Possible Death Penalty Affects Approaches to Bomb Trial
Dublin Core
Title
Possible Death Penalty Affects Approaches to Bomb Trial
Subject
Mello, Michael
___________________________
Capital punishment--United States
___________________________
Capital punishment--United States
Description
A recent bombing done by an Indiana man killed one and injured another Vermont resident. The perpetrator Chris Dean is being held without bond and is subject to Federal laws surrounding the death penalty. This has ignited a debate in Vermont as the state has no death penalty.
Creator
Ring, Wilson
Source
Ring, Wilson. “Possible Death Penalty Affects Approaches To Bomb Trial.” Valley News Vol 46 No. 304. (Montpelier, VT). April 9, 1998.
Publisher
HIST 299, University of Mary Washington
Date
1998-04-09
Rights
The materials in this online collection are held by Special Collections, Simpson Library, University of Mary Washington and are available for educational use. For this purpose only, you may reproduce materials without prior permission on the condition that you provide attribution of the source.
Format
2 JPGs
300 DPI
300 DPI
Language
English
Identifier
Valley News
Coverage
Fredericksburg, VA
Text Item Type Metadata
Text
MONTPELIER -- One man killed a feder-al prison guard in Atlanta. Another kidnapped a young girl in Texas and killed her in Arkansas. There are a handful of drug killers And then there is Timothy McVeigh, the man convicted of the Oklahoma City bombing.
What all the cases have in common is the defendants have all been ordered executed by the federal government.
The U.S. government hasn't put anyone to death in almost 35 years and no execution date has been set in any of the pending cases. And none of the 15 men now facing federal execution committed crimes in states that didn't have their own death penalties.
Nevertheless, the case of Chris Dean, the Indiana man accused of sending a pipe bomb to Vermont last month that killed a Fair Haven teenager, could be added to that list.
Vermont doesn't have a death penalty law and is unlikely to get one at any time soon. But, because Dean is accused of a capital crime under federal law, the state's opinion on the death penalty doesn't matter.
The crime Dean is charged with, "trans-porting in interstate commerce an explosive device with intent that it would be used to kill or injure and death resulting," carries the possible death penalty.
It's only the beginning, and a lot has to happen before Attorney General Janet Reno decides whether or not to seek the death penalty against Dean.
But no one involved in the case can forget. "It changes everything. It absolutely changes everything," said Michael Mello, a professor at Vermont Law School who worked for years in Florida on death penalty cases and has written two books on the subject. "What it should bring is a sense of terror for defense attorneys, prosecutors and the judge."
Those differences are already evident in the Dean case. Instead of having one court-appointed lawyer, he has two. The prosecu-tors used the possible death penalty to get 60 extra days to seek an indictment from a grand jury. {end page}
[start page]
And when Dean first appeared in court Friday, U.S. District Court Judge William Sessions III started at square one, reading the 35-year-old truck driver from Pierceton, Ind., his rights.
Dean is charged with sending the pipe bomb to 17-year-old Christopher Marquis to avenge a CB radio deal gone bad after it was arranged via the Internet.
Marquis' mother was seriously injured in the blast.
Dean appeared in court yesterday and was ordered held without bail pending trial.
What all the cases have in common is the defendants have all been ordered executed by the federal government.
The U.S. government hasn't put anyone to death in almost 35 years and no execution date has been set in any of the pending cases. And none of the 15 men now facing federal execution committed crimes in states that didn't have their own death penalties.
Nevertheless, the case of Chris Dean, the Indiana man accused of sending a pipe bomb to Vermont last month that killed a Fair Haven teenager, could be added to that list.
Vermont doesn't have a death penalty law and is unlikely to get one at any time soon. But, because Dean is accused of a capital crime under federal law, the state's opinion on the death penalty doesn't matter.
The crime Dean is charged with, "trans-porting in interstate commerce an explosive device with intent that it would be used to kill or injure and death resulting," carries the possible death penalty.
It's only the beginning, and a lot has to happen before Attorney General Janet Reno decides whether or not to seek the death penalty against Dean.
But no one involved in the case can forget. "It changes everything. It absolutely changes everything," said Michael Mello, a professor at Vermont Law School who worked for years in Florida on death penalty cases and has written two books on the subject. "What it should bring is a sense of terror for defense attorneys, prosecutors and the judge."
Those differences are already evident in the Dean case. Instead of having one court-appointed lawyer, he has two. The prosecu-tors used the possible death penalty to get 60 extra days to seek an indictment from a grand jury. {end page}
[start page]
And when Dean first appeared in court Friday, U.S. District Court Judge William Sessions III started at square one, reading the 35-year-old truck driver from Pierceton, Ind., his rights.
Dean is charged with sending the pipe bomb to 17-year-old Christopher Marquis to avenge a CB radio deal gone bad after it was arranged via the Internet.
Marquis' mother was seriously injured in the blast.
Dean appeared in court yesterday and was ordered held without bail pending trial.
Original Format
Newspaper
Vol. No./Issue No.
vol. 46, issue 304
Contributor of the Digital Item
Hiznay, Max
Student Editor of the Digital Item
Hiznay, Max
Files
Citation
Ring, Wilson, “Possible Death Penalty Affects Approaches to Bomb Trial,” HIST299, accessed July 2, 2024, http://hist299.umwhistory.org/items/show/302.