I’m almost always opposed to the death penalty (mainly because I tend to be skeptical of government’s ability to do anything right), so I’m probably biased, but, if this report from the London Times is accurate, it is, to say the least, dismaying:
A Texas man is due to be executed next month despite admissions by jurors that they consulted biblical passages advocating death as a punishment to help to decide his fate.
Before sending Khristian Oliver to his death after he was convicted of murdering his victim — who was bludgeoned with a gun barrel — jurors read passages of the Old Testament, including one that states that a killer who uses an iron object to kill “shall surely be put to death”. Oliver, 32, is due to be executed on November 5. He was convicted in 1999 of the murder of Joe Collins, 64, during a 1998 break-in at the victim’s rural East Texas home.
During the trial, the jurors were instructed by the judge not to refer to anything that was not presented as evidence in the courtroom.
Amnesty International called on the Texas authorities to commute Oliver’s death sentence because since his trial, jurors had admitted that they read the Bible while they decided whether he should live or die. In particular, they said that Bibles were passed around with specific passages highlighted, and that one juror read aloud to his fellow jurors the passage, from Numbers XXXV, 16: “And if he smite him with an instrument of iron, so that he die, he is a murderer: the murderer shall surely be put to death.”
Read the whole thing.
Texas capital crime trials have two phases where the jury sits in judgement: determination of guilt and sentencing. This was the sentencing phase. There was a probably a discussion about whether the death penalty conflicted with Christian teaching, which it does not, as the verses and about two-thousand years of history demonstrate, recent flaky popes notwithstanding.
I must say that the mere fact that the Bible was passed around seems less significant to me than it does to most. If the jurors merely consulted their own interior version of Christian belief, the result would be the same.
On the other hand, the farce of the Texan bloodbath of executions [more, I believe, than all the rest of the states combined], never even gets addressed. It is perfectly plain to an outside observer that the agenda down there is neither law nor justice, and this should be so even if you support capital punishment.
Here’s the standard i suggest be applied.
If you can honestly tell me that you would be objecting if these same jurors had consulted the Bible and found passages on mercy that led them to give the guy a lesser sentence, would you be objecting that the state must execute him because of that alleged “religious misconduct”? If so, then you are being consistent.
If, on the other hand, you would be just fine with their consultation of scripture to find grounds for mercy, then i suggest that you are a hypocrite and need to quit objecting to the imposition of a lawful sentence consistent with the secular laws of the state of Texas.
During the trial, the jurors were instructed by the judge not to refer to anything that was not presented as evidence in the courtroom.
Since juries have the right to judge laws as well as facts, they have the right to ignore the judge’s instructions, which are often lies anyway.
I’m almost always opposed to the death penalty (mainly because I tend to be skeptical of government’s ability to do anything right)
Same here, but I’m always glad when burglars are killed by their intended victims. If we could be sure of valid convictions I’d support the death penalty for burglary.
You’re missing the real story here. When have they started making gun barrels out of iron? Aren’t they all steel these days? I declare a mistrial!
If he’d used the barrel of one of those new fangled plastic pistols, or a good old pickax handle (without the pickax) they would have let him off.
Or maybe one of those guns that when you squeeze the trigger, a little flag pops out of the barrel and reads “Bang!”
Oh, Texas, land of my birth. How I do not miss thee.
The feeling’s mutal, Rick.
On the other hand… he DID murder some guy.
@Zimriel
I don’t think anyone’s disputing that, least of all me, certainly. The issue is that there’s a push to get this guy’s sentence commuted because the jury used the Bible to help determine it.