Speaker 1: It's Night Side with Dan Ray on WBZ Costin's new.
Speaker 2: Video Thank you, Dan Watkins. As we head into the
Speaker 2: nine o'clock hour, we will later tonight take in its
Speaker 2: entirety the speech of Vice President Kamala Harris her acceptance
Speaker 2: speech at the United Center in Chicago on this the
Speaker 2: last night of the Democratic National Convention twenty twenty four.
Speaker 2: But during this hour, I would like to talk with you,
Speaker 2: and I'd like you to talk with me about the
Speaker 2: latest chapter, the latest chapter in the bombings at the
Speaker 2: Boston marathon on April fifteenth, twenty thirteen. Think about that
Speaker 2: for a moment. The bombings on April fifteenth, twenty thirteen.
Speaker 2: It's now over eleven years ago. It is now twenty fourteen,
Speaker 2: So it is. It's eleven years and four months A
Speaker 2: long time, A long time. We know that there were
Speaker 2: two brothers who were involved in this bombing, one of
Speaker 2: whom died in the shootout in Watertown, Massachusetts. The other
Speaker 2: has been sentenced to death, a death penalty that was
Speaker 2: upheld by the US Supreme Court a couple of years ago,
Speaker 2: but now finds itself back in the court, back in
Speaker 2: the court of federal judge Jeorje O'Toole, who, in my opinion,
Speaker 2: is one of the better, if not one of the best,
Speaker 2: federal judges. I will admit that I have met Judge O'Toole.
Speaker 2: I've had conversations with him, not about this, but he
Speaker 2: is a well respected jurist. And what has happened is
Speaker 2: that now well eleven years and four months later, this
Speaker 2: horrific scar has once again been reopened. And now I
Speaker 2: don't use his name, I simply refer to him as
Speaker 2: Boston bomber number two. He was the individual who placed
Speaker 2: a backpack that took the life of eight year old
Speaker 2: Martin Richard and Lindsay Liu. At that time, she was
Speaker 2: a twenty three year old bost University graduate student from China.
Speaker 2: He also was involved and found responsible for the killing
Speaker 2: of MIT police officer Sean Collier days after the blast.
Speaker 2: What is to me extraordinarily frustrating about this is that
Speaker 2: this guy had a fair trial. His lawyers admitted that
Speaker 2: he had done what he was accused of. He was
Speaker 2: indicted and can victed on thirty counts. The number of
Speaker 2: people who died from this three from the initial bombing,
Speaker 2: as well as the MIT police officer Officer Collier, and
Speaker 2: there were two other deaths, one his brother, who I
Speaker 2: think he might have actually, if I recall correctly, drove
Speaker 2: over him in that shootout. Remember he was discovered a
Speaker 2: day later hiding inside a boat in the backyard of
Speaker 2: a home in Watertown. And also Boston Police officer Dennis Simons,
Speaker 2: who passed away from injuries that he suffered on that day.
Speaker 2: In twenty fourteen, two and eighty one people were injured,
Speaker 2: some of them lost limbs, some of them were impacted
Speaker 2: physically for Lifeologically, how many people besides the two hundred
Speaker 2: and eighty one who were injured, how many spouses, how
Speaker 2: many children, how many parents lived through recoveries, and how
Speaker 2: many of those folks still Beare the psychological scars as
Speaker 2: well as the physical scars of what happened that day.
Speaker 2: So here we are eleven years later, and we're still
Speaker 2: litigating whether or not he should receive the death penalty.
Speaker 2: Now I have a very limited view on the death penalty,
Speaker 2: and that is that if there is no doubt, not
Speaker 2: a sentilla of doubt about what an individual did, and
Speaker 2: if there are aggravating circumstances, I myself would be willing
Speaker 2: to pull the switch on Boston Bomber two because he
Speaker 2: fits into that select group of people of people for whom,
Speaker 2: in my opinion, death is the appropriate punishment. Now, I
Speaker 2: know lots of friends of mine disagree with me on that,
Speaker 2: but part of the reason that I think these matters
Speaker 2: should be resolved fairly but with finality. Are an example
Speaker 2: in this case, he's been living for eleven years that
Speaker 2: once again his lawyers are in court doing what they
Speaker 2: need to do as lawyers. They are asking that the judge,
Speaker 2: Judge o'tool recuse himself reportedly on statements that Judge o'tool
Speaker 2: has made, either privately or publicly. I'm not aware of
Speaker 2: what those statements are. They also want the background of
Speaker 2: a couple of jurors investigated, and so maybe what their
Speaker 2: goal is is to have another hearing in front of
Speaker 2: a different federal judge on the issue of the death bounty,
Speaker 2: in front of probably I assume a different jewelry, which
Speaker 2: would probably take another if that is granted another year
Speaker 2: and a half or so. In my opinion, that could
Speaker 2: be wrong, and it's just going to reopen so many
Speaker 2: of these scars that impact so many individuals. And again,
Speaker 2: we have the best justice system in the world, and
Speaker 2: we are we have fear to people, and there are
Speaker 2: a lot of people who kill and are convicted of
Speaker 2: murder who I would not want to see executed. But
Speaker 2: it's a high profile case like this, which some would
Speaker 2: argue is shows what a great system we have that
Speaker 2: even someone as scurrilous as this guy gets treated fairly.
