Posted on 12/02/2016 9:15:56 PM PST by nickcarraway
An Alabama inmate on Friday asked the U.S. Supreme Court to stay his upcoming execution to consider whether a judge should have been able to give him a death sentence when the jury recommended life imprisonment.
Ronald Bert Smith is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection next Thursday for the 1994 slaying of Huntsville convenience store clerk Casey Wilson. A jury recommended life imprisonment without parole by a 7-5 vote, but a judge sentenced Smith to death.
(Excerpt) Read more at al.com ...
Delay it. Sure. Just after he brings back the life he took.
Kill the bastard
Do juries have the authority to determine sentencing?
Buh-Bye Bobbie.
“Do juries have the authority to determine sentencing”
From the article:
“”Alabama is the only state that allows a judge to sentence a defendant to death when the jury has recommended a sentence of life,” lawyers for Smith wrote in the petition, noting that Florida and Delaware abolished that capability this year.”
...if I was the judge I’d tell them I’ll think about Friday
Jill Stein petitioned the Judge for a stay of execution, so the orderlies can recount the number of picoliters of lethal fluid in the vial, before the injection.
Ed
LOL
We need to revisit a national DNA database so we can make sure we got our guy and execute him quickly.
Sorry. No stays of execution for people who use three names.
It’s the law!!!
Juries can be fickle and irrational.
Ironic how big they grinned when the prosecutor thanked us and then told us that he had info that he wasn't allowed to bring up in the trial - the perp had been on the run from another State where he committed a similar assault....
“Juries can be fickle and irrational.”
And juries can have a good time too. I was on a jury once where a woman was hospitalized for several months. Part of the award dealt with her inability to provide sex for her husband. We figured out how many times they’d do it per week, what a good hooker would cost, then did the math.
Your trial sounds more fun than mine - maybe someday i’ll get called again, end up on a jury, and have a good time with it....so, how much in hooker fees did you award?
I used to strongly support the death penalty, at the state level, since it just won’t be carried out at the federal level. But it has become so eroded in most states that it is just a joke.
The only people who ever face it are multiple killers who are particularly gruesome in their means. Ironic in that they should be first in line for quick execution. But so many judges and politicians are adamantly opposed to it that it is almost a lost cause.
However, there is a remedy.
Right now, last year, various governments around the US executed a mere 28 savage killers. But ordinary citizens, not under the foolish constraints of government, are legally armed and dispatching huge numbers of villains.
Citizens shoot and kill at least twice as many criminals as police do every year (1,527 to 606). 2,133 total.
This really takes a bite out of crime.
The FBI regularly interviews armed criminals in prison, and has found that many commit a dozen or more crimes, and a significant number commit 50 or more crimes in just a small number of years.
So when an armed criminal is killed, it erases all the future crimes they would have committed. And this just slashes the armed crime statistics.
And more, to put violent criminals in prison may cost from half a million to a million dollars a decade. Each decade.
Add up the numbers. At the low end, $1,066,500,000.
At the high end, $2,133,000,000.
And this doesn’t include the substantial costs to people and society from their potential future criminal acts.
So the bottom line is that an armed citizenry is policing society far better than government is willing to do.
I do not recall how the award was broken down. I do remember I would not participate in the conversation regarding how much a hooker cost per visit, the younger members did all of that, I just agreed. The jury was equally divided between men and women. The women were in their mid-30’s, and had a good time doing the calculations too.
As a jury we were quite angered as the one being sued tried to blame his fault on a totally innocent third party, that was visibly dirt poor. As a result, we thought of every possible way to award the plaintiff money, since the defendant pissed us off. So when the award seemed small, one of the guys asked: “What about hooker fees?”
“This really takes a bite out of crime.”
I agree, if a thug sees the possibility of getting whacked in the commission of a crime, he will certainly exercise a little caution.
But what this does, is make “gun free zones” even more vulnerable to shootings, as the perp feels confident there are no armed citizens willing to do him in.
Some how or another, in accordance with the 2nd Amendment, these gun free zones need to be abolished.
I know of one such shopping mall, and when seeing the guns banned sign on the doors, I immediately think the place is operated by libtards.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.