Washington’s Supreme Court unanimously struck down the state’s death penalty Thursday based on the way that it has been used in an arbitrary and racially discriminatory manner. It was a surprising basis since usually capital punishment is rejected as cruel and unusual punishment. It is the punishment, not the imposition of the punishment, that is the common argument against executions.
Washington has had a moratorium on executions since 2014. Chief Justice Mary Fairhurst wrote that “The death penalty is unequally applied — sometimes by where the crime took place, or the county of residence, or the available budgetary resources at any given point in time, or the race of the defendant.”
Rather than demand greater consistency and coherence in the use of the punishment, the Court struck down its use entirely. I am no fan of capital punishment but I always viewed the question to turn on the nature of the punishment and not its administration. Given the alternative basis, the Court left open the possibility that a non-arbitrary law could be written: “We leave open the possibility that the legislature may enact a ‘carefully drafted statute’ to impose capital punishment in this state, but it cannot create a system that offends constitutional rights.”
The ruling came in the case of Allen Eugene Gregory, who is African American, who was convicted of raping, robbing and killing Geneine Harshfield, 43, in 1996. Gregory commissioned a study on the effect of race and county on the imposition of the death penalty by Katherine Beckett & Heather Evans, The Role of Race in Washington State Capital Sentencing, 1981-2012 (Jan. 27, 2014) . Beckett performed a new regression analysis and updated her report. Katherine Beckett & Heather Evans, The Role of Race in Washington State Capital Sentencing, 1981- 2014 (Oct. 13, 2014). The court relied heavily on her analysis over the objections of the state and earlier ordered a hearing to update her analysis.
The Court noted:
“The most important consideration is whether the evidence shows that race has a meaningful impact on imposition of the death penalty. We make this determination by way of legal analysis, not pure science. Davis, 175 Wn.2d at 372, 401 (“We acknowledge that ‘we are not statisticians.'” (quoting Wiggins, J., concurring in dissent)). At the very most, there is an 11 percent chance that the observed association between race and the death penalty in Beckett’s regression analysis is attributed to random chance rather than true association. Commissioner’s Report at 56-68 (the p-values range from 0.048-0. Ill, which measures the probability that the observed association is the result of random chance rather than a true association). Just as we declined to require “precise uniformity” under our proportionality review, we decline to require indisputably true social science to prove that our death penalty is impermissibly imposed based on race.”
The decision this week will result in the conversion of eight death sentences on Washington’s death row to life in prison.
Here is the opinion: Washington v. Gregory
Sure race enters into it, mathematically speaking. Because an overwhelming percentage of blacks are lousy, stupid, violent people. Koko the Gorilla was a better person than about a third of the Negroes in the country.
Which, even Liberals admit in a de facto sense, because they also refuse to live in black neighborhoods, or send their kids to schools with a high percentage of blacks. I would be curious if the author of the study is white, and if so, does she have kids, and where did she send them to school.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
PS, for fun, read this:
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-hagerman-white-parents-20180930-story.html
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
If you had bothered to follow the link to the Seattle Times which I provided then you would know, ignoramus.
I did follow the link, you ignoramus, and it did not answer the questions I asked. Which you would have know if you had taken the time to read your own link.
Moron!
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Thanks for your update on this week’s talking points from the Grand Wizard. Pro tip: there’s a white sale down to the Piggly-Wiggly this weekend; those pillowcases tend to get scruffy and stained after a good cross-burning.
this is to “being an overseer was probably a swell job back in the day” sqeeKKK
“… there’s a white sale down to the Piggly-Wiggly this weekend; those pillowcases tend to get scruffy…”
**************
The Piggly Wiggly is a grocery store franchiser and a darn good one.
https://www.pigglywiggly.com/about-us
Sqeeky, what is wrong with you?
Huh???
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Professor Katherine Beckett
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/crime/meet-the-uw-professor-who-just-killed-the-death-penalty/%3famp=1
despite everything which could be thrown at the study.
Shows that sociology is good for something.
This is a fallacious, outcome-based ruling. It fails in law and equity. I hope it crashes and burns if and when argued before the US Supreme Court.
Hey, illiterate wackjob, the opinion was based on Washington State constitutional grounds. the Supremes don’t get to sing here. So sorry for your ignorance.
this is to “anonymous” the idiot
I haven’t read the opinion, but if it is based on State law only the U.S. Supreme Court will have no jurisdiction to review it.
Rachelle – if Chief Justice Roberts can magically find a tax in ACA, he can certainly find a federal case in state case. 🙂
True. But he has to make the effort since all federal courts are courts of limited jurisdiction, though it seems many district courts and some justices act as if they are permitted to rule on anything regardless of jurisdictional competence. By the way, I was a little put off by Mark’s calling Anonymous an idiot for not understanding federal limits on jurisdiction. Most non-lawyers do not know that not everything can be appealed to the Supreme Court and that does not make them idiots.
