People v. State

Last week, just over the border in Niles, Michigan, a 14-year old boy, Dakotah Eliason, was tried as an adult for shooting and killing his 69-year old grandfather as he slept. According to WSBT News, “Dakotah told police he had no explanation for shooting his grandfather, with whom he had a good relationship and who, according to the teenager, had never hurt him.”

On Thursday the jury convicted him of first degree – i.e. premeditated – murder. Whether Dakotah shot and killed his grandfather was apparently not disputed at trial. Rather, the issue was whether he should be convicted of first degree murder, which carries with it a mandatory sentence of life without parole, or second degree murder, which would have allowed for the possibility of parole:

[I]n a taped interview with police [where was this kid’s attorney??], Eliason told the detective about grabbing his grandfather’s handgun and then arguing with himself over whether or not to shoot him — contemplating homicide or suicide — then shooting his sleeping grandfather in the head from about 7 feet away.

“The evidence shows he thought about this for hours. He told Detective Suarez he thought for hours about how he was going to do it,” said prosecutor Art Cotter.

. . .

Defense attorney Lanny Fisher argued Dakotah was a good student, but troubled and had problems expressing his emotion. He said Dakotah was troubled by the loss of a cousin who was killed in a car accident, the 13-year old family dog that had recently died, and a close friend who’d just committed suicide.

“This boy was hurting. Does that sound like this kid had a plan, that it was premeditated and intentional? No it doesn’t,” said Fisher.

In the back seat of a police car on the night he killed his grandfather, Dakotah told an officer: “My life just became ‘Law and Order'” without the commercials. Coincidentally, I think I might have seen just a couple weeks ago the episode Dakotah’s life has become. In that episode, there is no dispute at trial that the defendant, “Mitch,” along with some buddies, has killed for kicks an Asian deliveryman. Because Mitch turned 18 just a couple weeks before the killing, he is eligible for the death penalty, which the DA’s office has elected to pursue after much hand-wringing. During closing statement, his attorney argued to the jury (paraphrasing): “If you allow Mitch to live, will he be a different person in 20 years? I don’t know. But frankly, neither do you.” (The TV jury’s verdict: death.)

I don’t know whether under Michigan law the jury at Dakotah’s trial was kept in the dark about the awful consequences they would be visiting upon Dakotah by a first degree murder verdict versus a second degree murder verdict. It’s a crime if they were. Perhaps they assumed that the State is not sadistic enough to lock up a 14-year old boy and throw away the key. Perhaps if they had known that it is some of them would have voted differently. Will this 14-year old boy be a different person in 20 years? Unless his conviction or his sentence to life without parole is overturned, it won’t matter.

In a comment on the story, “Disco Duck” makes an intelligent if ungrammatical point:

While I agree this “kid” should be punished and locked up… I find it hypocritical that sometimes there kids, when under 18 but an adult when they commit a horrible crime… either your a juvinile or an adult…. a 18 yr old guy dates a 15 yr old girl and has sex, boom.. there charged with rape cause she is a child…. i dont know… no consisitancy with the justice system

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