Speaker 2: I look at it and I just begin to wonder
Speaker 2: whether or not I think this guy has had justice,
Speaker 2: He's had due process, and there's just something about this.
Speaker 2: And I speak as a lawyer. I understand what a
Speaker 2: lawyer's role is. And I have a good friend, many
Speaker 2: good friends were a lawyers, one of whom we're going
Speaker 2: to talk to in a moment who probably cann't disagree
Speaker 2: with me on this. So I'm going to invite you
Speaker 2: to call does this bother you? Again? This is B one.
Speaker 2: It's not even on the front page of the Globe today.
Speaker 2: It's B one. It was. It was a very thorough
Speaker 2: article written by my great friend Shelley Murphy, who knows
Speaker 2: this case as well as anybody. And this is just
Speaker 2: going to go on and on and on, and I
Speaker 2: know that there are those who say, no, he should
Speaker 2: he should be forced to live the rest of his
Speaker 2: life at that Supermax. Well, I disagree, uh, and I'd
Speaker 2: love to hear from you. Are you Do you want
Speaker 2: to basically put this case to bed and wish him
Speaker 2: the best of luck and wherever he goes from here
Speaker 2: and his miserable life, or do you feel that he
Speaker 2: deserves yet another bite at the apple, and then maybe
Speaker 2: another bite at the apple until he has finds more apples.
Speaker 2: Here's the number. Feel free to join us six one, seven, two, five,
Speaker 2: four ten thirty six one seven, nine three one ten
Speaker 2: thirty when we come back, when I talk to my
Speaker 2: good friend Harvey Silverglade, who I know is going to
Speaker 2: disagree with me on this nonetheless, and he will be
Speaker 2: first up on the other side of the break here
Speaker 2: on nightside. I think this is an important story. I
Speaker 2: hope you do as well. It's a story that will
Speaker 2: be remembered in Boston for years, for decades. There's no question,
Speaker 2: and those of us who were there or who covered
Speaker 2: the story as I did that night and for the
Speaker 2: next few nights on radio, it was the only story.
Speaker 2: But I think the story has been told. We know
Speaker 2: what happened, and justice tonight is justice delayed in my opinion.
Speaker 2: Back on Nightside, we'll start with Harvey, and you are
Speaker 2: more than welcome to join the conversation. Whatever your point
Speaker 2: of view is. You do not have to be a lawyer.
Speaker 2: Six one seven nine six one seven two five thirty
Speaker 2: Back on Nightside right after this.
Speaker 1: Now back to Dan ray Line from the Window World
Speaker 1: Nightside Studios on WBZ News Radio.
Speaker 2: We're talking about the fate of Boston bomber number two.
Speaker 2: I choose not to use his name. I refer to
Speaker 2: him as Boston bomber number two. You hear, you've heard
Speaker 2: what I have said. I think this has gone on
Speaker 2: now for eleven years, eleven years plus four months. I
Speaker 2: think now we're looking at another delay in in the
Speaker 2: resolution of this case, and probably if it's conceivable, if somehow,
Speaker 2: some way, Judge O'Toole in his investigation concludes that indeed
Speaker 2: two of the jurors were on the death penalty. They
Speaker 2: were on the jury as well as on the death
Speaker 2: penalty phase. UH, he might have to impanel an entire
Speaker 2: new jury to once again RELI the gate whether or
Speaker 2: not Bomber number two should receive the death penalty. With
Speaker 2: me is my friend Harvey Silvergladen. Harvey, I suspect you
Speaker 2: disagree with me on this. We had not talked about
Speaker 2: it during the day. I should have probably called you,
Speaker 2: but I'm so glad you were listening and have joined
Speaker 2: us here. Do you how strongly do you disagree with me?
Speaker 2: Let me ask Let me ask it that way.
Speaker 3: Harvey, extraordinarily strongly. But let me tell you why.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 3: Of course, first of all, a little bit of disclosure
Speaker 3: I represented as a teacher of ZARNAEEV from Cambridge Region
Speaker 3: Latin when he was visited by the FBI doesn't affect
Speaker 3: my views of the case. But I feel that I
Speaker 3: should disclose, and of course, as I always do, I
Speaker 3: refuse to let him talk to the FBI because, as
Speaker 3: you know, I don't trust the FBI. Okay, So that
Speaker 3: little bit of disclosure is out of the way. It
Speaker 3: has nothing to do with any sense that there is
Speaker 3: any doubt about him being guilty, no question, we rather
Speaker 3: that's correct. It has nothing to do with the fact
Speaker 3: that he deserves to be killed. It has to do
Speaker 3: with the system and uh. And by the way, there
Speaker 3: are many people who think that the life in the
Speaker 3: supermax prison is is worse than death. But we'll forget
Speaker 3: about that for a minute. That's not my argument.
Speaker 2: Is your view? Let me ask you those is that
Speaker 2: your view.
