Abused Wife sentenced to 50 years for killing husband(mandatory sentence)

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.cnn.com/2004/LAW/05/10/missing.husband.ap/index.html

An Iowa woman who shot her abusive husband, then left his body in their home for more than a year, was sentenced Monday to 50 years in prison by a judge who said the mandatory sentence was unjust.

Dixie Shanahan, 36, must serve at least 35 years under the state's mandatory sentencing law.

"The mandatory minimum sentencing structure imposed on this court is in my opinion wrong," District Judge Charles Smith said at the sentencing. "It may be legal, but it is wrong."

Smith said Shanahan shot her husband, Scott, after suffering 18 years of abuse. "No human should have to put up with that," the judge said.

I'm sick of these "law and order (mostly Repug) legislators taking away a judges ability to use common sense in sentencing. Murder is wrong but sometimes the victim has been driven to it by their abuser.

[MrSandman]

1. That is one reason...

"Smith said Shanahan shot her husband, Scott, after suffering 18 years of abuse. "No human should have to put up with that," the judge said."

There must be 50 ways to leave your lover.

Seriously, having worked with victims of domestic violence, there is no justification for abuse. OTOH, hiding the body kind of dilutes th imminent threat defense and domestic battery is not a capital offense.

[Maurkov]

2. Who's soft on crime?

Both parties fall all over themselves trying to prove who's tougher on crime. Minimum sentencing laws take away a judge's power to be arbitrary. There are arguments for and against. This is not a great case for showing (me) the injustice of minimum sentencing, as I have about a thimbleful of compassion for violent people.

She wasn't a child. That she endured 18 years of abuse does not make me sympathetic, as I can't comprehend the mentality of an adult who would tolerate being abused. She killed him after he went to bed. That's not self defense; that's revenge. She didn't report the crime. She didn't plea bargain into a reasonable sentence.

Obviously she didn't get all the justice money can buy, but that is a seperate problem.

[iverglas]

4. and, if anyone cared ...

That she endured 18 years of abuse does not make me sympathetic, as I can't comprehend the mentality of an adult who would tolerate being abused. She killed him after he went to bed. That's not self defense; that's revenge.

The opinions of people who either don't have the information they ought to have before speaking, or have it and decide that the interests they seek to advance are more important than truth ... those are always such worthwhile opinions.

Who cares whether you're sympathetic? Justice systems in civilized societies do not convict and punish people for crimes that they did not have the requisite intent to commit. People suffering from various psychological disorders may not be responsible for some things they do to the degree required for conviction and punishment. The disorder that results from long abuse is one.

It is recognized FACT -- recognized by those with the skills and honesty to assess such things -- that people who suffer from long abuse do feel themselves to be in imminent danger when another person in the same circumstances probably would not.

Any self-defence justification for an assault or homicide rests on the reasonableness of the accused's apprehension of an imminent threat of grievous injury or death on the part of the person assaulted. A victim of long-term, systematic abuse may in fact have such a reasonable apprehension in his/her circumstances.

I'm not stating my personal opinion. I'm repeating authoritative opinion.

It was evidently held in this particular case that the accused's claim to such a reasonable apprehension was not believable. There are many and various factors that can be considered in assessing the credibility of anyone's claims about anything. Her subsequent behaviour was indeed relevant. How she killed the man was relevant, although the fact that she did it while he was asleep is by no means conclusive evidence that she did not have the requisite reasonable apprehension that he would kill her at some time before too long if she didn't act. Again, not my personal opinion.

An interesting study of cases like this was done in Canada - a review of the sentences of women in penitentiaries for killing intimate partners who applied to have their cases reconsidered on this basis.
http://canada.justice.gc.ca/en/dept/pub/sdr/rtush-intro.html
Many of the applicants' cases were rejected.


This is not a great case for showing (me) the injustice of minimum sentencing, as I have about a thimbleful of compassion for violent people.

The amazing thing about RIGHTS is that one's entitlement to exercise them just doesn't depend on anyone else's personal opinion of one.

In Canada, most mandatory minimum sentences have been held to be unconstitutional as contrary to the guarantee against cruel and unusual punishment. Some stand: repeat impaired driving offences, use of firearms in the commission of crimes, murder; in those cases, the violation of rights has been held by the courts to be justified by the pressing concerns the sentences are designed to address.

