Pick Your Battles!/Boyd Case

Yes, right is right, and wrong is wrong. That doesn't mean that our state pols, or any of us for that matter, should suggest or initiate new laws which are illegal in themselves and will cost the state large chunks of money to defend...unsuccessfully.

Gay marriage? We now have a state judge who made comments on a current case; it was unethical to do so, and he knew it. Will he bear the monetary burden to defend himself, or will the taxpayers have to shoulder much of the costs. How about all those totally unconstitutional laws governing abortion clinics? How much has the state paid to defend these losing issues?

Closer to home, we have only to mention Phillip Pettus. Yet he says he will try to disenfranchise Florence voters during the next regular legislative session. Why should the citizens of Alabama have to pay financially for the inanities of these elected officials?

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Reporting what we don't know: That's often the case with the TimesDaily. A recent article on new sentencing rules for teens convicted of serious crimes mentioned the Boyd brothers. Nathan, who was 17 at the time of his crime (the murder of his former employer), is currently serving Life Without. He admitted his crime. Eric, 19 at the time of the murder, has denied taking an active part. He claims he knew of the crime only after Danny Sledge was already dead. He had no qualms about helping his brother escape and spending the money the robbery brought in, but no physical evidence connected him to the scene.

While we think Eric was...oh, we dunno...pond scum. He may not have been a murderer. He was sentenced to Life With Possibility of Parole. If he took an active part in the murder, he doesn't deserve that. If he was only an amoral idiot who couldn't have cared less about anyone else when he was high on drugs, he does deserve a chance to be free at some point and perhaps help others who are traveling the road he once trod. If we believe everything published in the TD, we would be severely limited in our assessment of this crime.

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Shoalanda