Father injects son with Aids

[bizmark]

wow, what a crazy story. I too was caught up in the emotional aspect of the story when I first started reading this thread and the story in the OP.... I can easily see how the jurors probably wept at night thinking of the tragic state of this boy and probably felt very strongly that they HAD to convict the father.

Thanks A1 for "the other side of the story". I agree that the evidence against the father was highly suspect.... once you get over the raw emotions involved, it's easy to see that the father really should have been acquitted. More than enough reasonable doubt exists in the story. I guess that kind of ambiguity is unfortunately a necessary part of such a case. With a disease that takes years to start showing, there's no way to establish a 'smoking gun'..... at best, the jury is stuck with hazy memories and one person's word against the other's.

A very sad case indeed. I wonder if the true identity of the killer will ever be known.

And to quell an argument that occurred earlier in the thread, fortunately there are barrier drugs available now that will prevent a mother from passing HIV/AIDS on to her unborn children.

 

[Don Vito Corleone]

Amused, with all due respect, you were not on the jury, nor was I. Even after reading this article, which paints a particularly sympathetic picture of the defendant's plight, I am not persuaded that the verdict was wrong.

You have cited a number of facts that I have not read anywhere, so I have no way of refuting them. The picture of the victim was shown at trial, but I have never read anything to indicate that it was present the entire time - presumably the defense preferred having the picture visible to having the victim there in person. I think the picture would clearly be relevant in sentencing. I have seen no reason to believe that the latter ex-girlfriend here was "disgruntled," and I find it easy to believe that she would remember that the defendant told her about the diagnosis prior to his having learned of it. The memory works in mysterious ways, but that would likely be a memorable event in one's life.

I am certainly not blown away by the fact that nurses did not remember noticing a crying child in the middle of a working hospital, and I hardly find that a fatally weakening piece of evidence as weighed against the mother's recollection of finding her own child crying.

Speaking as a prosecutor myself, I find it nearly impossible to believe that the DA's office "sat on" the case for two years. Typically the defense, not the prosecution, benefits from this kind of delay (since memories fade and witnesses move away and die), and frankly it sounds to me as though you are inclined to blame the prosecution here for every step of what happened.

As I said above, I am no expert on this case, but it sounds me as though the evidence was quite adequate to sustain a conviction. I have seen myself in numerous cases that even where there is no meaningful question as to a defendant's guilt (because he ultimately pleads guilty), there are ALWAYS minor inconsistencies and issues in every case - that is why the standard is guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, not any doubt.

In any event, the fact remains that neither you nor I have the authority to decide what happened here - that is the sole provenance of the jury. I certainly have no problem with engaging in a lively debate, but at the end of the day it does not really matter what I think, even in the cases I prosecute - the finder of fact decides who did what.

 

[DanTMWTMP]

:|:|:|:|:|:|:|:|:|:|:|:| mother fvcker....he should get injected as well

 

[TNTrulez]

I feel so sorry for the kid.

 

[Skyclad1uhm1]

Originally posted by: BoberFett

Originally posted by: BDawg

Originally posted by: BoberFett
Should any woman who gives birth to a child with AIDS go to prison for life?

Food for thought.

Although I know how you ATOTers don't like to think. It's all about emotional, knee-jerk responses here.

Was the infection intentional? Should we punish her for not having an abortion?

Maybe. When you get bloodwork done while pregnant, I'd imagine that testing for diseases is common practice. Chances would be pretty good that you know you have AIDS/HIV, so if you choose to give birth to that child, wouldn't that be premeditated murder?

When the mother is HIV positive, there is still a chance of the kid not getting it. And even if the kid is infected, some parents are hardcore against abortion, and want to try and raise the kid as lovingly as possible, hoping for a cure.
Here the asshole infected the kid on purpose, meaning to get rid of it. That sounds like (attempted) murder to me.

 

[Amused]

Originally posted by: Don_Vito
Amused, with all due respect, you were not on the jury, nor was I. Even after reading this article, which paints a particularly sympathetic picture of the defendant's plight, I am not persuaded that the verdict was wrong.

You have cited a number of facts that I have not read anywhere, so I have no way of refuting them. The picture of the victim was shown at trial, but I have never read anything to indicate that it was present the entire time - presumably the defense preferred having the picture visible to having the victim there in person. I think the picture would clearly be relevant in sentencing. I have seen no reason to believe that the latter ex-girlfriend here was "disgruntled," and I find it easy to believe that she would remember that the defendant told her about the diagnosis prior to his having learned of it. The memory works in mysterious ways, but that would likely be a memorable event in one's life.