In murder cases, there are mandatory terms (out of a life sentence) that must be served before parole may be applied for, but even there the courts have required that there be a "faint hope" clause, permitting a convicted person to apply for consideration of an earlier parole date. The application by the provincial cabinet minister convicted of murder-for-hire in the death of his wife some time ago was recently denied; I believe that the man who killed his severely and painfully disabled daughter, and whose sentence the Supreme Court upheld, will be applying: http://www.lexum.umontreal.ca/csc-scc/en/pub/2001/vol1/html/2001scr1_0003.html

Civilized societies really just do not lock people up and throw away the key; the violation of rights that is the very nature of imprisonment -- the justified violation of the right to liberty -- is limited precisely by the need for justification.

Otherwise, if we all took a dislike to jaywalkers, we'd be locking them away for 35 years without parole too.

Either everybody's rights are respected and protected, or nobody can expect that his/her rights will be respected and protected. First they came for _____, and all that.

.

[MrSandman]

5. Some disagreements among authurative sources...

I keep returning to the least discussed aspect of BWS. The men who deserved a trial before being executed: Were they, in fact, guilty?
http://www.independent.org/tii/news/021028McElroy.html

What is of crucial importance here are the examples of locations such as Quincy, Massachusetts where co-ordinated and determined law enforcement approaches to domestic violence have prevented domestic homicides. The deaths of men and women are preventable if domestic violence is taken seriously, and that ought to be our primary goal. Creating appropriate defences for women who kill in desperation is a damage limitation rather than a prevention strategy.

http://www.jfw.org.uk/BWS.HTM

[iverglas]

6. yeses and nos

Creating appropriate defences for women who kill in desperation is a damage limitation rather than a prevention strategy.

Absolutely. No question. And we all know how I love a good prevention strategy.

As we also all know, prevention strategies are not 100% effective -- they do not prevent harm from occurring in all target cases.



The men who deserved a trial before being executed: Were they, in fact, guilty?

I do believe I already addressed this.

"BWS" is a self-defence justification. All self-defence killings are, quite simply, imposition of capital "punishment" without due process. The only trial the victim is given is in the mind of the person who kills him/her; the only verdict and sentence the victim receives is the one reached and imposed by the person who kills him/her.

We exempt people whom we believe to have killed (or assaulted) in genuine self-defence from the prohibition on homicide (or assault). The law that allows for this exemption is in fact a violation of the due process and equal protection rights of anyone who is killed/assaulted in self-defence. Like all the other rights violations that our societies engage in hourly, we regard it as justified.

*If* the belief of the person who killed someone -- that the person who was killed was going to kill him/her and that s/he had no reasonable alternative to killing first -- is reasonable in the circumstances, then s/he is justified, under long-standing common law and statute law, in killing that person.

I can't think of why this concern for the "guilt" of the person killed in self-defence would be any greater in one case than in any other. It is addressed by considering the reasonableness of the belief on the part of the person who killed him/her -- and convicting anyone who does not meet the relevant standard, of homicide. Is there some other better way that we could address the problem of people killing other people who they claim were going to kill them? The only alternative is to abolish the self-defence justification altogether, and convict anyone who kills of homicide, even where s/he would be dead if she had not killed someone else.

If the homicide victim's own abusive behaviour, that behaviour being plainly designed to create a state of on-going fear in the victim of the abuse, was the reason why the person who killed him/her apprehended the threat to his/her own life, what's "innocent" about that? The homicide victim's own behaviour caused the other person to fear for his/her life at the homicide victim's hands. That's the essence of the self-defence justification.

And I'm afraid you can keep your Wendy McElroy in whatever closet the pin-up girls for the right wing are stored in. You may have found her at random (I don't know); my familiarity with her is long-standing. She's Canadian, eh?

From her screed:

BWS claims that battered women are psychologically traumatized and therefore not responsible for their violent actions.That may be what battered-woman syndrome is. But it is NOT what the battered-woman defence to a homicide charge is. Unless your jurisprudence is way different from mine, it is this, from the **Self-Defence** Review (my emphasis) done for the Canadian Minister of Justice to which I referred earlier:

I General Rule

1. A person is not guilty of homicide if the person (the "defender") uses force against another person (the "adversary") in self defence or in defence of a person under the defender's protection.

