Kuala Lampur, Sept. 21 -- The recent High Court verdict involving the 15-year-old boy who was acquitted of murder on grounds of insanity should make us pause before rushing to explain horrific violence through fashionable labels such as violent extremism, nihilism or terrorism.

The case was undeniably tragic and the loss of life devastating. But the court's finding reminds us of a fundamental principle of criminal justice: the seriousness or brutality of an act does not, by itself, determine its legal or criminological classification.

An act can be violent without being terrorism. It can be shocking without being violent extremism. And a young person can commit a horrific crime without being ideologically radicalised.

This distinction ...