Speaker 3: That the supermax is worse than death? It is if
Speaker 3: I had a choice between spending a life in the
Speaker 3: supermax prison and death. I think our issue's death. It's
Speaker 3: a form of torture. I actually think there should be outlawed.
Speaker 3: But again, this is not the fundamental My opposition is systemic.
Speaker 3: The reason I am opposed to the death penalty is
Speaker 3: I know as a practicing criminal defense and civil liberties lawyer,
Speaker 3: I know how prone the system is to making errors,
Speaker 3: including in cases where everybody is sure that somebody is guilty.
Speaker 3: The National Innocence Project has actually come up with a
Speaker 3: case after years of searching, of somebody whom they can
Speaker 3: would confidently show is executed who is innocent. Everybody is certain,
Speaker 3: Dura is a certain newspaper. People are certain, but there
Speaker 3: is no certainty in any human system. The error is
Speaker 3: human to forgive divine. I'm not talking about the forgiveness.
Speaker 3: I'm talking about who makes life and death decisions.
Speaker 2: Well, let me, I don't mean to drop Let me
Speaker 2: just ask a truly simple question, because to stand and
Speaker 2: it has taken the Innocent Project a lot of work
Speaker 2: to find someone who they believe was executed wrongfully. And
Speaker 2: we know it is a human system.
Speaker 4: But the the standards that I just outline, and we've
Speaker 4: talked about this before, is there's no question in your
Speaker 4: mind of this individual's guilt.
Speaker 2: Correct, That is correct, okay, No, no sentilla of doubt, convicted,
Speaker 2: pled guilty, no scentilla of doubt, no suggestion that he
Speaker 2: was forced by his lawyers to plead out or anything
Speaker 2: like that. And having said that, would you consider what
Speaker 2: he did and the way in which he and his
Speaker 2: brother did it aggravating circumstances?
Speaker 3: Absolutely, okay, And that is not my argument. No, I
Speaker 3: know that argument is systemic. If we allow the death penalty,
Speaker 3: it is inevitable, likely inevitable that at some point somebody
Speaker 3: innocent is going to be executed. It may not be
Speaker 3: during our lifetime, but it will happen.
Speaker 2: So someone who about whom there would be no scintilla
Speaker 2: of doubt about the guilt. And in addition to that,
Speaker 2: on top of that, aggravating circumstances of a horrific nature.
Speaker 2: And I realize I'm using language, but some people can
Speaker 2: Parson and say it's vague. But if it's I know
Speaker 2: you're opposed to it, you know, philosophically. But if you
Speaker 2: are willing to say no, no sentilla of doubt, that's
Speaker 2: a that's a legal standard. There's no question of doubt
Speaker 2: and aggravating circumstances.
Speaker 3: They said, we're talking about a system, and you know,
Speaker 3: everybody has their idea of what a sintilla of doubt is.
Speaker 3: Everybody has your idea of what absolutely clear in certain cases,
Speaker 3: but inevitably, inevitably, some point, if you have a death penalty,
Speaker 3: inevitably somebody innocent is going to be executed.
Speaker 2: My view, your argument, go right ahead. I just wanted
Speaker 2: to make sure that I fleshed it out. I do
Speaker 2: understand your argument.
Speaker 3: It is my view that it is better that twenty horrible,
Speaker 3: clearly guilty people live rather than one innocent be executed wrongly.
Speaker 3: And that is my art systemic. It's got nothing to
Speaker 3: do with its our native It's got to do with
Speaker 3: the system. Okay, what you're a lawyer, you know, you
Speaker 3: know you have talked about cases of innocent people that
Speaker 3: you have helped get get out of the death who.
Speaker 2: Were truly who are truly innocent, that the dead before
Speaker 2: before firm and versus Georgia. You're absolutely correct on that.
Speaker 3: But but when they were sentenced, nobody should or at
Speaker 3: least the people who sentenced them, didn't think you were innocent.
Speaker 3: And that's my point.
Speaker 2: No, I understand your point, But the point I'm trying
Speaker 2: to struggle with here is if if the the standard
Speaker 2: by which some people would be executed is so stringent
Speaker 2: that there is no sinillary of doubt and there are
Speaker 2: aggravating circumstances, I mean, if there are no if there's
Speaker 2: no sentillary of doubt, and and it's it's a it's
Speaker 2: a an individual murder, even if it's no centillary of
Speaker 2: a doubt where somebody shoots someone in Fifth Avenue in
Speaker 2: New York, to coin a phrase, but when you have
Speaker 2: the aggravating circumstances of these bombs being placed behind people
Speaker 2: who are watching a marathon. So so let's let's assume
Speaker 2: that I accept your argument for a second, and I
Speaker 2: accept the which is an anti death penalty argument. Does
Speaker 2: that also mean that we should never put people in
Speaker 2: jail because we probably incarcerate more individuals wrongfully then we
Speaker 2: kill individuals wrongfully.
Speaker 3: But incarceration is reversible, Yes, it is. That is you
Speaker 3: can you can when an incarcerated person can show that
Speaker 3: they're wrongfully incarcerated, yes, they get out.
