Capital Crime

[Wilson Gray]

It confuses me, Dave. Why would anybody who hasn't committed a capital
crime, as defined by law and not by someone's stupidity, be on death
row? :-)

-Wilson

On 9/28/07, Dave Wilton <dave at wilton.net> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Dave Wilton <dave at WILTON.NET>
> Subject:      Capital Crime
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Is "capital crime" being defined as homicide, as opposed to any crime which
> is punishable by death? Or is the following just an error? From today's
> Slate, "Deception at the Supreme Court," by Thomas Goldstein,
> http://www.slate.com/id/2174854/pagenum/2/:
>
> "The defendant in this case is the only person in the country who is on
> death row for a noncapital crime."
>
> (The case in question is a child rape case, which is punishable by death in
> Louisiana.)
>
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--
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
                                              -Sam'l Clemens

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