What the child rapist, saved today by Supreme Court liberals, did to his 8-year-old stepdaughter
Anthony Kennedy and the leftists on the Supreme Court ruled this morning that what child rapist Patrick Kennedy did to his 8-year-old stepdaughter is a crime that should not be punishable by death.
The MSM will tiptoe around what child rapist Patrick Kennedy actually did.
I’m reprinting the full description of the crime from Kennedy’s ruling below in the interest of fully informing you all (warning – explicit). Is the death penalty “not a proportional punishment” to this crime? You decide. And the next time liberals wave the “For the children” banner, ask them about L.H.
***
From Kennedy’s majority opinion in Kennedy v. Louisiana, decided June 25, 2008:
…Petitioner’s crime was one that cannot be recounted in these pages in a way sufficient to capture in full the hurt and horror inflicted on his victim or to convey the revulsion society, and the jury that represents it, sought to express by sentencing petitioner to death. At 9:18 a.m. on March 2, 1998, petitioner called 911 to report that his stepdaughter, referred to here as L. H., had been raped.
He told the 911 operator that L. H. had been in the garage while he readied his son for school. Upon hearing loud screaming, petitioner said, he ran outside and found L. H. in the side yard. Two neighborhood boys, petitioner told the operator, had dragged L. H. from the garage to the yard, pushed her down, and raped her. Petitioner claimed he saw one of the boys riding away on a blue 10-speed bicycle.
When police arrived at petitioner’s home between 9:20 and 9:30 a.m., they found L. H. on her bed, wearing a T-shirt and wrapped in a bloody blanket. She was bleeding profusely from the vaginal area. Petitioner told police he had carried her from the yard to the bathtub and then to the bed. Consistent with this explanation, police found a thin line of blood drops in the garage on the way to the house and then up the stairs. Once in the bedroom, petitioner had used a basin of water and a cloth to wipe blood from the victim. This later prevented medical personnel from collecting a reliable DNA sample.
L. H. was transported to the Children’s Hospital. An expert in pediatric forensic medicine testified that L. H.’s injuries were the most severe he had seen from a sexual assault in his four years of practice. A laceration to the left wall of the vagina had separated her cervix from the back of her vagina, causing her rectum to protrude into the vaginal structure. Her entire perineum was torn from the posterior fourchette to the anus. The injuries required emergency surgery.
At the scene of the crime, at the hospital, and in the first weeks that followed, both L. H. and petitioner maintained in their accounts to investigators that L. H. had been raped by two neighborhood boys. One of L. H.’s doctors testified at trial that L. H. told all hospital personnel the same version of the rape, although she reportedly told one family member that petitioner raped her. L. H. was interviewed several days after the rape by a psychologist. The interview was videotaped, lasted three hours over two days, and was introduced into evidence at trial. On the tape one can see that L. H. had difficulty discussing the subject of the rape. She spoke haltingly and with long pauses and frequent movement. Early in the interview, L. H. expressed reservations about the questions being asked:
“I’m going to tell the same story. They just want me to change it. . . . They want me to say my Dad did it. . . . I don’t want to say it. . . . I tell them the same, same story.” Def. Exh. D–7, 01:29:07–:36.
She told the psychologist that she had been playing in the garage when a boy came over and asked her about Girl Scout cookies she was selling; and that the boy “pulled [her by the legs to] the backyard,” id., at 01:47:41–:52, where he placed his hand over her mouth, “pulled down [her] shorts,” Def. Exh. D–8, 00:03:11–:12, and raped her, id., at 00:14:39–:40.
Eight days after the crime, and despite L. H.’s insistence that petitioner was not the offender, petitioner was arrested for the rape. The State’s investigation had drawn the accuracy of petitioner and L. H.’s story into question. Though the defense at trial proffered alternative explanations, the case for the prosecution, credited by the jury, was based upon the following evidence: An inspection of the side yard immediately after the assault was inconsistent with a rape having occurred there, the grass having been found mostly undisturbed but for a small patch of coagulated blood. Petitioner said that one of the perpetrators fled the crime scene on a blue 10-speed bicycle but gave inconsistent descriptions of the bicycle’s features, such as its handlebars. Investigators found a bicycle matching petitioner and L. H.’s description in tall grass behind a nearby apartment, and petitioner identified it as the bicycle one of the perpetrators was riding. Yet its tires were flat, it did not have gears, and it was covered in spider webs. In addition police found blood on the underside of L. H.’s mattress. This convinced them the rape took place in her bedroom, not outside the house.
Police also found that petitioner made two telephone calls on the morning of the rape. Sometime before 6:15 a.m., petitioner called his employer and left a message that he was unavailable to work that day. Petitioner called back between 6:30 and 7:30 a.m. to ask a colleague how to get blood out of a white carpet because his daughter had “ ‘just become a young lady.’ ” Brief for Respondent 12.
