Wednesday, July 18, 2007

Moonda -- I was wrong.

Donna Moonda got life in prison today and avoided the death penalty. So go ahead, tell me I was wrong. (See my post below from Monday) Getting "life" instead of "death" in these cases doesn't happen often, but maybe I should have thought better with this being a Federal jury. As one of my reporter brethren called to tell me, "if they didn't give Gotti the death penalty, Moonda wasn't going to get it."

Still, my experience has been that a quick initial verdict is usually followed by a death penalty decision. Although in this case, many would have claimed it was "overkill" to give the mastermind death while the shooter gets out in 17 years.

I think the best followup question is: "Why did prosecutors fight so hard (and spend taxpayer $$ in the process) to push for a capital case when they knew it was a long shot at best to get a conviction?"

1 comment:

Cathy said...

Well, I was wrong too but it was a cold act that she performed with hiring and watching a man kill her husband. I am surprised that she only got life.