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US Abortion Doctor's Killer Found Guilty of Murder
Kansas jury rejects plea by Scott Roeder that he killed George Tiller to protect unborn children
A jury in Kansas has rejected a plea by a man who admitted killing an abortion doctor that he acted in defence of the unborn and found him guilty of murder .
Scott Roeder is escorted out of the courtroom after being found guilty of murdering abortion doctor George Tiller. (Photograph: Jeff Tuttle/Wichita Eagle/EPA) The
jury took just 37 minutes to convict born-again Christian Scott Roeder
for shooting George Tiller, 67, in the forehead as he attended church
last May. Roeder, a 51-year-old airport shuttle driver, faces a
mandatory life sentence with the possibility of parole after 25 years.
To the dismay of abortion rights activists the judge, Warren Wilbert, permitted a defendant to present a jury with his justification for murder for the first time in US legal history.
However, before the case went to the jury the judge ruled that he would not allow it to consider a verdict of manslaughter or second degree murder because Roeder was not acting in defence of an immediate threat to life and the killing had been premeditated.
"It would be hard for a reasonable fact-finder to find anything other than the defendant formulating his belief and then planning on multiple occasions ... to carry out his intention to [kill] Dr Tiller," the judge said. Roeder did not deny it.
He told the court that he had made up his mind 17 years ago to kill Tiller, who was one of only three doctors in the US to carry out abortions late in a pregnancy.
Roeder said he considered hiding on a roof looking down on Tiller's clinic in Wichita to shoot him with a sniper rifle, or smashing his car into the abortion doctor's vehicle and chopping Tiller's hands off with a sword. But Roeder said he abandoned the latter idea because Tiller would still be able to teach others how to carry out abortions. In the end, Roeder walked up to Tiller at the doctor's Lutheran church and shot him in the head.
Roeder's lawyer told the jury how his client had grown increasingly frustrated over the years by the continued operation of Tiller abortion clinic despite a vigorous campaign against it by anti-abortionists. The clinic was bombed in 1986 and the focus of a mass blockade five years later.
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40 Comments so far
Show AllI really thought the jury would end up hung, but I guess the defense couldn't get any true believers in the process. It would only have taken one.
Good verdict though.
Woo-Hoo!
Even after one stops watching so much teevee, there is always the fear of a "Law & Order"-type jaw-dropping fluky outcome.
So far, so good.
Still, one of the most irksome aspects of the Global War on Terror mentality/propaganda/hysteria is its selective application-- that this kind of terrorist assassin isn't subject to the blithering of officials and Elected Misrepresentatives from troglodytic, imbecilic thugs like Peter King to our suave monarch sitting on the Oval Office Throne.
And the promulgation of Raw Fear and the utterly unwarranted but shrill, urgent cry for Special Procedures to Contain the Human Plague and Protect a Vulnerable Citizenry.
Consistency demands that this miserable, contemptible wretch be treated like the Worst of the Worst: a Super-Powered Alien Arch-Villain-- an amalgamation of Hannibal Lecter and General Zod, to be handled with HAZMAT suits and a specially-constructed mile-long titanium rod until actual Phantom Zone technology is perfected. Or Hell freezes over, whichever comes first.
Instead, Roeder will begin his well-deserved journey back to anonymity and oblivion. I don't expect him to improve by going to his room and thinking about what he's done.
And whether Officially classified "terrorist" or merely "principled assassin", please spare us the likes of the decaying Barbara Walters or her ilk bringing Roeder to Amerika's Living Room for an Up-Close and Personal Interview.
I'd rather watch a fetus slide show.
(By now, teevee apparatchiks somewhere are calculating the potential ratings for a televised Prison Wedding: Roeder and the Octomom, a marriage made in Heaven!)
· Yr Obd't Servant
The FBI defines terrorism as:
The unlawful use of force or violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a Government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives.
- Yet MSM does not treat this as a terrorist incident. Same as the anthrax cases, the shootings by the young fellows in the Northeast from out of their trunks... and who knows how many small cases. They have to keep the false legacy intact of Bush not having any terrorists incidents occur on his watch after 9/11.
