[winin2000]

Most Maryland murder victims are black, but all 13 men on the state's death row were sentenced to die for killing whites.

Aside from the fact that 13 cases is far too fragmentary to say anything meaningful about the system, did it occur to the author that maybe the murderers of blacks simply weren't caught?

Has anyone else noticed how the bar establishing "racism" in the justice system keeps being moved? At first it was simply a question of are disproportionate numbers of blacks being executed relative to whites. Now the complaint here seems to be we aren't arresting and prosecuting enough when the victims are black!

But wait a minute! If most black crime is, in fact, committed by fellow blacks, and those perps are brought in and sentenced, wouldn't that put us right back at the originial complaint?

Anyway, sounds like Ehrlich's making a positive difference already!

[Cicero]

Obviously you would have to look at all the murder cases individually. In the old days, first degree murder got the death penalty pretty much automatically. In recent years, there has to be extreme cruelty or other aggravating circumstances.

Probably a lot of black-on-black murders are between rival gangs or drug dealers, in which case most jurors would have a hard time working up much sympathy for the victims. I'm just speculating here, which is why you would really have to review all the cases in detail before drawing any conclusions.

[jackbill]

See #5