At 7:37 a.m., petitioner called B & B Carpet Cleaning and requested urgent assistance in removing bloodstains from a carpet. Petitioner did not call 911 until about an hour and a half later.
About a month after petitioner’s arrest L. H. was removed from the custody of her mother, who had maintained until that point that petitioner was not involved in the rape. On June 22, 1998, L. H. was returned home and told her mother for the first time that petitioner had raped her. And on December 16, 1999, about 21 months after the rape, L. H. recorded her accusation in a videotaped interview with the Child Advocacy Center.
The State charged petitioner with aggravated rape of a child under La. Stat. Ann. §14:42 (West 1997 and Supp. 1998) and sought the death penalty. At all times relevant to petitioner’s case, the statute provided:
“A. Aggravated rape is a rape committed . . . where the anal or vaginal sexual intercourse is deemed to be without lawful consent of the victim because it is committed under any one or more of the following circumstances:
. . . . .
“(4) When the victim is under the age of twelve years. Lack of knowledge of the victim’s age shall not be a defense.
. . . . .
“D. Whoever commits the crime of aggravated rape shall be punished by life imprisonment at hard labor without benefit of parole, probation, or suspension of sentence.
“(1) However, if the victim was under the age of twelve years, as provided by Paragraph A(4) of this Section:
“(a) And if the district attorney seeks a capital verdict, the offender shall be punished by death or life imprisonment at hard labor without benefit of parole, probation, or suspension of sentence, in accordance with the determination of the jury.”
(Since petitioner was convicted and sentenced, the statute has been amended to include oral intercourse within the definition of aggravated rape and to increase the age of the victim from 12 to 13. See La. Stat. Ann. §14:42 (West Supp. 2007).)
Aggravating circumstances are set forth in La. Code Crim. Proc. Ann., Art. 905.4 (West 1997 Supp.). In pertinent part and at all times relevant to petitioner’s case, the provision stated:
“A. The following shall be considered aggravating circumstances:
“(1) The offender was engaged in the perpetration or attempted perpetration of aggravated rape, forcible rape, aggravated kidnapping, second degree kidnapping, aggravated burglary, aggravated arson, aggravated escape, assault by drive-by shooting, armed robbery, first degree robbery, or simple robbery.
. . . . .
“(10) The victim was under the age of twelve years or sixty-five years of age or older.”
The trial began in August 2003. L. H. was then 13 years old. She testified that she “ ‘woke up one morning and Patrick was on top of [her].’ ” She remembered petitioner bringing her “[a] cup of orange juice and pills chopped up in it” after the rape and overhearing him on the telephone saying she had become a “young lady.” 2005–1981, pp. 12, 15, 16 (La. 5/22/07), 957 So. 2d 757, 767, 769, 770. L. H. acknowledged that she had accused two neighborhood boys but testified petitioner told her to say this and that it was untrue. Id., at 769.
The jury having found petitioner guilty of aggravated rape, the penalty phase ensued. The State presented the testimony of S. L., who is the cousin and goddaughter of petitioner’s ex-wife. S. L. testified that petitioner sexually
abused her three times when she was eight years old and that the last time involved sexual intercourse. Id., at 772. She did not tell anyone until two years later and did not pursue legal action.
The jury unanimously determined that petitioner should be sentenced to death…
***
Reax from Andrew McCarthy:
Even if you agree with their bottom line, do Justice Kennedy and the justices in Kennedy v. Louisiana have a clue about how offensive it is to write this line in rationalizing why a man who has savagely raped his eight-year-old step-daughter should not be executed by the humane process of lethal objection:
“Evolving standards of decency must embrace and express respect for the dignity of the person[.]”
And as for their “proportional” punishment argue, I think it’s silly on its face — read the almost unreadable (because it’s so excruciating) account of the rape and ask yourself whether it is really “disproportionate” to administer lethal-objection execution to a man who committed this type of barbaric a sexual assault on a child.
But let’s give him that one for argument’s sake. The Eighth Amendment talks about punishment that is cruel. First, punishment does not become cruel just because it’s disproportionate. And second, are we really striving here for proportionality? If a crime is cruel — as it clearly was in this case — wouldn’t a proportionate punishment also have to be cruel, and thus in violation of the Eighth Amendment?
Allahpundit sheds light on the liberal majority’s charade of Divining the National Ethos.