Definition 1. - Applicable where the defender intentionally causes death or serious bodily harm (s. 34(2)).

Elements of Self Defence

Assault

2. (1) A defender acts in self defence where

(a) the defender

(i) is unlawfully assaulted by the adversary;

(ii) is under an actual belief that the adversary is unlawfully assaulting her and her belief is reasonable; or

(iii) is under an actual belief that the adversary will unlawfully assault her and her belief is reasonable; and

Actual Belief: Death or Serious Bodily Harm

(b) the defender is under an actual belief that she is at risk of death or serious bodily harm from the adversary and her belief is reasonable; and

Actual Belief: Need to Use Force

(c) the defender is under an actual belief that it is necessary to cause the adversary death or serious bodily harm in order to protect herself and her belief is reasonable.

Actual Belief: Factors

(2) The defender's actual beliefs shall be determined by considering her background and state of mind, as well as all of the circumstances under which the killing occurred as the defender understood them to be.

Reasonableness: Methodology

(3) The reasonableness of the defender's actual beliefs shall be determined (a) by first considering what an ordinary sober person, who shared the defender's background and was placed in all of the circumstances under which the killing occurred as the defender understood them to be, would have believed; and

(b) by then considering whether the defender's actual beliefs constitute a marked departure from what that ordinary sober person would have believed.

Reasonableness

(4) The defender's actual beliefs are reasonable if

General Limits

(a) they do not constitute a marked departure from what an ordinary sober person, who shared the defender's background and was placed in all of the circumstances under which the killing occurred as the defender understood them to be, would have believed; and

Exception for Unreasonable Mistakes

(b) they do not derive from an understanding of the circumstances under which the killing occurred which constitutes a marked departure from what an ordinary sober person, who shared the defender's background, would have understood those circumstances to be.

Relevant Circumstances

(5) The circumstances that shall be considered under subsections (2),(3) and (4) are:

(a) the nature, duration and history of the relationship between the defender and the adversary, including prior acts of violence or threats on the part of the adversary, whether directed to the defender or to others;

(b) any past abuse suffered by the defender;

(c) the age, race, sex and physical characteristics of the defender and the adversary;

(d) the nature and imminence of the force used or threatened by the adversary;

(e) the means available to the defender to respond to the assault, including the defender's mental and physical abilities and the existence of options other than the use of force; and

(f) any other relevant factors.

And I'm pretty sure ... no, I'm absolutely certain ... that Wendy McElroy knows all this.

But then, her screed wasn't really about the reality of the battered woman's self-defence justification in the courts at all; it was about the alleged offences against decency committed by "radical feminists". Let's not be mixing our oranges and our road apples, okay?

.

[RoeBear]

7. Women who put up with abuse are stupid and get what they deserve...

...is what I would say if I were an asshole.

"The homicide victim's own behaviour caused the other person to fear for his/her life at the homicide victim's hands. That's the essence of the self-defence justification."

But unlike the gal being raped at knife point in a dark alley the abused wife has had innumerable chances to leave the situation.

[iverglas]

8. and unlike

... people who know what they're talking about and are genuinely concerned about finding solutions to social and individual problems ... you evidently don't.

Do feel free to read any of the materials I have quoted and cited to assist with that first problem. And ya never know; sometimes, when people are informed, they find that they develop concerns they'd managed not to have before.


But unlike the gal being raped at knife point in a dark alley the abused wife has had innumerable chances to leave the situation.

It all just says so much in one little sentence about violence against women and some men's attitudes toward it, doesn't it?

This male fixation on rape never fails to amuse </sarcasm> me. The "gal" (don't you puke in your mouth when you say such abysmally dumb and disgusting things?) in the alley was having her sexual/reproductive services appropriated by some man who wasn't entitled to 'em, and that's a baaad thing. And of course, historically, men have been quick to point out all the chances she had of avoiding that, too -- like by not going out on the street after curfew, not showing her bare legs/face in public ...

The "abused wife", well, she's on her own. What happens between a man and the man's wife -- unlike what happens between a man's wife and some interloper on his sexual territory -- that's nobody else's problem, and if she doesn't like it, she can lump it or leave it. If she happens to have the wherewithal (financial, emotional, social) to do so ... which of course the man's entire course of action is designed to deprive her of ...

