 GMT -5
I don't know how I feel about this. Just because someone tells you to do something doesn't mean you have to do it. People have free will. But she was his girlfriend, so what she said would have more of an effect than a stranger telling someone to jump off of a bridge, or something. Also, if it's true that she wanted the attention as the grieving girlfriend, that's just sick.
The boy did have free will and he didn't have to listen to the girl, but they were boy and girlfriend and she was encouraging him to commit suicide. He was obviously having some reservations about it and she was goading him into doing it. If that had been my son, I'd want to kill her. She got off light, the judge should have spent at least 4 or 5 years in prison.
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