The Bulger Killers; James Bulger; Children Who Kill + Update

Jamie Bulger

Under consideration here: The Bulger Killers: Was Justice Done? (Channel 4); James Bulger: The New Revelations (Channel 5); Children Who Kill with Susanna Reid (ITV).

I’m not including James Bulger: A Mother's Story (ITV) because it is a much more sensitive piece, balanced and compassionate, as you might expect with Sir Trevor McDonald at the helm. I cannot fault it nor the assertion of Denise Fergus (formerly Denise Bulger) that Jon Venables and Robert Thompson have never really been punished properly for their crime.

This article investigates murder, justice, law and the language used by reporters, presenters, officers of law, and the accused. The guilty tend to give themselves away. For more on high-profile murder cases, see my blogs on JonBenet Ramsey and Oscar Pistorius. Always #rememberthevictims.

Thompson/Venables

The Bulger Killers: Was Justice Done?

Fact: On 12 February 1993, James Bulger (2) was abducted, tortured and killed by Jon Venables and Robert Thompson (both 10).

Originally I assumed that the title was asking us to consider whether the sentence given was adequate to the suffering Thompson and Venables had inflicted on James Bulger and his parents. But the programme's remit seemed to be the very opposite, to convince us that it was wrong to imprison the ten-year-olds convicted of this horrific crime. The programme seems to expect the system to show the killers the mercy they never afforded their victim.

Matt Smith, the narrator: ‘In England, you’re responsible for a crime you commit when you reach your tenth birthday.’

This is ambiguous as it suggests that when you reach 10, you’re tried for crimes you committed when younger or that you would only be responsible on your actual tenth birthday. What he meant: ‘In England, you’re considered criminally responsible from the age of 10.

Blake Morrison

Blake Morrison: ‘I think the nation was eager to understand what had brought it about.’

I think the nation wanted the killers brought to justice. Yes, possibly we hoped that their might be some obvious scapegoat but nothing in the boys' backgrounds could explain or excuse what they did. I really wonder what Morrison would say if these ten-year-olds had killed his two-year-old.

This programme and its interviewees continually employ certain language techniques to distance the boys from the murder. It’s very similar to the way Oscar Pistorius talks about his killing of Reeva Steenkamp, refusing to own his actions by saying ‘the gun went off’, ‘the night of the incident’ (rather than ‘the night I murdered Reeva’) or ‘I’m sorry for what happened’ rather than ‘I’m sorry for what I did.’

Dominick Lloyd

Robert Thompson's solicitor Dominic Lloyd said, in an absurdly convoluted sentence: 'Both of those two children can't have been anything other than severely traumatised by what they were part of on February 12.' On a lighter note, I'm a little traumatised by his mutilation of the English language. Perhaps 'Both boys must have been severely traumatised … ' would have been clearer.

I question the use of the minimising 'what they were part of', implying that a number of others were involved, or that they were somehow coerced into it or had no (or very little) agency in it. As above, it's a tactic used to dissociate the boys from the crime. But they weren't 'part of' something. They performed this egregious act alone.

Venables/Thompson

Can the very trauma they initiated and perpetrated be used in their defence? When they essentially traumatised themselves through their own incredible cruelty? James Bulger was more than merely traumatised, he was abducted, terrorised, tortured and killed for their entertainment. I'm in tears whenever I think about what they put him through, how they planned to do it and worked out how they might get away with it.

This tactic is used more than once hence: ‘Yes they should have been tried because of their part in that murder.’

They didn’t have a part in that murder; they committed the murder.

Even this inadvertently depersonalises the action: ‘It was intended that a child should be killed.’

It reminds me of Patsy Ramsey saying ‘I’m the mother’ or ‘I loved that child’. See earlier link to the JonBenet case.

‘Real prison – it'll expose them to real psychological fear.’

Surely all fear is psychological? And what do they think Jamie Bulger felt? God forgive that his murderers should have to suffer any fear.

The court is described as ‘An environment that would have been intimidating to an adult let alone children.’

But their own actions placed them in this environment.

Lloyd also said: "Many years after the trial a juror said 'we found them guilty of murder but we didn't have the option to find them guilty of being two very bewildered and frightened little boys who made an awful mistake and need a lot of help'."

Pistorius

This is simply more bleeding-heart liberalism. Again ‘an awful mistake’ is language that might better describe a spot of truancy not a savage killing. Oscar Pistorius also calls his crime a ‘mistake’. This was not an awful mistake but an act of unparalleled, cold-blooded evil. It wasn't a spontaneous action, a bit of bullying that went too far. It was premeditated murder. And let's face it, they were bewildered and frightened by a situation they created themselves.

Think about it – even today the general public is not allowed to hear the extent of James Bulger's injuries; they are still too disturbing to be revealed. We know that he was kicked in the head with considerable force because there was a shoeprint on his face. This is what we're allowed to know so how bad must his other injuries be if we still have to be shielded from them? Here are some details - if we fail to consider them, we cannot come to a reasoned judgement. After reading them of course, it's very difficult to reason, to feel anything but rage.

Ralph and Denise Bulger

‘To lose a child in those circumstances is appalling.’

This again diminishes the true horror of what they did. The Bulgers didn’t lose a child in certain circumstances. It wasn’t an unpreventable, unfortunate tragedy, like an earthquake. It wasn’t an act of God. It was orchestrated. We learn that the two boys had already tried to capture one child and failed. The Bulgers' child was frogmarched to torture and death by two other children; he wasn't lost.

Narrator: 'Whilst in custody, witnesses who had seen the boys with James, started to come forward.'

