Draw the line
It’s time to bring back death penalty for cop killers and child murderers
Hatch officer Jose Chavez. Albuquerque officer Daniel Webster. Rio Rancho officer Gregg Benner. Navajo Nation member Ashlynne Mike, just 11. At this time, all of their accused killers are safe from facing the death penalty in New Mexico.
That could change. And it should.
Gov. Susana Martinez is calling for lawmakers to reinstate the death penalty in New Mexico for murderers of police officers and children.
“A society that fails to adequately protect and defend those who protect all of us is a society that will be undone and unsafe,” she said in a statement last Wednesday.
Capital punishment had been on the books for a number of years in New Mexico and applied to the most serious crimes, such as killing a police or corrections officer on duty, as well as murder committed during attempted kidnapping or rape or criminal sexual contact of a child.
But New Mexico repealed capital punishment in 2009 when former Gov. Bill Richardson signed legislation replacing it with a maximum sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole.
After taking office in 2011, Martinez supported legislation to reimpose the death penalty, but it didn’t make it through the Democratic-controlled Legislature. Since then, it has not been part of her legislative agenda — until now.
And that could send a deadly serious message to violent criminals who think nothing of taking the life of law enforcement officers dedicated to protecting the rest of us. People like members of the prison gang Syndicato de Nuevo Mexico who allegedly conspired to kill state Corrections Secretary Gregg Marcantel and his Security Threat Intelligence Unit chief Dwayne Santiestevan.
For officers Jose Chavez — who was laid to rest this weekend — Daniel Webster and Gregg Benner, and innocent Ashlynne Mike, their lives matter. Lawmakers should set this right when they convene in January.