Multiple Life Sentences for Minor in Police Shooting He did not Participate in.
Multiple Life Sentences for Minor in Police Shooting He did not Participate in.
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One: 65 years, while long, is not "multiple life sentences." Two: The 65 years was shortly thereafter reduced to 55 years, though I am not finding any details on why. That 55 years was 30 for felony murder and 25 for burglary and theft (???), consecutively. Three: Body cam shows A'Donte Washington charging the officer with a drawn weapon, so this does not appear to be a case of abuse of force. Four: A later court changed those to run concurrently, making it an effective 30 years. In this hearing, the victim's own father made a statement that Smith did not deserve to be charged with his son's death. Five: This screenshot is dated less than a week after the original sentencing.
Other notes: There were five teens involved in this burglary, Smith was the only one who did not take a plea deal. The day before this burglary, Smith and others were involved in the murder of another man. The stolen car used in the burglary came from yet another murder. I have to think it was a difficult argument for the defense to make, that Smith "did not intend to hurt anyone." The prosecution surely had an easier time framing this in terms of "Smith was at least present when someone was murdered the day before [it may have been a short time, hours, since the earlier murder was "around midnight" and I don't see what time of day the later burglary occurred]. He had to know that continuing to commit crimes with the same group of people could end with death, and still pressed on."
Whatever your opinion about this situation, you will be better served by presenting it alongside a more complete and accurate respresentation of facts than this screenshot of a tweet contains.
Thank you for this
Whatever your opinion about this situation, you will be better served by presenting it alongside a more complete and accurate respresentation of facts than this screenshot of a tweet contains.
is it possible to fit this level of nuance in a headline?
perhaps reading past the headline is recommended
Have you met people before?
Unfortunately.
It’s possible in a post on Lemmy but OP wasn’t about to do that.
Just included links to help the POS.
Thanks for the context but a court shouldn't be considering things they haven't been convicted for unless it's part of the matter before the court.
Also it doesn't matter if the police shooting was justified. Charging this guy with the police shooting is, and always has been, fucked up.
65 years is 3 life sentences in the normal world. That's not a normal sentence for burglary outside authoritarian countries.
a court shouldn't be considering things they haven't been convicted for unless it's part of the matter before the court.
They didn't consider it in the trial to determine his innocence or guilt, which carries a reasonable doubt standard. They considered it at sentencing, which falls under a an abuse of discretion standard. Basically anything can be relevant at sentencing. It's up the the judge to weigh the evidence, and the judge must give appropriate weight to uncharged crimes (probably not much, certainly not as much as convicted crimes). Ever read a pre sentencing report? It's the convict's entire life story. All of it gets considered. Should the court not consider whether someone has a family or deep community ties because they weren't convicted have having a family or deep community ties?
A rigid sentencing rubric that allows no discretion, to me, is the fascist approach to sentencing.
This sentence seems long for the kid's age, but that's Alabama. Vote.
A rigid sentencing rubric that allows no discretion, to me, is the fascist approach to sentencing.
For lesser crimes, I can agree, but felony stuff. I think it should be more rigid.
It's the felony murder rule. You intend the foreseeable consequences of your actions. Police shooting your accomplice in an armed robbery is certainly a foreseeable consequences of armed robbery. It's one of the reasons doing armed robberies is illegal.
Police shooting your accomplice in an armed robbery is certainly a foreseeable consequences of armed robbery.
I don't understand why that is being equated with murder though. If I would have forced my accomplice into the life threatening situation that got them killed, sure, I would be guilty of their death; but if we assume that they went along willingly how can I get blamed that they got themselves in the situation where (someone else!) killed them?
You shared the intent to do the crime, including all its foreseeable consequences.
Criminal liability criminalizes the forming bad intentions (conspiracy and attempt, inchoate crimes) and the bad action of advancing those intention (completed crimes, choate crimes; robbery, murder).
Felony murder liability says: don't do that (don't conspire to do a felony that may likely kill someone and which then did kill someone).
