Daniel Petric sentenced gets 23 to life in prison

This dude killed his mom and severely injured his dad because they took away Halo 3, I'm sure you've all heard. But today he was sentenced to life in prison with possibility of parole in 23 years. I don't know whether this kid should have been found not guilty by reason of insanity or if they made the right call, what are your thoughts?

The judge said in January "You can shoot these aliens, and they're there again the next day. You have to shoot them again. And I firmly believe that Daniel Petric had no idea, at the time he hatched this plot, that if he killed his parents, they would be dead forever."

That story sickened me when I first heard it. I think he should be in prison, yeah, and make sure there are no Xbox 360's in there. If so, then he wins.

To me, murder is murder. Video games should never be used as an excuse. Sure, I would get upset as a kid when my parents told me not to play a game or I couldn't have a game. But when I was 17, I knew the difference between reality and video games.

Serious waste of resources by putting him in prison. Just execute him and all the others that are 100% guilty.

Hopefully he makes parole after 23 years. He seems to regret what he did very much, but I don't think he was out of control when he fired that gun.

He's going to be 40 when he has the chance at parole. Man, that's missing the best years of your life (supposedly). I say the sentence fits.

Wow.  By the time he finally comes back into the real world here, he'll be like 40 something and won't have the slightest clue how anything works.

If someone stops seeing the difference between games and real life, their parents should've done something. I can't believe he just did it out of the blue, there must've been signs.

He shouldn't be judged though, don't get me wrong. Murder is murder and should always be punished like it.

"Petric was convicted of shooting his parents in October 2007 after they took the game "Halo 3" away from him. The judge had said the teen was so obsessed over a video game that he may have believed that, like the characters in the game, death wasn't real."

What a fucking cop out.

I think the question of how he got to the point that he would commit murder over a video game is important. It doesn't excuse what he did. But I feel that so much of how a kid turns out is based on the kinds of parents he had. If this kid's parents were too-far in the overbearing camp or the opposite where they let him do whatever he wanted as a child and throughout his life, I can see how his psyche could be significantly different of a person considered to be of sound judgment.

Video game addiction is just like any other addiction. One can be addicted to TV, music, moves, sports, or substances. It's life balance that prevents these kinds of behaviors over obvious trivial items such as games or any other medium. Long story short there is no true black or white answer to what made that kid kill his mother. However, in the eyes of the law and myself he took an innocent life. When it comes to an innocent life, there is no reason that justifies murder.

I wonder if he's going to play Halo 3 when he gets out?

This is yet another situation where I think the criminal should be given some kind of treatment in addition to just being chucked into a jail cell. If the kid really did do what he did because of his Halo addiction it's really sad though, he doesn't understand why he did what he did and he'll always know that he killed his own mother and can never change that fact.

He'll be fucking stoked about all the new Halo releases when he finally gets out.

Sounds like the Judge was coming down on the side of Diminished Responsibility?  I guess the jury didn't buy it.

I seriously doubt a 17 year old would think his parents would respawn like the judge said he thought..

Killing your mother over a game... That's fucked up.

I hope he gets pwnd by some n00bs in prison.

jeez, I remember this idiot, I'm talking about the judge too.

When I was a teenager I would play halo and grand theft auto all day, but when my parents grounded me from videogames I didn't go on a killing spree.  I the worst thing I would do is probably tell them I'm never talking to them again, then 2 hours later ask them to drive me to the mall.

Jail? He should be in a mental institution.

I just can't grasp my mind around how by the time hes 16 he still hasn't grasped the concept of death...unless he was insane. Which to me seems to be the case.