Maybe Death Penalty Right Call for Newark Murderer

Filed under: News, Profiles, Race and Civil Rights

As a confirmed opponent of the death penalty, it's hard to stick to your convictions and provide commentary on the trial of Melvin Jovel (pictured above with handcuffs), who was convicted of murdering three unarmed college students and seriously wounding another in a Newark schoolyard in 2007.

The death penalty is often applied unfairly in the United States.

It also is biased against the poor and people of low intelligence, who often lack the capacity to mount a proper defense, don't fully grasp the severity of the charges against them or are coerced in to falsely implicating themselves in the crime.

But none of those factors seem to be at play in the case of Jovel, a 21-year-old illegal immigrant from Honduras, who stood up in open court and admitted to killing Iofemi Hightower, 20; Dashon Harvey, 20; and Terrance Aeriel, 18.

The four victims attended or were planning to attend Delaware State University and were simply listening to music at the schoolyard, when they were attacked.

Prosecutors said Jovel and five other men stood three of the victims up against a wall and shot them in the head in an unprovoked attack that shook New Jersey's largest city to its core. Four other defendants are awaiting trial in the killings.

A fourth victim, Natasha Aeriel, survived being slashed with a machete and sexually assaulted and testified at the trial of the first defendant in the case, Rodolfo Godinez, a legal immigrant from Nicaragua, who was given three life sentences for the killings.

She told Jovel in court this week, "Have fun living your fancy life in jail."

I think I have a better idea.

Maybe we can make a special exemption for Jovel and send him to a swift, painless meeting with his maker.

Sometimes, when fairness, prejudice, race and economics are taken out of the equation, the death penalty can be the proper response of a civil society.

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