Speaker 2: But you know how high a standard? We know how
Speaker 2: to convict people beyond a reasonable doubt, but I still
Speaker 2: don't know what the standard is to prove someone's innocence
Speaker 2: after they've been convicted.
Speaker 3: Well, those are the rules of habeas corpus emotions for
Speaker 3: a new trial. They're all legal standards. They vary from
Speaker 3: state to state, yes, but they're all human systems.
Speaker 2: Okay, let's let's do this. Okay, I want to explore
Speaker 2: this more with you. We're at nine point thirty. I'm
Speaker 2: going to invite people to call and they can ask questions.
Speaker 3: Can I tell you one Tindy story?
Speaker 2: Sure? You want to do it?
Speaker 5: Now?
Speaker 2: Do you want to wait until after the newscast?
Speaker 3: Whatever you want, it's up to you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, if you wouldn't mind, we have right at nine thirty.
Speaker 2: So I'd like to do that and when we come back,
Speaker 2: we'll tell that story. In the meantime, we'll give people
Speaker 2: a chance to join the conversation by dialing six, one, seven, two, five,
Speaker 2: four to ten thirty six, one, seven, nine, three, one,
Speaker 2: ten thirty. Uh, this is a real case at hand.
Speaker 2: I'm never going to win an argument against Harvey Silverglake
Speaker 2: because he's one of the best lawyers that I've ever known.
Speaker 2: But if you have a question, if you want to
Speaker 2: make a comment, I'd invite you to join us. I
Speaker 2: think it's an important conversation. We'll be back on Nightside
Speaker 2: with Harvey Silverglade and your phone calls if you'd like
Speaker 2: to take the time to dial back right after this.
Speaker 1: It's Night Side with Boston's News Radio.
Speaker 2: My guess is Harvey Silverglade an extraordinary attorney and a
Speaker 2: great friend. Harvey, you said that there was a story
Speaker 2: that you wanted to tell before we went to some
Speaker 2: phone calls, Go right.
Speaker 3: Ahead, right I had a drug case once in which
Speaker 3: the agents had taken pictures of of my client. They're
Speaker 3: doing the drug transaction, so they had photographs and they're
Speaker 3: absolutely sure, and we get the trial, and what they
Speaker 3: didn't know was that he was one of two exact
Speaker 3: duplicate twin brothers, and they couldn't figure out which of
Speaker 3: the brothers had done it. There's all kinds of certainties
Speaker 3: that turn out not to be so certain. This is
Speaker 3: this is human life we're talking about, in which the
Speaker 3: strangest things happened.
Speaker 2: Now I understand, I do understand the argument, and I
Speaker 2: know that you're coming from a place where you do
Speaker 2: not believe under any searchircumstances. I mean, if if Hitler
Speaker 2: had been taken alive in the bunker in Germany, you
Speaker 2: would have you would have argued that he should not
Speaker 2: have been killed executed.
Speaker 3: That is correct because at that point, the amount of
Speaker 3: blood that had been spilled in that war was obscene,
Speaker 3: blood of both soldiers and millions and millions of civilians.
Speaker 3: And the idea that you're going to redress that problem
Speaker 3: by spilling more blood makes absolutely no sense. Well, Hitler
Speaker 3: killed himself. He committed suicide. He didn't want to, right,
Speaker 3: he didn't want to be captured.
Speaker 2: No, I get that. But but but if Hitler had survived,
Speaker 2: if the Allied troops had captured him, the idea of
Speaker 2: Hitler spending whatever time he had left in some sort
Speaker 2: of prison, being fed, uh, you know, three meals a
Speaker 2: day and and having a place to lay his head
Speaker 2: at night. Uh It It just seems to me that
Speaker 2: after the amount of carnage that he clearly caused. Now again,
Speaker 2: I know that when you say to me that you
Speaker 2: would not you would defend Hitler from being executed, that
Speaker 2: shows the depth of your passion and the death of
Speaker 2: your your belief.
Speaker 3: And I let me say this, Dad, Yeah, Hitler preferred death,
Speaker 3: and he inflicted in himself. He was a coward death.
Speaker 3: He preferred death for himself.
Speaker 2: Right, I understand that. And he was a coward, and
Speaker 2: and he was a monster. And if he had survived,
Speaker 2: I don't think there's any anyone, well maybe you and
Speaker 2: a few others who would say the principle is so important,
Speaker 2: and I and I understand the principle. Let's do this, Harvey.
Speaker 2: Let's get some folks involved in it. By the way,
Speaker 2: I need to ask you, how much longer you have
Speaker 2: more experience than I do in the courtroom. How much
Speaker 2: longer do you think this this, this entire procedure will continue.
Speaker 2: Judge O'Toole is supposed to conduct an investigation. I have
Speaker 2: no idea what he will find, But as I understand that,
Speaker 2: it is his findings, those findings, if if he finds
Speaker 2: that there was no error done, and if he doesn't
Speaker 2: recuse himself, I would have to ask you, I guess
Speaker 2: there's a threshold question. Do you think it's likely that
Speaker 2: that Judge o'tol will stay on or will will recuse himself?
