THE diary of Mr Cedric Murray, the wanted gunman who led the Stone Crusher gang before the police killed him last month is instructive, albeit sensational.

That is why we are publishing the details of it.

For it is our hope that those of us with the tendency to behave as if criminality is a senseless phenomenon that can be eliminated by brute force as opposed to a rational engagement of the country’s social apparatus and justice system, will rethink their position on reading it.

According to Friday’s and today’s editions, Mr Murray, aka ‘Doggie’ was a lonely, bitter individual who hated the police and politicians to the death.

But he wasn’t the sub-human monster that so many supposed him to be.

As the diary indicates, he was subject to the same emotions that are commonplace to the rest of us.

In addition to the hate, he felt love for life and his woman; envy of the freedom with which others lived and to which he had — by reason of his chosen lifestyle — no access; joy at the birth of his son and sympathy and concern for his stepdaughter.

That at least is indicative that somewhere within the madness beats the heart of a man who might, under different circumstances, have turned out differently.

The loyalty that he demonstrated towards Mr Christopher ‘Dudus’ Coke, the alleged drug and gun-runner, might — under different circumstances — have been otherwise employed.

This is where our ability, as a society, to understand the antecedents of people like Mr Murray becomes critical.

For, as this space pointed out on Thursday, the failure on the part of the many parents in this society to just be there for their children is slowly but surely condemning the country to death.

As long as we continue to produce children for whom we cannot care; as long as we continue to turn a blind eye to those who, through no fault of their own, are growing up without the benefit of parental love, we are going to be plagued by criminals like Mr Murray. It doesn’t matter how many police we employ to kill them out. Until we take the issue of responsible parenting seriously, we are going to have problems at every level. Mr Murray wrote about no less than seven children in his diary. What is to become of them, now that he’s gone? Would their fates be any brighter had he been alive today? It is easy, indeed tempting, to rush to judgement on Mr Murray and the many, many others who are pulling the triggers of the guns that snuff out life on a daily basis in this country. However, as the crime statistics for the past seven decades indicate, this doesn’t really help. Nothing, short of a return to the days when a village took seriously its responsibility to raise all its children will suffice. Mr Murray, unfortunately, missed the boat. Let’s not leave his, or anyone else’s children behind.