Supreme Court Restores Death Sentence for CA Murderer: LA Times writer David G. Savage reports on the Supreme Court's Monday decision to reverse the Ninth Circuit and restore a death sentence to a CA murderer. Fernando Belmontes bludgeoned a young woman to death in 1981 to steal a stereo from her house that he later sold for drugs and beer. The justices, in a unanimous opinion, rejected the notion that Belmontes should be spared because his lawyer had failed him by not presenting mitigating evidence about Belmontes' difficult childhood. This is the third time the U.S. Supreme Court has had to reverse the decision by the 9th Circuit to rescend Belmontes' death penalty. Kent's analysis is available here.
Halloween Attack Renews Debate on LWOP: Mercury News writer Howard Mintz reports on the potential sentences of three teenagers accused of attempted murders of their 12 and 13 year old victims. Currently locked up in Santa Clara County Jail, these 15 and 16 year old boys now find themselves in the middle of an ongoing debate over imprisoning violent juvenile offenders for life. Last week, the Supreme Court heard arguments in Graham v. Florida and Sullivan v. Florida that will decide whether it is constitutional to sentence juveniles to life without the possibility of parole for crimes short of murder. Kent Scheidegger, Legal Director for the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, notes that the legal attack on life without parole sentences gained momentum after the Supreme Court struck down the death penalty for juveniles four years ago,"The ink was barely dry on the decision and there was an effort to apply the same rules to life without the possibility of parole."
"In Prison, Playing Just to Kill Time and Just Maybe to Help Solve a Murder": New York Times writer Dan Barry reports on the appearance of a new product among prisoners: the unsolved deck. The South Carolina Dept. of Correctons started selling these decks in its prison canteens for $1.72 about a year ago; since then, inmates have bought more than 10,000 packs. Each card features the portrait of a crime victim and then along the bottom asks that if the inmate has any information on the case, to call a hotline number listed on the card. Each card also lists *49, the anonymous prison hotline, to give a degree of safety to their reports. Tom Lucas, designer of the cards circulating in South Carolina, has pictured on the Ace of Spades his son Brian, murdered in his motorsports shop in 2003. While Lucas acknowledges that the cards have yet to solve a murder in South Carolina, he emphasizes that they have prompted dozens of tips, including a promising lead in a case more than a dozen years old.
Halloween Attack Renews Debate on LWOP: Mercury News writer Howard Mintz reports on the potential sentences of three teenagers accused of attempted murders of their 12 and 13 year old victims. Currently locked up in Santa Clara County Jail, these 15 and 16 year old boys now find themselves in the middle of an ongoing debate over imprisoning violent juvenile offenders for life. Last week, the Supreme Court heard arguments in Graham v. Florida and Sullivan v. Florida that will decide whether it is constitutional to sentence juveniles to life without the possibility of parole for crimes short of murder. Kent Scheidegger, Legal Director for the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, notes that the legal attack on life without parole sentences gained momentum after the Supreme Court struck down the death penalty for juveniles four years ago,"The ink was barely dry on the decision and there was an effort to apply the same rules to life without the possibility of parole."
"In Prison, Playing Just to Kill Time and Just Maybe to Help Solve a Murder": New York Times writer Dan Barry reports on the appearance of a new product among prisoners: the unsolved deck. The South Carolina Dept. of Correctons started selling these decks in its prison canteens for $1.72 about a year ago; since then, inmates have bought more than 10,000 packs. Each card features the portrait of a crime victim and then along the bottom asks that if the inmate has any information on the case, to call a hotline number listed on the card. Each card also lists *49, the anonymous prison hotline, to give a degree of safety to their reports. Tom Lucas, designer of the cards circulating in South Carolina, has pictured on the Ace of Spades his son Brian, murdered in his motorsports shop in 2003. While Lucas acknowledges that the cards have yet to solve a murder in South Carolina, he emphasizes that they have prompted dozens of tips, including a promising lead in a case more than a dozen years old.
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