A Brief History
On December 20, 1991, the parents of a Palestinian American girl were sentenced to death for the first degree murder of their daughter, a murder committed in the name of “honor,” believing their daughter had shamed the family by living a decadent American style life and having a romantic relationship with an African American man.
Digging Deeper
Despite the death sentences, the father died in prison six years later while the mother’s sentence was commuted to life in prison. The vast time span between being sentenced to death and actual execution in the US is over 19 years!
The enormous time lapse between death sentence and execution is largely part of the extreme caution needed to avoid irreversible errors in such cases, but other cases also drag on for excessive amounts of time. In other felony cases in the US, the average time from indictment to sentencing is about eight months.
This sort of excessive time lag creates increased legal bills for all involved and sometimes leads to the loss of witnesses and or evidence. The delays can be caused by heavy court case loads or intentional delay tactics by either prosecutors or defense. Former President Trump used incessant delay tactics to successfully avoid potential jail time in 2024, and in his case of being convicted of 34 felonies in May of 2024 the delay after delay in sentencing has resulted in him not being sentenced at all, presumably until after he leaves office in January of 2029 if then!
Question for students (and subscribers) to ponder: Is it true that justice delayed is justice denied?
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Historical Evidence
For more information, please see…
Abadinsky, Howard. Law, Courts, & Justice in America. Waveland Pr Inc, 2014.
Mason, J. Cheney. Justice in America: How the Prosecutors and the Media Conspire Against the Accused . Titletown Publishing, LLC, 2014.