Rachelle,
I don’t know how many of the comments you might have read posted by Mark the Moron.
If you have read some of his comments, you’ll see why he deserves credit for working very hard at being an *******, and very little else.
It’s not something worth getting put out over when you consider the source.
You are right, I have not read many of Mark’s comments. I wonder how much success he has had in legal arguments telling people they are morons? It has never swayed me other than to think my opposition is going to be a relatively easy opponent. In this instance it looked more like an opportunity to explain something to someone rather than to insult him.
Rachelle – Marky Mark Mark supposedly does overflow appellate work for the Federal Public Defender’s Office. You have to image what his appellate briefs are like. 😉
I imagine they are not very persuasive unless he is able to set his anger and contempt down long enough to present a coherent legal argument.
Rachelle – it could be that he is assigned the ones they want to keep in prison?
Good one! I never considered that possibility. You assign it to him and have more or less clean hands getting the result best for everyone else.
I have great respect for my fellow members of the bar and officers of the court. For the gullible rubes, dupes. klan wannabees, pocket-traitors and grifters on the make who have placed our great experiment in such peril; not so much. you may have noticed–or not–that this is not a court of law. that being the case, I am free–as is any American patriot–to express my utter disgust with those who hate our beloved country and want to change its character into that of an authoritarian dictatorship. Further, as an officer of the court, I am quite capable of taking your argument and winning against mine, as I am with taking my argument and winning against yours. the revealed fact that you are unable to discern between a court of law and an anonymous internet website where mouth-breathing wackjobs gather to be corrected and / or ridiculed raises more questions about your grasp of reality than it does mine. So sorry for your misapprehension.
this is to “but I’m not really a moron” rachelle
Mark, you make me laugh.
By the way, if this is an “anonymous internet website (for) mouth-breathing wackjobs”, why are you here? Or are you explaining why you are here?
Mark M
you don’t respect others. say your real name here and you will answer for your malicious, false and defamatory statement that I “bag hannity’s balls”
Perhaps he’s not the who helps file the habeas writs for ineffective assistance,
perhaps he’s the one who provides the ineffective assistance in the first place?
I don’t know, pure speculation here.
By contrast, he asserted as a true fact that I “watch Hannity and bag his balls” which is false and defamatory
See how shamelessly the troll insults others? ban the provocateur
Not that I give a sh*t about you being put off, my commentary wasn’t based on the idiot’s lack of familiarity with federal jurisdiction. It was based on his ridiculous nonsense regarding “fallacious” and the “law and equity” yammering; all of which is more suited to reddit or wherever the idiots gather to circle jerk with their imbecility.
to “hall monitor” rachelle
You say your comment was not based on the lack of familiarity with federal jurisdiction. Perhaps you should read your comment more carefully.
he’s got a stack of plea bargains to convince the prisoners too accept, which he hasn’t got to yet this morning. Nor may he.
I get the feeling that one who insults others so easily, would say to himself, why try hard when you can just bully the prisoner into accepting whatever the government wants eh? if he’s a pd he should put his hand to the grindstone and work instead of spreading more malice and defamation
Rachelle – SCOTUS hears at least one death penalty case per year coming out of a state system. Certainly this case would have a federal issue. Anything based on a sociology study is based on bad statistics. Sociology is a “soft science.” It is more rigorous that Gender Studies, but less rigorous than Geology. I think the study is open to bias and manipulation. And this certainly has a Civil Rights Act cause of action.
Here in Maricopa County, Arizona, the Chief Judge’s office tracks the sentences of criminal judges. If he (right now it is a he) sees an outlier, that judge is called in to explain why they are outside the boundaries set by their fellow judges. They better have a good reason or they will be hearing divorces the next day. Judges in Maricopa and Pima counties are appointed by a judicial/attorney/civilian panel after a laborious process. Three names are finally sent to the governor (no two can be from the same party) and the governor selects one or none. The governor has selected none and the whole process starts from scratch. Then the judges run for retention. It is an up or down vote. Yes, we keep you. No, you clean out your office. Only at the beginning did we have some of them clean out their offices.
SCOTIS does hear death penalty cases but only when it is possible to arguably show a federal issue is at stake. If Washington relied on its interpretation of state law it is hard to imagine a federal issue that would require them to reinstate the death penalty. The citizens of the state might consider recalling the judges and reimposing the death penalty by initiative. Even the threat of a recall might make judges more cautious when they want to upset existing law.
