ALLENTOWN (TNS) — The racist white teenager who hunted Black people at a grocery store in Buffalo pleaded guilty to 10 murders Monday.
As a judge read the name of each victim and asked Payton Gendron whether he killed them because of the color of their skin, Gendron calmly answered, “yes” and “guilty.”
He will be sentenced in February to life in prison. It would be a shame if he rotted for decades behind bars.
He still could, and should, be executed.
The guilty pleas by Gendron, 19, occurred on state charges of murder and hate-motivated terrorism. New York does not have the death penalty so on those charges, Gendron would face a maximum sentence of life in prison.
He still faces federal hate crime charges and has pleaded not guilty to those offenses.
Why plead guilty in the state case and not in the federal case?
Because Gendron is a coward.
He is terrified he could end up on death row and be executed for carrying out his hate, as the federal hate crime charges can carry the death penalty if he is convicted.
The feds would be making a big mistake if they chose to drop their case since the state case has been resolved.
The U.S. Department of Justice has not said whether it will seek capital punishment if the case proceeds. That’s wise. Keep Gendron scared.
Let him fear the possibility that his life could end like a circus sideshow, with him strapped to a table, injected with poison and put down like a rabid dog as people watch.
}By pleading guilty to the state charges, Gendron likely is trying to come off as remorseful, to save his butt. He deserves no mercy.
Whether the death penalty will be pursued by the feds is up to U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland. Last year, he issued a moratorium on federal executions. That doesn’t stop the DOJ from seeking the death penalty, though. It only prohibits it from being carried out.
Garland’s moratorium hopefully will be rescinded in the future, either by him or a predecessor. And then justice truly could be served in cases like this.
I’ve previously called for the death penalty to be used more frequently. And Gendron is a perfect candidate, if he were to be convicted.
This isn’t one of those situations where someone was arrested based on a grainy video or the dubious testimony of a jailhouse snitch.
Gendron live-streamed himself starting the massacre May 14 at the Tops supermarket in Buffalo. And before he pulled the trigger about 60 times, he posted a diary and a 47,000-word manifesto online that spelled out his plans and encouraged others to commit racially motivated violence, according to a report by the New York attorney general.
Case closed.
There are many cold-blooded murders that have equally airtight evidence. More and more slayings are being captured on video. Plenty also have multiple, credible eyewitnesses with corroborating physical evidence.
In those situations, capital punishment is warranted.
Sadly, there’s a case pending in Pennsylvania that is similar to the racist rampage in Buffalo.
The man accused of killing 11 people at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh in 2018 is scheduled to stand trial on federal charges in April.
Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty against Robert Bowers, who is accused of committing the deadliest attack on Jewish people in U.S. history.
Like in the Buffalo case, authorities say he left a long trail of venomous rantings about Jews online, including one post on the social media site Gab in which he wrote that “jews are the children of satan.”
Bowers, who has pleaded not guilty, spoke to police after being taken into custody, according to an affidavit. It says he told police “he wanted all Jews to die and also that they [Jews] were committing genocide to his people.”
It’s important to acknowledge America has a poor track record with the death penalty. At least 190 people who were sentenced to death later have been exonerated, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. And at least a handful of innocent people have been executed.
But times are different now because of the frequent presence of video evidence. Not everyone who is convicted of murder should be put to death. But some certainly should.
Capital punishment won’t deter killings. It will ensure that the worst of the worst pay the ultimate price, instead of taxpayers paying to feed and house them until they wither away.
The most-recent federal execution was last year. There have been 16 state executions this year, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. Four occurred within the last three weeks, in Texas, Oklahoma and Arizona.
Pennsylvania has had a moratorium on executions since 2015. Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf put that in place shortly after he took office. I hope Pennsylvania’s next governor, Democrat Josh Shapiro, hangs the “open” sign on the death chamber again when he takes office in January.
He’s a law enforcement man, moving to the governor’s office after serving as state attorney general.
When he instituted the freeze, Wolf cited flaws and unfairness in the system. He said he would await the findings of a pending investigation by the Joint State Government Commission.
The commission’s task force issued its report in June 2018.
It didn’t offer an opinion on whether the death penalty should be used, but questioned whether it is applied equitably across race and geography; if there are safeguards to assure that intellectually disabled people aren’t sentenced to death; if there are adequate procedures to identify errors; and if there is adequate defense counsel.
The Legislature should shore up the system to address those concerns, because I sadly expect there will be plenty of cold-blooded killers who deserve to be executed in the near future.
(Email Morning Call columnist Paul Muschick at paul.muschick@mcall.com.)
