If a loved one killed someone

[Teddy_boy]

If a loved one , son , daughter , husband , wife , killed /murdered someone , and you knew they did it. Would you report them to the police or help them to cover it up to escape punishment ? I ask this because i read an article about a mother who reported her son for taking part in the rioting , and wondered would she have reported him if it had been a case of murder where he would most likely have been jailed for life .

[jackthehat]

Do we really have to go through, one by one, each and every scenario where it is possible to take a life......and give a back-story to each character/victim?

If my boy took a life, he would have to face the law. Simple.

Would it break my heart to be the one to do it? Of course.

Right is right...and wrong is no man's right. It's how I was brought up and how he was brought up and as I've said....I think the guilt of 'getting away with it' would cripple him more than standing up up for it.

[NOX]

My opinion is not based on emotion but on experience Squad, I have been arrested and imprisoned and am fully aware of the way the police and judicial service behave and it is not unbiased by any means- if it were I would have faith in it, as it is I have none because of personal experience. Can I think of a better way of trying people? No I can't but that was not the initial question.

[rowanwitch]

A friend shopped her partner after he seriously injured a bouncer at a club...many years ago
He wanted her to give him an alibi.... when the police came round she told them where they could find him... and handed over the clothes he'd given her to wash... but whether she'd have done this if they didn't ask I am not sure

[McMouse]

I don't think there's an 'absolute' here, but in general I would report a loved one.

[pa___ul3]

see JTH & Rowan, I know that that is the right thing to do, and what I think I would do would be the wrong thing but I think it would be a combination of me not having the balls to do what is right in such a situation and, I suppose, an instict of tribalism whereby my people take priority over everyone else in my world.
I'd feel bad for it, I'd feel guilty, I'd be in the wrong, but I'd do it for my reasons.
Bloody good question though for a Monday morning TeddyBoy!!

[whiskeysheri]

See, again, I'm with Paul on his one; I'm talking about my immediate family and all of whom I know inside out, so I'm basing this on the fact I know they're all good and decent people, so therefore can't ever imagine that that it would ever have been a simple case of premeditated malice and that they then wouldn't be full of remorse. That's what makes the difference in me answering the OP.

[Euphemia]

I would like to think I would report them.

[ummmm]

I wouldn't give anyone an alibi.

[jackthehat]

If you allow that any member of your family is basically an honest upright individual who must have been 'in extremis' to have murdered.........then you must extend that point of view to the family of an individual who may have murdered one of *yours*?

Or does it not work that way?

[joko]

but isnt emotion kind of the point of this post sqad...?

i mean its obvious the RIGHT thing is to report, and the WRONG thing is to not hide it... but this is a very emotional thing and people responses hinge on how they react to it.

if the child is a psycho then itd be for the best to report , but in other circumstances they could have their life ruined for soemthing that wasnt dlieberate, such as walking in on a man abusing your child.... few parents could manage not to rip them limb from limb... do they deserve their life and families lives to be destroyed for that?
its a tough call to know that your call could ruin the life of soemone you love more than life itself, when actually you are not totally sure you wouldnt have done the same thing in their circumstances....

fortunately relatively few parents have to deal with the horror of having a fred west or a jeffrey dahmler as a son, and in those circumstances i would 100% report... but there have been cases of parents not only protecting their son, but of actually helping them hide it...