A fed­er­al court has ordered a new sen­tenc­ing hear­ing for Robert Marshall after deter­min­ing that his tri­al attor­ney failed to ade­quate­ly rep­re­sent him at his 1986 tri­al. In its rul­ing, the court not­ed: This is not a case where, after rea­son­able inves­ti­ga­tion, Zeitz (the attor­ney) deter­mined that it was tac­ti­cal­ly a bet­ter choice not to put on a mit­i­gat­ing case. Rather, it is a sit­u­a­tion where Zeitz inad­e­quate­ly pre­pared for the penal­ty phase and put on no mit­i­gat­ing evi­dence because he had none to present.” (Emphasis added). Marshall, who has been on death row for 18 years, must be resen­tenced and has been removed from New Jersey’s death row. Additional prob­lems with inad­e­quate defense, the lethal injec­tion process, and oth­er con­cerns about the state’s cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment sys­tem con­tin­ue to sur­face. Celeste Fitzgerald, exec­u­tive direc­tor of New Jerseyans for a Death Penalty Moratorium, stat­ed that Marshall’s case is anoth­er exam­ple of how the cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment sys­tem is bro­ken, how it’s impos­si­ble to write a set of rules to imple­ment the death penal­ty in a way that ensures swift, fair and accu­rate jus­tice.” She added, The death penal­ty hasn’t worked in New Jersey. These cas­es go on and on – because a life is at stake and every­one agrees we need to be cau­tious. Many states don’t have the death penal­ty, and I think it’s time to fol­low that lead and imple­ment a pol­i­cy of life impris­on­ment with­out pos­si­bil­i­ty of parole.” (The Star-Ledger, April 8, 2004) See Life Without Parole and Representation.

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