Rachelle:
You were right to be incensed over Mark M’s crude replies and his elitist nonsense. The biggest rube is the one who thinks everyone around him is stupid. Not everyone is a lawyer here and you have every right to comment regardless of your training. Hopefully, the lawyers around here can explain the law in ways that are understandable to incentivize you to research yourself. There are many outstanding members of the bar who take the time and use their specialized knowledge to explain the law to others without condescension or derision. That’s what makes them outstanding. Mark M. is not typical of the lawyers around here so comment away!
Without a doubt, neither Marky Marky Mark nor Natacha are lawyers, their claims notwithstanding.
Off topic:
We are getting closer to understanding who the first Americans really were
Melissa Hoganboom
2017 Mar 30
BBC Earth
Sounds like the Washington State Supreme Court wants affirmative action executions.
What is your point, George? What assumptions should we make based on what happened to these two people?
None. Aspects of the case are a study in how the courts and the news media process certain sorts of phenomena, of course.
Tabarrok – I don’t think this is a question you can answer for George. There seems to be a conclusion he would like us to draw.
If I gave an answer, would it be an “Affirmative Action Privilege” answer, a “Quotas” answer, a “Fair Housing” answer, a “Non-
Discrimination” a “Medicaid” answer, an “Obamacare” answer, a “Forced-Busing” answer, a “HAMP” answer or a “HARP” answer?
No, I know. It would be a “Public Assistance” or “Welfare” answer. Am I right? I’m right, huh?
Have you ever read Lincoln? He never intended for freed slaves to become citizens or vote – The Naturalization Act of 1802, then in
full force and effect, required citizens to be “…free white person(s)…” He even generated specific plans to compassionately repatriate them to Africa; Liberia with specificity (upon the issuance of the unconstitutional proclamation on emancipation, freed slaves became illegal aliens requiring deportation after losing their legal status as “property.” . Unfortunately, “Crazy Abe” was unable to bring his correct, brilliant and equitable plans to fruition.
Somebody changed his mind.
That whole freed slave/illegal alien thing is a cold case in dire need of re-opening.
“Crazy Abe” Lincoln:
“If all earthly power were given me,” said Lincoln in a speech delivered in Peoria, Illinois, on October 16, 1854, “I should not know what to do, as to the existing institution [of slavery]. My first impulse would be to free all the slaves, and send them to Liberia, to their own native land.” After acknowledging that this plan’s “sudden execution is impossible,” he asked whether freed blacks should be made “politically and socially our equals?” “My own feelings will not admit of this,” he said, “and [even] if mine would, we well know that those of the great mass of white people will not … We can not, then, make them equals.”
Why don’t you simply answer the original question. Not that you aren’t quite clear already. I was quite familiar with Lincoln’s feelings about slavery. I was asking what you meant?
Does anyone believe for a split second that amendments to the Constitution are legal and valid when improperly ratified by corrupted vote tallies under the duress of post-war military occupation imposed by zealous ideologues, “Crazy Abe” Lincoln’s incensed, rabid successors?
The freed slaves were illegal aliens requiring deportation after losing their status as “property” upon the issuance of the proclamation which illegally confiscated them from their owners. The long arm of the law inexorably extends to their commensurately illegal descendants. America will tidy up a prodigious mess when that cold case is resolved and all the fraudulent, parasitic “asylum seekers” and Mexican invaders are compassionately repatriated to their countries of origin.
Enigma – You are free to draw any assumptions you wish to regarding what happened to these young people. George posted a news item about an utterly horrific, savage unprovoked attack and double-murder. The murderers were blacks and the victims were white. The white male had been raped, and the girl sexually assaulted and tortured for hours, with bleach poured down her throat while she was still alive. There are many, many terrible crimes, but this one stands out for its sheer, unprecedented savagery. I have seen it discussed elsewhere and have never forgotten it. Are you suggesting that everyone should pretend it never happened because the assailants are black? If you don’t like the inferences that you believe could be drawn, then you should take it up with the attackers, not the people who are simply acknowleging what they did. If you want to write to the savages, they’re in prison. If it were up to me, they would have received the death penalty. And while you’re at it, write to Eric Holder and ask why they weren’t prosecuted for hate crimes, because if this wasn’t sheer hated, I don’t know what is.
Tin – I didn’t draw any assumptions. I asked George to clarify what he meant. Can you find black people who do horrific things? Certainly. Did they do them because they were black? That seems to be what George was implying but because I didn’t want to assume anything… I asked. George did respond but didn’t come out and say what he implied because it… wel I won’t assume that either. If I found some random crime commited by white people should I make assumptions about an entire race? No, that would be pretty stupid wouldn’t it.
