After deciding to pursue the execution of the man charged with
fatally shooting 12 people in a Colorado movie theater last summer,
the prosecutor declared that "for James Egan Holmes, justice is
death." By that definition, he might have added, justice is also
highly unlikely.
Arapahoe County District Attorney George
Brauchler might have resolved this case quickly, simply and
inexpensively. Holmes' lawyers say their client would be willing to
plead guilty for a sentence of life without parole. But the
prosecutor declined.
Not much should be made of this announcement, since he has
plenty of time and many reasons to change his mind. Arizona
prosecutors had no apparent qualms about a plea bargain with Jared
Loughner, who agreed to spend the rest of his life behind bars for
killing six people and wounding 13 others in Tucson.
Rep. Gabby Giffords, who was shot in the head, and her husband
approved the deal. The Wall Street Journal reported that "victims
and their families largely welcomed" it.
It's not hard to see why. A plea bargain may deprive them of the
satisfaction of seeing the killer pay the ultimate price, but it
avoids years of uncertainty and frustration. If we know anything
about the death penalty in this country, it's that there is nothing
swift or sure about it.
Colorado is less than zealous in its commitment to this
particular sanction. The state has executed only one person since
the death penalty was restored in 1975 -- and he'd been on Death
Row for 10 years. One current resident was sentenced in1996.
Nationally, it takes an average of nearly 13 years for a death
sentence to be carried out. Holmes could be condemned to die and
still be breathing oxygen in 2030.
Getting a conviction and death sentence is no cinch. His lawyers
are expected to ask for his acquittal on grounds of insanity.
Holmes saw a psychiatrist at the University of Colorado Denver
while he was a student there, and a gun range refused to do
business with him because the owner found him "creepy." Even if a
jury is not willing to find Holmes innocent, it may decline to
execute someone with serious mental problems.
If the prosecutors insist on going to trial, the public will
need an excess of patience. The presiding judge stepped aside
because of other duties, forcing postponement of the trial until
next February at the earliest.
Holmes' lawyers want to put it off till the summer or fall of
2014. The trial is supposed to take four months, though the defense
says it could go on for nine. So a verdict may be more than two
years away.
By that time, many stacks of taxpayer money will be gone. A
capital murder trial costs far more than a non-capital one, because
of the extra sentencing proceeding, the special protections
mandated by law and the huge amount of time required.
The Death Penalty Information Center notes that the difference
can exceed $1 million. And the additional cost may be wasted, since
"only one in every three capital trials may result in a death
sentence" and "only one in 10 death sentences handed down may
result in an execution."
Given diminishing public enthusiasm for capital punishment,
there is no guarantee that if Holmes wound up on Death Row, the
sentence would ever be carried out. Michael Radelet, a professor
with the Institute of Behavioral Science at the University of
Colorado Boulder, notes that a future governor could decide to
commute all outstanding death sentences -- as Illinois Gov. George
Ryan did. "The odds that he'll be killed are about the same as the
odds of a snowstorm in Orlando tonight," he told me.
Death penalty advocates will argue that prosecutors owe it to
the victims and their families to demand the death penalty. But
that path offers cold comfort.
Marilyn Peterson Armour of the University of Texas at Austin and
Mark Umbreit of the University of Minnesota conducted interviews
with families of murder victims in Texas, which has capital
punishment, and Minnesota, which doesn't. Those in Minnesota, they
found, "show higher levels of physical, psychological and
behavioral health" -- apparently because "the appeals process in
Texas was drawn out, elusive, delayed and unpredictable."
Prosecutors can put Coloradans through that maddening process in
the Holmes case. Or they can save everyone a lot of trouble by
locking him up for good.
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