Speaker 3: Well, I think he may recuse himself. What he may
Speaker 3: be recused, But I think this case is going to
Speaker 3: golong for another year and a half or two years
Speaker 3: before it ends at least. And I think that the
Speaker 3: resources going into this would be much better used some
Speaker 3: other fashion.
Speaker 2: Right, So what you're saying is that if is that
Speaker 2: the government turned around now and said we agree he
Speaker 2: will not be executed, the case could end, correct, okay,
Speaker 2: and whatever funds were going to be expended could be
Speaker 2: put into you know, child education or whatever. Yeah, I
Speaker 2: understand that. But it is conceivable that that this he's
Speaker 2: not going to get a new trial. This is only
Speaker 2: going to be a determination on whether or not he
Speaker 2: should be executed.
Speaker 3: That is correct, fair enough, okay.
Speaker 2: And you think that this will finally be assuming that
Speaker 2: that the that the government pursues this, you think it
Speaker 2: will be concluded within a year or a year and a.
Speaker 3: Half, I say a year and a half.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so early early twenty twenty six.
Speaker 3: Yep, when the resources could be used for something much
Speaker 3: much more productive.
Speaker 2: Okay, And do you believe that there will be other
Speaker 2: issues that that that they that a good lawyer like
Speaker 2: you could develop.
Speaker 3: Well, the longer he's alive, the longer case goes forward,
Speaker 3: the more there is a possibility that somebody will show
Speaker 3: up who had some new evidence. And that's one of
Speaker 3: the reasons why.
Speaker 2: Well, it will be new evidence of his of his
Speaker 2: guilt or innocence, will it.
Speaker 3: That's correct, It will not be. It will not be.
Speaker 3: It may be it may be evidence of additional pressure
Speaker 3: that his older brother put on him.
Speaker 2: Well, that goes well, that goes to the that goes
Speaker 2: to the to the to the the That was the
Speaker 2: argument that was made and was rejected at trial. That
Speaker 2: so you're saying that's still an appealable issue.
Speaker 3: Well, the newly discovered evidence of this and and of
Speaker 3: course people will be investigating this forever, right, I kind.
Speaker 2: Of imagine what the newly discovered evidence would be other
Speaker 2: than someone saying the brother marched him to Boylston Street
Speaker 2: with a gun in his in his side pocket and
Speaker 2: basically told bomber number two, if you don't go through
Speaker 2: with this, I will shoot you to death. Here on
Speaker 2: boils the street. I mean, he's failing that. I don't
Speaker 2: see what other evidence could be introduced on that issue,
Speaker 2: do you?
Speaker 3: But you don't even you don't even know if that
Speaker 3: scenario is possible. You know, human life is strange, dand
Speaker 3: it is very strange. I will not predict what's going
Speaker 3: to happen a year and a half from now. I
Speaker 3: will not predict, but evidence may.
Speaker 2: Be so it's conceivable that this could go on a
Speaker 2: lot longer than a year and a half. And what
Speaker 2: I'm trying to I've kind of tried to trap you
Speaker 2: here a little bit, which I shouldn't do. But if
Speaker 2: all of a sudden, someone who comes along and says, oh,
Speaker 2: I remember I heard them talking in a cafe, uh,
Speaker 2: and he made a threat to his brother, Let's assume,
Speaker 2: even if it's someone's imagination, that could be another issue
Speaker 2: that could go back more, which would be another issue
Speaker 2: that would have to be resolved.
Speaker 3: That will go on forever as long as there is
Speaker 3: a death penalty hanging over his head. If the death
Speaker 3: penalty were not in the case, I think that this
Speaker 3: would be over. We would never hear from the guy.
Speaker 2: No, if there was no death penalty. Clearly the life
Speaker 2: in prison would be done. I get it, I get no,
Speaker 2: I understand that. Okay, we got some phone calls, Harvey.
Speaker 2: Let's see what people have to say. And by the way,
Speaker 2: needless to say, you're gonna be nice to me, and
Speaker 2: you're gonna be particularly nice to my guest, Harvey Silverglade,
Speaker 2: who is a great friend of mine and who I
Speaker 2: admire and respect immensely. Paul in Monson, Massachusetts. Paul, welcome
Speaker 2: to Knight's Side. You're on Nightside with Harvey Silverglade. We're
Speaker 2: talking about death penalty for bomber Boston bomber number two.
Speaker 6: Oh Hi Dan, Hi, Harvey, thanks so much for taking
Speaker 6: my call. I actually live in Munson, but I'm in
Speaker 6: a big truck and water town. Dan, I'll call back
Speaker 6: another time. I know you'd like to hear from truck drivers.