The death arose from the shared bad intent, so the consequences are fairly shared. That's the theory. I know some people who find this rule controversial. I find it controversial as applied, sometimes, but not in theory. It's the economics of the rule. Can't have people hatching dangerous conspiracies to do felonies.
If you commit a felony and during which someone dies, it’s felony murder. Even if you did nothing wrong except whatever felony
Yeah, we're asking if that's moral? We already have laws about being party to a murder or conspiracy to murder. Why do we need to automatically extend liability?
That's the law, but is is actually just?
Oh look someone with a Pro-Genocide tag shows up to defend charging people for the violence committed against them.
Such surprise.
Ridiculous. Go touch grass, honestly. "Pro genocide." You're so gullible and reactionary. Such a surprise your media literacy is such utter dogshite.
Your name is rather distinctive. But just to make sure I didn't forget about your shilling for Israeli Apartheid and War Crimes I added a tag. So yeah I'm not surprised you're in favor of charging people with murder for the police shooting their friends.
But just to make sure I didn't forget about your shilling for Israeli Apartheid and War Crimes I added a tag.
Thats churlish. You can't handle disagreeing with someone?
Why not just say: "I haven't figured out how to handle my emotions yet"?
No I can disagree with people just fine. But I don't tolerate the presence of people who use propaganda to defend the most blatant and horrendous war crimes. It's the same as tolerating the presence of a neo Nazi. For the record Israel hit another IDP camp this week, the EU and Human Rights Watch have said Israel is using starvation as a weapon against the Palestinian people, and now 7 of our allies are restricting or refusing arms sales to Israel.
Furthermore I mean what I said above literally. I am not surprised to find a defender of all of that coming here to defend the felony murder rule being used when the police did the killing.
Or, and this just struck me, are you saying my shit memory for people means I'm churlish?
The two have nothing to do with each other. You seem unhinged. It was also you that brought up Israel. Its a strawman and you just committed to it again in this reply.
Okay let me break this down Barney style.
Support for Authoritarian A makes support for Authoritarian B unsurprising.
Get it now?
I never said I didn't understand, I said I disagree with the logic of bringing it up. You can do whatever you want, I won't stop you. I do still think you maybe need some emotional regulation help but if you can't handle disagreeing with complete strangers on the internet, I won't force you into it.
You only reveal your failure to understand my position. Again, sorry I can't dumb it down for you any further, the subject inherently complex.
Your position isn't complex. It's just reprehensible.
Why are you always mean when people disagree with you? I noticed this a lot. You always claim that you can't dumb it down further to someone else. Strange mechanism to defend your opinion.
To be fair, they replied to a question in good faith and then the other person replied by calling them pro-genocide.
If you read most things JustZ, you would probably take that back... JustZ is a genocide denier in every sense of the word and they always say the other person is dumb when they are challenged.
Here's another one:
1 you shouldn't be charged with a murder you didn't commit.
I feel like that one is super important here.
A lot of people here are discovering felony murder for the first time.
Also seems to be a lack of understanding that just cause you didn't pull the trigger doesn't mean you didn't help create the scenario where a trigger got pulled.
I'm not sure I agree with all instances of felony murder (like when it's an accomplice who dies), but the general notion is you participated in the events that lead to this person's death.
Lets say I along with a number of others bought drugs from a dude who used that money to buy more drugs to sell and some of those drugs killed someone.
Is everyone that bought from them responsible?
You've got a break in events (going to buy more drugs). However, if you buy someone drugs and they die from them you can be found culpable!
I think the problem is the sentencing can get out of hand.
In this case 30 years is still more than most other countries would give, but its not outrageous like america usually is.
Based on what I was reading, I think they may have thrown the book at all of them because this was the third incident (possibly murder?) this group was involved in that week.
Yeah and it was appealed down as far as sentencing went. Wild story isnt it. Not what I would choose as an example of a miscarriage of justice.
