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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- 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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How is God’s name is life in prison adequate punishment for what this guy did?
The hell it won’t.
martin.musculus jr., we pray for the whole family. For every post you see there are many more who don’t post but still are moved.
I encourage you to linger, so you may see what your father knew indeed… That there are still much good in the world.
Agreed #286
The Supreme Court has lost its mind. Rape is one of the cruelist crimes out there. I’m not surprised that Rusty, our resident liberal, makes excuses. Hey Rusty, would you be so understanding if it was your female relative, your sister, who was raped? I experienced first-hand the disastrous after-effects of rape on my own family when it happened to my sister.
So, Rusty, do you think that rape should be a charming right of passage that all women should enjoy? It’s not cruel or unusual, given what that man did to his daughter in your opinion. Even though he exacted physical harm and damage (I won’t go into the graphic details that I just read which were shocking) upon his daughter.
Yes, it must be wonderful to be an understanding liberal like Kennedy or Rusty. Tell that to the thousands of children who aren’t only molested for years but raped and their lives wrecked forever. This ruling is sick and twisted and indicates that, indeed, rapists will always have more rights than their victims and will continue to reap the benefits of their crimes through taxpayer benificence. What a sad day for all of us.
To liberals: I hope you never have to experience what this young girl did.
You have to almost admire the leftists on the board, especially Rusty (who’s been most vehement about it), for managing to keep this silly “unusual punishment” ball up in the air for so long. The death penalty was the usual punishment for rape, treason, capital murder, and a few other crimes for centuries. Then the left managed to pack the courts to the point where they could declare the death penalty cruel and disproportionate, although it is as much as possible conducted humanely (i.e. with as little pain and suffering to the prisoner, regardless of the cruelty of the original crime). After many years of striking down any and all capital punishment, states managed to write some laws that were narrow enough in scope and humane enough to the condemned (lethal injection? Doctors do that to their patients routinely now) to past the “cruelty” challenge. However, it’s taken so long to do that, that the left now argues that it’s become “unusual”. Like I say, you almost have to admire them. Almost. Problem is, when justice is denied, people become frustrated, and eventually you find yourself with people substituting their own judgement for the court, and becoming judge, jury, and executioner to ensure that justice will be served. When somebody at the beginning of the thread says “get a rope”, even in jest,you are seeing the beginning of the end. You libs want to bring the country down around our ears for the crime of being better than anybody else. Looks like you’re succeeding.
On June 25th, 2008 at 8:18 pm, GJCorby said:
I agree the death penalty is not proportional to the crime, leathal injection is far too merciful for the scum.
Precisely.
In a major court victory, child rapists breathed a collective sigh of relief when the US Supreme Court ruled in their favor over a Louisiana death penalty case today. Calling the death penalty for the rape of an 8 year old “disproportionate”, the court ruled 5-4 in what is a watershed decision for the future of child rapists nationwide. This particular type of “criminal”, as right-wing talk-show hosts refer to them, will now be free of the worrisome burden of an unfair punishment and may now expect some type of proportionate sanction in its place…
Gods Rusty,
Look up the meaning of ‘and’
Also, if I understand you corrrctly it’s ok to use ‘national consensus’ to overide one decision and torture the constitution into new shapes (This case) but heaven forbit that we use national consensus to keep marriage as it’s always been. Consistant much?
Still nice yo know that you do feel that we should rely on Hammurabi’s Code (rules preceeding the constitution) and a majority of consent to make national policy. Always good to know where you’re coming from.
Miss(in)justice, I’ve yet to see anything from you worth replying to.
“Evolving standards of decency” is a phrase liberals use to confess they don’t know right from wrong.
Utter (a)moral relativism. It’s the same “reasoning” used by the CA court in it’s current attempt to redefine marriage over the democratically expressed will of the people.
Hey, if they’re against the death penalty – it doesn’t matter what the guy did, they don’t want the guy put to death. The rest is bs.
There’s a pretty strong “national consensus” against partial birth abortion too. Any bets on when we get a ruling from the Supremes?
