[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----USA

[Rick Halperin]

July 28



USA:

Death Penalty For Man Who Killed NYPD Officers


A New York City street gang member was given the death penalty on Wednesday in 
the execution-style slayings of 2 undercover police officers in 2003 - the 
latest chapter in a case that's seen his original death sentence overturned, 
his behind-bars affair with a prison guard exposed and the massive cost of his 
defense questioned.

It took a jury just 1 day to deliberate in federal court in Brooklyn before 
deciding the fate of Ronell Wilson.

Another jury had found Wilson guilty in the point-blank shootings of undercover 
officers James Nemorin and Rodney Andrews. The gunman shot both men in the head 
after one pleaded for his life.

The 1st jury also sentenced Wilson in 2007 to die by lethal injection, making 
him the 1st federal defendant to receive a death sentence in New York City 
since the 1950s. But an appeals court threw out the sentence in 2010 and 
prosecutors chose to repeat the penalty phase rather than let Wilson serve an 
automatic life term.

U.S. District Judge Nicholas Garaufis questioned the decision, saying that it 
put taxpayers on course to spend millions of dollars more on Wilson's defense. 
He noted that he had just presided over a capital case for a mobster where the 
defense bill was $5 million and the jury chose to impose a life sentence.

(source: lawofficer.com)