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- Right Voices » Blog Archive » SCOTUS: The Supreme Court has struck down a Louisiana law that allows the execution of people convicted of a raping a child
- Yet Another Candidate For Pancreatic Cancer « The Urban Grind
- How does this POS not deseve the death penalty? | I'm Surrounded By Idiots
- SCOTUS: Child Rapists are Protected from the Death Penalty « Axis of Right
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- What sort of man grows up to be a Democrat? Why this sort of man! Rep. James H. Fagan of the Massachusetts House of Representatives. Declares he will rip apart under age Rape Victims…Great News! Apocalypse just around the corner! | Pierre Legrand's
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- Supreme Court overrules on Kennedy c. Louisiana; rules that death penalty cannot be applied for rape of a child. (See update.) « HoodaThunk?
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Yes, the little girl still has her life to live, small recompense for the horror and injury she endured. No one, not one of us, can assume she’ll live a normal life with out fear. Why? because the S.O.B. is still alive and will, thanks to the softening of jurisprudence, he’ll go free.
OK, fine. We can’t give him the death penalty. Can we at least get a really big broomstick and . . . . ?
A new litmus test for Supreme Court nominees. Those who would agree with the court’s ruling in this case are disqualified.
The 5 liberal Justices are so perverted that it is fair and just to call them what they are – EVIL. This type of man and woman, serving as jurists, have been seen before in history, always twisting both law and decency away from truth and liberty, to rule that villains should escape punishment, and the innocent should be stripped of life and limb. They were in the Jim Crow South, Nazi Germany, and in all the communist slave camp nations. They can be found in most Muslim dictatorships, demanding that women be stoned to death. Today 5 members of the Supreme Court of the United States of America joined the ranks of true villains and the truly evil. No one decision earned them their disgrace. They should be impeached and future attorneys taught that their behavior marked them as unfit and unjust.
Be careful with your comments Ga. The trolls will accuse you of battery chic and demand your post be removed.
Ah…Godfather moral wisdom: “That is not justice. Your daughter is still alive.”
I am more interested in the fact that this ruling was a case of judicial usurpation of the rights of the people and their legislatures to decide these things than in the question of justice.
But only a strictly moral basis, I utterly reject the eye-for-an-eye approach, however biblical it might be.
Life is not a chess game where it is not considered rude to offer one piece in exchange for an equivalent piece…no hard feelings.
If, to cite an example close to my personal imagination, a mugger demands my wallet and then breaks my jaw with a pop bottle to occupy me while he flees, I do not consider it fair and finished for him to have to return the money and suffer a broken jaw. If I possibly can, I will hunt down the bastard and kill him. I don’t expect the law to be quite so hard (although it should be), but I utterly reject that justice means that the law should only extract and equivalent amount of suffering from the attacker.
That is true and I promise you, there will be times in this girls life when she will wish he would have killed her.
If the DA had come to me and had asked with respect, then the scum who did this to his own daughter would be suffering this very day. (But I would not have given it to Clemenza. I’d have given it to Luca Brasi.)
Well Rusty, since you seem to feel that national consensus is required for settled law. I take it you support that MArriage is between one man and one woman, since 19 states have ammendments, and no states have ammendments saying otherwise.
Oh, and don’t forget, the majority (sonsensus) doesn’t think terrorists get constitutional protection, guess you’re all for Guantanamo staying open.
just showing how absurd your argeuemnts are when they’re used against you. why in the abyss do you think they make sense when you say them?
It would seem, to me at least, that the liberalism that has crept into our legal system has succeeded in protecting the criminal from society instead of protecting society from the criminal. It is high time the pendulum swung the other way.
Remedy…
Introducing said Child Rapist & identifying his “offense” to the General (open) Prison Community. A couple of these incidents, and the Perverted Trash would “Welcome” a nice soft Gurney, with a calm/relaxing IV induced end to his sorry excuse for a piece of sewage filth life.
I do not like the bomb throwing coming from either side, but it is absolutely necessary to have a few articulate bomb throwers like Coulter to let the left know that reason can also bring a linguistic sword to the table. At times, you have to be on offense and that means being offensive.
And people wonder why our society has become increasingly callous and violent? Why not, they have nothing to lose? The punishment has ceased to fit the crime.
I am beginning to warm up to years in prison for this gentleman.
But I hope he escapes the quick justice of the shank.
I am imagining him get his butt tore up day after day, month after month, year after year.
1. I live in Florida, a state that has led the country in death row exonertions since 1976.
2. Considering the expense and complications with our current capital punishment system, I’m shocked that any state would try to expand the class of defendants.
3. Child abuse cases/allegations are sometimes muddied up with false allegations from the victim at the direction of an adult with selfish motives.
4. If a child rapist is getting the death penalty, it would be evil yet prudent for him to kill and conceal the child in an attempt at killing the sole witness to the atrocity, assuming he is rational….which leads to……
5. Whether it’s child-rape or first degree murder, it’s an irrational act, usually accompanied with mental illness, and capital punishment doesn’t enter the minds of these people before or while the evil is done. Captial Punishment isn’t likely to deter these types of crimes.