Hopefully we'll be getting some cogent analysis on your point. thanks for posting it
Think I'll copy it down and keep in my wallet
Per his statements in court and made to media, the defendent was not intending to do anything but kill the doctor, who he believed would facilitate more deaths at a future time. This alone doesn't fit the FBI's def of terrorism. Big media can't go tossing around the terrorist label on 'unofficial terrorists' for fear of lawsuits.
...to protect already born children - look to the Secretaries of War and State.
I am so glad that is over and the Doctor Tiller's dignity as a human being was respected.
One would wonder what Roeder's political views are regarding issues that impact on single mothers who need help from society, such as equal funding of all public education for students through college, single payer public health care,Disability entitlements for the girl, woman,should she suffer permanent injury from the birth ,social security for the child should the mother die in childbirth or if the child is deformed or disabled, affordable housing, safe affordable day care, living wage jobs,transportation to day care, jobs, doctor's offices, shopping, and food stamps or debit cards? Every time I hear an unmarried male Catholic Priest or anyone else say that women have abortions to avoid a little inconvenience, and I have heard it often,I shudder at their ignorance combined with their power, and how much harm and deaths they cause because they think they are infallible.
Why was this flagged?!!!!! These are very good points brought up.
A response I made to a comment was lost when that initial comment was flagged. I do not believe I made any unacceptable statements in my response. Why should our voices be shut out just because we respond to a flagged/dropped comment? I would hope that CD would review its flagging process.
Roeder said he considered hiding on a roof looking down on Tiller's clinic in Wichita to shoot him with a sniper rifle, or smashing his car into the abortion doctor's vehicle and chopping Tiller's hands off with a sword. But Roeder said he abandoned the latter idea because Tiller would still be able to teach others how to carry out abortions. In the end, Roeder walked up to Tiller at the doctor's Lutheran church and shot him in the head.
This animal is a poster boy for the religious right?
Sounds more like on of bin Ladens buddies.
I hope this filth gets shanked in prison during an anal gangrape.
Bring him a rubber embryo in his cell.
Murder is murder, no matter the excuse (including unjust wars).
Excellent points, wawa, except for one. I don't think this murderer is a coward, nor was his act cowardly. He walked up to tiller and shot him in the face in front of 2 witnesses and then walked away. In court he stated why he did it and that was that. His lawyer stated (to the press) that his client had no chance and he told him as much.
I liken that remark in your comment to the labeling of the 9-11 hijackers as cowards. What they did was ballsy. Horrorendous and unthinkable for most sane people, yes, but still ballsy. Same thing here with this murderer. I'm afraid that slapping on labels like coward, insane, etcetera, might discourage people from wondering why these crimes were committed. Once all the hooplah quiets down, the why is the most important aspect to look into.
A woman should have control over her own body, period! That's what it's all about, control. All this crying over babies is just bullshit. There are plenty of babies to cry over who are real babies, not some appendage of a woman's body. Who's crying over the infant 'collateral damage' in our wars--not the anti abortionists, I bet. True, education and birth control will lower the need for abortions, but those opposing abortion also tend to oppose these rational approaches. That's way I say, it's all about control.
It is not an appendage technically. Biologically, the relationship of the fetus to the pregnant female is parasitic. There are changes in the female immune system at the time of conception to keep the host body from rejecting the foreign body implanting itself into her womb. That is why the newly pregnant sometimes get "morning sickness".
Strange to think the assassin considers himself a Christian. Let alone the execution of another man as a mortal sin, he carried out his horrible act in the doorway of a church. Neither logic,nor humanity, nor the courtroom, nor the sanctity of the church is sparred this man's distorted reality.
17 years he planned the assassination of Tiller.
...incomprehensible.
Look at how gently they treated this dangerous conservative terrorist. The US "justice system" is a reactionary farce.
The story behind the story here is this:
The judge allowed the defendant to at least present the argument that the murder was justified to save the unborn. But, in stark contrast, in the cases where nonviolent peace activists have committed acts of trespass, burned pieces of paper, hammered on nuclear warhead parts, A-10 fighters - all acts where no one was hurt, and real children were being killed, the judge absolutely and strictly prevents the defendants from explaining their motivations or presenting any kind of moral- necessity defense. The jury is instructed to ignore any motivations on the part of the activists. Long sentences are usually handed down.
