House bill would stop judges from deciding death penalty

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- Last month, a Boone County jury couldn't decide if Deandra Buchanan should be executed or spend life in prison for killing his aunt, his stepfather and the mother of his two children.

With the jury hung, the judge stepped in and sentenced Buchanan to death.

That wouldn't have been possible under a bill that has been passed by the House and is pending in the Senate.

Missouri law now leaves the choice of execution or life imprisonment up to the judge when a jury that has convicted someone of first-degree murder cannot agree on a sentence.

Under the House legislation, judges could only impose life sentences in all future cases where juries cannot decide.

Proponents of the bill include attorney Stephanie Jirard, who represented Buchanan.

"If you can't convince 12 people to kill somebody, one elected official ... shouldn't be able to make that decision," Jirard said. "You had a jury that couldn't decide. The benefit of the doubt should be in Mr. Buchanan's favor."

The bill's sponsor, Rep. Ralph Monaco, D-Raytown, said death sentences should be issued only when an entire jury agrees. He questions the current law's constitutionality.

"Clearly, if you have the jury hung up on sentencing, then it is not beyond a responsible doubt," Monaco said.

The constitutional question has been raised elsewhere. The U.S. Supreme Court recently heard a case from another state dealing with the issue but has yet to rule.

Jury couldn't agree

In Buchanan's case, prosecutors painted the Columbia man as an abusive bully turned cold-blooded killer. The defense contended Buchanan was crazed by crack cocaine at the time of the killings.

The jury that convicted him could not decide if he deserved to die.

"They just came out and said, 'We can't agree, and that is our verdict,'" Jirard said. The judge "called a recess ... and said that he would make the finding."

It wasn't always this way in Missouri. From 1977, when Missouri reinstated capital punishment, until state law was changed in 1984, judges in such cases could only order life in prison, not execution.

"You had a number of cases were the jury hung on 11-1 in favor of the death penalty," said Cole County prosecutor Richard Callahan. "Those results were helping create a greater inconsistency."

Callahan believes judges should have the option to step in those cases.

While prospective jurors in capital punishment cases are asked beforehand if they can stomach the idea of sentencing someone to death, Callahan said, some people realize during the course of the trial that they cannot vote to execute.