6. I’m shocked that the decision was this close, and Obama has got to win this next election. I honestly thought this would be an 7-2 decision with Scalia and Thomas as the lone wackjobs in opposition. All of the talk I see on this site of nooses and torture do not reflect the type of country I want to live in. Frankly, I don’t trust Alito, Thomas, Scalia, and Roberts to protect the rights and uphold whatever dignities we have left. Obama has to win.
I know if some of you had your way, we would be allowing the death penalty for children(Roper), the mentally retarded(Atkins), and non-murderous crimes. Some of you want state sponsored torture, and I’d like to know whether you’d want your kids and grandchildren to watch the torture while sitting on your laps. Have at me with all of your insults, but I think you’re incredibly wrong and misguided.
If Kennedy is guilty, I wish him the worse on a personal level, and hope he experiences prison justice for the rest of his days. That’s an example of my own nasty, vengeful soul, and doesn’t make me right. What’s right is punishment and societal protection…life in prison without parole.
I am shocked that the decision was this close. George W. Bush has appointed two big middle fingers to haunt us as part of his legacy.
I am so angry about this I can’t type fast enough to spill the anger. The voters of this state want this animal executed. We will not let this rest. The only reason that baby didn’t die is because that animal got his rocks off before he inflicted the fatal thrust. This is outrageous.
It seems that many people are confident that this offender may meet his death in prison. What should the punishment be, if any, for the prisoner that end’s this man’s life? Also, would that killing be murder? If it is murder, should the murderer face the death penalty?
Someone upthread wrote:
That’s an interesting way to put it. A good place “to start”. Why would that be a good place to start? And if that’s the starting place, what’s the ending place? Should a person who murder’s an adult while robbing them face the same risk of the death penalty as a person who brutally rapes a young boy?
Or what about that case in Germany? Should a person who imprisons another person from childhood in a cage in their basement face the death penalty?
Ultimately, why do we decide one criminal should have to pay with his life while others shouldn’t?
The_Livewire, your straw men would make more sense if there was an unusual clause to habeus corpus like there is in the 8th Amendment. That’s why the national consensus applies here.
As for gay marriage, that’s an issue of the Equal Protection Act and the right for adults to marry that Loving rules predates the Constitution.
But the SCOTUS case legalizing gay marriage is probably 40 years down the line.
But I bet it happens in most of our lifetime. Can’t wait!
nlebou,
Should attempted murders that leave their victims paralyzed face the death penalty?
misstressjustice,
You make good policy arguments.
I’d hate to have you on the SCOTUS though. You’d fit right in with those who do not understand that it is the court’s role in such cases to decide what the constitution says, not what would be the best policy.
That much we can agree on, sort of, since I think it should have been clear to anyone with a brain that for all intensive purposes that girl would have died if the emergency surgery had not been performed perfectly and just in time.
But I guess bleeding heart liberals like you don’t care if the child would have died of her injuries, she lived so since it was just a brutal raping and not a brutal raping and murder he doesn’t deserve the death penalty. But like I said, our court system is beyond redemption at this point. The only justice that will prevail is the source of true justice and this man will finally get that after he dies in prison.
YES
If you attempt to murder someone but you don’t succeed the will was still there.
Ignatius,
The Constitution says that unusual punishments are barred. And it’s quite unusual to kill someone who is guilty of rape and not murder.
Alito has a great and obvious point that this is the case because legislatures (correctly it turns out) figured that these laws for child rape would be overturned eventually. So the unusualness was probably artificial.
But it was ruled in 1978 that killing someone guilty of anything short of murder is cruel. Now it’s unusual too. Can’t put that back in the box.
The Supreme Court made a ruling heavily footed in stare decisis. I know that sometimes that’s thrown out the window (ie Lawrence v. TX), but it wasn’t here.
I guess I don’t understand why there’s so much outrage when really nothing has changed.
And mistress justice, love your posts.
alaskangrizzly,
So we should apply the death penalty to cases in which something could have happened? If a mass murder “would” have occurred, but the attempted murderer only ended up shooting 20 people in the arm, should he have to face the death penalty?
Ultimately, should we start applying the death penalty to intent? Or possibility? Or both?
If a person intended only to shoot 20 people in the arm, since it was possible that they could have died if they didn’t get medical attention, should this be a case for the death penalty?
mp chops;
I wrote that.
I do think that child rape should be eligible for the death penalty.
Whether every case would reach that threshold is up to the judge and jury presiding over that case.
As to the German case you cite. I am ok with Grermany deciding it’s own case law. And we ours.
