How soon will community activists (poverty pimps) be calling for the shooter's release, due to "cruel and unusual punishment"?......

And of course, Boston cabbies ( and most anybody else) really aren't allowed to defend themselves here....

http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2005/12/14/shooter_to_face_victims_photo_in_cell?mode=PF


Shooter to face victim's photo in cell
Cab driver was left paralyzed

By Ralph Ranalli, Globe Staff  |  December 14, 2005

A Suffolk Superior Court judge sentenced a 21-year-old Dorchester man to nine years in prison after he admitted shooting a cab driver to avoid an $11.50 fare, leaving the driver paralyzed.

Then Judge Elizabeth M. Fahey ordered something highly unusual.

As driver Yves Andre listened from his motorized wheelchair, Fahey required that defendant Jermaine Edwards keep a picture of Andre on the wall of his cell every day Edwards is in state prison.

''I commend Judge Fahey's idea and hope that Jermaine Edwards does indeed look at the photo every single day he is behind bars," said Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel F. Conley.

To comply with the judge's order, Assistant District Attorney Cory Flashner and a victim-witness advocate from Conley's office took several digital photographs of Andre, as the 43-year-old man drove his wheelchair out of the Pemberton Square courthouse, said David Procopio, spokesman for Conley.

Flashner will give one of the photos to Fahey later this week for posting in Edwards's cell, Procopio said. ''It's the first time anyone here has heard of something like this."

Conley praised Fahey's unusual move yesterday.

''If, as they say, a picture is worth a thousand words, it can also capture, in a split second, the tragedy and heartbreak caused by senseless violence, and a photo of Yves Andre does just that," Conley said in a prepared statement released by his office.

Fahey could not be reached for comment last night.

Edwards's lawyer, Gordon W. Spencer, also could not be reached.

Andre had just started his first night shift, and the brutality of the attack scared Boston cabbies.

Edwards pleaded guilty to armed assault with intent to murder, assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, unlawful possession of a firearm, and unlawful possession of ammunition, and he was also sentenced by Fahey to eight years of probation, prosecutors said.

Two other Dorchester men who were with Edwards in Andre's taxi on the night of July 3, 2001, 22-year-old Eric Davis and 23-year-old Tyrone Brown, had each previously pleaded guilty to perjury in connection with the grand jury investigation in the case and were each sentenced to four years in prison.

Prosecutors said that the three men hailed Andre's cab on Callender Street in Dorchester, then told him to stop a short time later on Alwin Street.

Edwards admitted yesterday that, after they got out, instead of paying the fare, he pulled a gun and shot Andre three times.

One of the bullets tore through Andre's spine, paralyzing him.

Yesterday was also not the first time that the case against Edwards has been the talk of Boston's legal community.

This summer, the Supreme Judicial Court issued a landmark ruling saying that, if the case went to trial, prosecutors would be allowed to show the jury the grand jury testimony of a key witness who had later refused to testify, as long as prosecutors could show that the defendant had played a part in the witness's decision not to testify.

As part of their argument, prosecutors played tapes of jail telephone conversations in which Edwards and the witness, Jeremy Crockett, talked about how Crockett could flee Massachusetts to avoid testifying that Edwards had admitted shooting Andre.



 
 

10 bucks says there's piles of feces and graffiti on it by weeks end...

This guy ruined a stranger's life to avoid a cab fee of less than $12, and he's only getting nine years in prison?  WTF?

Most likely, he'll walk in 2-3 years anyway.  Ridiculous.

-James

What''s more senseless is the Scumbag only got 9 years.

Jesus.......If I ever got out, I'd finish him off after having to stare at his picture on the wall for those many years.........

edited....what kind of dumbass shoots someone over 11 bucks anyway?  What an idiot.....

Quoted: What''s more senseless is the Scumbag only got 9 years.

Liberals. [shrug]

The judge should be fired.  The two individuals with the shooter gets 4 years for perjury.  How dare they not respect the courts!  The guy who actually shot someone, paralyzed him for life over $12 get nine years.  What the judge thinking!  FUCKING DISGUSTING!  

I think a better solution is for the killer to experience what it is like for the victim now.

Quoted: I think a better solution is for the killer to experience what it is like for the victim now.

He didn't kill him, but I have no problem with him spending the rest of his life in a wheelchair also.

Having the picture tacked to his back with an ice pick driven into his spine sounds about right.
Then position a couple of mirrors on a surgical halo bolted to his head so he can see it.

Quoted: Quoted: I think a better solution is for the killer to experience what it is like for the victim now. He didn't kill him, but I have no problem with him spending the rest of his life in a wheelchair also.

Sounds good to me, confine the guy to a wheelchair for his time in prison

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: I think a better solution is for the killer to experience what it is like for the victim now. He didn't kill him, but I have no problem with him spending the rest of his life in a wheelchair also. Sounds good to me, confine the guy to a wheelchair for his time in prison

Actually I was thinking give the shooter an option: jail or paralysis.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: I think a better solution is for the killer to experience what it is like for the victim now. He didn't kill him, but I have no problem with him spending the rest of his life in a wheelchair also. Sounds good to me, confine the guy to a wheelchair for his time in prison

Actually I was thinking more like shooting him in much the same manner.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: I think a better solution is for the killer to experience what it is like for the victim now. He didn't kill him, but I have no problem with him spending the rest of his life in a wheelchair also. Sounds good to me, confine the guy to a wheelchair for his time in prison Actually I was thinking give the shooter an option: jail or paralysis.

Get both.

i'd say just hang the POS now and be done with him forever.

rope is cheap and reusable.

Quoted: i'd say just hang the POS now and be done with him forever. rope is cheap and reusable.

It's not really reusable.  The rope has to slide correctly, and a new rope is required.  

Buying rope by the roll will keep costs down.

Quoted: This guy ruined a stranger's life to avoid a cab fee of less than $12, and he's only getting nine years in prison?  WTF? Most likely, he'll walk in 2-3 years anyway.  Ridiculous. -James

The murderer of my friend's cousin only got 7 years for murder. It was over a drug debt but still.