Susan Smith redux

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100817/ap_on_re_us/us_sc_toddlers_drown

ORANGEBURG, S.C. – A South Carolina mother who claimed her children drowned when their car careened into a river was charged with murder Tuesday after authorities said she confessed to suffocating the two toddlers and then faking the accident.

Sheriff Larry Williams said 29-year-old Shaquan Duley told investigators she was distraught about money troubles and unemployment and that she killed her children by putting her hand over their mouths after a dispute with her own mother. He says Duley then strapped the children into her car and drove it into a river Monday morning.

Horrific story. Just mortifying.

It will be interesting to compare the treatment that Ms. Duley gets at the hands of the media and South Carolina justice system to that received by the infamous Susan Smith.

Originally posted by sh76
Horrific story. Just mortifying.

Indeed it is. The only thing that could cap it would be if the state carried out a ceremonial killing on her rather than making her spend the rest of her days behind bars.

Originally posted by FMF
Indeed it is. The only thing that could cap it would be if the state carried out a ceremonial killing on her rather than making her spend the rest of her days behind bars.

Perhaps the state will forgo the ceremonial behind bars for life and let her walk in 5 or so years?

Originally posted by FMF
Indeed it is. The only thing that could cap it would be if the state carried out a ceremonial killing on her rather than making her spend the rest of her days behind bars.

Susan Smith avoided the death penalty in an era that was much more friendly to capital punishment. My guess is that she will too.

Originally posted by whodey
Perhaps the state will forgo the ceremonial behind bars for life and let her walk in 5 or so years?

I wouldn't let her out. Horrific story. Just mortifying.

Originally posted by sh76
Susan Smith avoided the death penalty ....

Can you give us a three sentence summary of the Susan Smith case?

Originally posted by FMF
Can you give us a three sentence summary of the Susan Smith case?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susan_Smith

Susan Leigh Vaughan Smith (born September 26, 1971) is an American woman sentenced to life in prison for murdering her children. Born in Union, South Carolina, and a former student of the University of South Carolina Union, she was convicted on July 22, 1995 of murdering her two sons, 3-year-old Michael Daniel Smith, born October 10, 1991, and 14-month-old Alexander Tyler Smith, born August 5, 1993.[2] The case gained worldwide attention shortly after it developed, due to Smith claiming that an African-American man stole her car and kidnapped her sons. Smith later claimed that she suffered from mental health issues that impaired her judgment.

According to the South Carolina Department of Corrections, Smith will be eligible for parole on November 4, 2024, after serving a minimum of thirty years. She is currently incarcerated at South Carolina's Leath Correctional Institution, near Greenwood.[3]

Smith initially reported to police, on October 25, 1994, that she had been carjacked by a black man who drove away with her sons still in the car. Smith made tearless pleas on television for the rescue and return of her children. A Usenet chain letter circulated in the following days, asking Internet users to be on the lookout for the vehicle. However, nine days later, following an intensive, heavily publicized investigation and a nationwide search, Smith eventually confessed to letting her 1990 Mazda Protegé roll into nearby John D. Long Lake, drowning her children inside.

Originally posted by FMF
Can you give us a three sentence summary of the Susan Smith case?

Sleepyguy beat me to the Wikipedia link. But, in three sentences:

Woman claims to have been carjacked (with 2 kids in the car) by a black guy and cries her eyes out on TV, etc., begging for their return. It turns out that she drowned the kids because her rich boyfriend dumped her because he didn't want to take care of someone else's kids. Convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment, she's eligible for parole in 2024.

Originally posted by sh76
Susan Smith avoided the death penalty in an era that was much more friendly to capital punishment. My guess is that she will too.

depends on the state.

but what's-her-name Yeager copped an insanity plea, i think, in Texas, after drowning her five kids in the tub.

Yates, not Yeager.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrea_Yates

Andrea Yates (born Andrea Pia Kennedy July 2, 1964) is a former Houston, Texas resident who killed her five young children on June 20, 2001 by drowning them in the bathtub in her house.[1] She had been suffering for years with very severe postpartum depression and psychosis. Her case placed the M'Naghten Rules, a legal test for sanity, under close public scrutiny in the United States.[2] Yates's 2002 conviction of capital murder and sentence to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 40 years was later overturned on appeal.

On July 26, 2006, a Texas jury found that Yates was not guilty by reason of insanity. She was consequently committed by the court to the North Texas State Hospital, Vernon Campus,[3] a high-security mental health facility in Vernon, Texas, where she received medical treatment and was a roommate of Dena Schlosser, another woman who committed filicide by killing her infant daughter. In January 2007, Yates was moved to a low security state mental hospital in Kerrville, Texas.[4]

seems to me that (possibly in the past or possibly still happens) parents could get quite lenient sentences for killing their kids. maybe mandatory sentencing laws have corrected that somewhat. but i think the age limit is ridiculously low, something like 6-y-o for the victim to be eligible for enhanced sentencing. usual hodgepodge of state laws.

Originally posted by zeeblebot
seems to me that (possibly in the past or possibly still happens) parents could get quite lenient sentences for killing their kids. maybe mandatory sentencing laws have corrected that somewhat. but i think the age limit is ridiculously low, something like 6-y-o for the victim to be eligible for enhanced sentencing. usual hodgepodge of state laws.

If you can come to the conclusion in your mind that killing your children (and not killing yourself) is the answer to your problem, then there is something seriously wrong with you, and you shouldnt be released at all, whether you are serving a jail sentence or locked up somewhere in a mental institution.
These individuals should never see the light of day again. It may sound harsh, but I cant think of too many crimes much lower on the depravity scale than that one.