Killers can’t rewrite their sentences - Boston Herald

Convicted murders, whether they’ve killed one person or many, or compounded their heinous acts with the maiming of innocents, seem to have lost one key lesson post-sentencing: It’s not all about you.

The latest to miss the point is Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, whose attorneys are appealing his death sentence, asking instead for a punishment of life in prison.

As the Herald’s Stefan Geller reported, his lawyers argue that their client could not have received a fair trial anywhere in Eastern Massachusetts because the entire region was rocked by the April 15, 2013, twin bombings.

They also claim that inadmissible evidence was used against Tsarnaev at trial and that two of the jurors allegedly lied during the selection process, violating their client’s constitutional rights.

Of course, it’s a lawyer’s job to try to get their client the best deal they can, and the appeals process is a vital part of the American judicial system — however, Tsarnaev’s attorneys acknowledged that he, along with his older brother, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, placed pressure-cooker bombs at the finish line of the 2013 Boston Marathon. He admitted it as well, in open court, “If there is any lingering doubt, I did it along with my brother,” he said.

Whether one agrees with the principle of having a death penalty, that is what Tsarnaev received as sentence for his part in that reprehensible attack. Of course Tsarnaev would prefer to live — but so would the three people whose lives he took in the bombing — 8-year-old Martin Richard, 23-year-old Chinese exchange student Lingzi Lu and 29-year-old Krystle Campbell.

Dropping legal chaff to deflect from his admitted guilt in order to alter that sentence is specious at best.

But Tsarnaev is not the only killer looking to better his fate. A group of first-degree murderers, sentenced to life in prison without parole in Massachusetts, want to rewrite their sentence so they can get out after 25 years. They’re supported by state Rep. Jay Livingstone, who introduced a bill for their cause.

His “Act to Reduce Mass Incarceration” would let the parole board release first-degree murderers they are satisfied are not at risk of reoffending. State Sen. William Brownsberger also filed a bill that would make future first-degree murderers eligible for parole after 35 years.

Family members who lost loved ones at the hands of these killers let the Joint Committee on the Judiciary at the State House know how they felt.

As the Herald’s Rick Sobey reported, Terry Titcomb of Charlestown, whose son was murdered 25 years ago, told the committee Tuesday “I don’t get to kiss my son. I go to the cemetery, and I look at his stone. My son doesn’t know I’m there.”

It’s not so much a case of whether these murderers will “reoffend,” it’s that they offended in the first place. Whether it’s Dzhokhar Tsarnaev or Shawn Fritz, the man who killed Titcomb’s son — they are being punished for their crimes.

They don’t have to like it, but they do have to pay for what they’ve done.

https://ift.tt/2pken8w