One: 65 years, while long, is not "multiple life sentences." Two: The 65 years was shortly thereafter reduced to 55 years, though I am not finding any details on why. That 55 years was 30 for felony murder and 25 for burglary and theft (???), consecutively. Three: Body cam shows A'Donte Washington charging the officer with a drawn weapon, so this does not appear to be a case of abuse of force. Four: A later court changed those to run concurrently, making it an effective 30 years. In this hearing, the victim's own father made a statement that Smith did not deserve to be charged with his son's death. Five: This screenshot is dated less than a week after the original sentencing.

Other notes: There were five teens involved in this burglary, Smith was the only one who did not take a plea deal. The day before this burglary, Smith and others were involved in the murder of another man. The stolen car used in the burglary came from yet another murder. I have to think it was a difficult argument for the defense to make, that Smith "did not intend to hurt anyone." The prosecution surely had an easier time framing this in terms of "Smith was at least present when someone was murdered the day before [it may have been a short time, hours, since the earlier murder was "around midnight" and I don't see what time of day the later burglary occurred]. He had to know that continuing to commit crimes with the same group of people could end with death, and still pressed on."

Whatever your opinion about this situation, you will be better served by presenting it alongside a more complete and accurate respresentation of facts than this screenshot of a tweet contains.

[–] pineapplelover@lemm.ee 1 points 11 months ago (3 children)

What even is multiple life sentences, never understood it

[–] Nougat@fedia.io 7 points 11 months ago (2 children)

Each conviction carries a sentence. It is not unheard of for a particular conviction of many to be overturned on appeal, or for a sentence for one charge to be modified. In such a case, the remainder of the convictions or sentences remain in place.

There is a certain person who was recently convicted on 34 counts of fraud in New York State, and because of the "specialness?" of this defendant, the Supreme Court decided after the jury returned all those convictions that this defendant is immune from prosecution for certain kinds of crimes. This gives the defendant a ripe avenue to appeal those convictions. Some of those convictions may be overturned on the basis of that immunity ... but not all of them.

The same concepts apply to any convictions and any sentences, including the death penalty. Not only is it just to render consequences for each crime committed, it is also a safeguard to ensure that someone who is convicted of multiple felonies does not escape all consequence in the case that only some of the sentences change in the future.

This very case of Lekeith Smith is a perfect example. 30 years for felony murder, 25 years for burglary and theft, served concurrently. There is a fair argument for overturning that felony murder conviction; there is no such argument for overturning the burglary and theft conviction.

[–] Strykker@programming.dev 2 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I do recall hearing about either precedent or laws relating to being involved in a crime where if someone is killed all involved get charged with the murder regardless of who actually committed it, so that could be the reasoning here.

Though I don't recall any of the specifics.

[–] Rekorse@sh.itjust.works 2 points 11 months ago

Thats exactly what they are talking about, felony murder.

They are likely saying that there are solid arguments both ways on it though.

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