I will agree with you on the jail house justice issue. I do not believe in it. And as I stated I think it is manily urban legend and some folks wishful thinking.
I do not believe there are statistics bearing out that rapists are murdered in jail. If there are facts supporting this, someone should produce them. Too many rapists walk out of jail, they have to be alive to walk out, and repeat offend for this to be true.
Riddle me this batman, if a terrorist has a nuclear device and intends to kill as many people as possible but the device fails and never goes off do you push for the death penalty on 5,000,000 counts of attempted murder? Or do you push for life in prison because he didn’t kill anyone?
210 Why show we reward them for being incompentent when they try to kill someone?
Rusty, If you’re going to argue that law should be based on sometihng pre-dating the constitution then I guess you feel we should accept the 10 commandments as the basis of law.
Do you even realize how absurd you sound?
As to the 8th, how is killing this SOB, when it’s been determined by the courts to be the approproate punishment to be cruel and unusual?
In fact Ammendment 10 seems to say the Surpremes had no voice in the matter.
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.
This wasn’t a federal crime.
AK, your argument is often used by capital punishment opponents too! Why should the quality of medical assistance determine whether the perp spends 10 years in jail (attempted murder), life in jail (really bad attempted murder, mutilation, rape), or death (first degree murder)?
To be fair, the point is perfectly salient on your end of the spectrum too. Just found that interesting. Just usually aren’t interested in killing based solely on intent.
So though your point makes sense, I don’t think it will be a winner with the American electorate.
And in the cases where their intent was only to paralyze the victim and they end up murdering the victim?
Obviously we also have to look at situations where they intend to paralyzing a victim and end up paralyzing the victim.
Of the three cases(murder/paralyze, paralyze/murder, paralyze/paralyze) should the offended risk death?
Livewire, the 14th amendment applied all amendments to the states as well. So it doesn’t matter if it was a federal crime.
And I explained the cruel and unusual part in comment 214.
A sidebar on liberal, anti-capital punishment consensus:
I recently heard an ~amazing~ report on the BBC that polls show that even in Europe there is majority support for capital punishment.
Yes…not a typing mistake. Of course, Europeans are even more led around by their elites than we are. But, apparently, when you put the question to the people, like Americans, they also favor capital punishment, in at least some circumstances. (Nothing was said by the Beeb suggesting that the question in the poll referred to extreme cases such as terrorist mass murder.)
Justice Kennedy is made of fail! Two dunderheaded decisions in a row. Let’s hope they locked him in the john when it came to deciding Heller.
Cruel and unusual punishment is what that little girl went through. Several years ago, a sick evil child molester abducted one of his young karate students and ran to CA. He was caught here and the boy was found alive, though of course he had been sexually abused. When they extradicted him from CA to Louisiana, the kid’s father was waiting for him in the airport. As the child molester was frog-marched past the father, Pops pulled out a gun and shot the child molester, killing him. Expect more of that happening as the legal system goes increasingly NAMBLA’s way and it’s up to families to protect/avenge their kids.
Alaskan,
I don’t support the death penalty, so I would not support the death penalty in either of the situations you describe. In which situation would you support the death penalty?
And yes, it is complicated and thought-provoking, as riddles tend to be.
Exactly.
So you’d put the terrorist who tried to nuke LA or NYC in prison for life. Got it, thanks.
oldcollegeguy1980,
Just child rape? What about when an adult is raped? An adult doesn’t have less rights than a child, and may be equally as mentally and physically injured during the rape.
I ask because it seems like we’re cherry-picking crimes punishable by death.
alaskangrizzly,
alaskangrizzly,
What do you have? What did that reveal?
mp;
Since this thread concerns a child rapist.
I limited my discussion to that category.
I reserve the right to support the death penalty as an option for other cases as well.
#223 You are correct.
oldcollegeguy1980,
This thread concerns more than a child rapist. It’s concern is also the death penalty and the application of such penalty. To say that THIS particular child rapist should be put to death doesn’t address the question that was before the Supreme Court, who had to decide, largely, when a person should face the risk of death for their actions.
It’s easy to say that this person should die because he did this or that person should die because he did that, but are you comfortable saying that “all people who do this” should die.
mp chops:
Thank you for attempting to say something I did not say.
I have stated that I think child Rape should be eligible for the death penalty.
Whether any specific case reaches the threshold for the death penalty is as yet unknown.
Not every murderer get the death penalty, not every child rapist would likely get the death penalty.
I would like the option on the table.
You would not.
I understand from your writing you enjoy broad generalizations. I do not.
But I did agree with you on jail house justice. See we have common ground.
The larger point is how “evolving standards of decency” have taken us, in less than 40 years, from Roe v. Wade to here.
