The Anatomy of Violence by Adrian Raine Read Free Book Online Page A

“free will.”
    There is a side of me that would argue that Page should not have been punished as fully as he could have been in the eyes of the law. There are limitations to his free will that we should take into account when sentencing criminals like him. We are not all the same.
RETRIBUTION REIGNS
    Let’s now argue the other side of the case we have before us. There is a compelling reason that we should be unwilling to let Page off the hook,despite all the risk factors he had against him. Retribution—the mainstay philosophy within the legal system for justifying the punishment of an offender.Peyton Tuthill had her throat cut and died in a pool of her own blood after enduring a horrific rape. Should not the victim’s cries for justice be heard and a pound of flesh rendered?
    You almost certainly have been a victim of crime at some point—aburglary, a robbery, a theft, or an assault. Do you remember the outrage and injustice you felt? The unwillingness to forgive? The instinct to demand an eye for an eye? Justice exists to address a victim’s powerful psychological need for retribution. If we were to take tough retributive justice away and replace it with softer sentencing, would that not leave a bitter aftertaste of injustice in the mouths of the victims?
    I’ve presented to you the case for clemency for Donta Page, but now let us go through the hard facts of therapeand murder. This will not be as vivid as it would be were you sitting in the jury box at the trial, facing the photographs and forensic testimony, but perhaps it will give you pause before rendering your verdict—and help you better understand the retributivist’s position.
    First and foremost, Peyton Tuthill was a truly wonderful young woman. As an undergraduate at the College of Charleston, in South Carolina, she had been a cheerleader, athlete, lifeguard, and sorority president. She worked as a drug-abuse peer counselor. She volunteered in a convalescent home for the elderly. She had an intense sense of social responsibility toward the less fortunate. She worked selflessly during her studies to help underprivileged minorities—mentoring children from very poor homes and organizing the “adoption” of five of them by her sorority. When she left college she moved out to Denver to eventually attend the Colorado Institute of Art. While she waited, she registered at a temporary employment agency for work—I know all too well what that is like. Ironically, she had even visited theStout Street Foundation, where Donta Page lived, and spoken to officials there about drug and alcohol rehabilitation. She was considering volunteering for them and perhaps might have even helped in Page’s rehabilitation. More ironically, they had reassured her that where she lived was quite safe, and that if she ever needed help she should get in touch.
    On February 24, 1999, she went to an interview with the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. Meanwhile, Donta Page was back at the Stout Street treatment center waiting for a lift to the bus station for hisone-way trip back to prison in Maryland. He had two hours to kill before his ride, and impulsively decided toburglarize a nearby home.
    Returning from her interview, Peyton parked her car outside her duplex. When she entered the house she encountered Page. Terrified, she ran upstairs. Page chased after her, catching her at the top of the stairs, where he proceeded to punch her several times in the face. He hit her hard on the head with the butt end of the knife he had taken from the kitchen drawer. Blood splatters on the railing, floor, and wall showed that she was cut here. As her dog barked loudly in one closed upstairs room, Page dragged Peyton into another bedroom. He tied her hands with cord, and asked where her money was. She told him it was in her purse in her car outside.
    Page went out for the money. Peyton, meanwhile, got her hands loose and ran downstairs, seemingly free of her ordeal. But she encountered Page for a