Criminal Justice
1- Chapters 9, 10, and 11 in our Mallicoat textbook address the typical and not-so-typical offenses committed by women. Chapter 9, more specifically, begins to look at the sentencing and processing of women through our criminal justice system. For the purpose of this assignment, we will take a look at those women who have been sentenced to death. Women are rarely sentenced to death in the United States and executions of women are even rarer. Researchers have suggested that women who are sentenced to death are often perceived as breaking gender norms.
Here are a few sources;
1) Here is a list of all female death row inmates in the United States from the Death Penalty Information Center;
( https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/death-row/women)
2) Article
( https://scholarship.law.wm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1035&context=wmjowl )
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For this essay I ask that you research a case of a woman on death row and answer the following questions;
1- Explain the facts of the case in detail and the court proceedings.
2- Did the perpetrator deserve the sentence she received? Why or why not?
3- After your investigation, argue whether or not the sentence received was justifiable?
4- Include any other comments about the death penalty to support your position.
ANSWER
Women on Death Row
Darlie Routier
Darlie Routier is one of the six women on death row in Texas. She was accused of murdering her six and five-year-old sons Devon and Damon. On June 6th 1996, early morning, 011 dispatchers in Rowlett received a call from Darlie Routier. She said that an intruder had broken into her home and stabbed her two sons and herself. Her husband and their infant son were upstairs sleeping and were unharmed (Lamoureux, 2021). When the police got to her home, Devon was already dead, and Damon died in the ambulance and on the way to the hospital. In her description, Darlie said that her attacker was a white male about six feet tall. There was a window screen in the garage, which was assumed to be the entryway for the attacker, which he used to gain access to their home.
Holes started developing in her story when a video surfaced of Darlie laughing and spraying silly string on her sins’ grave. This led people to wonder whether she, in fact, killed her sons and made it look like they had been attacked. The forensic evidence showed inconsistency with what she had told the police. The knife that had been used as the weapon was from her kitchen, and there was no motive for the intruder as nothing had been stolen despite there being valuable items lying around. The blood patterns were also inconsistent with her story. They showed the patterns of a person who had been standing around and not one who had been running away (Lamoureux, 2021). Her behaviour during the 911 call also led to the case surrounding her quickly forming. According to the dispatcher and the police, she was so calm for a person who was under attack. She also did not ask where they were taking her sons. The case was mostly built around her behaviour during the call, and the jury replayed the video of her on her son’s grave.
The appellant was convicted of capital murder of a child under six. The appellant was sentenced to death by the trial judge following the jury’s answers to the special issues set in the Texas code of criminal procedure (Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas). The evidence supporting the verdict showed that the appellant stabbed and killed her two sons. The appellant did not challenge the legal sufficiency of the evidence to support her conviction.
Darlie Routier’s case is one hard case to decide as she was charged using a video of herself. Giving her a death sentence was wrong as the evidence supporting the claim is not sufficient. There was no evidence of abuse to her children. She was a regular good mother and therefore did not deserve the sentence she got (Fiorillo, 2020). The video that raised the suspicion and pointed the killings of her sons towards her was an edited video that showed one side of the story. It was also wrong to judge a woman depending on society’s definition of grieving. The prosecution said that the video did not portray a woman who had lost a child a few days ago, but who are they to tell her how she should grieve the loss of her sons? Sending her to death row based on not properly grieving the loss of her sons is preposterous. Darlie said she was doing what she thought would make her son happy, which was celebrating his seventh birthday. As a mother, she did what she thought was suitable for her son and something that helped her with the grieving process, which led to her arrest and now her sentencing to death row.
The dispatchers also said that she failed to put pressure on her son’s wounds. In her situation, it could be understandable that she did not pay attention to what was being said or the instructions given by the medics because she was confused or in shock (Fiorillo, 2020). When a person is in shock, they tend to do things unusually, such as asking about fingerprints on the knife and not concentrating on the dying children. The nurses in the hospital also said she did not receive the news like a person who had currently lost two children, but she was still in shock, and there is nothing wrong with a person not processing feelings the way other people expect them to process feelings. There are holes in her story, but given the evidence provided in this case, the woman did not deserve a death sentence. This is because there was not sufficient evidence to show that she was guilty. DNA evidence was also not included in the case, and the bloody sock that was found around the house was also not factored in the sentencing, which means that the case was decided using insufficient evidence.
The death sentence given to Darlie was not justifiable as the case did not have sufficient evidence. The case was mainly built on her failure to grieve the way society expected her to grieve, which led to her sentence, her case is not foolproof and has some holes in it, but that does not justify the sentence she got (Derida, 2017). The case needs to be redone, and DNA evidence needs to be tested and used before deciding to take away her life. The prosecution did not prove her guilt. They proved that she had a different way of grieving for her loss which is her right as an American. She can grieve however she wants, and that should not be the basis for judgment. The death penalty is a cruel way of punishing offenders. There is nothing right about taking another person’s life, and taking a person’s life because they took the life for another makes two murders. The justice system should be about rehabilitation, not punishment.
References
Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas. Routier V. State. https://caselaw.findlaw.com/tx-court-of-criminal-appeals/1273764.html
Derrida, J. (2017). The Death Penalty, Volume II. University of Chicago Press.
Fiorillo, C. (2020). Death Row, when is Darlie Routier due to be executed? https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/13437321/darlie-routier-execution-murder-sons/
Lamoureux, A. (2021). Darlie Routier said an intruder carved up her sons- but the evidence says she did. https://allthatsinteresting.com/darlie-routier