Why don't you invite some DU women down from GD or someplace to discuss this with you here?

.

[RoeBear]

9. Please help me here...

...Where did I say anything that would remotely cause you to come up with this gem:

"and unlike people who know what they're talking about and are genuinely concerned about finding solutions to social and individual problems ... you evidently don't."

How dare you suggest you know what I think about this subject.

[iverglas]

10. well gosh, follow the breadcrumbs, eh?

I mean, especially when you put 'em there.

How dare you suggest you know what I think about this subject.

Well ... how 'bout because I read what you wrote? --

But unlike the gal being raped at knife point in a dark alley the abused wife has had innumerable chances to leave the situation.

It really didn't take a lot of work.

.

[RoeBear]

11. You know shit...

...and I don't care.

[iverglas]

12. ... when I see it!

:D

[iverglas]

13. but to elaborate

You appear to be positing a difference between

Women who put up with abuse are stupid and get what they deserve

and

But unlike the gal being raped at knife point in a dark alley the abused wife has had innumerable chances to leave the situation.


I'm not seeing one, but maybe you can point to it.

.

[RoeBear]

14. To see the point...

...take off your bonnet and look in the mirror.

[Maurkov]

16. That's quite the feminist deconstruction

I've rarely seen one so venomous yet facile.

What happens between a man and the man's wife ... that's nobody else's problem

Did Iowa go and repeal the Escaped Wife Act? I thought runaways had to be returned to their husbands. Oh, wait, that's your distorted imagination.

Society did what it could to help her. Here is a little background. Scott already had 2 convictions for domestic abuse. Then,

In October 2000, Scott locked Dixie and their children in a bedroom closet until deputies forced their way into the house to free them. According to her attorney, Dixie moved to a domestic violence shelter in Texas for a few months to try to get her life in order.

But she soon moved back in with Scott, and in a letter to authorities, asked that the charges against him be dropped.

"I still love my husband," she wrote.
:puke:

So even after being away from him for months she was still powerless against him? At what point in eighteen years of abuse does she need to take just a tiny bit of responsibility for her situation? Ever? I support the branch of feminism that actually empowers women by encouraging them to take responsibility for their lives. Society can only provide tools, like strong domestic violence laws and battered women's shelters. Women have to have the will to use them. Casting them as eternally powerless victims doesn't help anyone.

[MrSandman]

17. Responsibility requires accountability

[iverglas]

18. my dear fellow; follow the breadcrumbs

Society did what it could to help her. Here is a little background.

I have actually made NO COMMENT on the case reported in the initial post. So your little background has nothing to do with anything I said.

Here's pretty much the sum total of what I said about that case:

It was evidently held in this particular case that the accused's claim to such a reasonable apprehension was not believable. There are many and various factors that can be considered in assessing the credibility of anyone's claims about anything. Her subsequent behaviour was indeed relevant. How she killed the man was relevant, although the fact that she did it while he was asleep is by no means conclusive evidence that she did not have the requisite reasonable apprehension that he would kill her at some time before too long if she didn't act. Again, not my personal opinion.

I don't see me making any claims or assertions that would be affected by knowing any more "background". Do you?

No, what I was responding to was exactly WHAT I SAID I WAS RESPONDING TO, which I did by quoting what I was responding to:

But unlike the gal being raped at knife point in a dark alley the abused wife has had innumerable chances to leave the situation.

And THAT was a blanket statement, NOT a statement about the case in issue in the initial post.

So I dunno ...

So even after being away from him for months she was still powerless against him? At what point in eighteen years of abuse does she need to take just a tiny bit of responsibility for her situation? Ever?

... why would you be asking ME this?


CAN NO ONE IN THIS BLOODY MICROCOSM OF A UNIVERSE SPEAK TO SOMEONE ELSE WITHOUT "MISUNDERSTANDING" WHAT THAT SOMEONE ELSE HAS SAID????


I support the branch of feminism that actually empowers women by encouraging them to take responsibility for their lives.

Bully for you. As it were.

Society can only provide tools, like strong domestic violence laws and battered women's shelters. Women have to have the will to use them.

