Couey Guilty On All Counts In Lunsford Case

[johnnie]

"AP) MIAMI A jury in Miami has found John Couey guilty of burglary, first-degree murder, kidnapping and sexual assault in the kidnap-slaying of nine-year-old Jessica Lunsford.

John Evander Couey, 48, was charged in the slaying of Jessica Lunsford, who was snatched from her bedroom in 2005 about 150 yards from the trailer where Couey had been living. Her body was found in a shallow hole, encased in two black plastic trash bags. She had suffocated, and was found clutching a purple stuffed dolphin.

The murder charge was punishable by death by lethal injection or life in prison without parole."

More:

http://cbs4.com/national/topstories_story_066113546.html

[Waya]

1. Am generally against the Death Penalty...however,

...I might be willing to make an exception with this piece of rubbish. Or maybe it would be a greater punishment if he would be left to rot in jail for the rest of his life......

[AlCzervik]

4. me too, i am not a violent person at all but this case makes me question

my own temperament.

[SteppingRazor]

2. Well, dude had it coming...

I mean, can you imagine burying someone alive, much less a little girl?

Her dad has been sitting a few feet away from this nutcase every day for the past few weeks. He's a stronger man than I am.

One thing on the death penalty, though — Jeb announced a moritorium before he left office. I don't know whether that's been lifted or what Crist has to say about it.

[AlCzervik]

3. i made the mistake of watching court tv this morning, they were discussing the details

of the crime, some details i never heard before. That poor little thing.
:cry:

[UnyieldingHierophant]

5. I can't even hear or think about this case without getting insane..

I'd happily put two in this piece of shit's mellon.

[truebrit71]

6. A quick and painless death is too little punishment for this animal...

...and the rest of you bleeding heart "the death penalty is cruel" whiners can save it...Normally I am one of you...but not when it comes to kids....If this happened to my child, this motherfucker could never be dead enough...

My God have mercy on his soul, his ass belongs in hell...

[Inkyfuzzbottom]

7. No to the death penalty...

that would be too easy on this monster. He needs to spend the rest of his miserable life locked up in prison. Even the worst kind of criminals in jail don't like a perverted child rapist baby killer. Let him spend the rest of his life getting worked over by some real bad asses.

[whoneedstickets]

12. Supermax, solitary confinement...

23 hours a day, no human contact for the rest of his life. Supermax prisons are probably the most extreme form of mental torture designed. Twenty five years of that and this slime bag may barely be coherent enough to pray daily for someone to come and bury him alive thereby freeing him of his wretched existence.

Check out this Time article on these prisons.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1582304,00.html


I'm only a death penalty opponent because of the potential for irreversible error. I'm not opposed to some suffering for monsters like Couey. Here is domestic terrorist Eric Rudolph's experience in the federal Supermax in Colorado:

"It is a closed-off world designed to isolate inmates from social and environmental stimuli, with the ultimate purpose of causing mental illness and chronic physical conditions such as diabetes, heart disease and arthritis," he wrote in one letter to The Gazette of Colorado Springs.

Rudolph wrote that he spends 23 hours a day in his 7-by-12-foot cell, adding that his only exercise is in an enclosed area he described as a "large empty swimming pool" divided into "dog-kennel style cages."
"Using solitary confinement, Supermax is designed to inflict as much misery and pain as is constitutionally permissible," he wrote.


Sounds about right to me.

[Zynx]

8. Rope. Get.

[lpbk2713]

9. Good. And it only took the jury four hours.

Now I just hope the defense doesn't get anywhere with a bogus insanity plea.

[medeak]

10. thank gawd ... and they were saying the prosecution didn't have a case

without admission of confession

[LonelyLRLiberal]

11. Isn't it said that other inmates hate child molesters?

If so, death would be an easy out. Just let the meanest prisoners take care of this creep.

[RebelOne]

15. I agree with that. He won't last long in prison.

[rocktivity]

13. Her father looks as frail and heartbroken as ever

Not that I thought a guilty verdict would cheer him up. I'm glad he had the likes of John Walsh and Marc Klaas to support him. And he said he could at least take comfort in the rule he and Jessica had not to leave the house without sharing a kiss and an "I love you."

:(
rocknation

[Trajan]

14. As much as the emotion screams for revenge ....

Becoming him solves nothing for society ....

A life-long miserable existence in prison seems hardly worth his crimes, but I cannot go against a personal position AGAINST purposely taking one life for another ....

[ET Awful]

16. Agreed.

Solitary confinement? Sure, no problem. Life sentence to hard labor? Sure, that works for me too. Drop him off on a deserted island with a couple of fruit trees, a fishing pole and a small plot of fertile land to grow some food if he can with no possibility of ever seeing another human being? Sure, that's good too.

BUT, my firmly held belief is that the death penalty is wrong. Whether it's this slimeball, Timothy McVeigh, Tookie Williams, Sadam Hussein, or even Osama bin Laden.