Top US court OKs Bible use death penalty rejection

[sabra]

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N16151365.htm

Top US court OKs Bible use death penalty rejection

WASHINGTON, Oct 3 (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court let stand on Monday a ruling that overturned the death penalty for a Colorado murderer because jurors during deliberations had been improperly influenced by passages from the Bible.

The justices declined to review a Colorado Supreme Court ruling that imposed a sentence of life imprisonment for Robert Harlan because jurors brought a Bible into the jury room and discussed the passage about an "eye for eye, tooth for tooth."

Without comment or recorded dissent, the nation's top court rejected an appeal by Colorado prosecutors who argued the introduction of the Bible into death penalty jury deliberations did not automatically violate the defendant's constitutional right to a fair trial.

Harlan was convicted and sentenced to death in 1995 for the kidnapping, rape and murder of a cocktail waitress who was on her way home from work at a casino. He also was convicted of shooting another woman who had given the waitress a ride.

[mzteris]

1. mmmmm... misleading?

shouldn't it be SC okays REJECTION of Bible use in DP?

[Fridays Child]

2. A very poorly worded headline, for sure.

[dhinojosa]

3. I agree about the headline....but this is still one messed up case.

it should be overturned, the bible has nothing to do with the case.

[never cry wolf]

4. It was overturned

This is actually a good thing, IMHO. In the original trial, the jurors found him guilty and used the bible passages to partially justify giving the death sentence. An appeals court ruling overturned the DP because of the use of the bible and the Colo SC agreed with the appeals court. SCOTUS essentially agreed the bible should not have been used by the jurors in the original case.

[asjr]

5. Tsk Tsk--those blood-thirsty Christians.

[SteppingRazor]

6. Ignorant, dumbasses that don't even know their own Bible...

Man, I hate it when people do stuff like this. Here's the line they're talking about, Matthew 5:38 --

"Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth: "

HOWEVER, here's the very next lines, Matthew 5:39-42 --

"But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.
And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also.
And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain.
Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away."

If you're going to live your life by the Bible, fine. But live it by the actual Bible and what Jesus said, not just by your own ass-backward, out-of-context interpretations of it.

[daleo]

7. Funny they didn't notice "thou shalt not kill"

Or Jesus's admonition to turn the other cheek, etc.

[Straight Shooter]

8. I've seen countless jurors excused from death penalty cases because

they cite the scripture, "Judge not, lest ye be judged."

In my past work as a court reporter, I probably heard that a hundred times. My oh my, how times have changed. The Bible has gone from being a source of comfort to the afflicted, to being a very formidable weapon for the ignorant.