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A Shortened Life, on Tape

November 10, 2008 3:58 PM

The video of Sara Weir is deeply moving, with photographs and videos of her throughout her life, from infancy to 19. With her mother narrating and soft music playing in the background, Sara -- reserved, modest and shy -- is shown swimming, riding horses and going to school.

One of the last images on the 20-minute video is Sara's grave. She was killed in 1993 by Douglas Kelly, a man she believed was a wealthy Chicagoan who was working as a personal trainer in Burbank, California.

After watching the video, a California jury sentenced Douglas Kelly to death. The California Supreme Court upheld the death sentence, rejecting Kelly's arguments that the video of Sara’s life prejudiced the jury and violated his constitutional rights.

Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear his case -- but not before three justices raised concerns about the growing use of videotaped "victim impact evidence" in capital sentencing.

Victim impact evidence has been used in criminal trials since 1991, when the Supreme Court overruled a 1987 case that had categorically prohibited it. In the years since, it has not revisited the issue, and all 37 states with the death penalty allow its use. Most also allow videos, such as the one in Kelly's case, which chronicled Sara's life before he murdered her.

Justice John Paul Stevens dissented in that 1991 case, and he wrote today that he continues to believe that allowing juries to consider such evidence in sentencing is inappropriate. Of the video introduced in Sara’s case, as well as another death penalty case from California, he wrote:

"Their primary, if not sole, effect was to rouse jurors' sympathy for the victims and increase jurors' antipathy for the capital defendants. The videos added nothing relevant to the jury's deliberations and invited a verdict based on sentiment, rather than reasoned judgment."

He also accused the Court of failing to offer guidelines to the lower courts on when it should allow victim impact evidence.

"Having decided to tolerate the introduction of evidence that puts a heavy thumb on the prosecutor's side of the scale in death cases, the Court has a duty to consider what reasonable limits should be placed on its use," Stevens wrote.

Justice David Souter also objected to the Court's refusal to hear Kelly's case. He voted to allow victim impact evidence back in 1991, when he was a new (and most believed strong conservative) justice. But he wrote separately then to say "evidence about the victim and survivors, and any jury argument predicated on it, can of course be so inflammatory as to risk a verdict impermissibly based on passion, not deliberation."

Justice Stephen Breyer wrote a separate dissent today, explaining why he, too, believed the Court should have taken Kelly's case. He said the Court should "help elucidate constitutional guidelines" on how to draw the line on permissible victim impact evidence.

In weighing Kelly's appeal, the California Supreme Court relied on the 1991 decision in Payne v. Tennessee, in which then-Chief Justice William Rehnquist wrote that prosecutors can present victim impact evidence to remind juries that "the victim is an individual whose death represents a unique lost to society."

In Kelly's case, the state court said trial judges "must be very cautious" about admitting videotaped evidence. It said that the evidence cannot be so irrelevant or inflammatory that it "diverts the jury's attention from its proper role or invites an irrational, purely subjective purpose." It noted that some courts have reached different results, based on whether they believed the video was excessive.

For example, the Idaho Supreme Court recently allowed a four-and-a-half minute video of a murder victim with her young children, while a Massachusetts federal court excluded a 27-minute videotape of another victim's life.

The state court concluded that Sara's video was "not unduly emotional" and "humanized Sara Weir."

"The viewer knew Sara better after viewing the videotape than before, but the tape expressed no outrage over her death, just implied sadness," the state court said. "It contained no clarion call for vengeance."

In his dissent today, Justice Stevens complains that standards are unclear and vary from court to court and state to state. He also suggests the victim impact evidence isn't relevant, because it doesn't address the culpability or character of the defendant or the circumstances of the crime.

In Kelly's case, however, the jury had heard horrific details about his character, culpability and the circumstances of the crime. It heard witness after witness testify about a sociopath who betrayed and raped and robbed multiple women before he killed Sara Weir.

Here's a brief sketch of the picture the witnesses painted of Doug Kelly and the circumstances of the crime:

Sara, who worked at Warner Bros. and lived with a friend, met Doug Kelly at her gym. She was "trusting" and "naïve," and Doug led her to believe he was a part-owner of the gym. He became her personal trainer. He told Sara and other girls at the health club that he was from a wealthy family, and he offered jobs with his "family business."

Kelly was arrested for beating his girlfriend, and she moved out of her apartment in fear. Sometime afterward, Kelly lured Sara to the ex-girlfriend's apartment, where he stabbed her 29 times. He then wrapped her naked body in plastic and stuffed her under the bed of his girlfriend's 10-year-old son.

At trial several other women -- from Florida to New Jersey and over a 10-year period -- testified about how Kelly had lied to them, lured them into his apartment or broken into theirs and then raped them repeatedly.

"Sara's death did not occur in a vacuum. She did not survive her encounter with defendant to tell her story," the California Supreme Court said. "But, fortunately, many others... did survive and can tell their tales."

And Sara's mother, the state court said, could tell the story of Sara's life.

November 10, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (7)

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Posted by: Jwench | Nov 10, 2008 7:13:50 PM

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