Livewire, txvet,
Are you kidding me? Are you both really that obtuse? National consensus was set up by the Court specifically to question exactly what punishments are “unusual.” Even Justice Alito, who wrote the freaking dissent, didn’t attack the national consensus standard in this case. He argued that the state legislatures couldn’t represent a consensus since they were handcuffed by Coker. Frankly, it’s a good point. A national consensus plus a Supreme Court ruling makes overcoming that standard very, very difficult.
There are no “unusual” clauses for equal protection and the privacy penumbra (which I understand is an originalist’s nightmare, but 40 years of precedent at this point) so there will never be a national consensus standard for gay marriage or choice.
Emjem, I’ll discuss this with you once you regain your sanity. I am against capital punishment no matter what. That does not make me pro-murder, pro-rape, pro-terrorism, or pro-genocide. Get a grip.
Rapists will always have more rights than their victims? What are you smoking? You lose quite a few rights when you are incarcerated forever.
Martin’s son -
You can be sure of prayers from folks here for your Dad and for your family.
Thank you for letting us know what’s up, we look forward to your father rejoining the curmudgeonly ranks here ASAP.
Take good care of yourself, too.
OK, so no death penalty and a life term is 30 days or so it seems.
How about we remove the problem organs from the offender, he can then apply for a soprano position at a nearby opera company.
If this crime doesn’t cry out for the death penalty then I cannot imagine the crime that would!
Kennedy is out of his mind as are his four friends on the court. This is sickening and the “logic” of the “Fab Five” is beyond comprehension.
Jesus made it very clear that it would be better for a millstone to be hung around the neck of anyone who offended a little child. You want to take that up with Him, Rusty? As far as this perp getting his in prison, I doubt it. The State, at the order of his lawyers, will stand on its head to give him a nice isolated, comfortable quarters. A pox on Kennedy and his ilk. Rev Wright had the words for Kennedy.
UPDATE:
from Gov. Bobby Jindal Signs Bill to Chemically Castrate Sex Offenders
Now there is a proper politician and a human being.
I’m just catching up spending most of the day in Boise at an appointment and all I can say is these thugs in black robes have done a disservice to this country by allowing this monster to live. I hope he will be put among general population in the Louisiana prison system, if he is lucky he might last 24 hours. Even criminals have standards of behavior and in the prison system he will be dead meat. Hell can’t find a place horrible enough to punish this man and the 5 idiots in black by protecting someone guilty of a crime so horrible he no longer deserves to have a carbon foot print.
Ya know I like Jindal, but this is too close to sharia… so if a woman falsely cries rape (& it happens) do we pull her tongue out? Cut off the hand that steals? Stoning for adultery anyone?
txvet2
You have articulated perfectly what I am feeling about this SCOTUS decision. I’ve read most of Rusty’s posts and my impression is that he is not yet a parent. When I read the description of what this monster did to this 8 year old innocent, my thoughts turned to my own children, one of my pleasures, when they were little, was to look in on them as they were sleeping, all sleeping children resemble little angels, but not for this monster, she was an object of lust. No amount of logical reasoning can persuade me that this monster doesn’t deserve to die, if not by legal means then by whatever it takes. This monster took away this girl’s innocence and trust in the world, she will never be the same. Maybe, Rusty, when you hold your baby in your arms, you will understand that feeling.
I am so sorry for what you and your family are going through right now. That’s tough. I will keep you, your dad, and your family in my prayers as well.
When I was a teenager, my father suffered a cerebral hematoma. There is nothing that makes a person feel so helpless (besides the current political, intransigent climate affecting our country) as seeing your own father collapse in front of you in an unconscious heap. My father was rushed to a county hospital and then a bigger regional hospital for testing. He had to undergo emergency surgery to relieve the pressure from the hematoma or he would have died. It was hours before my family and I knew if he would make it.
Yet, my father did make it and I sincerely hope that your father does too. I might not have always agreed with your father, but I’ve enjoyed his posts and feel that he will be missed.
Chemical castration is not a new treatment/punishment, Red. Been around for some time.
