Published on 12, July, 2020
Trigger warning: knife crime and murder
I had not been following too closely the news reports about the tragic murder of Brianna Ghey. However on the news last night it stated that both of the accused are autistic and that has shocked me. This online news report states the the boy "has been diagnosed with selective mutism and autism spectrum disorder" and the girl "has traits of autism and adhd". They were described as 'high functioning' in court
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-67727331
I find it impossible to comprehend how any autistic person could be capable of such a premeditated heinous crime and then to lie about it afterwards.
The stigma against autistic people persists and news reports like this are not going to help with the negative perceptions some people continue to have. Sadly there are some people who believe that autistic people are in some way dangerous and should be locked away in institutions. Cases like this might damage public support for the NAS campaigns to release autistic people who are wrongly detained
ASD people can and will commit heinous crimes, especially if they have the "no empathy" ASD and not the "hyper empathy" kind. I did a lot of unlawful activities back then, but I managed to never get caught. Now I work with an active SC lol.
Anders Breivik has high functioning ASD, Antisocial disorder and Narcissism
Jeffrey Dahmer probably had ASD, but he is too busy being dead for having a proper diagnosis.
Adam Lanza had ASD, OCD and anorexia.
I think that the prison psychiatrists will identify many more conditions in this pair of monsters than just ASD.
Hopefully they will have many decades to do so.