FLORIDA TODAY
A 45-year-old wheelchair-bound man who allegedly robbed a Space Coast Credit Union branch on Merritt Island this afternoon was arrested minutes later near the parking lot of a FLORIDA TODAY office a block away from the bank, the Brevard County Sheriff’s Office said.
Merritt Island resident Christopher Reed was arrested about 4:20 p.m., about 10 minutes after the bank was robbed, according to investigators.
Investigators said Reed, who is a paraplegic confined to a motorized wheelchair, entered the bank on the 400 block of Fortenberry Road on Merritt Island, and demanded money, after telling the employees that he was armed with an explosive device.
“He left the bank with an undisclosed amount of money,” according to Brevard County Sheriff’s Office Lt. Vic DeSantis.
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Courtesy Amnesty International
Death Penalty Cost
“Using conservative rough projections, the Commission estimates the annual costs of the present system ($137 million per year), the present system after implementation of the reforms … ($232.7 million per year) … and a system which imposes a maximum penalty of lifetime incarceration instead of the death penalty ($11.5 million).”
–California Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice, July 1, 2008
Recent Cost Studies
* A 2003 legislative audit in Kansas found that the estimated cost of a death penalty case was 70% more than the cost of a comparable non-death penalty case. Death penalty case costs were counted through to execution (median cost $1.26 million). Non-death penalty case costs were counted through to the end of incarceration (median cost $740,000).
(December 2003 Survey by the Kansas Legislative Post Audit)
* In Tennessee, death penalty trials cost an average of 48% more than the average cost of trials in which prosecutors seek life imprisonment.
(2004 Report from Tennessee Comptroller of the Treasury Office of Research)
* In Maryland death penalty cases cost 3 times more than non-death penalty cases, or $3 million for a single case.
(Urban Institute, The Cost of the Death Penalty in Maryland, March 2008)
* In California the current sytem costs $137 million per year; it would cost $11.5 million for a system without the death penalty.
(California Commission for the Fair Administration of Justice, July 2008)
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Courtesy Chron (The Houston Chronicle)
GALVESTON — About 1,000 prisoners and a full jail staff remained in the Galveston County Jail on Galveston Island this morning, even as the island began to be battered by the onslaught of Hurricane Ike.
The reason for not evacuating the prisoners is a security issue and cannot be discussed, sheriff’s spokesman Maj. Ray Tuttoilmondo said.
“The prisoners and their safety and well-being are paramount and it will be handled,” Tuttoilmondo said.
Any decision to move the prisoners would be kept secret for security reasons, as happened before Hurricane Rita in 2005, he said.
“We did this during Rita and no one knew until it was absolutely done,” Tuttoilmondo said.
The prisoners were in the jail as of 10 a.m. today, leaving little time to transfer them to the mainland. Hurricane-force winds are expected to strike the island later today, making exit across the causeway to the mainland difficult.
Tuttoilmondo declined to say how many deputies were at the jail, but said a full jail staff and relief shifts remained on duty at the lockup at 57th Street and Broadway.
He also declined to discuss measures the Sheriff’s Office would take to make sure the prisoners and jail staff remained safe if a storm surge floods the jail.
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*Thank you to Betsy, The HORN’s Texas Ninja for this Article.