To wit: it is OK to
abortmurder a baby, without due process or oversight of any kind into the decision, for whatever reason, including no reason at all. This has resulted in over 42,000,000 dead babies.Now it is not OK to kill violent and despicable child rapists who have been given due process and full and exhaustive rights of appeal.
The total moral inversion of the Supreme Court is complete.
This decision has nothing to do with the constitution or the democratic traditions of this great Republic. It is yet another subversion of the people’s right to determine what is just and appropriate.
It is about elitists dictating to us what we can and cannot do. And they do it because we can’t do anything about it…
I’m sorry to say that I think we have finally descended into amoral legalistic Authoritarianism, and will continue into tyranny.
Release the child rapist monster ba$tard, Patrick Kennedy, into the general prison population.
And Justice Anthony Kennedy, please consider resigning from the bench. We expected better from you.
As heinous as this dreadful saga is, I agree that the state should not take a life unless a life is actually taken.
But if I or some other guy could walk into that court with a gun I’d shoot him 3 times in the crotch first – just to disarm him – then once in each leg at the femoral artery and watch him bleed, then 4 times right in the face.
You’re right #199 Ignatius, Luca woulda done the job right!
And after todays ruling the application discussion is actually closed.
I have tried to keep my discussion in the area of having the option. Sadly without the option, which the SC removed,
APPLICATION IS NOT A CONCERN ANYMORE.
oldcollegeguy1980,
I think you’re creating an artificial difference. If a case is eligible for a particular penalty, the idea is that if they are guilty of the crime, they will be given the penalty.
People are eligible for penalties to give leeway to mitigating circumstances, but we have to assume that there are no mitigating circumstances.
To say that a person guilty of raping a child should be “eligible” for the death penalty, but the specific cases should decide if they’re “given” the death penalty is really saying a lot.
Yes, I am trying to break this down into a generalization. If not, why not say the the death penalty should be possible in any case? The specifics of the case(murder/jaywalking..etc) should determine if its actually applied.
To all the hopelessly optimistic: McCain is much more likely to deliver a Souter than anything else. He WILL NOT be putting up anyone as contentious (in terms of getting the candidate through the Judiciary Committee & Senate) as the great Justice Scalia.
C’mon, we know this.
mp;
I am not an attorney
but isn’t this how the system works now?
It was not “unusual” to execute a rapist until the last 50 years or so. My father was a depression era baby and it was expected for rapists to be hanged (although rape was much rarer in his day than it is now… wonder why?). We have been hanging rapists since the formation of the Republic, so your stupid and myopic statement is simply false.
By “unusual”, I submit being drawn and quartered, or burned at the stake would be “unusual” for the time it was written.
It depends on what part of the system you’re referring to. There’s the criminal trial where they try to determine exactly what the defendant did, and sentencing where a punishment is handed down if the defendant is found guilty of committing crimes.
In this discussion, we’re assuming that the defendant is guilty of exactly what he’s being accused of. If it’s raping a child, he’s guilty of raping a child. The debate lies in the next step: “Since he’s guilty of raping a child, what should his punishment be?”
Since death is an all or nothing type deal, you can’t really argue how MUCH death he should get. Should he get the death penalty or should he not?
That leads to other questions though: For example, why should a person be put to death for brutally raping a child, and not for brutally raping an adult?
I have no problem taking life to prevent a crime, (even a lesser crime than this) in fact I would recommend it… but to punish a crime, I don’t know.
I don’t know, but I think that given the choice most people would prefer death to life imprisonment… if punishment is the goal, then lets bring back the chain gangs.
But I am in the minority here & I know that most would would disagree. So the court should not have over-ruled the will of the people.
I support the death penalty for the aggravated rape of anyone, but particularly for a child because children are more defenseless than adults, in case you didn’t notice.
#209 Rusty
NATIONAL CONSENSUS DOESN’T APPLY AND LEAVES ITSELF TO BE OVERTURNED!
They used International Law on 3 occasion in the past 2 weeks!
Again you’re moron and definitely not an attorney!
Do you realize how stupid that sounds?
Also, Rusty EPA under the 14th doesn’t protect gay marriage either!
We work within the system we have.
If a jury of the rapist peers deemed the specific case eligible for the death penalty and the sentencing court/jury/judge (showing my limited knowledge of the inner workings of court rooms) agreed and the appeals courts agreed.
Then yes That case would get the DP.
However at this point it is a useless discussion. My side lost. Your side won.
Child rapists no longer, for the time being, have to worry about the death penalty. I see no glory in this decision.
It is the decision of the court and until it is overruled in some way, it stands.
This guy won and that little girl lost.
