🐱 james holmes faces death penalty

  • Want to keep track of this thread?
    Accounts can bookmark posts, watch threads for updates, and jump back to where you stopped reading.
    Create account
CatParty
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/08/03/jury-reaches-verdict-in-phase-2-james-holmes-sentencing/

Jurors have unanimously agreed the death penalty should remain an option for Colorado movie theater shooter James Holmes as the sentencing portion of his trial heads to its final phase.

The decision clears the way for a last plea from both sides, including what is expected to be gripping and emotional testimony from victims about the harm and suffering Holmes caused with his slaughter.

After those arguments, the jury will make its final decision on whether the 27-year-old should die by lethal injection or spend the rest of his life in prison.

If jurors did not unanimously agree that mitigation outweighs aggravation, Holmes would have been automatically sentenced to life in prison.

The same jury last month convicted Holmes of killing 12 people and injuring 70 in the July 2012 attack at a suburban Denver movie theater. Jurors rejected the defense claim that mental illness had so warped his mind that he could not tell right from wrong.
Click to expand...
 
Click to expand...
I hate how they are using mental illness as an excuse, this man killed 12 people, people who will never be able to see their family, see their kids, have a life. So you want to have a guy who killed to just live off the tax payers money? You want to keep giving killers excuses? Kill someone "Oh I'm bipolar/autist/some other mental illness" and the state will save you? that's just not right.
 
Last edited:
The legal calculus the jury weighs is whether the aggravating factors (those that make the defendant more culpable) outweigh the mitigating factors (those that make the defendant less worthy of execution), to reach a decision about whether to apply the death penalty rather than life without parole.

It's the same jury that heard the guilt phase, so they've already heard all the relevant evidence, and presumably were death qualified.

The mitigating factors in this case are piss-poor. Things like a lack of priors, which might make a difference in a borderline case. However, the extreme premeditation and essentially senseless and heinous nature of the acts is as aggravating as it gets.

There's also obvious mental illness, but it isn't the kind that makes anyone sympathetic. It's sort of like a California case where they actually used mental health evidence as an aggravating factor: specifically that the perp's motivation was he was a sadistic pedophile who got off on torturing and murdering the victim. Okay, so he's a sick fuck. This guy had a mental disorder that made him enjoy murdering a bunch of innocent people. Good, kill him real hard.

Not a fan of the death penalty, but a death qualified jury has no gripe with it, by definition, and it's really a matter of weighing these factors objectively. The aggravating factors clearly outweigh the mitigating factors by a shit-ton, so as a matter of law, he should get the death penalty.

It only takes one juror to get cold feet or find something in the defense's presentation compelling enough to vote no on it and make it life without parole. But I don't think the jury will do that if they do the job they were brought there to do.
 
Gaol said:
I hate how they are using mental illness as an excuse, this man killed 12 people, people who will never be able to see their family, see their kids, have a life. So you want to have a guy who killed to just live off the tax payers money? You want to keep giving killers excuses? Kill someone "Oh I'm bipolar/autist/some other mental illness" and the state will save you? that's just not right.
Click to expand...
IIRC it's actually cheaper to house someone for the rest of their life than to execute them.
 
Splendid Meat Sticks said:
IIRC it's actually cheaper to house someone for the rest of their life than to execute them.
Click to expand...
It is, by a sizable margin. Also, not to be grim, but the guy is kind of a criminal celebrity. Housing him in gen pop would sort the issue out on its own without the enormous expense and burden of the appeal process. He's doomed either way, it's just a matter of how much taxpayer money to sink into it.
 
Dr. Boe Jangles Esq. said:
It is, by a sizable margin. Also, not to be grim, but the guy is kind of a criminal celebrity. Housing him in gen pop would sort the issue out on its own without the enormous expense and burden of the appeal process. He's doomed either way, it's just a matter of how much taxpayer money to sink into it.
Click to expand...
For this reason, he'd go to maximum security, where this wouldn't be a likely outcome at all.
 
I support the death penalty in certain cases but lethal injection seems like the shittiest possible method. Just shoot the bastards!
 
I've always been of the opinion that people who are given the death penalty should just be shot on the same day as the verdict. It'd be much less expensive and it's no less "humane" than the current method.
 
https://kiwifarms.net/attachments/1425684303563-jpg.37792/
 
Red_Rager said:
The defense lawyer deserves a great big drink for this. Imagine having to be the poor sap having to advocate in Holmes's defense.
Click to expand...

Incidentally, the defense had already offered a plea to life in prison prior to the trial. Here's what the brother of one of the victims had to say about this:


The state of Colorado spent $5 million just trying to get a death sentence. Money utterly wasted for a huge trial that got exactly the result they could have got just by signing a plea agreement with a $1 ball point pen.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom