I was listening to Tempest performing the song “Iron Lady” (written by Phil Ochs), which is about the electric chair. The song includes the following verse:
The last line caught my attention. Is that true? Let’s define “rich” as “net worth of over a million US dollars.” Has such a person ever been given the death penalty in the U.S.? Actually been executed (in the electric chair or otherwise)?
This thread is NOT for a debate about the death penalty! It is a specific question about the accuracy of that particular line in that particular song.
Louis Buchalter rode lightning in 1944. I don’t know what his net worth was, but his associate Meyer Lansky had an estimated net worth of $600 million, according to some sketchy website. I’d expect Buchalter, a major figure in organized crime, would have been considered rich when he died.
Well there’s Louis Buchalter. Not sure if he was a millionaire, but he was pretty well off. And this was quite some time ago, so we’d need to adjust for inflation anyway.
That’s an awfully low bar for being “rich.” I’d say that in the context of your question, “rich” means that you can afford to have high-powered law firms devote significant time and research to your case, tracking people down who might offer an alibi, hiring expert witnesses, and filing appeals, indefinitely if necessary.
I don’t think a million bucks would last more than a year or two.
I don’t think that’s actually possible in the real world. If it was, cheap public aid lawyers or anti death penalty activists could do it just as well.
“An analysis of Georgia cases showed that prosecutors were almost twice as likely to ask for the death penalty when the defendant couldn’t afford a lawyer.”
Ah, well, that’s because poor people are almost twice as guilty.
My totally unqualified understanding is that, at least in some states, the first appeal is automatic, but subsequent appeals are only granted if some substantial new evidence comes to light. A public defender would not have the time or resources to find new evidence, but a firm that could hire private detectives and expert witnesses, or even pay people for phony alibis, might have more success.
Well, I’ve got a net worth of about a million, and I don’t feel rich. And I sure don’t think that if I killed my wife, I’d get the same quality defense as OJ did.
Are we talking about all murder cases, or only cases that have similar circumstances. Lumping “Rich guy finds wife in bed with another man” and “Crack dealer tries to shoot rival but kills 12 year old girl instead” cases together doesn’t really prove there’s a systematic discrimination against poor people in the legal system. Aside from a few wealthy serial killers maybe poor people really do commit more / more henious crimes and thus get punished more?
First let me say to the millionaire who posted here “I don’t feel rich”, that you may be kidding your self, but no one else. I’m not poor and I have a net worth of around $35,000 including life insurance.
As to in general, we must remember we are searching for historical data, As ‘little’ as a million dollars may be today, for most of our history, one million dollars has been a very substantial net worth.
In 1978, when gacy grossed 200,000, the median white household income in the US was under 16,000 (with the addition of black households of course the US median was substantially lower). Just to bring in $1,000,000, not accumulate such a worth, the average householder would have to work 62 years.
Gacy’s business (not him) grossed $200,000. How much of that was spent on materials, operating expenses, etc.? I’d speculate his income was good, but not fantastic.
Except for the Gacy types, who are secretive serial killers - the majority of murders (from my reading of the news) are people with substance abuse or anger control issues, poor education, and poor judgement. 99 times out of 100 that personailty precludes getting rich too.
The Leopold and Leob murderers, IIRC, were the sons of fairly rich people - and so their parents could afford Clarence Darrow for the defence and they escaped a sure execution, getting life instead - thus being a data point in support of the song.
I think the OJ trial is a good example that points out the serious shortcomings in what would otherwise be a slam-dunk (but circumstantial) case. If the police brought that same attention to detail to every case, it’s no surprise if those who can afford a good lawyer and the investigators can get off or at least escape execution. What public defender has the resources to chase down what prejudicial comments a policeman may have said, or done over his career, for example, in the days before Google? Hire expert witnesses to counter the defense? Psychology consultants to aid in jury selection?
Justice is NOT blind - she sees in shades of green.
The one I was going to mention; a bizarre case that involved a backwoods witch(herself very rich, and a lawyer when most women didn’t go to college) and the subject of a really good TV movie that starred Andy Griffith that comes and goes from YouTube.
But, O.J. and Robert Blake are more the norm when the rich are charged with felonies; the worst thing that happens to them is the dent to (in Blake and OJ’s cases, eradicaton of) their wealth from attorney’s fees.
