Father indicted in death of drunk driver

[mookiemookie]

Originally Posted by CaptainHaplo

His actions were against the law. However, the law was created to protect the innocent. The law failed - resulting in the death of his two sons. An impotent law is no law at all.

How did the law fail? He never had the chance to be subjected to it! Laws don't stop behavior - they provide punishment for it.

Everyone, even those we know are guilty, is entitled to due process. Vigilantism undermines one of the core tenets of our justice system - the right to be assumed innocent until proven guilty. Citizens don't have the right to be judge, jury and executioner. That's anarchy.

Charge him for murder. In the US - he would likely go free. The reason - jury nullification. If the law failed him and his family - why should it stand to further punish him and his family for its own failure.

Technically, jury nullification would never play into it. Jury nullification is a way of expressing disagreement with a law by refusing to convict someone guilty of breaking said law on the grounds that it should never have been put on the books in the first place. I really doubt anyone is going to say that the law against murder is a bad one.

Refusing to convict someone ≠ jury nullification.

[tater]

If the DUI guy had ever had a previous DUI then the law failed. Serial DUI is the norm for many. Getting blind drunk and starting the car is no different than taking your rifle outside and firing in a random direction. 99.9999% of the time the bullet will hit dirt or a tree, or even a house, only rarely will it find a human.

The two are no different.

[CaptainHaplo]

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

How did the law fail?

In 2010 he was convicted of a felony. Any idea what the original charges were and what his conviction was for? I will give you a hint - it had to do with operating a motor vehicle.....

Everyone, even those we know are guilty, is entitled to due process. Vigilantism undermines one of the core tenets of our justice system - the right to be assumed innocent until proven guilty. Citizens don't have the right to be judge, jury and executioner. That's anarchy.

I don't say that citizens do have that right. We are not talking about joe blow citizen though are we - we are talking about one of the victims of the crime....

Technically, jury nullification would never play into it. Jury nullification is a way of expressing disagreement with a law by refusing to convict someone guilty of breaking said law on the grounds that it should never have been put on the books in the first place. I really doubt anyone is going to say that the law against murder is a bad one.

Refusing to convict someone ≠ jury nullification.

Thankfully - not every case is decided purely on the "technicals". A jury can choose to acquit using the rationale that while the law itself is good - it is being misapplied or applied in error. That also is jury nullification.

Jury nullification occurs when a jury returns a verdict of "Not Guilty" despite its belief that the defendant is guilty of the violation charged. The jury in effect nullifies a law that it believes is either immoral or wrongly applied to the defendant whose fate they are charged with deciding.

(emphasis in Bold added)

Source: Doug Linder, School of Law - University of Michigan - Kansas City
http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/project...ification.html

Since people are talking of breaking the law canceling out breaking the law then the father is responsible for the drunk driver hitting his car.
He failed to follow the laws of the road concerning creating a traffic hazard with a broken down vehicle.

[HundertzehnGustav]

Originally Posted by Tribesman

Since people are talking of breaking the law canceling out breaking the law then the father is responsible for the drunk driver hitting his car.
He failed to follow the laws of the road concerning creating a traffic hazard with a broken down vehicle.

valid.
Walk the rest of the path home, away from the road instead (paralell 10 feet?) of exposing himself and his kids.

[tater]

Not the best decision. But it is not breaking the law for the jury to decide whatever they like, for whatever reason they like, a jury is remarkably powerful in its narrow area.

I wonder why people are still going on about what a fictional jury will do when a grand jury has already looked at it and decided the indictment is fitting murder.
Is there some magical formula where 12 future people will view the case completely differently in regards to law than the 12 who already looked at it?

[tater]

Originally Posted by Tribesman

I wonder why people are still going on about what a fictional jury will do when a grand jury has already looked at it and decided the indictment is fitting murder.
Is there some magical formula where 12 future people will view the case completely differently in regards to law than the 12 who already looked at it?

I take it you have not sat on a US Grand Jury.

I did for 3 months a few years ago.

The GJ is given the charge the DA wishes to bring. ONLY the DA's case is presented. The GJ then virtually rubber stamps the indictment. In 3 months I was empaneled for only about a weeks worth of days over that period. We worked 8 hours, and did multiple criminal indictments per day. There were hundreds of charges, usually several per case. In a FEW of the cases we indicted on fewer than all the charges. Maybe 5%. No one was NOT indicted for any crime. Not one. We all knew that we were not deciding anything other than "is it worth having a day in court?" We didn't suggest lesser charges to the DA or asst DA, we assumed they knew what they were doing.

You can, as they say, indict a ham sandwich.

Indictments mean nothing at all.

PS---I never suggested that juries should ignore instructions, but that they could ignore instructions.

[mookiemookie]

Originally Posted by CaptainHaplo

In 2010 he was convicted of a felony. Any idea what the original charges were and what his conviction was for? I will give you a hint - it had to do with operating a motor vehicle.....

Ah, I did not see that. My bad, then.

I still stand by the fact that allowing revenge killings is a bad thing to do. Even by victims.

[CaptainHaplo]

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

Ah, I did not see that. My bad, then.

I still stand by the fact that allowing revenge killings is a bad thing to do. Even by victims.

Not your bad - I had to go digging (which I did initially) to find that out. It isn't in the quoted article, but it is out there in others.

I agree with you that "allowing" revenge killings is generally a bad idea - by anybody. Victims included. However, I do see a difference between the guy walking (or running) 100 or 150 yards (about the length of a football field) into his home to get his gun and shoot the guy after seeing his two sons CRUSHED - vs some premeditated plan that results in a vengeance killing.

Seriously - as a dad of 2 - if that were me - I wouldn't be in my right mind for a long, long time. I can so totally see that this guy might have lost it. The time frame to get the gun and kill the drunk driver - is not enough for it to be premeditated. The shooter just saw his 2 sons crushed to death....

Which brings up the issue of WHY he will get off. Temporary insanity or jury nullification. It would be a rare jury that knows they have nullification rights that would be ok with applying the murder statute to this guy. I don't think its "ok" to commit a vengeance killing. However, given the individual circumstances of this case - the actions could be viewed as justified. That is what a jury may consider in regards to nullification. If they feel he was justified, then that would mean the law would be applied to him in error.

While I am against vigilanteism generally speaking, but I admit that my views are subject to change on it. The reality is that our legal system at this point continues to fail to protect us or rehabilitate the wrongdoer. Its broken - perhaps beyond repair.

[Bilge_Rat]

There are some cases where revenge killings have been accepted as mitigating circumstances, but it is always on a case by case basis.

You have, for example, the Don Ayala-Paula LLoyd case.

Paula LLoyd was a anthropologist who worked as a volunteer in Afghanistan. In november 2008, she was part of a team visiting a village, she went to talk to a vilager who was holding a can of gasoline. For an unknown reason, he doused her with gasoline and set her on fire. She suffered first/second degree burns to 60% of her body and died two months later.

Don Ayala who was on her team immediately detained the attacker who was then held by other soldiers. Ayala went to check on the condition of LLoyd. When he came back 10 minutes later, he shot and killed the attacker with one bullet to the head. At that point, the attacker was lying on the ground with his hands tied behind his back.

Ayala was initially charged with 2nd degree murder, but he eventually pleaded guilty to manslaughter and was only sentenced to probation.

Obviously an extreme case.

http://www.nbcnews.com/id/30645926/

[swamprat69er]

Personally, I don't think I would have wasted the time to go and get the gun. Just beat the drunk to death. That way he would get to die as slowly as the kids did and probably with as much pain.