Speaker 6: I can give you a whole rundown on driving a
Speaker 6: big truck and labor economics in the industry. So I guess,
Speaker 6: I guess if you wanted to prep me to that,
Speaker 6: maybe put me on with your producer afterwards. But death
Speaker 6: penalty is near and dear to my heart and my guest,
Speaker 6: I don't want to speak for miss Silvergate but my
Speaker 6: guess is that on his part, this isn't a matter
Speaker 6: of belief. This is about knowledge and understanding. I've been
Speaker 6: so opposed, completely opposed to the death penalty. I turned
Speaker 6: fifty nine this year. When I was fourteen, I went
Speaker 6: to an Anty International presentation, and I've understood since the
Speaker 6: age of fourteen that civilized societies don't have capital punishment. Basically, now,
Speaker 6: what we're hearing about in the news is barely a
Speaker 6: week goes by. More than once a month somewhere in
Speaker 6: the country, someone is released from prison or jail after
Speaker 6: it was shown that they were wrongly convicted. Given the
Speaker 6: frequency with which we hear these press reports, we can
Speaker 6: easily extrapolate from that that we have executed scores. I
Speaker 6: can't even imagine a number of innocent people who have
Speaker 6: been executed in this country.
Speaker 2: Is Paul, let me jump in for a second. And
Speaker 2: I don't know if Harvy will back me up on this,
Speaker 2: but I don't think you that that that formula can work,
Speaker 2: because the Innocence Project has tried to find for many,
Speaker 2: many years cases of actual innocence of people actually being executed,
Speaker 2: and they have found, as I understand that, and I'm
Speaker 2: not familiar with the case as Harvey is with that case.
Speaker 2: There have been innocent people in this country lynched, you know,
Speaker 2: by the Ku Klux Klan and all of that. But
Speaker 2: in terms of going through the judicial process, I don't
Speaker 2: think I don't think it scores. But let me see
Speaker 2: what Harvey has to say. And again I appreciate you
Speaker 2: calling in. You obviously support Harvey and his position, which
Speaker 2: is great.
Speaker 7: Can I just say before before Harvest, even if the
Speaker 7: Innocence Project doesn't find a single open and shutcase it is,
Speaker 7: we can extrapolate. We can understand your extrapolation that there
Speaker 7: is no way it hasn't happened.
Speaker 6: Please go ahead, and misters okay, let's.
Speaker 2: See if Harvey agrees with you on your extrapolation argument.
Speaker 3: Harvey absolutely agree. It is inevitable that there are more
Speaker 3: than just the one that the Innocence Project has discovered.
Speaker 3: Is a human system, and there are obviously more than
Speaker 3: one error. And I don't think as a moral society
Speaker 3: we can justify the state putting somebody to death if
Speaker 3: it's systemically we know that there are certain number of
Speaker 3: innocent people who are going to be executed. It's as
Speaker 3: simple as that.
Speaker 2: Okay, go ahead, Paul Harvey agrees with you, and.
Speaker 3: You can just you can.
Speaker 7: Just The good news for you, Dan is that you can.
Speaker 6: Just understand that the argument that Harvey is making is correct.
Speaker 6: And no matter what we say, think, do and tell ourselves,
Speaker 6: we can do effective crime and punishment in this country
Speaker 6: without capital punishment.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I disagree, Paul, do me a favor. I disagree
Speaker 2: with that argument. I made it pretty clear that there
Speaker 2: are cases, and again Harvey disagrees with me in this,
Speaker 2: but I'm not going to back from my position that
Speaker 2: there are cases I disagree where there is no sentilla
Speaker 2: of doubt.
Speaker 6: Likes it doesn't matter that there are people.
Speaker 2: Paul, give me the courtesy. Let me at least making
Speaker 2: sure that.
Speaker 3: You understood Erica.
Speaker 2: I cannot argue against someone who is inextuably opposed to
Speaker 2: capital punishment. There's no question about that. It's like someone
Speaker 2: who is inexorably opposed to abortion under any set of circumstances,
Speaker 2: incess rape, life of the mother. That is a position
Speaker 2: that you can't argue with someone if that's their position.
Speaker 2: What I'm saying is that when you have a case
Speaker 2: like the Boston bomber, where there is no question, no
Speaker 2: scintilla of doubt about what he did.
Speaker 1: And.
Speaker 2: There are aggravating circumstances. You can have a guy that
Speaker 2: goes in to rob a bank and kills someone in
Speaker 2: the process. I don't want that person to go to
Speaker 2: the go to the death penalty because there's no aggravating circumstances.
Speaker 2: Even though it's a felony murder, it's not aggravating circumstances
Speaker 2: at the level of the Boston bomber. He put bombs
Speaker 2: beside behind He and his brother put two separate bombs
Speaker 2: behind people who watching the Boston marathon. If you cannot
Speaker 2: authorize the death penalty for this guy, and clearly you
Speaker 2: are someone who is an absolute opponent of the death,
Speaker 2: which you are and which Harvey is, and I respect
Speaker 2: both of your positions, but please don't misrepresent my position.
Speaker 6: Okay, I'm not misrepresenting anything.
Speaker 7: It's just it's just it doesn't matter, just doesn't matter.
Speaker 2: Well to me, it does, and I think there will
Speaker 2: be others who might agree with me.
