A 'distinctively American form of punishment' may get a long look from the nation's highest court

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Business Insider

A 'distinctively American form of punishment' may get a long look from the nation's highest court
Christina Sterbenz
2h

Lawyers for a convicted murderer in Virginia have asked the Supreme Court to decide whether death row inmates should automatically be placed in solitary confinement.

If the Supreme Court agrees takes up the case, it could also examine the broader issue of whether solitary confinement violates the Constitution's ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

As New York Times columnist Adam Liptak writes this week, the high court "seems eager" to weigh in on this "distinctively American form of punishment." In 2011, a United Nations expert on torture called for a ban on the practice, but the US still routinely uses it.

The inmate bringing the case, Alfredo Prieto — who's been convicted of killing three people and raping two of them — has spent at least 23 hours a day, every day for seven years alone in a 71-square foot cell, according to the petition filed by his lawyers. Under Virginia's penal system, death row inmates are automatically placed in solitary confinement.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/supreme-court-could-hear-solitary-case-2015-9

[4139]

1. He is far more evil than that indicates, serial killer

In May 1988, he abducted, raped and fatally shot Tina Jefferson behind McKinley Elementary School. He left no evidence other than his DNA and the case remained unsolved for 17 years.

In December 1988, he somehow abducted two people, Rachael Raver and Warren Fulton III, and rode with them to a vacant lot outside Reston. No one witnessed the abduction, no one knows how he crossed paths with the two clean-cut, athletic 22-year-olds. Prosecutors said Prieto made Fulton get on his knees and then executed him. Rachael Raver ran. Prieto shot her too, then raped her as she lay dying. He then took their car to Queens, N.Y. and abandoned it, without a trace of evidence. This case also remained unsolved for 17 years, and Prieto continued to work and live with his girlfriend, son and father in Arlington for another year, until his father raped an Arlington woman.

In September 1989, Prieto is believed to have shot his fourth victim, Manuel Sermeno, in Prince William County...

In May 1990, another young couple, Stacey Siegrist and Tony Gianuzzi, were found shot to death in Rubidoux, Calif. Siegrist was raped, and DNA later matched Prieto.

• In June 1990, an older couple, Lula and Herbert Farley, were abducted and shot to death in Ontario, Calif. Ballistics matched with Prieto’s weapon, authorities say. His homicide total was now eight, and he had left almost no clues in any of them...

On Sept. 2, 1990, he and two of his friends abducted three young girls, took them to a vacant lot in Ontario and raped them. His friends let their victims leave. Prieto shot and killed his victim, 15-year-old Yvette Woodruff. But with two living witnesses and two co-conspirators, he was arrested within days. He was charged with capital murder, convicted in 1991 and sentenced to death in 1992. It would not be until 2005 that his DNA was entered into a national databank, and a match was made with the Fairfax and Arlington murders.



http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/local/wp/2014/06/13/serial-killer-alfredo-prieto-is-still-claiming-hes-intellectually-disabled-seriously/

[7962]

4. This is the type person the death penalty is made for.

[duhneece]

9. It's not and neve was about how evil he is,

It's about who we, as a state, as a nation are. We don't torture...until Bush came along and made it an American value.

[Hortensis]

13. Exactly. +1000.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

11. "In May 1988, he abducted, raped and fatally shot Tina Jefferson behind McKinley Elementary School."

Oh, that guy. I went past McKinley ES on a bus two weeks ago. I immediately recalled that it had been the site of a homicide back in the late 80s and that the same person who had committed the homicide had carried out another homicide (two, actually) in Reston later on. I was living in Arlington and working in Reston at the time.

[saturnsring]

2. Monsters bitching about their treatment

[duhneece]

10. Unless you want US to be monsters, too, we don't torture nt

[LanternWaste]

14. You've been staring into the abyss a wee bit too long.

You've been staring into the abyss a wee bit too long.

[7962]

3. If he'd been executed 6 yrs ago it wouldnt be an issue.

There is no question of this mans guilt. he should've received his punishment years ago.

[passiveporcupine]

5. I don't believe in the death penalty, no matter the crime

but even if I did, I still could not condone torture...and seven years of torture? Are you kidding me? Why do we feel we have the right to torture anyone who cannot defend themselves...unless we are vigilantes. Prison is not supposed to be about revenge or pain. It's supposed to be a penalty paid for your crime.

Plus, considering how many people have been put on death row and then found innocent years later, do we really want to allow this torture to happen to them too?

Come on people. We are liberals. We don't go for this kind of stuff. Putting people in solitary can and often does drive them literally nuts. So we imprison a murderer, who is guilty, and sane and tell him he's going to die, and then we torture him for years because of the necessary appeals process for death row, until he is insane and then we kill him...an insane person who may not even understand what is going on any more?

That's not even human.

[Judi Lynn]

6. You're so right, passiveporcupine.Liberals, progressives do NOT, never did condone torture,ever.n/t

[duhneece]

8. OMG After reading the first few posts, I had to check I wasn't on a Republican website

Opposition to death penalty and solitary confinement was never about what horrible things THEY did, it's about who WE are.

[Hortensis]

16. Yes. Notably, liberals and conservatives actually see moral issues differently.

Fascinating subject to read about, which I first did when I couldn't understand why my neighbors seemed too busy being upset about coarse language to worry about, say, child prostitution or murders of helpless inmates in America. Didn't make me agree, but at least I can now understand that there are different ways of defining what makes a "good" person.

In any case, I often find myself wondering if some -- presumed -- moderate/liberals here are actually much more like the conservatives who might lie toward the extremes of a U- or O-shaped liberal-conservative spectrum (over-simplified in 2 dimensions, of course.)

Another thought is that most of us do, in fact, hold a wide variety of views that can range all over the left-right spectrum depending on the issue and our experiences, in spite of our basic orientations.

Still, an eagerness for very harsh punishment, pushing aside all other considerations, is strongly characteristic of those on the authoritarian right, and uncharacteristic of liberals. That is known.

[Elmer S. E. Dump]

15. That's why I was impressed with Dukakis' answer to the Willy Horton question.

If you have principles, then you support eliminating the death penalty. That shouldn't change if the victim happens to be a family member. Dukakis showed the highest level of humanity ever witnessed in a presidential candidate and he was excoriated because of it.

He had it right.

[FSogol]

18. +1 Agreed. n/t

[dogcatdog]

7. He must have been privileged.

Or he would have gotten capital punishment on the spot. No judge no jury just executed.

[Lychee2]

17. AUTOMATED MESSAGE: Results of your Jury Service

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On Thu Sep 17, 2015, 10:44 AM an alert was sent on the following post:

Liberals?
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1014&pid=1209127

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ALERTER'S COMMENTS

Being against the death penalty and torture is "Wimp-fuck"
If this doesn't get hidden I am on the wrong site

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There is not the remotest possibility that this inmate was wrongly accused; he is a monster, and the planet would likely be a better place if he was fertilizer. But the grotesquely biased, and in too many cases, outright sadistic, administration of the death penalty, the endemic corruption of prosecutors, and the prison system in general, argues strongly for the abolition of the death penalty. Again.

The alerter's contention that he or she is "on the wrong site" if we don't agree and do their bidding is, quite frankly, a bit offensive in itself.
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