But in Ireland, where such a defense was allowed in the Shannon Airport ploughshares actions against several US aircraft, the jury acquitted the activists.
So, as far as I'm concerned, it would be fine for the judge to allow this murderer to present his crazy rationalizations, if they were only consistent and allowed such a defense when only some inanimate material gets damaged in an effort to save lives.
Well said pjd...hmmm, Peter? So, anyway, I just have to say this: For all you right wingers who might be reading Common Dreams...WAR IS NOT PRO-LIFE...and you support war. Your side does exactly what pjd said, fail to make the courts listen to International law, and the highest law of the Christian teachings. I love the billboard:
What part of "Thou shalt not kill." don't you get?
Oh by the way, no one mentioned that the right doesn't want to disperse condoms either. Dumb, just dumb.
Being a Christian is pretty stupid, if you ask me. But no one has.
This is proof that a terrorist can be afforded the right to a fair trial without endangering national security.
Even a Christian terrorist.
If the jury had let him off, with even 2nd degree, then all of the terrorists past and future would have based their reasons and actions in the same way, "necessity." Necessity can never be the mother of prevention.
It's sort of ironic, sadistically so, that American soldiers, unwilling to murder any more people in Iraq, have to leave the country to be safe from prosecution for their belief to Not kill. But how many taxpayer dollars went into this murderer's trial in an attempt to acquit in the American way? But we let potentially innocent people rot for years in Gitmo because we are afraid to prosecute.
What am I missing here?
And the Blackwater murderers got off scot free...well, except that they have to live with themselves...and that isn't over yet either.
Thanks Stonepig. Unfortunately, YOU aren't missing anything. I just listened to Jeremy Scahill's taping on Democracy Now of the Iraqui man whose son's brains were literally blown out in the Blackwater massacre. Indescribably horrible and heartbreaking. The words "crime of the century" come to mind. This father's lawsuit against the American assassins is now the only one remaining. How on earth can we stop the runaway monster known as the MIC which terrorizes the world with impunity and practically unlimited financing by taxpayer money?
Stop paying taxes
I see this typed a lot on these pages. Unless you are a corporation, none of your federal income tax dollars goes to the defense budget.
"Unless you are a corporation, none of your federal income tax dollars goes to the defense budget."
Please tell us where you got this information? I never knew that tax money was divided up into little boxes of "this money's from real people" and "this money is from corporations". I call bullsh*t on this inane statement.
Stop! Look! Listen! Mr. McQuade, you are an idiot. I don't like to attack people personally, but common, give me a break!
Murder is murder. Private religious beliefs can not serve as a defense. Law must remain secular and applicable regardless of personal beliefs.
Let us now see whether there's a movement to make this murderer Sarah Palin's running mate in 2012. Just a thought.
What this man did by any definition was cold blooded murder, premeditated with malice aforethought and no remorse after.
He was not insane, so his reasons are beside the point. Using this pathetic excuse of a human being for political point making, right or left is beneath contempt. Period.
This man is convicted of one murder, yet Mr. Bush and Cheney are mass murders who have murder hundreds of thousands.
There is no justice when Mr. Bush et al walk free. Bush should be tried in a court of law, too.
He's more of a murderer than the doctor by far. If these anti-abortion groups are so hot about having women NOT abort, why don't they pay for the kid's upbringing? Why don't they work to alleviate the very poverty that causes abortion?
Not feasible?
Really?
Then maybe the world is overpopulated with scarce resources to the point where abortion is helping. Abortion is not a solution like education and free birth control, and is generally a BAD idea. I'd prefer zero abortions if possible, because having to get one (in most cases) is like saying 'I was stupid about birth control'. But seriously, 7 billion people on Earth?
Those who use phony, faith based arguments to justify murder are as evil and demented as the murderers, themselves.
I responded to a post earlier this morning submitted by someone who called themself "Prince Pieray Awele Odor" from "Lagos, Nigeria" regarding what he called the "murder of the murderer".
Does anyone know why it is no longer on this sight? Or did I wake up in an alternative universe somewhere?
I'm leaning towards the Old Testament version of justice the older I get. They should leave Scott Roeder in a locked room with a few dozen victims of back alley abortions for an hour. They might include one or two women who had to have children because they were in a place where there were no doctors to perform the procedure because of anti-abortionist terrorism.