Speaker 6: I mean, you just say, I know you want to
Speaker 6: get the other calls, and I'd like to. I'd love
Speaker 6: to give my number to your producer talk to you
Speaker 6: about trucking sometime I'll just say this, I'll just on
Speaker 6: part with this and thank you both so much. It's
Speaker 6: the idea that you cannot have effective criminal justice without
Speaker 6: capital punishment. It's just it's absurd.
Speaker 2: You're setting up a straw man with that argument. I'm
Speaker 2: saying you can have effective criminal justice. However, I never
Speaker 2: want to take off the table. I never want to
Speaker 2: take off the table that a society can use that
Speaker 2: to punish someone whose actions are so clearly clear without
Speaker 2: a centail of doubt. We're not talking about reasonable doubt,
Speaker 2: without a sintilla of doubt. There's no question that this
Speaker 2: guy did this. Okay, he had a trial, and the
Speaker 2: circumstances are just so aggravating. I mean, if if someone
Speaker 2: goes into a skull and murders ten or twelve or
Speaker 2: twenty children and they survived, like the guy down in Newtown,
Speaker 2: you could argue to me that he's insane, and I
Speaker 2: might agree with you on the insanity argument and say, well,
Speaker 2: he's not going to be convicted because he's insane. He
Speaker 2: didn't understand what he was doing right from wrong. But
Speaker 2: if you conclude that he knew what he was doing
Speaker 2: was right from wrong. He's going to take twenty kids
Speaker 2: in five teachers' lives. That would be.
Speaker 6: Another champ Capital punishment gets serenayas the Supermax and Flawrence Colorado.
Speaker 6: That's a that's a life there, that's a worst punishment.
Speaker 2: Well, I'll tell you I've never been in the super
Speaker 2: Max in Colorado. What I do know is that they
Speaker 2: get fed every day, they get to put their head
Speaker 2: on a pillow at night, they get to have visitors,
Speaker 2: they get to correspond with people. I believe that they
Speaker 2: also had television access to television. They don't live a
Speaker 2: life that I want to live, but I think it's
Speaker 2: it's it's a life that's a little bit better than
Speaker 2: what that what I would do. Paul, we've gone on
Speaker 2: really long. I loved your call. Leave your number with
Speaker 2: Rob and Rob will give you my number. You can
Speaker 2: call me directly at WBZ and we'll have a conversation
Speaker 2: off air about that other topic.
Speaker 6: Fair enough, wonderful, Thanks, Okay, thank.
Speaker 2: You, Harvey. We will continue. You've got a bunch of
Speaker 2: calls here. Stay with us. We're keeping an eye for
Speaker 2: everyone needs to understand this on what's going on in Chicago,
Speaker 2: and we will bring you in its entirety. Uh, the
Speaker 2: the acceptance speech tonight of device President Vice President Harris.
Speaker 2: We do not win, and we do not know when
Speaker 2: it will stop. But will you will hear it in
Speaker 2: its entirety, and it finishes before midnight and we have time,
Speaker 2: we will be able to get your reaction to the
Speaker 2: speech as well. But we got to take a quick break.
Speaker 2: Now we'll continue with my friend Harvey Silverglade. More calls.
Speaker 2: You could see at this point Harvey is carrying the day,
Speaker 2: as I suspect that he would in our conversation. There's
Speaker 2: no one who's better than my friend Harvey Silverglade. I
Speaker 2: always hesitate to disagree with him on anything, but I
Speaker 2: feel passionately about this. Back on Nightside right after this
Speaker 2: in Harvey, by the way, I did get your email
Speaker 2: today regarding that author and I do want to have
Speaker 2: that author on. We can talk about that perhaps privately tomorrow.
Speaker 2: Just I should have mentioned that earlier. We'll be right
Speaker 2: back on Nightside.
Speaker 1: Now back to Dan Ray live from the Window World
Speaker 1: Nightside Studios on WBZ News Radio.
Speaker 2: Back to the calls. Let me go to Sam in Bedford. Sam,
Speaker 2: you were next on Nightside with Harvey Silverglake.
Speaker 8: You're right ahead, Sam, Yeah, thanks thanks for taking the call.
Speaker 3: Dan.
Speaker 8: So so the amount of pain, misery and the financial
Speaker 8: cost you know, with this heeneous crime has been commented.
Speaker 8: I see no reason why you know, kind of human
Speaker 8: beings disguised, I mean there was disguised as a human beings, right.
Speaker 8: They should not be fed to fed to sharks?
Speaker 7: Right?
Speaker 8: Why why why continue? Why why allow them to live?
Speaker 8: Because they are not part of the civil society. They
Speaker 8: didn't have any any any concerns for all those people, right,
Speaker 8: so why should they be treated with such a with
Speaker 8: such a passion.
Speaker 2: You know, well, haeld Harvey can speak for himself. Sam,
Speaker 2: But uh, and Harvey, we've got a couple of a
Speaker 2: minute and a half left here. Let me turn Sam
Speaker 2: over to you because he's on the other side of
Speaker 2: the issue than you are. Go ahead, Harvey.
Speaker 7: Yeah.
Speaker 3: My argument again, and I hate to sound repetitive, is
Speaker 3: you have to make problem that's important that no sensient
Speaker 3: human being would have a doubt about built in this case.