Enigma – No, it wouldn’t be stupid to make assumptions about people based on your experiences in life. I think most people hold views of the characteristics of certain groups, while at the same time recognizing that not every single member of that group reflects those characteristics. It is established that Asians, as a group, do better in math than other groups, although not every Asian is good in math. So if an Asian won a Nobel Prize in math, it would be a small blurb in the newspaper, and most people wouldn’t give it much thought because it fits with their expectations. But if some black women are found to have been good in math, they make a movie about it! And a book was published about a black man who became a doctor (Ben Carson). Do you think anyone will publish a book if a Jewish man becomes a doctor? I can see a book or movie coming out if a Jewish guy makes it to the NBA, but it’s not going to surprise anyone if a black guy does. And with respect to crime, the rate of black criminality is unusually high, vis a vis other groups. And this is especially true of violent crime. Jews and Asians commit crimes, of course, but it tends to be financial crimes, not violent street crime. Whites commit the full range of crimes, although not anywhere near the rate of blacks. Thus if the type of crime that George posted about serves to reinforce stereotypes about black criminality, that’s a shame for innocent blacks, but the fault lies with the blacks who commit crimes and create the stereotypes. You can’t reasonably expect everyone else to ignore reality.
There is no Nobel Prize in Mathematics although there are several other awards.
The latest big prize is named for Abel, intended to be the equivalent of the scientific Nobel prizes. However, the older main award remains the Fields Medals, up to 4 once each 4 years.
*sigh*. Thanks, DBB. That was not the point at all. Not even close.
Kitty Wampus – you must be an NPC because you know nothing about Jewish gangs or Asian gangs. Because you are an NPC I will overlook your ignorance.
Kitty – What assumptions should I make when about all white people based on right wing extremists and skinheads and the Klan? If a story runs about a white cannibal from Tennessee that ate a family of six. Should I suspect all white people of cannibalism? George’s inference and your rationalization says more about the two of you than it does black people.
https://radaronline.com/exclusives/2014/06/satanist-cannibal-killer-gregory-hale-emulated-the-night-stalker-i-am-beyond-good-and-evil/
enigma – the Nightstalker was Hispanic. 😉 They wouldn’t let him in the KKK with a name like Richard Rameriz unless they were using Affirmative Action to fill quotas.
PCS, is the right to private property optional for communists, community organizers and minorities?
“Affirmative Action Privilege” for the new “untouchables” is a clear violation of the right to private property, “…in
exclusion of every other individual?”
_____________________________
James Madison defined private property as:
“that dominion which one man claims and exercises over the external things of the world, in exclusion of every other
individual.”
_________
Government cannot possess or dispose of an idividaul’s private property except through the absolute “taking” of property under legislation of Eminent Domain after just compensation.
Paul – Then we better classify all Hispanics according to the least common denominator too. That philosophy seems to apply to every group but one who is apparently exempt. BTW, I’m reading Black Klansman after seeing the movie. Apparently, the Klan let anybody in with the $10 at the time membership fee.
enigma – membership must have been down. 😉 I know the old joke about the KKK was that the only thing propping it up was membership dues from the FBI plants.
The MSM refused to cover this crime precisely to keep the truth and the facts from adversely affecting the image of negroes which has been carefully and deceptively crafted by global communists.
Murders of Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom by Blacks
“Christian and Newsom were leaving an apartment together on the evening of January 6, 2007 to go to a friend’s party when they were abducted via her car from the apartment complex parking lot. Worried about not hearing from their daughter, Christian’s parents sought help from her mobile phone provider. They found her abandoned Toyota 4Runner on Monday, January 8. Police recovered an envelope from the vehicle that yielded fingerprint evidence leading them to Lemaricus Davidson of 2316 Chipman Street, an address two blocks from Christian’s car. When police went to the address on Tuesday, January 9, they found the house unoccupied and Christian’s body in a trash can in the kitchen.
Newsom’s body was discovered near a set of nearby railroad tracks.[7] He had been bound, blindfolded, gagged, and stripped naked from the waist down. He had been shot in the back of the head, neck, and back, and his body had been set on fire. According to the testimony of the Knox County Acting Medical Examiner at the trial of Eric Boyd, Newsom was sodomized with an object and raped by a person. Police believe these actions took place at the house and his body was later wrapped and abandoned.
The medical examiner said that Christian died after hours of torture, suffering injuries to her vagina, anus, and mouth in repeated sexual assaults. Bleach was poured down her throat and used to scrub her body while she was still alive in an attempt by her attackers to remove DNA evidence. She was bound with curtains and strips of bedding, her face covered with a trash bag, and her body stashed in five large trash bags. These were placed inside a residential waste disposal unit and covered with sheets. The medical examiner said there was evidence that Christian slowly suffocated to death.”
