Because of this new fact, I’m even more convinced that the prosecuting of death penalty cases needs to be taken out of the hands of county prosecutors and put in the hands of state’s attorneys who do not stand for re-election.

No I read every pearl.
You begin by dismissing my comments by implying I want to ignore the constitution. Then basically agree with my point. Sorry that’s still BS.

Your reference to the constitution is total BS. I never suggested foregoing the presumption of innocence. I actually made the case for protecting it by directing more funds to cases where guilt or innocence is in question by not wasting millions on defending some dirt bag who commits murder in front of a hundred witnesses.

When he was working a shift that involved the inmates going to bed, the TV in the rec room is supposed to be cut off and stay off until morning. It kept coming back on to entertain the inmates. The inmates told him that it must be broken because it kept coming back on. The next day the TV was sent off for repairs to fix the problem. After a week, they sent the TV back without finding a problem to fix, but the TV stays off when it is supposed to be off now.
(That’s a funny story.)

FYI, I am fairly certain that he is pro-death penalty, but he doesn’t talk about it publicly because of his job.

As far as the state not managing prisons very well, it’s main job is to keep the criminals locked up and there are few escapes. There is much room for improvement in some areas though. Some judges don’t think it’s a big deal for an inmate to have a cell phone. Cell phones lead to escape attempts and trafficking other banned items, money for payoffs, weapons, drugs, and more.

http://www.peachpundit.com/2008/12/16/on-the-death-penalty-victim%E2%80%99s-families-and-jurors/

Short answer, it may not be a deterrent, but it remains an effective tool to generate plea bargains in lieu of expensive death penalty trials.

As for waiting four years and no trial, there are no excuses. That’s unacceptable.

As for aquaman, yeah, there’s that whole damn “innocent until proven guilty” thing. Stupid constitution. I’m sure the framers weren’t all that interested in it.

Yes, there are definitely “slam dunk” cases. But there are also marginal cases where the state’s case is flimsy, but the local prosecutor wants to make a name for himself so he can move up in county politics and is willing to do it on the back of an indigent defendant who was caught in the wrong place at the wrong time, but might not be the one who deserves the death penalty.

I wrote it earlier in another thread: we need to take the prosecution (and defense costs) of death penalty cases out of the hands of county prosecutors and put them into the hands of a state attorney’s office. That way we don’t worry so much about bankrupting a county trying one of these cases and the odds of monkey business are lower.