Making a false report is already a ounishable crime.
The hand & adultery stuff is over the top hyperbole and irrelevant.
Patrick Kennedy raped a child. Anthony Kennedy raped America.
Anti-death penalty…anti-abortion…anti-war unless absolutely necessary…
People talk about Sharia law – I see little difference with far right Christian conservatives who lust for bloody revenge for crimes committed.
Love Jesus, but I don’t always love his followers.
And he damaged (perhaps permanently)her body in the most horrific way. Also, according the records he has a history of child-rape. Who knows how many innocents he has destroyed over the years?
I believe you’re right that for some people it’s just an interesting theoretical social question. But I hope they wise up without ever having their own lives impacted by any like savagery.
purplepeep, Stoning has been around for some time too… but I have to fall back on religious convictions & bodily integrity is a right, if it wasn’t then rape would not be a crime in the first place, no? We may have the legal right as a society to kill, but not to maim.
Rusty, you make perfect sense, and this post is excellant. Some people don’t want to get it because they are programed to argue on the “right” side of every issue, and won’t listen to reason. For others it’s too emotional and close to home for reason to prevail. A few on this board actually understand the analysis, but can still disagree with intellectual honesty. I wouldn’t bother kicking knowledge to the knuckleheads that don’t understand basic constitutional law and the roles of the courts.
Like this:
Okay, for example, if an elected by the people state legislature decides that it’s okay to tie a rapist to a chair and set him on fire, SCOTUS doesn’t have the right to say that it violates the eighth amendment to the U.S. constitution. WRONG.
Try talking their language Rusty,
Imagine a state legislature, elected by the people decides that it’s illegal to own handguns in that state. Not only that, but law enforcement has the right to search their homes w/o warrant to look for said gun on a random basis. Based on analysis like Flenser’s, SCOTUS should not be able to decide these 2nd and 4th amendment issues. It should be up to the states and what the people decide. Some of these so called “originalists” have no concept of constitutional law, and particularly what the 14th amendment stands for. I’m done here, cause I don’t speak “crazy talk” very well, and this thread makes me want to pound a wall. Some of these morons are potential jurors, which is HORRIFYING.
Rusty,
I’m sure the rights emjem was referring to were those a rapist receives while going through the criminal justice system. Those “rights” far exceeded those which this lousy POS extended to his victim. There is no punishment this coward could get that would be “proportionate” to what he has done. If decent society deems death appropriate for the convicted child rapist, then so be it. The perp must then consider whether the crime he wants to commit is worth his life.
I find it pathetic that you or anyone else disregard the lifelong consequences an attack like that brings. Those of you that defend human waste like that disgust me.
The arrogant piece of lawyer scum has spoke.
Rusty:
I don’t think you or many other people really understand how truly awful rape is on both the victim and the victim’s family. You have no concept and you have the audacity to say that I’ve lost my sanity? This from the man who thinks people shouldn’t be able to protect themselves in DC while at the same time he was mugged. Gotta love the irony you continually embody there, Rusty.
Yes, rapists enjoy a lot more rights than their victims. It is often very hard to prove that a rape has taken place, especially in the circumstance of date rape. Our legal system tears apart rape victims and often makes it very easy for rape cases to be dismissed based on things such as “no memory (because of drugging)” or “flimsy evidence.”
No, it is you who are making excuses for the piece of trash who ruined the life of that young girl. Her life is over. She may get to live but it will be no life. As to her assailant, his rights aren’t over when he goes to prison. He gets to appeal his sentence, he gets to enjoy the largesse of the American tax payer.
You’re a real piece of work, Rusty. You really are. For someone who says how “empathetic” he is, your defense of this animal really shows how your humanity has been compromised. I think you’re very pro-criminal with the statements you’ve made.
No, the one who’s lost their perspective and their sanity is you, Rusty. You’d make the perfect little defense attorney. Perhaps you can be MJ’s protege… she can show you all the ins and outs of how to manipulate the legal system to make sure justice is never done.