– Wiki
Channon christian Christopher newsom.jpg
a horrible crime and the alternative media helped inform people. mass media abdicated.
the black perpetrators horrifically attacked white victims and it was also racial in the political sense because the newspapers covered it up out of a patent desire not to “inflame” the white readership
one could assemble both anecdotal and statistical evidence to credibly support the notion that there is some kind of greater inclination among black Americans to commit violent crime at higher rates than other segments of the population; but we need not bother because everyone who is old enough to have seen the news and newspapers for at least a couple decades knows this already including black folks most of whom are likely decent people.
one could also observe that they are the primary victims of black criminals; but that does not mean that whites can’t be reasonably concerned about this.
the stock answer is to call it “RACIST” and thus stop weak minded people from making obvious conclusions. that mostly works but occasionally the cobwebs are ripped from peoples’ eyes as in the Chastain and Newsome murders
What does Trump’s muse, Kanye, have to say about this? Aren’t you Trumpsters proud that your President has such a wizened adviser to rely on?
There’s always more room on the Trump train. We’re having a good time and all are welcome. The sun is shining over here. Everyone one the left is so bitter. It must drive you crazy.
Excellent. You have yet again revealed the shallow ignorance of you, your ilk, the gullible rubes, dupes, klan wannabees, pocket-traitors and grifters on the make who are the few remaining supporters of the day glo bozo. Yet, you–like most of the other aforementioned buffoons–neglect to ask the most relevant question: “what is that ticking sound?”
this is to “ya, my fellow travelers are ignorant hicks, but I made it through 11th grade without any problems” ivan
Marky Mark Mark – that ticking sound was Hillary and her minions losing their security clearances.
Who is this “Hillary” character and how is this person relevant to anything of consequence?
this is to “my mind wanders now, but hannity straightens me out” paulie – georgie
Marky Mark Mark – have you forgotten so soon. Hillary wanted to be YOUR President. The reason you are so angry at DJT is because Hillary lost. Think of it. Hillary lost to the dayglo bozo with the little hands. Hillary, the smartest woman in America, lost to Bozo the clown. Oh, my God. Oh, my f**king God, how humiliating. And you voted for her. You voted for a loser. A LOSER. L O S E R ! ! ! You must feel like trash. It must be hell to get out of bed everyday knowing that people smarter than you picked the winner. Every spare moment must be spent raging against the people you think twarted your wet dream, the election of the Queen of Pay-for-Play, Hillary Clinton, as the 45th President of the United States. And here we are, almost exactly two years since the election of Donald J. Trump and the loss of Hillary, and you still do not have that rage out of your system.
Now is the time for extreme chemical help and shock therapy. At this point, it is the only remedy. Check your insurance, check your savings and check yourself in.
It wasn’t a long trip.
Can someone please tell me the name of a millionaire on death row?
You can’t. Why? He or she doesn’t exist.
Who gets the death penalty? The poor. And that costs each of us money. Why? Because SCOTUS ruled many years ago that the state is required to pay for all defense appeal efforts. As a result, by the time you’ve executed a criminal the state has spent between $2M and $3M. Lawyers aren’t cheap, especially experienced capital punishment defense lawyers.
Hey, OJ was guilty of killing his ex and her friend. He plunked down about $600k (he sold his Brentwood house) to hire a group of great lawyers. Result: he got off. Yeah, he did loose the civil trial but that’s because the burden of proof in a civil trial is the “preponderance of evidence” versus “beyond a reasonable doubt” in a criminal trial.
Can someone please tell me the name of a millionaire on death row?
There are about 55 executions (on average) in a year in this country. Fewer than 1% of those convicted of an intentional homicide are executed. There are few people with a high net worth among those 55 because only a single-digit % of the population is all that wealth and because people able to acquire and maintain large fortunes don’t tend to be the sort of people who commit violent crimes of any kind, much less commit murder, much less commit a murder sufficiently heinous to garner a capital sentence. Crime fiction (including the issue of Hollywood screenwriters) is meant to be entertaining; it is, however, sociological nonsense.
So you agree with the Supreme Court of Washington state in outlawing capital punishment.
Good.
No I don’t. And you’re being snotty or you’re being dense.
So it’s ok to spend between $2M and $3M to execute a person? Why not use that money to boost crime prevention efforts such as keeping school athletic facilities open late, job training programs and improving schools? Killing a person solves nothing. It’s revenge. Keeping a person behind bars is cheaper and it really punishes the killer.
What’s budgeted is due to the machinations of the public interest bar and the appellate judiciary, whose votaries then show up in fora like this and complain about the cost. It’s called chutzpah.
I didn’t get that from what he said. You’re pushing outcome-based jurisprudence, which rules neither on law nor equity.
It pulls its desiderata from a dark, smelly place in which racial bias is assumed to exist, and any disparity in outcomes at all is assumed to have be based on that bias,
It’s not how the law was ever supposed to work. It is the inappropriate application of social justice theory to a system in which the only matter before the court ought to be the letter and spirit of the law.
