Rhode Island Governor Lincoln D. Chafee (Indep.) recent­ly explained his denial of a request to trans­fer Jason Pleau to the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment for a poten­tial death penal­ty pros­e­cu­tion. Chafee stat­ed, ” As a mat­ter of pub­lic pol­i­cy, Rhode Islanders have long opposed the death penal­ty, even for the most heinous crimes. To vol­un­tar­i­ly let Mr. Pleau be exposed to the fed­er­al death penal­ty for a crime com­mit­ted in Rhode Island would be an abdi­ca­tion of one of my core respon­si­bil­i­ties as gov­er­nor: defend­ing and uphold­ing the legit­i­mate pub­lic-pol­i­cy choic­es made by the peo­ple of this state.” In his op-ed in the Providence Journal, the gov­er­nor not­ed that Pleau had offered to plead guilty to mur­der in state court and accept a sen­tence of life with­out parole. Chafee reject­ed the accu­sa­tion that his actions were dri­ven by a per­son­al oppo­si­tion to cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. The gov­er­nor not­ed that Rhode Island abol­ished the death penal­ty in 1852, although a very nar­row death penal­ty statute was put in place after­wards. That law was final­ly removed in 1984, and no exe­cu­tions occurred in Rhode Island after 1852. Read full op-ed below.

Lincoln D. Chafee: My Pleau stand affirms core R.I. val­ues
By Lincoln D. Chafee

Over the past sev­er­al months, there have been a num­ber of erro­neous claims put for­ward regard­ing the case of accused mur­der­er Jason Wayne Pleau and my involve­ment, as gov­er­nor of Rhode Island, in it. I am writ­ing here to cor­rect mis­con­cep­tions and set the record straight.

In his Aug. 17 Commentary piece (“Shielding crim­i­nal betrays pub­lic trust”), state Sen. Edward J. O’Neill express­es what is per­haps the most com­mon of these mis­con­cep­tions: that my dis­ap­proval of a fed­er­al request to trans­fer Mr. Pleau for the pur­pose of expos­ing him to the death penal­ty is moti­vat­ed by my per­son­al oppo­si­tion to cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. That is sim­ply not the case, and Senator O’Neill is wrong in his asser­tion.

Instead, my actions are moti­vat­ed by my oblig­a­tion as gov­er­nor to safe­guard Rhode Island’s sov­er­eign­ty and the integri­ty of its laws. Mr. Pleau has already offered to plead guilty to state mur­der and rob­bery charges and to accept the state’s harsh­est pos­si­ble pun­ish­ment — life in prison with­out parole. As a mat­ter of pub­lic pol­i­cy, Rhode Islanders have long opposed the death penal­ty, even for the most heinous crimes.

To vol­un­tar­i­ly let Mr. Pleau be exposed to the fed­er­al death penal­ty for a crime com­mit­ted in Rhode Island would be an abdi­ca­tion of one of my core respon­si­bil­i­ties as gov­er­nor: defend­ing and uphold­ing the legit­i­mate pub­lic-pol­i­cy choic­es made by the peo­ple of this state.

Senator O’Neill uses the costs of incar­cer­at­ing Mr. Pleau and his long, vio­lent crim­i­nal his­to­ry to jus­ti­fy aban­don­ing Rhode Island’s long­stand­ing oppo­si­tion to the death penal­ty in this case.

On the first point: Senator O’Neill is seem­ing­ly unaware that the costs of try­ing a fed­er­al death-penal­ty case, in addi­tion to the lengthy appeals process that will inevitably fol­low the tri­al, are enor­mous. The real­i­ty of this unfor­tu­nate sit­u­a­tion is that costs to the tax­pay­er will be con­sid­er­able whether Mr. Pleau is tried and incar­cer­at­ed in Rhode Island or tried and exe­cut­ed by the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment. Clearly, this is no jus­ti­fi­ca­tion for dis­re­gard­ing a firm­ly held belief of the peo­ple of our state.

On the sec­ond — and more fun­da­men­tal — point: There is no doubt that Mr. Pleau is a career crim­i­nal with an exten­sive record of deplorable acts. But this does not jus­ti­fy the aban­don­ment of Rhode Island’s long­stand­ing abo­li­tion of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment.

As far back as 1838, a report solicit­ed by a General Assembly com­mit­tee exam­in­ing the death penal­ty urged its repeal. Calling back to the ​“live­ly exper­i­ment” of Rhode Island’s found­ing, the report’s authors, W.R. Staples and Samuel Y. Atwell, wrote: ​“We appeal now to the leg­is­la­ture of Rhode Island to try anoth­er exper­i­ment.… By [repeal­ing cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment] before her sis­ter states, Rhode Island will show that she still pos­sess­es that inde­pen­dence of feel­ing, sen­ti­ment, and action, which char­ac­ter­ized her first set­tlers, and will regain that proud pre-emi­nence among them, which she only lost by their imi­tat­ing her exam­ple.”

In 1852, the General Assembly heed­ed their advice and Rhode Island became only the sec­ond state in the nation — fol­low­ing Michigan, in 1846 — to abol­ish the death penal­ty.

In 1872, an extra­or­di­nar­i­ly nar­row cap­i­tal-pun­ish­ment excep­tion was enact­ed but nev­er invoked, even­tu­al­ly prompt­ing the Rhode Island Supreme Court to rule, in 1979, that the death penal­ty was an uncon­sti­tu­tion­al vio­la­tion of pro­hi­bi­tions on cru­el and unusu­al pun­ish­ment. Following the rul­ing, in 1984, the General Assembly removed manda­to­ry death penal­ty require­ments from Rhode Island General Law, and each sub­se­quent effort to autho­rize it for spe­cif­ic crimes has failed. The State of Rhode Island has not exe­cut­ed a pris­on­er since the orig­i­nal 1852 ban.

There is no ques­tion that the mur­der of David Main was a sense­less act that shocked, sad­dened and angered the peo­ple of the state, includ­ing me. I can­not begin to imag­ine the grief of the Main fam­i­ly, and I extend my deep­est sym­pa­thy to them for their trag­ic loss. There is also no ques­tion that Jason Wayne Pleau is a career crim­i­nal who deserves to answer for his crimes and spend the rest of his life in prison.

But my involve­ment in this case is not about Mr. Pleau. It is not about the ter­ri­ble ordeal of the Main fam­i­ly. And it is not about my per­son­al feel­ings or opin­ions. It is about main­tain­ing and pro­tect­ing the sov­er­eign­ty and laws of the state I was elect­ed to gov­ern.

Leadership requires defend­ing and uphold­ing the pub­lic pol­i­cy of the State of Rhode Island in all cas­es, not just those where it is easy or con­ve­nient. Indeed, it is sit­u­a­tions such as this, which are dif­fi­cult and fraught with emo­tion, where we must stand up for our state’s core prin­ci­ples. They lose mean­ing if we are unwill­ing to do so.

Lincoln D. Chafee, an inde­pen­dent, is gov­er­nor of Rhode Island.

(L. Chafee, ​“My Pleau stand affirms core R.I. val­ues,” Providence Journal, August 24, 2011). See New Voices and Federal Death Penalty.

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