Elizabeth Smart kidnapping trial

[beaucoup]

Why has it taken 8 yrs for this case to come to trial?

 

[superme80]

Because it took this long for the courts to realize the guy is actually mentally fit to stand trial.

 

[Deon.Newmankgyxc]

i dont know the reason

 

[Mermaid02]

That's the legal system! I must say I am impressed with her and her family. They seem like really nice people.

 

[The Mystery Machine]

Nuts isn't it?

 

[angie@dvcstore]

8 yrs? Wow thats crazy

 

[lovetoscrap]

I believe that there have been several attempts in the past but both of them (the woman and the man) were declared mentally unfit. I guess meaning that they are not mentally stable enough to understand what is going on. I think when that happens they are in a hospital facility with the goal being for therapy and medications to get them to a stable point where a trial can happen.

 

[Deb in IA]

Her testimony today was amazing.
What a remarkable young woman.

The man accused of abducting Elizabeth Smart was a crude, vulgar, self-serving person who used religion to justify his actions, including her kidnapping and rape, she told jurors on her third and final day of testimony.

"He was his number one priority, followed by sex, drugs and alcohol, but he used religion in all of those aspects to justify everything," Smart said in a clear voice.

When the defense tried to portray Brian David Mitchell was suffering from escalating mental illness and holding extreme religious beliefs that led him to think that he was being directed by God, she shot them down and called him a hypocrite.

"Nine months of living with him and seeing him proclaim that he was God's servant and called to do God's work and everything he did to me was my family is something that I know that God would not tell somebody to do," she said. "God would never tell someone to kidnap her at knifepoint from their bed, from her sister's side ... never continue to rape her and sexually abuse her."