For your perusal – vicious murderers who aren’t on death row, excluding O.J. Simpson:
Murders of Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom by Blacks
“Christian and Newsom were leaving an apartment together on the evening of January 6, 2007 to go to a friend’s party when they were abducted via her car from the apartment complex parking lot. Worried about not hearing from their daughter, Christian’s parents sought help from her mobile phone provider. They found her abandoned Toyota 4Runner on Monday, January 8. Police recovered an envelope from the vehicle that yielded fingerprint evidence leading them to Lemaricus Davidson of 2316 Chipman Street, an address two blocks from Christian’s car. When police went to the address on Tuesday, January 9, they found the house unoccupied and Christian’s body in a trash can in the kitchen.
Newsom’s body was discovered near a set of nearby railroad tracks.[7] He had been bound, blindfolded, gagged, and stripped naked from the waist down. He had been shot in the back of the head, neck, and back, and his body had been set on fire. According to the testimony of the Knox County Acting Medical Examiner at the trial of Eric Boyd, Newsom was sodomized with an object and raped by a person. Police believe these actions took place at the house and his body was later wrapped and abandoned.
The medical examiner said that Christian died after hours of torture, suffering injuries to her vagina, anus, and mouth in repeated sexual assaults. Bleach was poured down her throat and used to scrub her body while she was still alive in an attempt by her attackers to remove DNA evidence. She was bound with curtains and strips of bedding, her face covered with a trash bag, and her body stashed in five large trash bags. These were placed inside a residential waste disposal unit and covered with sheets. The medical examiner said there was evidence that Christian slowly suffocated to death.”
– Wiki
The broader minded person would see that there are often more than one reasons to do something, any one of which justifies a move. Turley’s approach is typically the decision making formula that depends on a precedent. If cruel and unusual punishment has been the pivotal argument then the legal position doesn’t stray from that point. This is the safe way, the way that can be mindlessly argued in court, ad infinitum. However, the law must be alive and responsive to the realities of the society. In this case it has been well chronicled that the law is biased against certain types based on their race and/or color. The statistics clearly show that blacks do more time in jail for like offenses regarding drugs and just about any other crimes. For Washington State to suspend or discontinue putting people to death based on statistical facts that it is applied disproportionately when it comes to race, or for any other reason, is to be applauded as a move forward. This is the law as it should be, open and subject to the people.
Except there is no law permitting statistics or social justice theory to determine policy or court decisions. And any precedent allowing that is defective and ought to be overturned. Hopefully it will be, and sooner rather than later.
Those who kill need to be killed. Those who rape need to be raped. Male rapists need a telephone pole stuffed up the rear end. Catholic priests who sexually abuse children need to be raped and killed. So sayeth The Lard. The Lard sayeth this on Sunday and on Monday Crisco says it.
Please post more materials. Just. Like. This. It reinforces my smug sense of self-superiority over you and your ilk. Thanks for playing.
this is to “I get into the wine early on Fridays” libbie 2
antonio
“Blacks commit crimes at a much higher per capita than Whites.”
WHY do you think that “Blacks commit crimes at a much higher per capita than Whites.”?
What should be done to change that?
What makes you so certain that your claim is accurate – or do you simply that blacks are arrested more often than whites?
WHY do you think that “Blacks commit crimes at a much higher per capita than Whites.”?
Because slum neighborhoods are only lightly policed and because the psychology and culture of the young in those neighborhoods is exceptional for its impetuosity.
What should be done to change that?
Nothing. You can improve matters some by assiduous law enforcement, which has dramatically reduced violent crime rates in Greater New York City and reduced crime gradients as well. You’re never going to reach a point where there isn’t some disparity between neighborhoods. Cultures are not interchangeable and (thank God), they’re not directly manipulable either.
What makes you so certain that your claim is accurate – or do you simply that blacks are arrested more often than whites?
He’s capable of reading statistical tables, which you’re not. It doesn’t matter whether you look at conviction data, arrest data, the prison census, survey research of crime victims, or ecological studies of metropolitan settlements. They tell the same story, a story you’re denying because you lie and fantasize about everything.
WHY do you think that “Blacks commit crimes at a much higher per capita than Whites.”?
Because, on the whole, Blacks are more overcome by hopelessness than whites. Cure the hopelessness and you will see the crime rates go down. Maybe figure out why the Dems haven’t done much for their pet minorities in all these years of “representing” their best interests.
Blacks are more overcome by hopelessness than whites. Cure the hopelessness and you will see the crime rates go down.
