On the “Video Games Made Me Do It” Defense
Friday, February 29th, 2008Decatur Daily, a newspaper in Tennessee recently published an article regarding a man who killed an 80 year old man. Is he a psycho? Is he a serial killer? Are there voices in his head telling him to do it? No. Apparently, he thought he was in a video game. And apparently, this is a valid defense for first degree murder these days.
The deadly confrontation between the accused and an innocent 80 year old man that occurred on Halloween 2005 “resembled a video game”. I wonder, is this a reason to take someone’s life? If I am walking down the street and say to myself, “Hmm, this street reminds me of a violent video game I just played”, do I automatically react violently? No, and I’m sure you don’t either.
Clearly, this is just another over-the-top, flashy defense hoping to confuse the jury so much that they are left asking themselves, “What the hell just happened in there?”
The elderly man was left “lying on his living room floor in blood-soaked pajamas with more than 70 stab wounds, one eye gouged out and a gunshot wound”. Now, that sounds more to me like a cold-hearted murderer than a confused kid, but hey, that’s just my opinion, and I’m no defense attorney, right?
This is clearly a robbery gone very, very bad, especially since the defendant can be heard on the 911 call screaming, “Where’s the vault?” the entire time. This sounds like an open and shut case to me.
I’m just glad this lunatic is getting the attention he was craving, because clearly, that’s the only reason they could be throwing this out there. That, and to try and drag down the gaming industry. You heard it here first, folks: video and computer games don’t kill people; crazy people with weapons kill people.