Monkey See, Monkey Do

The Moors murder - Ian Brady - made the most of his appearance at a mental health tribunal the other day where he complained in a self-obsessed, narcissistic way - that he was a 'monkey in a cage being poked with a stick'.

An apt description, if you ask me - but something he has brought entirely on himself after the cold blooded sexual torture and murder of five young children all those years ago in Yorkshire back in 1966.

When asked why he committed these foul crimes, Brady replied - for the 'existential experience' - which in plain language (rather than his purple prose) means that he  committed these horrific acts for no better reason than he wanted to see what it felt like at the time.

The cost of providing this convict with the opportunity to impress the world with his contrived vocabuarly and interest in Shakespeare and Plato is estimated at £250,000 - much of which will be spent on legal fees for some of the most expensive lawyers and QCs that money can buy.

But there's surely something wrong with the criminal justice system that so much money is wasted on providing this man with such a platform to share his views - which no one is interested in apart from himself.

So while I am not advocating locking him up and throwing away the key - I do object to the fact that so much public money is being spent handing Brady yet another 15 minutes of fame - so that he can play to the gallery over the motives, or lack of them, for his crimes.

I can honestly say that I've no interest in poking Brady with a stick - though he does deserve to be in a 'cage' for the rest of his life where he can reflect on some of the big big mysteries of life.

Such as 'monkey see, monkey do' - or that classic line from from Peter Sellers as Inspector Clouseau - "Do you have a 'leesance' for that 'minkey'?"

In other words, Brady is desperate to be taken seriously, yet all he deserves is our cold contempt and ridicule - instead of all the attention that has been lavished on him recently.