Free Republic

FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. — Concluding that racial bias played a significant factor in a death sentence here 18 years ago, a judge on Friday ordered that it be changed to life in prison without parole, the first such decision under North Carolina’s controversial Racial Justice Act. The landmark ruling could be the first of many under the law, which allows future defendants and current death row inmates to present evidence, including statistical patterns, suggesting that race played a major role in their being sentenced to death. ...Mr. Robinson’s guilt was not at issue. The judge called his crime — kidnapping 17-year-old...

FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. — Concluding that racial bias played a significant factor in the sentencing of man to death here 18 years ago, a judge on Friday ordered that the man’s sentence be reduced to life in prison without parole, the first such decision under North Carolina’s controversial Racial Justice Act. Reading a summary of his ruling from the bench, Judge Gregory A. Weeks of Cumberland County Superior Court said that “race was a materially, practically and statistically significant factor in the decision to exercise peremptory challenges during jury selection by prosecutors” at the time of the trial of the inmate,...