The Senate continues their consideration of Senate Bill 461, NC Racial Justice Act, today.
Sen. Phil Berger (R-Rockingham) debates the merits of the bill on 3rd Reading. Upon an analysis of the bill, the first part of the bill says you should not impose the death penalty based on race – that’s okay, of course. The bill does more. But how do you prove racial discrimination and what does that tell us is a problem. The bill says you can do it by statistical data. This makes the circumstances and facts of the case become irrelevant. Cites a part of the bill that says if the court finds that race was a significant factor in decisions to seek the death penalty, the court shall order that a death sentence not be sought and the defendant be resentenced to life imprisonment without parole. And this is without any consideration of the facts of the case!
Berger tries to amend the bill to if a defendant previously raised the issue of racial discrimination in their case, they could not raise it again and they could not raise statistical evidence that had nothing to do with their case. Amendment fails with 16 voting yes, 30 voting no.
With a few words from bill sponsor, Sen. Floyd McKissick (D-Durham) saying the bill was fair and equitable, the bill passes 35-10, meeting the crossover deadline and eligible for consideration in the House.
There is a very similar bill on the House calendar today, House Bill 472, that has been skipped over a few times. I suspect bill sponsors, Rep. Larry Womble (D-Forsyth), Rep. Earline Parmon (D-Forsyth), Rep. Paul Luebke (D-Durham) and Rep. Pricey Harrison (D-Guilford) wanted to keep it on the calendar in case the Senate version failed and they would then bring their’s up to meet crossover. They may not bring the House version up today and just work with the Senate bill now that it has crossed over.
