Accountability in Entertainment • Page 313

Right, we don't know. He's an outwardly decent person but could be an abuser

It's also irresponsible to hold an awards show where no one wears masks

 

Yeah I don’t think we need to add to speculation in either direction here

 

Saddened to hear it. Glad she seems to be doing better now. Hoping she finds the support she needs when she gets back into acting.

 

She just wrapped up directing something and acted in something coming out soon-ish

 

Wasn't Anna kendrick dating Edgar Wright around the time of Scott Pilgrim?

 

What the fuck

 

Wait, what?!

 

Death penalty is still a thing? Oh, it's Texas. Fucking hate this country sometimes.

(and, yeah, using a comedian to get a confession out of an inmate is also wrong)

 

literally said the same thing after reading the post, cartoonishly evil

 

What the FUCK

 

Yeah and cancel culture is ruining society

 

wasn't jeff ross just recently accused of abusing someone?

 

I thought he had a teenage girlfriend

 

Yeah I think there was something with him involving a fifteen year old I think?

 

My brain cannot process anything in this tweet. How is this the real timeline??

 

It’s an entirely unique brand of appalling. His Twitter background is apparently a photo of him with men from the prison. I had to read the tweet six times before I posted it here

 

The way that the person wrote the tweet makes it very misleading.

What happened was that the man was tried and convicted of some murder. While that was pending, Jeff Ross’s special happened, in which the man was apparently recorded making statements that, at least according to the prosecution, pointed towards an absence of guilt.

The man was tried and convicted of the murder, and when the prosecution seeks the death penalty in a case, there is a whole separate second “trial” in front of a jury in which the only issue at play is whether to impose the death penalty or not.

At that second “trial,” it is not a question of guilt or innocence, but what kind of punishment is deserved. So while the rules of evidence may still apply to an extent, it is a much more informal affair, as sentencings typically are — the prosecution may present all sorts of things about how bad or dangerous a defendant is, the defense may present all sorts of things about how good they are, etc.

At this death penalty phase, the prosecution introduced those statements from Jeff Ross’s special. The defense objected to them being introduced, stating that doing so would violate his 6th Amendment rights because of a no-contact letter that his lawyers served on the sheriff forbidding law enforcement from talking to him about the case without his lawyer’s consent. The judge overruled the objection and let the statements in, on the basis that Jeff Ross is not a “state agent” and so any communications he may have had with this defendant have nothing to do with his constitutional rights.

So while the prosecution did use those statements as part of its argument for the death penalty, it also undoubtedly used countless other things, most significantly *the fact of the murder itself.*

The defense is now appealing, apparently *solely* on the admission of those statements. If we assume that the appellate courts ultimately side with the defense (huge long shot in its own right), then the only real impact it would have would be a whole new penalty phase without those statements entered into evidence, where they would go right back to arguing for/against the death penalty. Which, I don’t know the whole facts of the case, but honestly based on my experience, appeals like these tend to be much more a matter of due diligence, because even in the case of a win, the odds of that win ultimately resulting in a different outcome are incredibly low.

But ultimately what really irks me is, as I said, the implication that attorney is making that the man’s death penalty sentence essentially turned solely on his statements to Ross. That is absolutely the idea they are trying to put into people’s heads with their tweet being worded like that, and there is simply no way that it is true. A jury is completely within their own discretion whether to give the death penalty or not, and once the defendant has been convicted of the murder itself, that tends to be more than enough for plenty of people

 

I also don’t think there’s anything about this that is the fault of Ross in particular…I haven’t seen any claim that he/his team themselves brought any footage to the attention of the prosecutors specifically. Like it sounds like it was simply some footage that was included in the special for the sake of the special

 

According to this article, the specific footage was not included in the special. Comedy Central was subpoenaed by the prosecutors and it was shown to the jury during the punishment phase.

https://www.rollingstone.com/cultur...eath-penalty-appeal-supreme-court-1234653683/

 

Regardless of its impact (or lack thereof) on the sentence, that still seems fucked up to me

 

Sorry, I'm still caught up in the fact that we as a society, in some parts of the country, are okay with the state having the power to just execute people. I guess that's nothing new and not the most shocking thing about this whole situation, it's just kind of appalling that we still have systems in place to allow this whole thing to happen in the first place. It's fucked that people are like "well this is fine, he's a murderer, he deserves it" as though capital punishment is okay and yet for some reason abortion apparently isn't

 

the video can be easily found on twitter, i wont link it here