Body cam shows A’Donte Washington charging the officer with a drawn weapon,
Unsurprisingly there's no footage of this other person in that link. Not that that would justify putting an innocent person in a cage.
There were five teens involved in this burglary, Smith was the only one who did not take a plea deal.
Why would anyone take a plea deal for a murder that they didn't commit? The real problem here is this scam of forcing people into plea deals by threatening them with insane punishments in a fundamentally unjust system. It's gross when people act like refusing a "deal" is some kind of guilt. It's mostly likely the opposite.
The day before this burglary...
That's irrelevant to the cop murdering this kid.
... Smith and others were involved in the murder of another man.
Even if this were relevant, did this even happen? Your article is from 2016 says nothing about Lekeith being convicted.
More generally it's amazing how "normal" people are brainwashed enough to post this kind of copaganda word salad.
There's no "opinion" here. Teenagers shouldn't be convicted for murders committed by cops. It's that simple.
It's really important to know the details because it's the details that allow us to parse and challenge injustice effectively.
Knowing the context of Felony Murder and how it applies to this sentencing is not saying 'this is fine then, no worries'. Rather, it means we can actually talk about the systematic issues in the legal system that enable things like this.
The comment you replied to was in no way 'word salad' or 'copaganda', it was context.
Whatever your opinion about this situation, you will be better served by presenting it alongside a more complete and accurate respresentation of facts than this screenshot of a tweet contains.
This is not a trial.
And the wall of text dumped above doesn't make it one, either.
Police murdering someone and blaming others is the discussion. Save the rest for your L2 seminar discussion.
Whatever your opinion about this situation, you will be better served by presenting it alongside a more complete and accurate respresentation of facts than this screenshot of a tweet contains.
Police murdering someone
Shooting someone who is charging you while armed is not murder, dope.
That's my point. You did not present a "complete and accurate representation" at all. You just recycled copaganda, most of it misleading and irrelevant.
... that article from 2016 says nothing about this Lekeith being prosecuted.
Edit: Parent commenter has since edited their comment to read "convicted" instead of "prosecuted."
MPD investigators say Jaderrian Hardy, 18, of Montgomery, is now charged with one count of capital murder in the death of Brandon Brown, 18, who was gunned down around midnight on Feb. 22, 2015.
Hardy was served the warrant Tuesday at the Montgomery County Detention Facility where he was already being held on unrelated charges. He joins Jhavarske Jackson, 18, and Lakeith Smith, 16, who were charged with reckless murder in Brown's death last year.
Body cam shows A’Donte Washington charging the officer with a drawn weapon,
... so this does not appear to be a case of abuse of force. That is the context here, which I made sure to include in the sentence you selectively edited.
So let's be clear here, he was charged with felony murder of his accomplice in a dangerous felony. Felony murder is the crime of killing of a person in the commission of a dangerous crime.
It's pretty debatable if it makes sense to charge someone for felony murder if they were an accomplice, but that's a different discussion than the framing of "charged for a murder committed by cops". The cops didn't murder this guy, it seems pretty clear that the cops acted in self defense here. So it's not like they transferred the "blame" as it were from murderous cops to an innocent kid.
The reason felony murder exists is that even if there was no actual intent to kill, the risk of death during a dangerous crime is so high it becomes reckless. There's a similar crime of depraved heart murder where the act that causes the death of someone is so dangerous that one could only do it if they had no concern of killing someone. You go into a felony knowing someone could get hurt or killed and do it anyway, so you are responsible for the consequences whether you "pulled the trigger" or not. A more common example would be if you and a buddy are robbing a bank and your buddy kills a teller or a cop, you get charged with felony murder.
It's pretty debatable if it makes sense to charge someone for felony murder if they were an accomplice
That's is the felony murder rule. It's a transfered intent doctrine. I don't think the rule itself is very controversial. This isn't even a controversial application of the law except for the length of the sentence and the age of the offender. While those are motivating factors at sentencing, others have posted the many aggravating factors that apply in the case. And while prior convictions and prior arrests aren't relevant at the trial, they are relevant at the sentencing.