1. Hire more cops, deploy them optimally, and stand behind them during public controversies. You don’t want your police force sitting in doughnut shops in lieu of working because disagreeable encounters with people routinely turn into career enders.
2. Write the law so that penal courts punish. Liberals want courts to be social work agencies (at least so long as their mascots are on the docket). Liberals should have no influence over criminal justice.
3. It’s not the business of local governments to provide ‘hope’. It’s the business of local governments to provide public goods, including a baseline of order and safety (in addition to roadways, sewerage and drainage, water, and miscellandous amenities).
4. ‘Hopelessness’ may explain deficits of labor force participation among blacks. It does not explain predatory behavior, which finds it’s roots in people power drives.
Appellate judges tend to be monsters of arrogance. All state constitutions should have provisions for recall so they can be bounced out of office. Ideally we would have an amendment to the federal constitution which would provide for recall, for disbarment by popular vote, and for the exile of abusive judges.
The implicit message of this opinion is that the citizens of Washington who compose the juries well as the judges who formally impose the sentence are irredeemably racist. It follows then that the Washington Supreme Court has to save the day and swoop in as a super legislature to rectify the problem based on a study commissioned by an admitted rapist murderer. The will of the people be damned. And justice for the victim and her family as decided by the community is merely window dressing to,these moralists. This is not democracy but judicial social engineering based on nothing more than the liberal political philosophy of the judges. They should be impeached.
Or, what is more likely, the Washington State Constitution protects the rights of all persons in Washington, and the Washington Supreme Court performed its assigned role to protect those individual rights–as is becoming and required of the judicial branch of the government.
to mespo
The implication of you comment is that racism is unconstitutional.
If Americans enjoy the freedoms of speech, press, religion and assembly,
shall Americans be denied the right to racism and to be racist?
“That dudn’t make any sense.”
– George W. Bush
The American Founders passed, within the year of adoption of the Constitution, the Naturalization Act of 1790 requiring citizens to be
“…free white person(s)…”
Was that also unconstitutional racism?
Please cite the Article, Section and Racism Clause of the Constitution.
My fervent desire is that you just keep on doin’ you.
this is to “I’m mad as a hatter, but I’ve got internet access until the orderlies find out” georgie – paulie
A. The Fly Analogy.
Society decided that certain species of life were too bothersome to be kept alive and went into Black Flag mode. I thought of that when this subject came up and found most people were hypocritically ridiculous in their outlook on life and life forms.
What do flys and convicted felons of the worst kind have in common? They both have been decreed at one point or another to be overly bothersome to some ones picnic.Just to put things in the proper frame of reference.
Now those whose kitchen are full of Black Flag and Raid have decided it’s OK to be brutalized and murdered, raped pillaged and plundered or worse but still make total war on the fly.
Do they stop to find out the fly’s name or ask after it’s family or worry about wiping out an entire species (thank you very much Ender) Not even a second thought
What should they have in common?
This one ending to their story. Both the fly and the criminal will not change nor will it slow down the others BUT
BUT that particular fly and that particular criminal will never bother societies picnic again. Guaranteed.
So who ends up losing?
Remember the girl then the second girl from Iowa? Did you have to look up the name? Their names were “Some.”
And you in your mock attempt to attain a human status only lost all vestiges of humanity because, you know what? Those human flys you cared about so much will produce the next flock of “Some.” And you won’t remember their names either.
B. Cruel But Not Unusual (Two examples)
1. Is watching my father beg the doctors to let him die. A once proud man reduced to crapping on the floor trying to get to the toilet then reduced to the same in a hospital bed. With no hope and no desire to live. I was so tempted to pull a plug myself.
Afterwards my sister figured out from clearing his estate the staff had agreed only when the insurance etc. had run dry.
During the down hill phase we found out and I developed the phrase Cruel But Not Unusual.
Your Judge Learned Hand answer forgets that for every one of the criminals the averages seem to be 1,000 victims. Saving ONE affects One Million.
2.Treating Dogs better than children.
Our society treats two classes of people with disdain. The elderly and the youth. The elderly by ripping off their retirement funds and destroying the value. For that you can thank Obama No Nomics.
The youth? Quoting Heinlein.
‘juvenile delinquent’ is a contradiction in terms. ‘Delinquent’ means ‘failing in duty.’ But duty is an adult virtue—indeed a juvenile becomes an adult when, and only when, he acquires a knowledge of duty and embraces it as dearer than the self-love he was born with. There never was, there cannot be, a ‘juvenile delinquent.’ But for every juvenile criminal there are always one or more adult delinquents”
“Suppose you merely scolded your puppy, never punished him, let him go on making messes in the house . . . and occasionally locked him up in an outbuilding but soon let him back into the house with a warning not to do it again. Then one day you notice that he is now a grown dog and still not housebroken—whereupon you whip out a gun and shoot him dead.
