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Governor Chafee is refusing to turn over a suspected murderer in state custody to the federal government, declaring that doing so would expose prisoner Jason Wayne Pleau to the death penalty, a penalty he says has been consciously rejected by Rhode Island, even for the most heinous of crimes. In a letter dispatched to U.S. Attorney Peter F. Neronha Thursday afternoon, Chafee said he is not going to allow the transfer of Pleau, who has been accused of robbing and killing gas station manager David D. Main as he prepared make a deposit at a Citizens Bank branch in Woonsocket on Sept. 20.
If prosecuted in the federal system, Pleau would fall under the Hobbs Act, in which conspiracy and robbery can be punishable by life imprisonment or death if a firearm was used in a crime that results in death.
In his letter, Chafee said his rejection of the federal request should in no way minimize the tragic and senseless nature of Mr. Mains murder, and declared that the person or persons responsible for this horrific act must, and will, be prosecuted and punished to the full extent of the law. I extend my deepest sympathy to Mr. Mains family for their unspeakable loss.
Don't you just love it when a liberal challenges the supremacy of federal laws and no one mentions it?
Which will probably be the outcome.It was not immediately clear Thursday night whether any other states have flatly rejected a request to turn over a prisoner to the federal government.
But Jarad Goldstein, a professor of constitutional law at Roger Williams University, said its possible Chafee was within his legal rights to turn down the request, given that the federal government didnt get a court order that would have mandated it be given custody, but made the request under another agreement that allows states to request an interstate retainer.
This agreement gives each state the discretion to decline a request from another state. It may be that the state is within its rights, though it is still not clear to me whether a state can decide not to turn over a defendant because it disagrees with the federal policy, Goldstein said. Usually, federal law trumps state policy but, in this case, I think an argument can be made either way. Goldstein said the federal prosecutors could get an order from a federal judge that state officials could not ignore.
Amy Kempe, a spokeswoman for state Attorney General Peter F. Kilmartin, said her boss was on a plane returning from a meeting of state attorney generals in Chicago and was not available for comment.
The Constitution overrides State law and explicitly allows the Death Penalty. So it doesnt matter what the Governor thinks. He can't do what he chooses, at least assuming we follow the Constitution.
The Constitution overrides State law and explicitly allows the Death Penalty. So it doesnt matter what the Governor thinks. He can't do what he chooses, at least assuming we follow the Constitution.
Really?
Identify by article section and clause the proviso which allows fedgov to prosecute this offense and imposed the death penalty,
.
The Constitution overrides State law and explicitly allows the Death Penalty. So it doesnt matter what the Governor thinks. He can't do what he chooses, at least assuming we follow the Constitution.
You mean no liberal mentions it?
Perhaps because they read the entire article. This is more a procedural issue than a challenge.
Which will probably be the outcome.It was not immediately clear Thursday night whether any other states have flatly rejected a request to turn over a prisoner to the federal government.
But Jarad Goldstein, a professor of constitutional law at Roger Williams University, said its possible Chafee was within his legal rights to turn down the request, given that the federal government didnt get a court order that would have mandated it be given custody, but made the request under another agreement that allows states to request an interstate retainer.
This agreement gives each state the discretion to decline a request from another state. It may be that the state is within its rights, though it is still not clear to me whether a state can decide not to turn over a defendant because it disagrees with the federal policy, Goldstein said. Usually, federal law trumps state policy but, in this case, I think an argument can be made either way. Goldstein said the federal prosecutors could get an order from a federal judge that state officials could not ignore.
No one edits copy anymore?Amy Kempe, a spokeswoman for state Attorney General Peter F. Kilmartin, said her boss was on a plane returning from a meeting of state attorney generals in Chicago and was not available for comment.
"As a young state senator 30 years ago, Paul Pfeifer helped write Ohios death penalty law. Today, as the senior member of the state Supreme Court, hes trying to eliminate it.
I have concluded that the death sentence makes no sense to me at this point when you can have life without the possibility of parole, Pfeifer said in his most recent public comments, testifying in December in favor a bill to abolish Ohios law. I dont see what society gains from that.
Pfeifer, a Republican, has always charted his own course on the court. For years he was a member of a foursome two Democrats and two moderate Republicans dubbed the Gang of Four for a series of 4-3 rulings that critics said were anti-business and favored Democrats and their causes. Hes also not afraid of mud-slinging: In his spare time, the lifelong farmer raises Black Angus cattle.
Pfeifers experience as a death penalty supporter-turned-opponent is not isolated.