So the left is back supporting stare decisis again, huh Rusty/Chapoutier? Gee, you were throwing all kinds of rocks at me a week or two ago when I mentioned that in relation to the Gitmo case. I love people who can argue either side of the issue with equal ease, without regard to the law, the facts, or the morality of the situation.
Exactly. But people like Livewire like to call this “judicial activism”.
*rolls eyes*
This doesn’t make sense. A rape victim can be equally as defenseless to the rape, regardless of if they’re a child or adult.
By the I mean, if a person drugs a child or drugs an adult, the victim is still drugged an unable to defend themselves.
You defy common sense. Any person with average intelligence can see that children are weaker than adults in physical strength, not to mention experience and judgment as well.
If you can’t see that, then you are invincibly ignorant.
Of course, but that’s not the point. What does any of those characteristics have to do with rape? If a person is raped, by definition, their strength, experience and judgment didn’t factor. Rape is rape. Or do adults get ‘less raped’ than children when they’re raped, which is what you’re implying.
atheling re: #247 “Do you realize how stupid that sounds?”
… and vengeance belongs to whom??
No, actually I am not feeling all that stupid.
I am a strong advocate of capital punishment (although I am certainly concerned that we are not doing this to innocent people).
But for me, it is not all about delivering the most fierce punishment. It is about (1) community expression; (2) humility; and (3) the care of public funds.
(1) George Will has written about “the expressive function of the law.” The community needs to defend and affirm, in the most profound way, its core values which utterly repudiate murderous and viciously violent behavior.
(2) We need to have the humility to realize that there are problems we can not fix and the psyches of people who are candidates for CP certainly fall into that category. We can’t even convince young girls not to get pregnant, kids to stay in school, people to be good citizens, etc., etc. We have no magic for recovering lost souls. Murders and such are beyond reasonable hope and our capacity. Yes, I am willing to throw some people away at a certain point. (God does not need, IMO, for us to worry about not interfering with plans He might have to make a new St. Paul, or whatever.)
(3) This country and the world are full of people who could use a helping hand. We can provide medical care, build schools, look for a cure for cancer, feed hungry people, even repair levees, with the million bucks or so it takes to support each life prisoner. (If liberals disrupt this and cause us to waste millions with their frivolous law suits, then that is on them. Eventually maybe they will get tired of throwing away money.)
What was stupid is that you propose using death as a preventative to a crime not yet committed, yet to forebear that same remedy to a crime already committed. That’s absurd, and, quite frankly, creepy.
I have no problem with pre-emptive action as others here have proposed, but your comment reminds me of the premise of Minority Report, which is immoral.
I will no longer argue with a moral midget such as yourself. It’s an exercise in futility… why, it’d be like taking candy from a baby… /sarc.
I hope that creep rots in prison.
What I find much more alarming (like some of you have already mentioned) is that the SCOTUS over-ruled the state!!
Regardless of the discussion back and forth about it here, that’s what the BIG deal is.
We the people are losing our power every day!
The more they rule like that, the more we’ll get used to it. Not lookin good.
Brooklyn Red:
Defense of self, and defense of others, right?
OK atheling, lemmie break it down fo yah…
1. We agree that shooting the creep to prevent him from committing the act is OK, yes are you with me?
2. Once the deed is done, putting him down like a beloved family pet won’t undo it, now will it.
3. If punishment is what you want then, then 30 yrs. or so of suffering is a greater punishment that an Rx cocktail no?
juss sayin.
I guess this ass just heard of the ruling. One year old brides O.K. for Saudi Arabia. Go figure.
mistressjustice re: #260 “Defense of self, and defense of others, right?”
Yes mam, we just call it “doing the right thing”.
- Ignatius Reilly
And you are within your rights to reject it. My comment responds to Michelle’s own question about this ruling being “proportional” or not.
-MNUSMCDavid
Small recompense? The fact that she still has her life is the BEST recompense. I don’t for one moment assume she’ll live a normal life without fear. However, I strongly suspect that any fear she does endure will be of men in general, and won’t be lessened by this guy being dead or not. Yeah, he’s an S.O.B., and he too will live in fear for the rest of his life in prison. . .fear that one day the general population will get its hands on him. I take no small pleasure in thinking about that.
And even if one accepts the “national consensus” line, is it not apparent to all that a national consensus that reaches to the point of making the punishment “cruel and unusual” does not exist where there are even a few states where the punishment remains legal? Is it their contention that when they divine by their mystical methods that 50.1 per cent of Americans oppose CP then then they are entitled to throw out the law. Obviously, they do not see this “consensus” as a large, super majority, because that does not exist for their reasoning.
I admit that, at some point, one must reasonably consider the “consensus” viewpoint. But this is not a substitute for the democratic process. The consensus of the people is first and foremost expressed in the people’s laws. It is an absurd stretch to have the SCOTUS set itself up with the moral authority to overturn laws based on their extremely biased readings of the “national consensus.”
