This Hot Air OpEd gets it right about yesterday's execution of Kelly Gissendaner for the murder of her husband almost 20 years ago. Gissendaner was not the trigger man; she got her boyfriend to do it for her. He cut a deal, turned state's witness against her, and will be eligible for parole in seven more years.
Should this seem like a miscarriage of justice? It's much like the way we get an ironclad case against Mafia boss in exchange for a lighter sentence against the underling who did the wet work. It just seems weird because we're not used to seeing a woman in the role of mastermind. We also don't like the idea of the boyfriend testifying against her to save himself: wasn't he supposed to be acting as her white knight in knocking off the husband?
The only concern is making sure that his testimony was not self-serving lies. That's the work of the individual court, of course. Providing it was well done, there is no reason the mastermind shouldn't pay the highest price.
ReplyDeleteAlways the problem in a court case, particularly with someone turning state's witness. The breaks.
ReplyDeleteYes, it does seem like a miscarriage of justice: the trigger should have burned, too. The one mistake in no way justifies making another.
ReplyDeleteEric Hines
Sometimes the price of making one case is a deal on the other case. If they had been able to lock up the case on the mastermind without the trigger man's testimony, that's the route they would have chosen.
ReplyDeleteProsecutors got to make bank and career with sure fire convictions. How else are lawyers supposed to gain more power in DC.
ReplyDeleteIf you'd like to make the case that the triggerman should have suffered the same fate, I'm behind you 100%. The idea that someone turning state's evidence to save his own life somehow requires an equally reduced sentence for the mastermind of the plot is ridiculous. That man would (likely) be alive and well today, had she not been a sociopath who decided it was easier and more convenient to have him killed than to just leave or divorce him. She deserved to lose her life for that, absolutely.
ReplyDeleteExactly. It's a shame we have only one currency with which to buy the triggerman's testimony, but in our system we don't get to compel testimony, so this is where we are. It doesn't excuse the mastermind, who deserved to die just the same. The prosecutor was going to offer a deal to somebody if he couldn't get by without insider testimony. It could have been her, but she blew it. Tough for her.
ReplyDeleteIt's an outgrowth of our tradition of liberty that we sometimes endure miscarriages of justice in order to preserve liberty. Saddam might have killed them both on the strong suspicion that they deserved it. On the other hand, he also killed a lot of people who probably didn't deserve it, and some just because he wanted to kill them. We insist that the government prove its case in open court, to the satisfaction of a jury of their peers. Sometimes that leads to things like this, but they're the price for not having a Saddam. Having seen what even an Obama can do with the system we've got, if anything I'd lean in favor of further limits on government discretion and power.
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