7.12.2005

Man Found Not Guilty in Fort Worth

Today's Star-Telegram has a story of how a jury found 19-year-old Andrew Crump not guilty of capital murder. http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/news/local/12113209.htm "Not Guilty's" are fairly rare in murder cases and extremely rare in capital murder cases. Capital Murder means there was a murder with aggravating circumstances (in this case, more than one person were killed in the same criminal episode). It also mean that the person is eligible for the death penalty (although this young man was no so eligible thanks to the Supreme Cour's decision last year that a minor is immune from this ultimate punishment. He did, however, face an "automatic" 40 years in prison.) Anyway, the assistant DA in the case was not happy. His quote: "Clearly, I didn't do my job," he said. "[The victim's families] deserved everything that I had, and apparently there was something lacking in my effort. I'll engage in some introspection and try to determine where I failed." Trust me, that's a quote of a prosecutor who is devasted.