Speaker 3: But this is stemid and there's in ever is over
Speaker 3: the course of time. Time is a long time that
Speaker 3: there would be an innocent person executed and I would
Speaker 3: rather have any number of guilty people alive in a
Speaker 3: horrible supermatch prison than one innocent person executed. This is
Speaker 3: the stomach argument, Sam.
Speaker 8: Right, but then if you if you take the extremee step,
Speaker 8: then people continue to do this, these these enious crimes,
Speaker 8: and then know then they can they can live, They
Speaker 8: can live comfortably for twelve fifteen years because they can
Speaker 8: exploit the systems. So so good things are for you know,
Speaker 8: people who made error in judgment because they made.
Speaker 2: A bad call.
Speaker 8: But this guy didn't made a back on. He intentionally knew.
Speaker 8: And the amount of amount of pain, misery and the
Speaker 8: cost to the to the to the country is done.
Speaker 8: I don't think he needs to see the light of
Speaker 8: the day. Just feel into the shocks.
Speaker 2: Oh okay, okay, the shocks. Sam, thank you very much
Speaker 2: for calling Harvey.
Speaker 3: I'd like to hold comment. When you're talking about a
Speaker 3: supermax prison. The description of live comfortably simply doesn't resonate.
Speaker 2: Well, that's what I want to do when I come back.
Speaker 2: I'd like to hold you through the ten Okay, I've
Speaker 2: never been to super max. I do not know, uh
Speaker 2: the specific circumstances. I'd love for you to sketch out
Speaker 2: for us what it's like for the people who are there.
Speaker 2: I know it's the worst of the worst, but I'd
Speaker 2: love to just get some information from you on that.
Speaker 2: Can I hold you through the ten yep? Okay, Sam,
Speaker 2: thank you for the call. All right, have a great
Speaker 2: night to Bob and Mark. You guys, stay there. I'm
Speaker 2: going to get to you. I don't think we're gonna
Speaker 2: hear from the Vice President for at least a half
Speaker 2: an hour, maybe longer. So I want Bob and Mark
Speaker 2: to stay there, and I'll invite others to call. You
Speaker 2: have the numbers, and Harvey is gonna, if not do
Speaker 2: her little research. For all I know, he may have
Speaker 2: actually visited one of his clients there. I have no idea,
Speaker 2: but he will give us an explain of why he
Speaker 2: feels life in supermacs is worth the worse than the
Speaker 2: death penalty. Back on night side right after this, this
Speaker 2: is Dan Ray. We all know that these times can
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Speaker 1: Rules WBZ in Boston, w XKSFM HD two Bedford, and Iheartradiot.
Speaker 1: This is WBZ, Boston's news radio, redefining local news.
Speaker 9: Good Evening, I'm Dan Watkins. Here's what's happening. After three
Speaker 9: consecutive nights of speeches, spectacle and celebrity. Democrats in Chicago
Speaker 9: are ready to hear from the person around which all
Speaker 9: of it swirls. Tonight, Vice President Kamala Harris will formally
Speaker 9: accept the Democratic nomination for president. CBS's Uija Jang is
Speaker 9: at the convention and tells us what she's expected to
Speaker 9: talk about in her speech.
Speaker 10: He wants to focus on sharing her personal story, talking
Speaker 10: about coming from a middle class family, being raised by
Speaker 10: working mother working at McDonald's. These are a lot of
Speaker 10: the themes that we've already heard, but we expect that
Speaker 10: she will build on it even more.
Speaker 9: Vice President Harris will be the first woman of color
Speaker 9: to lead a major political party's ticket. Meanwhile, former President
Speaker 9: Trump spent the day at the southern border in Arizona.
Speaker 9: While there, he said, if he's elected again, he'll finish
Speaker 9: building the wall.
Speaker 5: I was never in love with an architecturally until I
Speaker 5: saw the fact that nobody could climb over it without it.
Speaker 5: It's a big difference, is that right? Which is It's
Speaker 5: a huge difference, big, big difftinance. So the anti time
Speaker 5: panel at the top was a big deal.
Speaker 9: The former president will be in Arizona again on Friday.
Speaker 9: A Peaboty mom is getting the attention of Noah Kahn
Speaker 9: after a night she'll never forget. Wbz's Brooke McCarthy with
Speaker 9: the story.
Speaker 11: Noah Cohn playing to pack crowds at Fenway Park last month,
Speaker 11: and in the crowd dancing and singing all night long
Speaker 11: was Chloe Stanko. She was nine months pregnant at the time,
Speaker 11: but didn't let some back paine stop her. Turns out
Speaker 11: that back pain was actually the start of labor, and
Speaker 11: the next day Baby Noah was born.
Speaker 7: I know, I keep wondering.
Speaker 6: I'm like, if I didn't go to the concert, I
Speaker 6: am wondering, like when I would have actually had the baby.
Speaker 11: Chloe and her husband always loved the name Noah, and
Speaker 11: with Noah Cohn's concert sending her into labor, it was
Speaker 11: the perfect fit. She recently posted a TikTok about the
Speaker 11: whole experience.