Talk:Hannah Ocuish

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External links modified[edit]

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"Alleged"[edit]

As the sources state, the confession has been accepted by a court of law and the sources therefore take it for granted. Is there any source that actually disputes the confession and argues that the confession never occurred? If not, the article should not be littered with the word "alleged". If there is no dispute as to whether the confession occurred, there is no need to refer to it as an "alleged confession" or that she "allegedly confessed".

A court of law found Ocuish guilty because it was satisfied that the prosecutors proved her guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Unless a source disputes her guilt, the word "alleged" should be removed from all references to the murder. There is a difference between an indictment (accused/alleged) and a conviction. To keep the word "alleged" is to suggest that the conviction is invalid in some way (forced confession, false confession, ineffective counsel, etc.), which might be possible but would require references.

It is also important to consider the time when the offence occurred. Although the age of criminal responsibility or other novel legal principles could save a 12-year-old from trial or execution today, they did not exist back then, and at that time, the general belief was that even infants have criminal liability and cannot use defense of infancy.

It's very possible that Ocuish was actually innocent, immune under later law, or that her confession was less credible because of her age and disability, but then references would need to be added to sources supporting this claim. 2001:56A:706E:1100:B1C1:2FA:8EEF:3A25 (talk) 23:26, 4 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The Connecticut chapter of the Innocence Project launched an investigation into her actual guilt and if she received a fair trial a few years ago. TheXuitts (talk) 00:03, 5 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I would recommend adding a section about that, especially with a reference to the investigation's findings. 2001:56A:706E:1100:B1C1:2FA:8EEF:3A25 (talk) 00:32, 5 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

"with an intellectual disability"[edit]

The introduction of this article states that Ocuish had an intellectual disability. I believe this is an unsourced relic of the first version of this article, from over 18 years ago; may be inaccurate; and should be removed unless there is evidence for it.

I see no conclusive citation for this claim in this article. There are a few citations that might appear to be in support of the claim, to wit:

The cited passage in Caulkins's History of New London, Connecticut describes her as a "fierce young savage" possessing "extreme ignorance." However, it is not clear to me that these descriptions meaningfully suggest an intellectual disability, as opposed to a lack of schooling and the author's prejudice.
The "Sentencing" section states that "under the state of law at that time, age and disability were not mitigating factors," but the cited article from the Hartford Courant makes reference only to Ocuish's age.
The "Reexamination" section states that "It has been suggested by the group and by others that her race, age, disability, and gender may have played a role in her conviction and sentence." There are two citations for this sentence. In the first, a National Geographic article, there is one sentence about Ocuish, which addresses only her age. The second, which is no longer available at the given link but is still up here, does not appear to me to be a scholarly article, and mentions her alleged disability largely in passing. It would not surprise me if this Wikipedia entry was the source for that claim.

Second, the claim seems very much at odds with the quoted contemporary description of Ocuish by Henry Channing as having "...a degree of artful cunning and sagacity beyond many of her years." I do not suggest that Channing's description is particularly factual, or that it was not highly prejudiced. However, if Ocuish did have an intellectual disability, it seems unlikely to me that Channing would have described her with the terms he did.

Finally, I think it's worth summarizing the timeline of how this phrase appeared and remains in this Wikipedia entry.

In the very first version of this article, in November 2005, Ocuish is described as "apparently retarded." The article's creator does not seem to have been malicious, but their work was often not of high quality. For instance, this article was entirely their work.
The article has no sources until August 2007, when a general book on the death penalty for juveniles is added, without any citations.
In September and October 2008, "apparently retarded" was changed to "mentally retarded." No further sources or citations had been added since 2007.
In December 2014, "mentally retarded" was changed to "with an intellectual disability." By this point, a separate "Biography" section had been created, with this clause being in the first sentence of that section. A few more references and citations had also been added, though not for this passage.
In the years since 2014, the sentence was moved to the beginning of the article, and other changes were made to it, but "with an intellectual disability" has remained intact.

I would greatly appreciate discussion and perhaps further relevant citations on this issue before making any relevant edits. Improbabilimited (talk) 20:39, 6 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]