You’re confusing “revenge” with the need for justice, sausage.
Prison rape is not funny. The guilty should also be executed. Encouraging thugs to dispense justice because the courts won’t is disgusting.
Robert Bork should’ve been on SCOTUS. This crap wouldn’t be going on.
lots o comments here…did not get past all of mm stuff. dont need to. have an 8 yr old daughter. have a .45, nuff said.
I don’t understand why folks are saying the Supreme Court came out against extending the death penalty. Here in Nebraska we used to hang horse thieves.
Robert Heron Bork (born March 1, 1927) is a conservative American legal scholar who advocates the judicial philosophy of originalism. Bork formerly served as Solicitor General, acting Attorney General, and judge for the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. In 1987, he was nominated to the Supreme Court by President Ronald Reagan, but the Senate rejected his nomination.
The crap that mistressjustice writes goes to show the depth of her ineptitude. She claims, like the idiot she, is someone like Bork who’s an originalist has no concept of Constitutional Law. What a lowlife moron. Justices Scalia and Thomas are orginalists! Let me guess mistress idiot, as long they’re conservatives they have no concept on how to interpret Constitutional Law. What a demented phony.
Spoken like the manipulative, overbearing defense attorney you are. I bet the rapists just love you. Pardon me for actually using a real life experience to demonstrate that rapists continually enjoy rights their victims will never be able to. Victims will never get piece of mind again, will never ever feel comfortable in their own skin, will always look over their shoulder and will never know the comfort of safety.
Yes, I bet you’re a joy to behold to victim advocates.
You’ve continually shown how condescending and disingenuous lawyers can be. Do you treat victims and jurors like this too? I wouldn’t be surprised.
In the legal stakes, you’re a real prize. In the human stakes, where child rapists and molesters get protection from liberal judges, you’re an abject failure. Well, if I’m programmed to argue the “right” of any issue, then you are certainly “programmed” to argue the “left.” It doesn’t take much to know right from wrong or, in your case, that excuses can be made for things such as rape and murder.
Almighty God will exact justice on the rapist and the five supremes. I hope I live to see it.
Red – if you can provide me with info re: which state has been using it as deterent/punishment, you’d have a point. Otherwise, as I said, it’s just a red herring.
You lost me there, Red. I have no idea on “bodily integrity”.
No – child-rape and murder hurt people, robbing them of something precious and irreplacable. It also hurts society.
You’re reaching for some kind of moral relativistic link between savage criminal action and justice, but there is none to grasp.
If you’re referring to the use of chemical castration we have the right to “disarm”, Red. We don’t allow ex-cons, much less inmates, to carry a weapon.
We need to align the US Supreme Court with justices that reflect the morals of our once great country. If they indeed reflect the behaviors of our citizens, God help us.
Purplepeep and Ciscerokid
You both get it and Rusty and Sausage, et al never will. There are cases where you can argue legal gobbledygook all you like, but when you are dealing with the true innocents of this world, there is no parsing of the legal rights of the perpetrators. Anyone who does this to an 8 year old innocent loses pretty much any argument he may have for extenuating circumstances. There is none. You can sit here and argue all the pretty legal arguments you like, but the fact of the matter is, only a monster could do what this monster did. Period, end of argument, he doesn’t belong in normal society.
thanks, flmom. seems common sense has gone the way of dinosaurs. Very much time to take the responsibilities of caring for our own on our own.
The Supreme Court no longer functions “under God”. They act like Gods – and this is dangerous to our freedoms.
purplepeep, re: “You lost me there, Red. I have no idea on “bodily integrity”.
It is like this… OK, you want him dead, fine string him up, whatever.
If you go for castration, then why not lobotomies? They used to be quite in vogue, you know. The next administration may just regard YOU as a thought criminal… don’t worry, be happy
cicero
You are so right, I heard this decision whilst listening to Glen Beck, I was on my way to pick up my 12 year old daughter from camp,
Glen Beck had a call from a young woman who had been sexually molested by 3 members of her own family 20 years ago, her father, her grandfather and her aunt. the anguish and pain in her voice made me stop the car, 20 years later she was still in pain, she had tried 6 times to end her life and was still in therapy , but what really made me stop and think, was when she said to Glen that if anybody ever did that to her child, knowing how it had affected her, she would kill that person herself, even if it meant giving up her own life. From the horses mouth.