Why were the witnesses in custody? He means that the perpetrators were in custody.

Morrison: ‘Justice could never have been served.’

Yes – it could have, if they’d received appropriate sentences. Morrison evidently believes that Venables and Thompson’s childhoods ended on that day (he neglects to add ‘through their own unimaginable malice’). But so did Jamie Bulger’s, through no fault of his own. Where's the perspective?

Morrison even manages to suggest that Jamie’s mother must feel guilty though he doesn’t explain why. Because she let James out of her sight? How could she possibly have foreseen what would happen? It’s an attempt to attribute blame to anyone other than the guilty parties. Let’s blame Jamie’s parents, Venables’s parents, Thompson’s parents, society, the system.

James Bulger: The New Revelations.
First of all, let me say there are no new revelations about James Bulger as the title suggests. How can there be? He’s the same guiltless two-year-old boy he always will be thanks to his murderers Robert Thompson and Jon Venables.

Burke and JonBenet Ramsey

Most of this concerns tapes of the killers talking and in particular, Thompson’s plea for parole. Remember that these quotes are from the eighteen-year-old rather than the ten-year-old and tell me if you think remorse, guilt or empathy are at all in evidence. Instead you'll find the same distancing techniques that Pistorius and the Ramseys use.

His reasons for lying he explains as: 'I wanted to tell what happened but I was too frightened to accept any blame' I'm not surprised. This gives the lie to the people who claim children of that age can tell right from wrong but not understand the possible consequences (see below). He's frightened because he knows he did something terrible and will be punished accordingly if he admits it.

'I would be under risk if convicted.'

This shows fear and a wish for self-preservation rather than any regret for his actions.

Of the public reaction: 'It frightened me … the people who were accused of that crime.'

But he wasn't just accused of it, he did it, was convicted of it and sent down for it.

Then there's a truly unforgivable bit of poor me-ism: 'The van stopped and I hit my head.'

Why mention this now? Has he still no idea that him hitting his head is not going to garner much sympathy after he’s tortured and beaten a toddler to death? That an ‘ouch’ does not compare to the terrible ordeal they put James Bulger through?

'I’m ashamed of playing a part in this murder.'

At least he’s used the word murder instead of ‘what happened that day’ but he did a bit more than play a part. That suggests a minor role in a conspiracy rather than someone who chucked bricks at a toddler until he stopped crying or moving.

Then there’s the usual partial amnesia. See my Pistorius blog: I Don't Remember What I've Forgotten.

'I’m not completely sure of everything that happened' and 'I’ve not got it sorted out in my head.'

Read as: I can't think of anything that would absolve or excuse me so I’m going to fake confusion.

And now for the apologists, one says: 'There was something at home that Robert was avoiding.'

My sister suggests: 'Consequences.'

'Crimes like this come from very bad experiences' and 'Experiencing such violent acts … can lead to trauma.'

But let’s get this straight, he didn’t experience it, he caused it so just like Oscar Pistorius, he can't call himself a victim of the trauma he initiated.We're asked to blame the parents not the children.

Reid with Phillips

Children Who Kill with Susanna Reid

The title is a bit poorly phrased as it suggests that Susanna Reid was alongside them when they killed. The programme considers two cases.

Fact: In 1998, Joshua Phillips (14) killed Maddie Clifton (8) in Jacksonville, Florida.

Josh Phillips's appeal is all about him. He bleats on about how he never knew what real suffering was until he went to prison: 'I was just a kid. I’d done some really dumb stuff.’

Witness the same strategy in his choice of words. 'Dumb stuff' would be knocking over mailboxes, not beating a little girl to death, then hiding her body under your bed for six days while the whole neighbourhood searched for her.

He says ‘I’m so sorry for what happened’ rather than ‘I’m so sorry for murdering your daughter’. Again, it’s a blatant refusal to accept responsibility.

Leppert and Lowry

Fact: In 2008, Morgan Leppert (15) and her boyfriend Toby Lee Lowry (22) beat, stabbed and suffocated the disabled James Stewart (62) to death in his own home in Melrose, Florida.

Reid: ‘What would you say to your fifteen-year-old self?'

Leppert: ‘I wish I wasn’t so naïve and gullible.’

Once more, focused on herself, how she's been affected rather than ‘I wish I hadn’t beaten, stabbed and suffocated a man to death.’

Leppert giggling about the murder

Reid: 'Will the most brutal of crimes still condemn children to die in prison?'

This is such an emotive sentence. No one wants to think of children dying in prison. But the facts are that these two were teenagers, close to adulthood, and if they remain in prison long enough to die, they won't be children when they do. Sadly I couldn't even find a photo of the victim, James Stewart.

Some new science featured on these programmes, a theory that the area of the brain that controls behaviour, empathy, and the ability to predict consequences, does not fully develop till after puberty although some newspapers have misinterpreted this as meaning that preteens cannot yet tell right from wrong. What the 'experts' seem to say though is not that the killers could not predict that beating, strangling someone, etc. would result in pain and death as they could clearly see the effects of what they were doing but that as a result of this death, they might have to face the consequences of ending up in prison for life. Too bad. Meanwhile, see this article on potential psychopaths.

Until these ‘children’ admit their own culpability, and understand the consequences of what they have done, they should not be released. This programme proves they haven't and the American courts were astute and brave enough to recognise this fact and recondemn both to life without the possibility of parole. Hurray for America. Meanwhile the European Court of Human Rights ensured that Jamie Bulger's killers were released. 

#rememberthevictims James StewartRIP

James Bulger RIP

Maddie Clifton RIP