The Modern Salem Witch Hunt

Michelle Carter is the victim of a modern Salem witch hunt, so it is only appropriate that it is taking place in Massachusetts.

Here is her story, from the Washington Post:

In July 2014, Michelle Carter’s 18-year-old boyfriend committed suicide in a Kmart parking lot. 

After his death, Carter texted a friend. 

“Like, honestly I could have stopped it,” she wrote. 

But instead of trying to stop her teenage boyfriend from taking his life, prosecutors in Massachusetts believe that Carter pressured Conrad Roy III to go through with the act.
And on Friday, the state’s highest court ruled that she could go to trial for her alleged role in his death. 

“I hope they hold her accountable for her actions,” Roy’s grandfather, Conrad Roy Sr., told the Boston Globe. “She told him to get back in the truck. She prodded him on. All of the text messages are pretty much self-explanatory.”

Let's get some facts straight:

1. Conrad Roy III killed himself without any direct assistance from Michelle Carter.
2. She encouraged him to kill himself.

Without a doubt, her encouragement was heinous, vile, despicable, and whatever other adjective you would like to toss onto her words to him. But that is the key: They were just words.

Conrad took the action. Conrad took his life. Michelle did not make him do anything he didn't want to do already. She said she could have stopped him, but how does she know that? She doesn't, really. He may have done it anyway, without her encouragement.

What she did was wrong, and she will have to live with it. But putting her in jail for this serves no purpose, other than to find someone to blame for a suicide. Putting her in jail won't absolve Conrad Roy for committing suicide.