Death Row Sentence Dismissed Because Jury Read Bible
Yesterday I read that in Colorado, a conviction for the death penalty was set aside because the jury read bible passages such as the Leviticus “an eye for an eye” and “he who kills a man shall be put to death” during deliberations. Back in 1995, the jury unanimously found the defendant Robert Harlan guilty and senetenced him to death.
Robert Harlan’s savage crimes began one winter night near Denver in 1994, when he ran a 25-year-old cocktail waitress, Rhonda Maloney, off the road and raped her. She managed to get away, and another driver who came along, Jacquie Creazzo, picked her up. But Harlan followed them and shot up their car. Jacquie Creazzo was left paralyzed. Rhonda Maloney’s body was found under a bridge a week later.
Colorado judges found that church and state were not kept separate.
What’s missing from this story is that it was the defendant’s lawyers that brought up the bible in the first place. Harlan’s lawyers invoked the Bible and God’s mercy on Abraham and asked the jury to impose a life sentence. So the jury, of course, consulted the Bible, just like the defendant asked.