I am certainly not blown away by the fact that nurses did not remember noticing a crying child in the middle of a working hospital, and I hardly find that a fatally weakening piece of evidence as weighed against the mother's recollection of finding her own child crying.

Speaking as a prosecutor myself, I find it nearly impossible to believe that the DA's office "sat on" the case for two years. Typically the defense, not the prosecution, benefits from this kind of delay (since memories fade and witnesses move away and die), and frankly it sounds to me as though you are inclined to blame the prosecution here for every step of what happened.

As I said above, I am no expert on this case, but it sounds me as though the evidence was quite adequate to sustain a conviction. I have seen myself in numerous cases that even where there is no meaningful question as to a defendant's guilt (because he ultimately pleads guilty), there are ALWAYS minor inconsistencies and issues in every case - that is why the standard is guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, not any doubt.

In any event, the fact remains that neither you nor I have the authority to decide what happened here - that is the sole provenance of the jury. I certainly have no problem with engaging in a lively debate, but at the end of the day it does not really matter what I think, even in the cases I prosecute - the finder of fact decides who did what.

No, we don't have the authority to decide here. However, that does not change my opinion on the case. How any reasonable person can say, without reasonable doubt, that this man infected the boy is beyond me.

As for the other facts I have, they come directly from the defense attorney here.

In 1996 Stewart's son, then 5, was diagnosed with AIDS, launching an investigation by the Saint Charles County sheriff's department and the Missouri Department of Health. No evidence was found of two common sources of HIV transmission in children: blood transfusion or sexual abuse, although an expert trial witness would testify that he could not rule out sexual abuse with 100 percent certainty. The police concluded that Stewart was the culprit. Two years then passed, during which no work was done on the case, before Stewart was arrested in April 1998 and charged with first-degree assault. A preliminary hearing in May resulted in the case being bound over for trial.

You can read more of it there.

And he's not the only one who objects to the outcome of this case. There has been condemnation of this verdict in much of the legal community. It was a verdict found on emotion, not facts, as the facts HARDLY overcome reasonable doubt. At most, they form reason for suspicion, and as a prosecutor, you should know that suspicion does not mean guilty beyond reasonable doubt.

 

[Zebo]

Amused, I agree with you however this is the second time I seen in a thread you express doubt in the verdicts on capital cases. Why continue to support the death penalty then? Are a couple mistakes a year worth the deterance if there is even one?

 

[Amused]

Originally posted by: Carbonyl
Amused, I agree with you however this is the second time I seen in a thread you express doubt in the verdicts on capital cases. Why continue to support the death penalty then? Are a couple mistakes a year worth the deterance if there is even one?

I've been on the fence over the death penalty for a while now.

 

[joohang]

Unbelievable :|:|:|

 

[Don Vito Corleone]

As for the other facts I have, they come directly from the defense attorney here.

That article does not say the things you are apparently getting from it.

As I said above, there is nothing to indicate that the victim's picture was sitting in the courtroom for the entire trial, as you said it was. The photo would clearly have been relevant evidence in sentencing, so I fail to see what it improper about its display during the sentencing phase - I have made similar blow-up photos for a carnal knowledge case I prosecuted, as well as a recent child molestation trial, and left them sitting in the view of the finder of fact during sentencing. Any prosecutor who failed to show an AIDS-wasted child victim to the jury would not be doing his job.

I see nothing to indicate that Stewart's later girlfriend was "disgruntled," which is a subtle but critical factor in her highly damning testimony.

I obviously have no firsthand knowledge of whether the DA left the case sitting for two years, but I doubt very seriously that was done for no reason. This would simply make no sense from strategic, tactical, or political perspectives. In any event, I totally fail to see how that could have worked to Stewart's detriment - it could only have helped him.

Just to be clear, I am, once again, not claiming to know whether Stewart is guilty, but I respect the process, and I feel there was ample evidence to sustain a conviction. The fact that the defense apparently trotted out a strange Munchausen-by-proxy theory to imply that the mother infected her child suggests that they were having a tough time coming up with any plausible alternative to the proposition that Stewart was the guilty party here.

If there were legitimate issues with the way the case was tried, they may be flushed out on appeal, but nothing I have read gives me cause to believe the case will be reversed.