Cardell Hayes to receive new trial in Will Smith murder case (1 Viewer)

mb504

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I don't expect this to be well-received, but Cardell Hayes appealed his manslaughter conviction to the U.S. Supreme Court, and yesterday the Louisiana Attorney General's office conceded that he is entitled to a new trial because he was convicted by a split 10-2 jury and the Supreme Court has since held that non-unanimous jury convictions are unconstitutional. Once the Supreme Court formally vacates the conviction we will be re-living this saga once again.



For anyone who wants to subject themselves to the original 100+ page trial thread

 
I followed the trail closely the first time and I really didn't get how it was a split jury. The evidence was pretty clear, and not only that, but every bit of reasonable doubt that his attorney painted during the trail was completely torn down by Hayes' own testimony that pretty much refuted every scenario his lawyer setup for him.
 
I think this is the right thing. I do not like non-unanimous convictions.
Same. I don't know the history of why that was allowed. Sucks that Raquel will have to relive that again. Not only did she lose her husband, she could have been killed as well.
 
Same. I don't know the history of why that was allowed.

Louisiana required unanimous jury verdicts when the State was founded but the state constitution was changed in the Jim Crow era to make it easier to convict black people in the event that prosecutors weren't able to prevent one or two black people from making it on to the jury. That was changed by a state ballot initiative passed only two years ago in 2018 which returned the requirement for a unanimous jury verdict. (Louisiana and Oregon were the only two states where that was even allowed any more.) And earlier this year, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned another conviction in Louisiana and ruled that the U.S. Constitution requires conviction by unanimous verdict, placing basically every non-unanimous conviction under the old law in question. It's not clear yet if every prisoner in Louisiana convicted by a non-unanimous jury has a new right to contest their conviction on that basis. I assume that will be decided by courts in the near future. Cardell Hayes could raise it because his appeal wasn't completely through when the Supreme Court made its ruling. He had lost his appeal in the Louisiana Supreme Court maybe a month before the new U.S. Supreme Court ruling.

tl;dr, the history is because racism.
 
We all know the guy killed Will so let’s just move ahead to the public execution. While I’m somewhat joking about that I believe that if we went back to public executions the crime rate would drop dramatically.

I used to be in favor of the death penalty,but no longer. Statistics have shown the death penalty does not drop the crime rate.
 
I used to be in favor of the death penalty,but no longer. Statistics have shown the death penalty does not drop the crime rate.
There‘s not much deterrent to it now. When someone gets the death penalty they may spend 20-25 years in jail. Sometimes the life expectancy on death row is longer than the areas these people come from.
 
We all know the guy killed Will so let’s just move ahead to the public execution. While I’m somewhat joking about that I believe that if we went back to public executions the crime rate would drop dramatically.
I mean, that guy that night wasn't thinking about jail let alone death row. If common sense didn't stop that tragedy, I don't know what would. It's hard to claim self defense when the guy you shot is laid out across his front seat. You think he's going for his gun? Then you flee while he's distracted or take cover. You don't shoot first, under the law. And you don't shoot the guy's wife in the leg. Laws don't really prevent crime at all.
 
I mean, that guy that night wasn't thinking about jail let alone death row. If common sense didn't stop that tragedy, I don't know what would. It's hard to claim self defense when the guy you shot is laid out across his front seat. You think he's going for his gun? Then you flee while he's distracted or take cover. You don't shoot first, under the law. And you don't shoot the guy's wife in the leg. Laws don't really prevent crime at all.
You are right laws don’t but I just think when people see what will happen to them if they break the law there is some deterrent to it.
 
You are right laws don’t but I just think when people see what will happen to them if they break the law there is some deterrent to it.
I don’t think so. I don’t think people are too considerate of the consequences when committing a severe crime. Murderers/rapists aren’t usually calculating — I think they’re more often compulsive.

Aside from that, I recommend looking up the innocence project. There are way too many innocent people who are executed to be in favor of something so uncivilized as death-as-punishment. We don’t live in a world where only guilty people are punished
 

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