The jury sentenced him to life in prison.
The judge (a white man) overrode the sentence claiming that he already sentenced three black people to death, it would look bad, the jury verdict notwithstanding, if he does not sentence to death a white guy - and he did sentence the white guy to death.
It took 3 judges of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit to uphold the judicial override and the death sentence based on race and statistics.
Here are these unsung "heroes" of racism in America:
Judge Dale Segrest
who overrode the jury recommendation of a life sentence and sentenced Bobby Wayne Waldrop to death.
His name was cowardly not mentioned in the decision of the federal appellate court, so I am making sure people know who did it in the first place.
Judge Dale Segrest is now retired and is practicing law with his son, advertising his experience as "reassuring":
The retired Judge Dale Segrest
does not advertise on his law firm's website that he considers race as a lawful basis for judicial decisions.
What Judge Dale Segrest does advertise is that he has chosen a building for his law practice "in a renovated historic structure built to quarter Confederate officers in charge of the Tallassee armory".
I purchased Judge Segbert's book "Conscience and Command" trading on Amazon, but without any feedback, and will provide both the feedback and a review on my blog when the book arrives.
I already admire the book for the dire gall of its author to use the word "conscience" in its title.
On the federal appeals level the heroes who confirmed that a human being can be sacrificed in the United States of America in the 21st century in the very literal sense because his race was necessary to dilute the otherwise all-black statistics of the death penalty are:
- Judge Beverly Martin;
- Judge Stanley Marcus, and
- Judge Adalberto Jordan
And here are credentials of judges who believed that overriding a jury decision in a death penalty case in favor of the death penalty based on consideration of race is legitimate.
#JudgeBeverlyMartin, a career prosecutor of 26 years before coming to the bench (she "concurred in the judgment", with a separate opinion):
Judge Stanley Marcus, a career prosecutor and a law professor
I wonder how #JudgeStanleyMarcus will be explaining his decision to his law students in Brooklyn Law School and in St. Thomas University School of Law. Or - probably, he will not explain it at all, expecting them to be afraid to ask for fear that he will ruin their entire career in law if they do.
Judge Adalberto Jordan, an immigrant from Cuba and a law clerk to a federal appellate judge and to the U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor
These amiable, smiling, educated, polished people sworn to protect and uphold the U.S. Constitution just sent to death a person who was sentenced to life in prison by the jury of his peers, but for whom a judge made an "exception", because the judge just sentenced to death three black people and did not want the statistics of his death sentencing to appear "too racist", so he just threw in another number to dilute that statistics - and crossed out a person's life.
And these three upheld that.
They first said this:
The majority - judges Marcus and Jordan - simply ignored that the death sentence was CLEARLY, IN SO MANY WORDS, was based ONLY on the defendant's race, and in order to dilute the otherwise "all-black" death penalty statistics of a racist white judge in the racist state of Alabama.
Instead, they affirmed the death sentence based on their "precedent", after some legal gymnastics during which reason, common sense, justice and any reference to what Judge Dale Segrest did disappeared, and Judge Segrest's name never appeared in the first place.
That was the two-men majority of the 3-judge panel. Let's see what the "minority", Judge Beverly Martin, wrote in her opinion - agreeing with the "boys" to put to death a person based entirely on black-and-white statistics of the death penalty:
Judge Martin then blabbers for some time that because the claim was "procedurally defaulted" (the defendant , or rather, his incompetent previous "free" attorneys, did not raise it earlier in the appellate process), and because the defendant was found guilty by the jury, it does not matter that he was sentenced to death for the sole reason that #JudgeDaleSegrest wanted to dilute with his body and blood the judge's racist statistics of the death penalty.
But, Judge Martin has already admitted, in plain language, that Judge Segrest, the author of the book having the word "conscience" in its title, did this:
And then she carefully claims that it is supposedly the defendant's position that his death sentence is based on race, implying the judge's actions and words can have any shades of meaning as to the judge's motivations in sentencing #BobbyWayneWaldrop to death.
Tell me, how ELSE can anybody else read the phrase, while overriding the jury life sentence recommendation and sentencing a person to death: "If I had not imposed the death sentence, I would have sentenced three black people to death and no white people"?
But, changing the decision of the jury from a life sentence to death based entirely on the man's race is racism, whichever race the condemned man is.
Right?
I wonder whether the three appellate judges similarly ruled to affirm a death sentence because they affirmed so many death sentences for black people and needed to dilute the statistics somewhat - because these judges routinely review death penalty cases, and have done a lot of them, I am sure, in their careers.
So, be very afraid, people of the United States of America.
Now, a precedent has been created providing that judicial decisions may be made not on the merits, but on the basis of the race of parties for whom similar decisions were made.
Imagine - the judge took children away from three undeserving fathers of race A, and a deserving father of race B comes in front of him, and upon the merits, he should clearly get custody. No, we cannot give a child to a father of race B, because it will create an appearance of racism, let us dilute the statistics a little bit and take the child from that father, too.
Or, on the opposite - we decided three breach of contract (defamation, personal injury, you name it) cases against parties with race N, now a person with race M comes in front of us - let's dilute the statistics somewhat.
Just think what these four "judges" have done to this country.
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