It's part of felony murder but not the whole thing. The other parts of felony murder are if your accomplice intentionally kills someone or the death of someone is caused without intent (such as hitting a pedestrian while fleeing).
I could make the argument that by participating in a felony, accomplices are accepting the inherent risk, so if they happen to get hurt or killed that's on them and shouldn't be considered felony murder.
That first part is the same part. It's the same thing. Transferred intent. Your accomplice intends the foreseeable consequences of their actions, and you theirs.
I could make the argument that by participating in a felony, accomplices are accepting the inherent risk, so if they happen to get hurt or killed that's on them and shouldn't be considered felony murder.
Sure, I suppose that's as logical of a thing to do. It's because of public policy and the social economics of it that we don't. We as a society and our legal system, at our best, should be indemnifying, like, employees that get hurt on the job, firefighters that get lung cancer and such, delivery drivers that get bit by dogs, Major League Baseball (/s), and gun manufacturers (/s), not convicted felons who conspired to do a thing that could foreseeably and then did get their accomplice killed. They don't have the political capital to get a law like that passed. Just, as a group, not a lot of lobbying money for convicted felonious coconspirators whose accomplice died in the course and scope of it.
It's only felony murder when the accomplice is killed by something that justifies making the conduct illegal in the first place. That limits the concern of runaway criminal liability. Also I think just doctrinally, one can't assume a risk of wrongful death; it would essentially legalize negligent or reckless homicide.
The parent comment doesn't appear to be copaganda, or even have a stance one way or the other. The comment is context, which is important for discussing the issue at hand. Because of the context, we should not be discussing police brutality or excessive use of force in this case, we should be discussing the immorality of a justice system which allows someone to be charged with felony murder in the case of an accomplice.
To clarify, if this group of teens broke into a home and shot the homeowner, that would be a justified charge of felony murder for all the accomplices. However, their friend chose to essentially commit suicide by cops, and the convicted was running away at the time. Again, the parent comment did not make any qualifiers on the actions of the cops or anyone else present, they posted context with which other commenters can frame their discussion. Nowhere in their other comments could I discern a pro-cop stance, reading with an objective eye. Reactionary pointing of fingers just discourages future posters from providing context.
Before you accuse me of copaganda as well, ACAB, systemic racism is a huge problem in the US, and our justice system is rigged against the most vulnerable.
You complete me.
Mwah
More generally it’s amazing how “normal” people are brainwashed enough to post this kind of copaganda word salad.
Waiting to hear about the drugs they found in his system.
We need more people like you.
I appreciate this more than you know. Thank you.
Appreciate you being informative but 65 years is, in most cases due to multiple life sentences. It's more to do with how many years before you're eligible for parole, not the expectation of 100 years or something.
I didn't read into the situation and don't have an opinion, but your first point is already misleading.
I didn't read into the situation ...
I did. The sentences were 30 years for felony murder and 25 years for burglary and theft.
Which I stated were initially set to be consecutive, and later changed to concurrent. So you didn't even read the comment you replied to.
It's still misleading to say "while 65 years is long, it's not multiple life sentences." That's just flat-out not true.
The sentences were 30 years and 25 years. As of right now, they are running concurrently. A "life sentence" is one where you are sentenced to prison for your natural life. A life sentence may be with or without the possibility of parole.
Nobody in the history of language has been more wrong than you are.
I know the US is different than Canada, but up here a life sentence is 25y and then you can get parole.
You might not get it then, but you can. There is no "without parole" legit life sentence.
Different US states have different sentencing guidelines, but generally speaking, you can be sentenced to "life with the possibility of parole after n years" (where n is determined by the judge at sentencing), or "life without the possibility of parole."
Charles Manson, for example, was sentenced in California, and came up for parole about a zillion times. Was never granted parole, of course, but his parole hearings were a bit of a spectacle for a while.