And what is their methodology in determining the “national consensus?” It seems that they count one hundred per cent of the people in the states without capital punishment as being anti. Only by that twisted logic could they find this “consensus.” Don’t we have legislatures do perform this function.
My outrage against this rogue five is boundless. They are tearing apart the country by deciding that naked power is more important than playing by the rules. When you throw away the rule book, the game can get awfully ugly. It already has, but it is apt to get a great deal uglier.
#151:
The court has no authority to make that determination.
Dang it. Forgot to paste this in my above post
The court has no authority to make that determination.
I wonder what the Supremes would say if this happened to someone they cared about….
This ruling likely means Treason is no longer punishable by death. Not that the 5 Kings care.
Where have you been? Treason apparently hasn’t been punishable by death for years. Hell, for a while treason was an almost daily pursuit at the NYTimes. They didn’t even end up in court for it.
Hello Everyone:
I am “martin.musculus”-es’ son. I am posting here, using his account to ask a favor.
Actually I am posting this comment to ask a favor of his online friends and acquaintances.
Some explanation might be necessary, (but if not, skip down to the bolded area of the comment):
Recently my Dad asked us all to pray for a successful surgical outcome for a woman who had a heart attack, who’s husband posts on Mrs. Michelle Malkin’s blog. I don’t blog, as do my younger Sib’s, but I am told this is fairly common practice.
I know Dad has a lot of online friends. When our family stays in his house, often after midnight I’ll hear Dad downstairs reclined in his chair reading blogs and chortling about a particular post. When I asked what kept him from bed, he’d say arguing politics with young fast minds keeps his own quick and lively.
Because of his huge affection for his online friends (and philosophical opponents), our family’s comfortable requesting those who pray: please pray for his speedy recovery.
On Saturday, 21June @ 2215h, Dad was hospitalized with a stroke and coma caused by cerebral hemorrhaging. The surgery to fix the bleeds went well, and we’re told that the length of time a coma lasts varies from person to person. This is entering the fifth day he has been comatose with no change.
He has received a Blessing by Elders of our Church, which is the procedure in these cases. After a Family Council, we’ve decided to request Prayers of Recovery by his friends. I was the one tasked to post this request to Mrs. Malkin’s blog. I was also given the responsibility of Dad’s blog.
For updates, please stop by his blog (here). You can even leave a comment, (I think he has it set up so anyone can). I know that when he returns home he’ll treasure your saying “hello”, or any kind words you might leave.
Thank you for your time.
Do not fret. I know its not easy but, as much as we would like to avenge our wrath upon this “His Honor” lib-ocrat judge, God will eternally avenge him at the final judgment. And that will be much worse than eye has ever seen or words can ever tell for the perp and each judge who voted to let him live.
puhiawa said:
“This ruling likely means Treason is no longer punishable by death. Not that the 5 Kings care.”
No treason is punishable by re-election.
Martin, you (his son), and your family will be in my prayers. And while Martin is being cared for, make sure you all take care of yourselves. It’s as vital to his recovery as what his nurses and doctors are doing.
“martin.musculus”-es’ son
Tell your dad we need him back.
Mot this one
“A laceration to the left wall of the vagina had separated her cervix from the back of her vagina, causing her rectum to protrude into the vaginal structure. Her entire perineum was torn from the posterior fourchette to the anus. ”
?
Mot = Not
I don’t think that’s the question. The question is who gets to make those decisions. And I’m pretty sure it’s not supposed to be the courts.
I bet that this has already been said, but I am sure that prison justice will take care of this clown.
Me, I would let him live. His sentence would be that every father with daughters that lives within a 200 mile radius gets to come visit him once a month and beat the &@^%# out of this retard. The other 29 days, the prison doctor nurses him back to health to get him ready for the next month’s visit. In the fall he is the tackling dummy for the nearest NFL team, and in the spring he is the live target for batting practice.
No reason why not, if that is the law that was passed. You’re arguing with yourself here.
If that’s what the people decide, yes.
If the people decide to do something unconstitutional then it’s SCOTUS’s job to remedy that. And they’ve consistently ruled that you can’t kill rapists (unless they kill someone too).
I don’t understand how people could have expected a different decision here. The swing justice, Kennedy, consistently limits capital punishment.
What good is having a conservative Chief Justice, ala Roberts, if we never hear from him and these libs keep carrying the day at SCOTUS??
This country is in a world of hurt.
I don’t think we’re ~surprised~, Rusty, just ~enraged~.
Your dad will be in our thoughts and prayers.
I agree the death penalty is not proportional to the crime, leathal injection is far too merciful for the scum.