In her cover story for the New York Times Magazine, “He Was Sent to Prison for Killing His Baby. What if He Didn’t Do It?” Pamela Colloff examines the case of Russell Maze, convicted and sentenced to life in prison in Tennessee in 2004 for killing his infant son, Alex, whom prosecutors insisted died from shaken baby syndrome. Colloff follows the former public defender, now head of the Nashville district attorney’s conviction-review unit, from the time she takes the case to its crushing end when the CRU’s motion seeking to reopen the case was denied by Judge Steve Dozier, the same judge who “presided over not only Russell’s trials but also his appeals and postconviction proceedings. It was Dozier who sentenced Russell to life in prison.” The story is emblematic of how so many prosecutors and judges rely on the shaken baby syndrome argument despite the many studies that have proven it is junk science.
A powerful essay in The Tennessean by Sarah McGee, a victim-witness coordinator in the Davidson County DA’s office, who has also served as an assistant public defender for youth and adults, explains how the push by Republican legislators to pass bills allowing a death sentence for any individual convicted of the rape of a minor, “may actually encourage abusers to kill their child victims in order to eliminate any witnesses because the punishment is now the same whether or not they kill their victims.”
McGee also notes that another consequence of the legislation is could also lead to a “dramatic under-reporting” of the crime because experts have estimated that 90% of rapes of minors “are committed by members of the child’s own family or those in their circle of trust.”
In May, Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee signed a bill that requires adults convicted of the rape of a child “or especially aggravated rape of a child” to be sentenced to death or life in prison, or life without the possibility of parole.
Florida also has a bill authorizing the death penalty for the rape of a child, and six other states are considering similar bills.
When will legislators learn that draconian laws almost always have unintended consequences?
In their study, “The influence of the race of defendant and the race of victim on capital charging and sentencing in California,” in the Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, Catherine M. Grosso, Jeffrey Fagan, and Michael Laurence “draw on data from over 27,000 murder and manslaughter convictions in California state courts between 1978 and 2002. Using multiple methods, we found significant racial and ethnic disparities in charging and sentencing decisions.” The piece is especially relevant in light of the writ petition filed in April by a coalition of prominent civil rights and legal organizations at the CA Supreme Court stating that “Extensive empirical evidence demonstrates that California’s capital punishment scheme is administered in a racially discriminatory manner and violates the equal protection provisions of the state Constitution.” (Death Penalty Focus aired a webinar about the legal challenge that can be viewed here.)