I wonder how many of the molester-defenders on this site have ever dealt with kids who have been raped. I wonder how many have seen the terrified tremors, heard the nightmare-induced cries, or stopped an 11 year old from trying to kill themselves. Have you ever seen how sexually molested and raped children often go one to rape and molest other children as they grow older in a sick cycle?
The shattering of a child’s innocence is one of the most horrid things that happens on this earth. Anyone guilty of committing such an affront to humanity deserves every ounce of wrath humanity can muster.
If we must defend those among us who would perform such acts on our children then maybe our system is fundamentally flawed.
People like Rusty have to parse justice. He says he is not pro-murder but by refusing to execute the guilty he is effectively pro-murder. Of significance is that a number of very recent studies show that executions do have a positive impact on reducing the murder rate. (Unfortunately, a life sentence has no such impact and life sentences for even the most heinous of criminals is all too often commuted or reduce through probation. The famous McDuff case in Texas is quite instructive here and people lost their lives because of a corrupted justice system.)
In the days when American did not have prisons but only jails, all felonies were punishable by death. A convicted felon could beg for mercy and sometimes win, but he or she was branded on the right hand to show that mercy had been granted. Mercy, however, was not granted a second time and the execution followed normally within 10 days. Justice was both swift and certain. There was one appeal, it was immediate, and the sentence was rendered immediately.
Just another step towards anarchy. They’ll be a révolution one day that’ll dwarf the French révolution.
Alright, emjem.
People shouldn’t be able to protect themselves in DC? Huh? Who are you confusing me with? Check the Heller post from earlier today. Notice I am post #1 and notice my sentiments. I hate the handgun ban here.
Um, I 100% agree with you? Did you know in some places, judges are banning the word “rape” from rape trials because it’s so inflammatory. Isn’t that ridiculous?
The irony is that we agree here and yet many people on this site were very quick to say rape is overblown and accusations are made because of regret instead of assault. Oh man do I wish I remember what thread that was on. It was shocking and horrible.
1. I am not making excuses for anyone. The perp here is a piece of trash. He may very well deserve to die. That doesn’t make it acceptable or Constitutional.
2. How dare you say this victim will never have a life? Seriously, how dare you? I dated a sexual assault victim and, yeah, it stuck with her, but to say she didn’t have a life is incredibly insulting. Her life is changed and obviously not for the better. But to assume recovery is impossible is pretty twisted.
3. The largesse of the American taxpayer?
a. Executing someone is more expensive. Since killing a person is more expensive, appeals are necessary to make sure we get it right.
b. One hour of sunlight and the constant threat of rape and assault is largesse to you? Where are you from? Siberia?
The fact that you confuse things like rights of the accused to me supporting rapists is ridiculous. You know what I support? Justice. Justice isn’t executing people because you’re angry. Justice is making sure everyone, even monsters, have the best legal help available to them.
Once you stack the deck against the accused, you run the risk of imprisoning or executing the innocent. And that is not acceptable in a free country.
And, as I said earlier, being anti death penalty does not make me pro-rape, pro-murder, pro-terrorism, or pro-genocide. It means I don’t trust a system of life and death that is operated by angry, fallable humans.
And if you’re a real patriotic American, you should be worshipping the ground that defense attorneys walk on. They are the best defense between a free country and a police state where the accused are hauled off to jail, or worse, without a fair trial.
I know of a 12 year old girl who was gang raped by a group of older boys. She is now nearly 16, is in therapy, and cuts herself. She has created a scar with the words “I hate myself” carved into her flesh. The question is will she survive? The answer is unknown.
Would that a child rapist be doomed to execution if the individual he raped committed suicide. I suggest that it would be a fitting punishment to have such a rapist live day to day with the sword of Damocles hanging over his head.
