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People who harm others must be condemned, obviously.  But the question that does need to be asked is why?  This is what criminologists do.  

Let us see.  Is Lindsay Clancy a bad person for killing her kids?  Absolutely.  A social norm says murder is not okay, and for obvious reasons.  The consequences for murder were eventually coded into law.  

But everyone knows Clancy had a mental illness.  She should spend the rest of her life in some place for the criminally insane. "Guilty but mentally unresponsible" should be the verdict in my opinion.  She did know what she was doing.  But her mental state (she was on lots of medications) has to be taken into account.  As with Lindsay Clancy, we should ask "what were they thinking, if anything?"