WAVY-TV posts the AP report, "Triggerman bill killed by Senate panel," written by Larry O'Dell.
For the fifth year in a row, the Virginia General Assembly has rejected legislation to expand the state's death penalty law.
The Senate Courts of Justice Committee voted 8-6, with one abstention, on Wednesday to kill a proposal to allow the death penalty for accomplices who share a murderer's intent to kill. The bill would have revised Virginia's "triggerman rule," which in most cases allows capital punishment only for the person who does the actual killing.
Two weeks ago, the Senate's own version of the Republican-backed bill died in the courts committee on a 7-7 party-line vote, with one GOP senator abstaining because he accepts court appointments to represent capital murder defendants. Sen. Bill Stanley of Franklin County abstained again Wednesday. Republican Sen. Bryce Reeves of Fredericksburg switched sides and voted against the bill.
Reeves said after the committee meeting that he changed his vote "based on my faith," but he declined to elaborate.
Similar bills cleared both the House and the Senate in 2008 and 2009, but were vetoed by then-Gov. Tim Kaine, a Democrat, and supporters of the legislation could not muster the two-thirds majority needed in both chambers of the General Assembly to override the vetoes. The Senate courts committee rejected the bills in 2010 and 2011, when Democrats held the majority.
"A step in the right direction," is the title of Nelson Graves' News Virginian column.
It’s really amazing how the now Republican controlled Virginia General Assembly works. For every step the General Assembly takes forward it takes two backward. Look at recent examples of how it seems the conservative state senators and delegates have their priorities backwards.
A step forward – two weeks ago, the assembly’s senate failed to pass the “triggerman” bill. According to the Associated Press, “A Senate committee killed a bill to expand Virginia’s death penalty.” The bill failed after party line voting ended in a 7-7 tie. As it happened a Courts of Justice Committee Republican abstained because he accepts court appointments to represent defendants in capital murder cases.
The AP report goes on – “Death penalty opponents say Virginia should not expand capital punishment because the commonwealth ranks behind only Texas in the number of state executions conducted in the United States.
“They also said there is too much danger of executing an innocent person because there is no DNA or fingerprint evidence that would prove a conspirator’s intent.” A similar bill is working its way through the House of Delegates but must clear the same Senate committee.
One step backward involves the sales of guns.
Earlier coverage of the Virginia death penalty expansion legislation begins at the link.
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