Like many of you on this thread, I am horrified at the depravity and savagery of this crime. The thought that someone who claims to be a human being could commit such a vicious and violent act on a helpless little child sickens me to no end.
nlebou, well said. Of course CP will deter a future crime. Although the threat of CP isn’t likely to enter the mind of a would-be attacker, rapist, murderer, etc., b/c these people are not constrained by internal rational thought. They are consumed with selfishness, lust, anger, whatever it is that drives them to torture and kill others. However, if they receive the just punishment for their crimes in the form of capital punishment administered by the justice system, they won’t be AVAILABLE for future crimes. Imagine how many victims would be spared if their attackers had received justice the FIRST time they violated someone else.
I believe that the majority’s view is wrong.
The death penalty is not unconstitutional. The Supreme Court has ruled on that issue. In fact, the Court determined that under the Constitution, the issue of the death penalty was an issue reserved for the states under Article 10.
Despite the Court’s view that this is a state matter, the court has inserted itself in issues regarding how the penalty is administered. And under the 8th Amendment’s proscription against cruel and unusual punishment, the Court does have the Constitutional authority to review issues where the manner in which the death penalty is administered may cross the line of cruelty.
This case, however, was nothing of the sort. It was a simple matter of a state determining what punishment fit what crime. And the punishment in this case was not out of proportion to the nature of the crime.
The death penalty for the rape of a chile is neither cruel (the penalty has been deemed appropriate for other capital offenses) and it is by no means unusual in the historical record.
The violent rape of a child causing serious bodily injury is a particularly heinous offense that shocks the conscience of most people. This was not a case of imposing the death penalty on a thief. This was a case of a state legislature determining the penalty appropriate for a most atrocious crime.
If states are free to impose the death penalty, why aren’t they free to determine whether the penalty is appropriate for a crime that some would argue is worse than murder?
Interesting that none of the justices in the majority who are so fond of looking to the laws of other countries in assisting them in their decisions here took it upon themselves to inquire into the practices of other countries in rendering their decision in this case. If they had, they would find that in the international arena, the death penalty for a child rapist is not disproportional at all. But, when you are legislating from the bench, consistency in that approach would have a unfortunate chilling effect on one’s goal to advance liberal political ideology.
Obama condemned the decision. Yet, he would appoint justices with the same liberal activist qualities to fill vacancies on the court if he is elected President. Someone needs to buy that man a spine.
martin.musculus’ son
I’ll certainly pray for your father’s recovery. God bless.
I don’t think I can support the death penalty, I don’t think it is a deterrent… but I must admit it does prevent repeat offenders.
“And if you’re a real patriotic American, you should be worshipping the ground that defense attorneys walk on. They are the best defense between a free country and a police state where the accused are hauled off to jail, or worse, without a fair trial.”
Wow, I just threw up in my mouth a little bit. While defense attorneys have a purpose in many instances, often they are as deplorable as the filth they represent. Maybe you should read Predators, especially the story about a defense attorney who didn’t report that his client in a child custody hearing had been raping his five-year-old daughter for years. People like you are always empathetic, to the people who destroy the innocent.
I also dated a girl for a while who had been brutally raped, and it eventually cost our relationship. I often daydreamed about killing the garbage that did that horrible and life-altering act to such a wonderful girl. I wish God was real so he could get the justice he deserves.
Rusty,
Anger is the litmus test for wrong and right, the number of posts on this thread indicates that this case has hit a nerve with many people. In my case, I am infuriated that a monster who could do what he did to an innocent child who couldn’t defend herself, could get away with the murder of her innocence. He is a pox on society, even you, with your clever legal arguments, cannot deny that he is not of any benefit to our society. I realise that we, as a sophisticated society, must not let our baser instincts take over what should be our progress in the grand scheme of the animal kingdom, but sometimes we need to let the more primeval amongst us realise that, whilst we have evolved, we will not let the lesser evolved [such as this monster] prevail. In other words, you hurt my child and you’re dead.