Gerald Kogan, a retired chief justice of the Florida Supreme Court who prosecuted death penalty cases early in his legal career, now says the death penalty should be abolished, with the possible exception of worst of the worst defendants such as Osama bin Laden or a mass serial killer.
Rudy Gerber helped write Arizonas death penalty law in the 1970s but now opposes capital punishment and represents death row defendants trying to escape the law he created.
In California, Don Heller authored a 1978 ballot initiative that created the states death penalty law. Thirty years later, with more than 700 inmates on death row, Heller has changed course and is advocating the laws demise, saying its too prone to human error."
I think the death penalty is wrong. We have no God-given right to take a life unless it is in self-defense.
I think the death penalty is wrong. We have no God-given right to take a life unless it is in self-defense.
The murderer also did not have a God given right to take a life.
I think the death penalty is wrong. We have no God-given right to take a life unless it is in self-defense.
The murderer also did not have a God given right to take a life.
I agree, that's why I think he should never draw another free breath. However, mistakes are made in the application of the death penalty, as evidenced by the folks on death row who have been exonerated.
The death penalty is also applied unfairly. Poor people who can't afford private attorneys and minorities are about 10X more likely to be sentenced to death.
The murderer also did not have a God given right to take a life.
I agree, that's why I think he should never draw another free breath. However, mistakes are made in the application of the death penalty, as evidenced by the folks on death row who have been exonerated.
The death penalty is also applied unfairly. Poor people who can't afford private attorneys and minorities are about 10X more likely to be sentenced to death.
So we pay for his room and board for the rest of his life? Why should i? Also, we have DNA now, so it's less "likely" to happen. I agree it's unfair that poor people can't get private attorneys, I couldn't afford one! But that's the way it goes....not all murderers are poor. And they sit in prison for years before they have to worry much about it, look at Scott Peterson. He wasn't poor.....and he's still alive!
I agree, that's why I think he should never draw another free breath. However, mistakes are made in the application of the death penalty, as evidenced by the folks on death row who have been exonerated.
The death penalty is also applied unfairly. Poor people who can't afford private attorneys and minorities are about 10X more likely to be sentenced to death.
So we pay for his room and board for the rest of his life? Why should i? Also, we have DNA now, so it's less "likely" to happen. I agree it's unfair that poor people can't get private attorneys, I couldn't afford one! But that's the way it goes....not all murderers are poor. And they sit in prison for years before they have to worry much about it, look at Scott Peterson. He wasn't poor.....and he's still alive!
Yep, we pay for his incarceration. The last thing I want to chance is meeting my Maker with innocent blood on my hands.
Blackstone's Ratio - In criminal law, Blackstone's formulation (also known as Blackstone's ratio or the Blackstone ratio) is the principle: "better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer", expressed by the English jurist William Blackstone in his Commentaries on the Laws of England, published in the 1760s.
The principle is much older than Blackstone's formulation, being closely tied to the presumption of innocence in criminal trials. An early example of the principle appears in the Bible (Genesis 18:23-32),[1][2] as:
Abraham drew near, and said, "Will you consume the righteous with the wicked? What if there are fifty righteous within the city? Will you consume and not spare the place for the fifty righteous who are in it?[3] ... What if ten are found there?" He [The Lord] said, "I will not destroy it for the ten's sake."[4]
The twelfth-century legal theorist Maimonides, expounding on this passage as well as Exodus 23:7 ("the innocent and righteous slay thou not") argued that executing an accused criminal on anything less than absolute certainty would progressively lead to convictions merely "according to the judge's caprice. Hence the Exalted One has shut this door" against the use of presumptive evidence, for "it is better and more satisfactory to acquit a thousand guilty persons than to put a single innocent one to death."[1][5][6]
Sir John Fortescue's De Laudibus Legum Angliae (c. 1470) states that "one would much rather that twenty guilty persons should escape the punishment of death, than that one innocent person should be condemned and suffer capitally." Similarly, on 3 October 1692, while decrying the Salem witch trials, Increase Mather adapted Fortescue's statement and wrote, "It were better that Ten Suspected Witches should escape, than that the Innocent Person should be Condemned."
Other commentators have echoed the principle; Benjamin Franklin stated it as, "it is better [one hundred] guilty Persons should escape than that one innocent Person should suffer".[7]
The Constitution overrides State law and explicitly allows the Death Penalty. So it doesnt matter what the Governor thinks. He can't do what he chooses, at least assuming we follow the Constitution.
Well...God knows who is guilty and who is innocent. He knows everything about us.
We are human...human's make mistakes. God knows this.
He answered, For the sake of ten, I will not destroy it.
Sodom was destroyed....God knew there were no innocent.
