Dr Tiller's Murderer Trial underway on TV

[Skeptic Ginger]

If this thread needs combining, fell free. I looked for a new thread on this but didn't find one with search.

Here's the older thread discussing the murder just after it happened. This thread is specifically about the trial if you all don't mind.

Anyway, the trial is underway and it's being broadcast live on court TV. It's moving fast and will likely be a short trial. The murderer has confessed and only wants to claim he killed the Dr to prevent Tiller "murdering" babies. The judge is allowing the defense but being extremely cautious to prevent the trial becoming a trial on the legality if abortion. Already the ex-Kansas Attorney General who tried to bring Tiller up on charges, lost the case, and has since moved on to be involved in an anti-abortion group gave testimony with the jury out of the room. The judge disallowed the testimony and said the AG's testimony was self serving and didn't reflect the outcome of the charges he tried to bring.

It's a pretty interesting trial as trials go. Now the murderer is on the stand and his attorney keeps trying to get in stuff in about abortions being gruesome, babies in pain, brains being squished out of baby heads and limbs being torn off. The judge is stopping all of it.

The trial continues tomorrow, live in your living room via court TV,

 

[Matthew Best]

Trial report in the Guardian.

 

[slingblade]

Found guilty of first-degree murder.

 

[headscratcher4]

While the judge let the defendent testify that his actions counted as the lesser charge of Manslaugther and argue the necessity of his killing Tiller to prevent the murder of featuses (sp?), the judge declined to instruct the jurry on the lesser charge, leaving them only with 1st degree murder or innocent with respect to Tiller. The jury was out about 36 minutes before finding guilt. Also was convicted of threatening parishoners in the church where Tiller was murdered by pointing a loaded weapon at them.

 

[Nursefoxfire]

From the Guardian article:

He considered different methods: shooting him at his clinic, using a sniper rifle from a nearby church, or chopping off his hands with a sword. In the end he decided that severing Tiller's hands would not stop him, as he could train others. He had to be killed, he admitted.

Did he honestly think that no other doctor knew how to perform late-term abortions? Like Dr. Tiller was some sort of Jedi master who held the arcane magickery of late-term abortions in his head and no one else had access or training to that information?

I'm scared and fascinated by this man's thinking.

ETA:

Another odd thing:

Roeder did not even approve of abortions for rape or incest, as "two wrongs don't make a right".

So murder doesn't factor into this?

 

[Matthew Best]

Did he honestly think that no other doctor knew how to perform late-term abortions? Like Dr. Tiller was some sort of Jedi master who held the arcane magickery of late-term abortions in his head and no one else had access or training to that information?

I'm scared and fascinated by this man's thinking.

Well, he's not far wrong. According to another Guardian article, there were "only two men skilled enough" to do an abortion with the complications presented by a woman from Canada in May last year.

Now, of course, there may well be only one.

 

[Finster]

I just read an article about the conviction and this jumped out at me (Rudy is the defense attorney) -


"During closing arguments earlier Friday, Rudy urged the jury to reject the murder charge, saying, "no one should be convicted based on his convictions."

Rudy mentioned leaders who stood up for their beliefs, including Martin Luther King Jr. They were "celebrated individuals (who) stood up and made the world a better place."

"They leave their marks based on their words and deeds," Rudy said."


I guess the defense had to come up with something but comparing him to King and saying that as long as you have convictions it's OK the murder people. Yikes.

 

[WildCat]

And if you blinked you missed it. Guilty of 1st degree murder, sentencing to come later.

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE60S4UB20100129

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

So murder doesn't factor into this?

The twisted mind of this man claimed as the reason for no abortions after incest or rape was that "only God had the right to take a life". I'm sure the irony/hypocrisy there escapes the creep.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Well, he's not far wrong. According to another Guardian article, there were "only two men skilled enough" to do an abortion with the complications presented by a woman from Canada in May last year.

Now, of course, there may well be only one.

It's not the skill as much as the willingness to make it part of your practice. Any good OBGYN or surgeon could certainly learn the procedure.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Thank goodness some Pro-lifer didn't sneak on to the jury and create a mis-trial for publicity.

 

[Achán hiNidráne]

The twisted mind of this man claimed as the reason for no abortions after incest or rape was that "only God had the right to take a life". I'm sure the irony/hypocrisy there escapes the creep.

I saw that, he kept dragging up the line that an "innocent" shouldn't die for the "sins of the father."

Really? What about the mother? What did she do to be saddled with a unwanted pregnancy? What about her "innocence?"

Oh yes, that's right. According to Christianity, women are chattel. Breeding stock for the next generation of believers.

Rot in jail, you piece of crap.