Let me ask you all a question....now that we know that Kathy's daughters want for him to get the death penalty, does it change your mind in the direction of DP or reinforce any beliefs you had before about the sentence of death?
Speaking for myself, I have not had a strong opinion about what his sentence will be. I am just happy to know he'll never get out of prison. I've always been on the fence about the death penalty, under any circumstances, but my one hang up has always been that if the family of the victim wants the death penalty, I feel like their feelings should be taken into consideration. Their feelings will not be taken into consideration in this case, in front of the jury. While Jason's family and friends all got on the stand to plea for his life, none of Kathy's family was given that opportunity. I think the State has done a good job but not a great job. Saacks is an ace and Jacobs is, too. But, I feel there is one huge error in their case: they didn't have anyone from Kathy's family to speak for her, her family and from their perspective. She's had zero advocacy while Jason's entire defense was about people taking up for him. She was a great gal who did a lot of important, awesome things. She was a mother, a grandmother, a sister and an extraordinary citizen who worked hard to help others. Jason was a drunk and a loser. Yet, somehow, he got to tell his story, to the point that it made me sick and I had to shut it off. Kathy Taft, or her family members, didn't get the chance to tell us all about what a wonderful woman she was and all the great things she did. And they never will. That bothers me. Nobody has ever stood up for this woman, who was the longest-standing member of the State Board of Education before she was murdered, giving nearly twenty years of her life to help kids and anyone else who wanted to improve their lives. That's just the tip of the iceberg of what this woman did for the people of the State of North Carolina. It bothers me that the State never really told her story. It bothers me a LOT!
Having said that, I don't expect it but if, somehow, he's sentenced to death, I feel like I'll be at peace with it. I'm just being honest in saying that I've gone from saying that if I were on that jury, I would've undoubtedly voted "Life In Prison, No Parole" to (with what I know now,) "death might be an act of mercy to him and Kathy's family wants this." I understand it's a terribly expensive thing to have an inmate on death row, with all of the appeals, etc. I also have moral qualms with a state-ordered killing. But, if Kathy Taft's family wants a death sentence, shouldn't we, as a society, take that into consideration? We can't honor Kathy's last wishes. Shouldn't we honor her and her legacy, by way of enforcing the wishes of the people who loved her? Help me out here. I'm really struggling with this.