Charles Manson, you are hereby sentenced to life with parole
Sentencing form
[ ] person is actually eligible for parole
[X] were just fucking with them, never grant parole.
He was actually sentenced to Death, but California abolished the death penalty before he was executed
So ... death with the possibility of parole?
Uh OK. So now I did read into it, and still stand by my statement that you're being generally misleading. That might not be the case here specifically, but you're definitely trolling with your first "argument".
I didn't know cops needed you to protect them when they sentence people to death. You a union member?
I don't know how you figure that sentences of finite numbers of years are life sentences unless you're being willfully obtuse.
You should also note that I have not made any arguments. I've only provided additional information beyond a screenshot of a very old tweet, which is publicly and easily available, and I have stayed as far from editorializing as possible.
Whatever your opinion about this situation, you will be better served by presenting it alongside a more complete and accurate respresentation of facts than this screenshot of a tweet contains.
Not the person you're arguing with, but just to be clear, in the US, life sentences are either determinate or indeterminate. The former are for the remainder of natural life. The latter typically have a fixed part
(25/30 years, in this case)after which parole is possible for early release, but can extend up to the remainder of natural life.So when we say "multiple life sentences" it doesn't mean sentencing for the duration of a multiple of their remaining natural life, it means that there are multiple sentences that have the possibility of life imprisonment.
Edit: I see what you're saying. In this case, these were both fixed sentences, not indeterminate life sentences.
Which, so far as I can see, is not the case here. 30 years for felony murder, 25 years for burglary and theft.
I didn't read into the situation and don't have an opinion
You literally gave your opinion directly before this statement.
I meant an opinion on the situation regarding the subject of the article and the circumstances they're in.
Does that make sense?
Makes sense to me
The day before this burglary, Smith and others were involved in the murder of another man. The stolen car used in the burglary came from yet another murder.
Gee, it's almost as if there were real crimes he could have been charged with, instead of the bullshit crime of his friend getting killed by the cops.
His friend getting killed by the cops as a result of a crime sprea is grounds for Felony Murder charges. You can say it's a dumb law but you cannot say the charges are bullshit.
Yes, I can say the charges are bullshit because they're bullshit. Felony murder in general is bullshit. Felony murder for a murder not committed by a member of the group is extra bullshit. Felony murder charges for a member of the group getting killed by the cops is ridiculous bullshit.
What even is multiple life sentences, never understood it
Each conviction carries a sentence. It is not unheard of for a particular conviction of many to be overturned on appeal, or for a sentence for one charge to be modified. In such a case, the remainder of the convictions or sentences remain in place.
There is a certain person who was recently convicted on 34 counts of fraud in New York State, and because of the "specialness?" of this defendant, the Supreme Court decided after the jury returned all those convictions that this defendant is immune from prosecution for certain kinds of crimes. This gives the defendant a ripe avenue to appeal those convictions. Some of those convictions may be overturned on the basis of that immunity ... but not all of them.
The same concepts apply to any convictions and any sentences, including the death penalty. Not only is it just to render consequences for each crime committed, it is also a safeguard to ensure that someone who is convicted of multiple felonies does not escape all consequence in the case that only some of the sentences change in the future.
This very case of Lekeith Smith is a perfect example. 30 years for felony murder, 25 years for burglary and theft, served concurrently. There is a fair argument for overturning that felony murder conviction; there is no such argument for overturning the burglary and theft conviction.
I do recall hearing about either precedent or laws relating to being involved in a crime where if someone is killed all involved get charged with the murder regardless of who actually committed it, so that could be the reasoning here.
Though I don't recall any of the specifics.
Thats exactly what they are talking about, felony murder.
They are likely saying that there are solid arguments both ways on it though.
I think the biggest issue is not that he doesn't deserve jail, he does. But if this exact crime had involved white teens, he would have gotten a few years tops
class, not race
Oh no... Class divide is whether it happened at all or gets swept under the rug... Race divide is how harsh the sentence is, but no one's making anything disappear