“purplepeep, re: “You lost me there, Red. I have no idea on “bodily integrity”.
.
No, Red, I meant that term has no meaning, no defintion – at least to me.
Again, that’s another red herring.
If you drive at 40 mph over the posted speed limit you would expect to get a speeding ticket, correct? So would I.
If I commit a heinous crime against a fellow human I would likewise expect to be punished in the manner proscribed by my fellow citizens. We all have to live – and sometimes die – according to the consequences of our actions. To coin a wise phrase; “As we sow, so we shall reap.”
This is a bit simplistic but I don’t recall the term “proportional” in my wanderings through our nations highest law.
I was convinced that if the death penalty were determined by SCOTUS to be constitutional (and it has) that it was the concern of a jury to decide whether capital punishment fit the crime.
I think this is a fish that the Justis’ should have thrown back.
I know God is real and that the person you mentioned will get the justice he deserves – even if he doesn’t face a judge in this lifetime he will still have to stand even greater Judgment.
Even though I joked about this, I complete agree with you. I do not believe whatsoever in coddling criminals, but I also don’t believe in subjecting the weaker ones to an orgy of abuse by the stronger.
OTOH, I have more of the Chinese view: This man should be taken care as one carries out the garbage. Have him kneel, put a bullet in the back of his head, and move on.
purplepeep, what is this thing you got for herring? I like em in wine sauce.
Look guy I have read your posts for some time, & you are smart enough to get “bodily integrity”. It’s real simple, kill em or don’t. Now Jews, Christians, Hindus, Buddhists & most other faiths do not main people as a form of punishment. Period. If you want to throw “As we sow, so we shall reap.” at me I will assume Christian… if you care to pursue your case for castration, well your gonna have to give up the beer & pork chops.
Does giving up beer and pork chops prevent child rapists from repeating their crimes as effectively as castration or execution does? I’m not a doctor.
KILL ALL THE TRAITORS and those who support child molestors.
How much more must we endure?
No, Harris… kill em or don’t.
Dersu, I think happy hour is over…
Once a molester is found guilty, just as the step-father in this case was, there is no punishment harsh enough. The evidence cited proves that he did rape the girl, he was found guilty, a jury of his peers called for his death, and there is no rehabilitation of this kind of evil.
Anyone who is against the death penalty in such a wretched case hasn’t the faintest clue as to what kind of effects a violent rape has on a child.
it is and are you for your friends?
it is and are you afraid for your friends?
With the Congress and the Presidency moving towards socialist/communist ideology, the Supreme court was our only hope.
With Kennedy on the bench, we can’t count on the Court either, to check the powers of the leftist loons.
We are doomed!
Sometimes I wonder if Kennedy is intentionally casting his ruling so that he can grab the spotlight for himself!
I wash my hands of this…
Wash the blood from this young childs body
from your mind, and then you might convince yourself that this monster rapist
deserves to breathe another breath.
Yes, if they do something unconstitutional. Executing people is not unconstitutuional.
Even that loon Kennedy did not say that it was. He invoked some “evolving standard of decency” which only he can discern.
This already happens (partly) and is Unconstitutional, so which side of the Heller case are you on MJ, defender of the Constitution?
You know, people always try and use the old, “Life in prison is worse than death anyway,” spiel, but I don’t buy it. In prison an inmate can make friends, read a good book, write a letter home, enjoy an apple, get a degree, sit in the sunshine, etc.
I wonder if the convicted rapist will cut himself or urinate and defecate on himself so no one will ever be sexually attracted to him again. I have personally seen abused children do this.
I wonder if the convicted rapist will swallow pills or try and hang himself with his underwear.
I wonder if the convicted rapist will freeze up and be unable to move for quite a while after seeing someone who resembles their attacker.
I wonder if the rapist will ever feel responsible for the child he raped that has now begun to rape other children. It happens more than you think.
No punishment is harsh enough.
“Unusual” in the context of “cruel and unusual punishment” does not mean “historically uncommon”. It means “exceptionally harsh”.
