The prosecutor’s position

Satz had no choice, really, but to file that notice. If prosecutors are considering the death penalty, state law requires them to say so within 45 days of a defendant’s arraignment. And as Satz said a week after the shooting: “This certainly is the type of case the death penalty was designed for. This was a highly calculated and premeditated murder of 17 people and the attempted murder of everyone in that school.”

Politically speaking, Satz had to do it. When the state attorney in Orange County refused to seek the death penalty for someone who killed an Orlando police officer, Gov. Rick Scott removed her from the high-profile case because “she will not fight for justice.”

More than that, Satz is an old-school prosecutor, first elected in 1976, who not infrequently pursues the death penalty, often to force plea deals. How could his office maintain such an approach if he failed to pursue death for one of the nation’s 10 worst mass murders?

Most importantly, Satz, who isn’t speaking publicly about the case, is there to prosecute the person who shot 17 people and killed another 17 families’ loved ones. It would be wrong for him not to entertain the death penalty, given the carnage, the ruthlessness, the premeditation, the confession, the hurt and the pain. Plus, the survivors and victims’ families need time to sort out what they want.