Yeah. The tools are so very readily available ... and the abuse that women suffer has absolutely no effect on their "will".

Where there's a will there's a way ... where there's a way there's a will ... blah blah blah.

My interest in the nattering of people who value their opinions above other people's experience is just so, well, non-existent, as I believe I've said.


Casting them as eternally powerless victims doesn't help anyone.

Yes, we all know that Wendy McElroy has a big fan club out there. And I find the words no less disingenuous in anyone else's mouth.

And in case you missed it, I AM A VICTIM. I was abducted, choked, raped and almost killed by a man FOR NO REASON OTHER THAN THAT I AM A WOMAN. I am NOT "powerless", but I AM A VICTIM. And I could have shot him dead, and I WOULD STILL BE A VICTIM. What he did, and the fact that I and all women are vulnerable to it being done to us, is not changed by calling me and us something else.

I feel no shame at being a victim. I was not responsible for what was done to me. So I'm just not easy prey for the right-wing, misogynist effort to persuade me that my life will be better if I deny that I was and am potentially, at any time, a victim. Sorry.

.

[Maurkov]

19. Backing away slowly

I will forbear from responding to your posts in the future as they always seem to mean something quite different than what I interpret. Lets assume it's my fault. I apologize if I reopened wounds.

[iverglas]

20. here's a tip

I will forbear from responding to your posts in the future as they always seem to mean something quite different than what I interpret.

When you, uh, respond, to someone's post, quote what s/he said. That makes it a little less easy to, uh, misunderstand what s/he said.

As usual, I have absolutely no idea how you could have "interpreted" what I said in the manner in which you appear to have done.

In a nutshell, what I said was that the self-defence justification to homicide is properly available to women who reasonably feel themselves to be in imminent danger of death, and that not all abused women reasonably feel themselves to be in imminent danger of death.


I apologize if I reopened wounds.

Hey, the incident was nearly 30 years ago, and has been discussed here regularly ... pretty much every time someone tries to exploit women's victimization for his/her own agenda -- which I find, uh, amusing when juxtaposed with admonitions against victimhood.

.

[Maurkov]

15. Impressions and opinions matter

First, thanks for implying Im ignorant and/or dishonest. That really adds to the debate.

The original post argues that minimum sentencing is wrong, and frames it around a news clip as though the conclusion is self evident.

I did not find it persuasive.

In a democracy, we do punish those who engage in unpopular behavior disproportionately to the harm caused by their offense. Current shit list: drunk driving, hate crime, possession of child porn. If jaywalking was equally reviled, we would punish it as severely. The solution, in a democracy, is to persuade others that they are wrong, you are right, and get the laws changed.

Therefore, while the author need not value my opinion at all, it would be wise to consider others might react as I did. Additional reasoning or examples could be added to make the piece more persuasive.

...people who suffer from long abuse do feel themselves to be in imminent danger when another person in the same circumstances probably would not.... It was evidently held in this particular case that the accused's claim to such a reasonable apprehension was not believable.

Right. Moving on.

In Canada, most mandatory minimum sentences have been held to be unconstitutional as contrary to the guarantee against cruel and unusual punishment. Some stand: repeat impaired driving offences, use of firearms in the commission of crimes, murder....

Right. Moving on.

In murder cases, there are mandatory terms (out of a life sentence) that must be served before parole may be applied for, but even there the courts have required that there be a "faint hope" clause, permitting a convicted person to apply for consideration of an earlier parole date.

In the United States, criminals can be pardoned. We also have a concept called Jury Nullification, where even if the defendant is guilty to the letter of the law, the jury can choose not to convict. The judge informed them that they could convict on a lesser charge (which they did). Do any of those satisfy the "faint hope" that makes minimum sentencing palatable?

To this case:
I think 50 years is appropriate for second degree murder.
I dont think she deserves 50 years.
I dont think the solution is to let judges override juries.

What exactly do you think is the problem here, and what is the just solution?

[TexasMexican]

3. She should have shot him like 17 years earlier.

That being said yeah covering up the thing makes her look shady and that is probably the real reason she was convicted.

Had she called the cops and whatnot and claimed self defense she probably could have gotten off free.

However considering that she put up with the abuse for over 18 years that shows that she probably isnt in her right mind.