BUMP
While we've all been thinking about a virus, Joseph James DeAngelo has offered to plead guilty and take a life sentence without the possibility of parole.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/04/u...ler-trial.html
He's doing this to avoid the death penalty, which prosecutors are seeking.
Amazingly, prosecutors are refusing to take this deal, which is stupid. I have to think they're refusing this for political purposes.
California governor Gavin Newsom has stopped executions in the state, even though the death penalty remains on the books. Given that Newsom is likely to be reelected, it will be January 2027 at minimum when executions are reinstated, and even then, an execution takes decades to happen in California. Also, given the Democrat-dominated California legislature (which will remain blue for a very long time, perhaps forever), I am doubting that the death penalty will ever function swiftly.
Given that DeAngelo is 74 years old and doesn't appear to be in great health, it is highly unlikely that he could possibly be put to death before dying naturally.
So why not take the slam dunk life-without-parole plea bargain, and spare the families of victims from re-living all of this -- even 35-to-50 years later?
This is actually the most useful application of the death penalty. It scares the guilty into plea bargaining to life-without-parole. Without the death penalty, the most heinous criminals have a freeroll to plead not guilty and hope for either a lesser sentence or an acquittal -- which they sometimes get!