If it meant uncommon then we’d have to use hanging rather than death by lethal injection, developed very recently.
Being of full Swedish blood, I prefer ‘em pickled (Inlagd sill). But I suspect you already know “red herring” is used to denote a detraction from the central topic.
Thanks, Red, but I actually had to Google the term and came up with varying and contradictory uses. e.g. one site uses the term to support abortion. I take it you’d see it differently.
If you’re speaking in the context of justice being applied for the intentional destruction of innocent human life, you’re spot on, Red.
If yoou’re refering to chemical castration there, no maiming is involved.
I infer you’re alluding to Levitcal laws there? (If so, it’s another “red fishy”) Well, I wouldn’t mind giving up beer since I rarely imbibe in the stuff. If you shake up some Manhattans, you’d get my interest, though. Also not a big fan of pork, so that’s not much of a sacrifice for me either!
But you can sustitute other terms of your preference that explain the phenom. John Lennon’s “Instant Karma”, the scientific laws of “Cause And Effect”, or even “you make your bets, and you take your chances” might do it.
From LGF:
Rusty
But he had the best legal help available to him, probably a shyster like you. Now it’s time for us to execute him, which it is perfectly constitutional for us to do.
Rusty, who seemingly got his law degree from some mail-order school:
Strange, there is nothing at all in the Constitution to that effect. The opposite, in fact.
I always thought Justice was people getting what they deserved. Hmm…Maybe I’m old school.
Rusty has never seen the aftermath of a child molester.
I prefer Stu Berguere’s Plan
for Child molesters.
He advocates putting them in an incinerator because that way,
“You always know where they are.”
Now that brooklyn red has left us, hopefully with the smell of a childs blood in his nostrils burning his soul, I say again.
KILL THE TRAITORS and those that support
child molestors.
The libs on Air America Radio are sportin’ wood after this debasement.
What — to my lay mind — is meant by “uncommon” is “fiendishly novel.”
Many of us (myself included) sometimes like to indulge ourselves in rhapsodies of sadistic fantasy…”if I could get my hands on that SOB, I would…”
Apparently, this has always been a popular past-time and is how we arrived at such combinations of torture and execution as “breaking on the wheel.”
It would seem obvious to me that the founders meant to confine capital punishment either to the standard methods of the time or other straightforward methods of dispatch not especially contrived to increase the suffering of the condemned.
(Of course, as an originalist, I would want the court make a scholarly, historical judgment as to what the word meant to the founders.)
Where do we get the idea the deadly lives of Mason and Bundy and others are so damn holy sacrosanct?? Tell me!! Why are they kept alive for life on our dime when most people today still have no problem at pre-birth abortions (not to make the argument, but hell!) We have no qualms killing enemies on a battlefield, so why make these of oh so sacred life exemptions for the scum of the earth??
The Supreme Court basically wants us to get in step with the more “civilized” countries without death penalties. Makes us look more humane somehow I guess. Has anyone tallied up the expenditures keeping society-leaching murderers and child rapists alive in prison for life — really??? I have a feeling people would feel different if that funding came out of the social services budgets!
James Greenidge
Queens NY
The emperors have no robes.
Both presidential candidates have spoken out to criticized the child-rape decision.
Does this not show the preposterousness of Justice Kennedy’s claim that “there is a national consensus against capital punishment for the crime of child rape?”
There manifestly is no such consensus. It could not possibly be more transparent that the SCOTUS liberal gang of five is just making it up.
Imagine for a moment, how much easier it will be to garner similar rulings for similar and even far more heinous crimes under the Supreme Court staffed with one or two Obamessiah appointees. Remember, under Liberalism, it is the criminal who has rights…not the victim.
One can only hope that the evil that is that “man” will meet a similar fate in prison. Let’s go Prison Justice…doing the job the Liberal Courts fail to do.
If I had a choice and I did such evil, I’d rather have the needle than to spend the rest of my life in isolation, away from anyone, because I, and the jail personnel, were afraid for my life with the inmates. It would be torture to me, to spend years and years, with only my own thoughts, most of the time.