Buried in Monday’s state Supreme Court decision upholding the death sentence of 29-year-old Brian Wakefield, who was convicted of the 2001 home invasion and beating deaths of Richard and Shirley Hazard in Atlantic County contained a kernel of hope for opponents of the death penalty.
The court ruled that the Wakefield trial and sentencing met all of the criteria under New Jersey law, that it was fair, the death sentence was properly imposed, and his death sentence is not disproportionate.
Justice Virginia Long, in a dissent, offered a concise rebuke not only to the courts immediate decision, but to the ethical underpinnings of the courts willingness to continue endorsing the death penalty. She said the state court in the 1980s relied on evolving standards of decency to uphold that ultimate sanction and that a changing moral climate required the state to reconsider its commitment to the death penalty.
Justice Long’s view of the death penalty is consistent with the recommendations made in a report issued by a state panel that had been charged with reviewing the state’s capital punishment statute.
The key finding of the report, issued in January, was that the the death penalty was inconsistent with evolving standards of decency in New Jersey and elsewhere in the country. The report also found that there is no evidence that the death penalty acts as a deterrent or “rationally serves a legitimate penological intent”; that there remains too much risk that felons who commit similar crimes will face different sentences or that the innocent will be executed; that it is more expensive than life in prison without parole; and there are better alternatives, including life imprison without parole.
Unfortunately, the court may not have the authority to follow Justice Long’s lead — Justice Roberto A. Rivera-Soto, writing for the majority, cited a 1992 constitutional amendment explicitly stating that the death penalty is not cruel or unusual punishment to explain why he believed the court did not have the constitutional authority to strike down the capital punishment statute.
But that does not mean the death penalty cannot be overturned by the state Legislature. With Thursday’s Senate hearing coming up, I am hoping that members of the Senate Judiciary Committee read Justice Long’s dissent and take it to heart.
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Hank Kalet 