Heinlein, Robert A..
And that is exactly how our nation treats it’s dogs better than it’s elderly and it’s children.
Heinlein advocated return to flogging over incarceration. He was right. It works better for many offenses. It can be administered humanely. It is also more humane than locking the offender up in a rotten jail to be abused and trained by even worse hoodlums.
I am opposed to the death penalty because it has been applied too often to people who have been found innocent of the crimes they allegedly committed. Not many, admittedly, but a handful is more than enough. At the same time I know that if someone murdered a family member of mine, I would want vengeance and I think I should be entitled to it. The Biblical cities of refuge have always appealed to me. If you could reach one of the six designated cities of refuge you were safe from existing laws that allowed blood feuds. Until then, you were fair game. We already have an infrastructure for the cities of refuge except they are called sanctuary cities. Even here in Texas we have them– several of them. I am sure the citizens of sanctuary cities would welcome the addition of capital murderers because “they are people too.” Unfortunately, it would be unfair to the families of the victims of capital murder that are committed in a sanctuary city but there would be an advantage to the rest of the cities and towns in the state in that capital murderers would high-tail it to the sanctuary cities thereby drawing murderers away from them and to the sanctuaries. There are some kinks in the idea that need to be worked on but overall I think it would fix some of the problems with existing capital punishment laws.
Since death penalty sentences are automatically reviewed by the state Supreme Court, and then typically appealed to the federal courts, I would think that any bias which may have existed at a local level has been addressed and rectified. Moreover, Washington State has no history of slavery or Jim Crow. I believe the justices used this study as an excuse to eliminate a punishment that they were simply opposed to. Which is inappropriate and another example of the judiciary arbitrarily usurping the role of the legislature.
Washington state indeed has a history of slavery. Including ones who escaped to British Columbia.
The rest of the comment is equally ill-informed.
David Benson is the King of Making Stuff Up and owes me thirteen citations (one from the OED) and the source of a quotation, after nineteen weeks, and needs to cite all his work from now on. – citation??????
David: Based in your comment I tried to research slavery in the state of Washington and came up with next to nothing. There is info on one case of a slave, a young boy named Charles Mitchell who was brought to Washington from Indiana by his “owner,” and was able to escape to Victoria, B.C. with the help of free blacks in Washington. The story was so unusual that Prof. Lorraine McConaghy wrote a book about it, entitled “Free Boy.” In an interview, she said that she was unable to find any other slaves in Washington Territory (or later, WA State), but that there were “two to three dozen” free blacks, including the ones who purchased a ticket on a steamer to take 12 y/o Charles Mitchell to Victoria. So since this professor, who wrote a book on the subject, couldn’t find any other instances of slavery in WA, I’m rather skeptical, but if you know something she doesn’t, please let me know. Thank you.
TIN, that appears to be the account that I recently learned. Good for you in uncovering it.
Slavery, schmavery.
And the Mayans ripped the hearts out of so many citizens, the steps to their temples ran thick with blood.
Brutal, tyrannical and oppressive governance was ended with the Constitution and Bill of Rights (slavery would have inevitably
been ended through oppositional promotion, boycotts and divestiture in the free markets of the private sector).
Slavery is over, in general and with the exception of a trickle of bizarre cases like those of Elizabeth Smart and Jaycee Dugard.
The only thing America is compelled to accomplish now is the absolute, irrevocable annihilation of any and all forms of
redistribution of wealth, social engineering, central planning and control of the means of production (i.e. regulation).
The American thesis is Freedom and Self-Reliance.
Charity is industry conducted in the free markets of the private sector.
I suppose this will save taxpayers several million dollars per annum in appellate fees.
David Benson is the King of Making Stuff Up and owes me thirteen citations (one from the OED) and the source of a quotation, after nineteen weeks, and needs to cite all his work from now on. – you suppose wrong be now they will be sentenced to life plus 1000 years, so there is no way in hell they ever get out. Their lawyers will be trying to get that reduced to just life.
“Gregory commissioned a study …” Huh? I suppose his lawyers commissioned the study.
I highly recommend reading a publication called “The Color of Crime” which is available for free at “https://www.amren.com/the-color-of-crime/”. Blacks commit crimes at a much higher per capita than Whites. Even the most deluded, liberal whites know this instinctively and thus avoid living around large numbers of blacks or sending their kids to inner city schools. Of course, they will never admit it is due to race. It is been said when it comes to mating and migratory habits, liberals are no different than the KKK.
Oh, but Antonio. Jared Taylor wrote it, he is pro white, which supposedly “discredits” him, even though he is a phd and went to Yale and the stats and conclusions were totally solid. He’s discredited even if his assertions were true. That’s what people are taught.