Lizzie Borden Society Forum

Assume you were on the jury and you had found Lizzie guilty. What should have been her punishment?

I voted "life-sentence, no parole"-- but with release, of course, should new evidence proving someone else guilty emerge.
In Lizzie's for-instance, Emma would have had more than enough money to spend, if she so chose, on private detectives to determine "the real culprit." And, too, on further legal counsel to take the matter to a higher court, or courts.
Emma could have placed full-page advertisements in every major newspaper in the country, offering $10,000 for information leading to an arrest and conviction in the case.
Andy Rooney did as much on "60 Minutes" right after the Simpson verdict, and we know the rest of that story.

That's a good question, Harry. At the time there were two degrees of murder in Massachusetts, first and second, both with mandatory sentences. First degree murder required the death penalty and second degree murder required a life sentence. This was established in 1858. Since insanity was not claimed by the defense, commitment to a mental institution would not be a choice, nor would any sentence less than life in prison. Since there were two murders, with a span of time between them, there was premeditation. This leaves no recourse under the laws at the time for anything other than the death penalty, a jury would have no other choice. Lizzie was tried for first degree murder, so to find her guilty of second degree murder was not an option. If I had been on the jury and we had found Lizzie guilty, her sentence would have to be death by hanging.

If I were on the jury and convinced of her guilt, she'd have followed in Mary Surratt's footsteps. It's the only fitting punishment for such a heinous crime.

I voted for the death sentence by hanging; if Lizzie had been found guilty, then the jury wouldn't have had any other choice.

Since pressing with stones was not an option, hanging would be the thing.

I voted for a life sentence with no parole. I have never believed in the death penalty. If people are wrongfully convicted and later found innocent, you can release them. If they have been executed, there is nothing that you can do.

As of 1893, the year of Miss Borden's trial, Hassachusetts had hung only two women in the past 114 years.

The electiric chair was introduced in 1891. Massachusetts used it to electocute its first victim in 1901.

I can find no death penatty for a women in Massachusetts since that time.

This website has a detailed listing by state of all executions from 1608 to 2002. It is in PDF format. Massachusetts begins on page 148.

According to this listing the last woman executed in Massachusetts was a Rachel Wall for robbery on Oct. 8, 1789.

http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/ESPYstate.pdf

My mind is running on fumes today, so I leave this to the historians for clarification and/or correction:
I remember a TV doc that claimed the following about the last two women executed in Massachusetts:
(1) One kept professing her innocence, and, on the very day she was hanged, she was proved right, though of course too late. The real perp came forward.

(2) The other kept claiming she was with child. The authorities thought this a ruse. After her hanging (and I presume some sort of primitive autopsy), she was found to be about halfway through her child-carrying term.

Well, Judge Robert Sullivan in Goodbye, Lizzie Borden mentions Bathsheba Spooner as the last woman hanged in Massachusetts. The conviction was for "Inciting, abetting, and procuring the manner and form of murder." Spooner was hanged at Worcester 2 July 1778. (This is the gal you're thinking of, DJ.) The process seems to have been fraught with issues there too.

But Sullivan seems to have overlooked Rachel Wall, who was convicted of and hanged for the crime of robbery on Boston Common the 8th of October 1789. Wall apparently had an eye for ladies' bonnets, attempted to steal a bonnet from one Margaret Bender. (Wall is also said to have tried to rip Margaret Bender's tongue out in the course of the robbery.)

Strangely, the crime Wall wanted to be tried and hanged for was piracy, although she stoutly maintained she'd never killed anybody.

It's possible that Judge Sullivan confined his research to murder, in which case his claim that Bathsheba Spooner was the last could be correct

I voted "Death by Hanging" thinking along the lines that Yooper did. By the laws that were present at the time, we would have no choice but to give Lizzie a death sentence if found guilty. If we did have a choice as to her sentence, given the information that the jury was allowed to hear at that time, I would have voted for "jail time with chance of parole".

I imagine if I had been a female jurist on the Borden trial in the 1890s, I probably would have been more of a spectacle than Lizzie herself! It got me thinking as to when women were first allowed to serve on a jury. The first sexually integrated grand jury to hear cases was in Cheyenne, Wyoming in 1870. The chief justice stopped a motion to prohibit the integration of the jury, stating: “It seems to be eminently proper for women to sit upon Grand Juries, which will give them the best possible opportunities to aid in suppressing the dens of infamy which curse the country.” This right to serve was later taken away.

I didn't realize how fairly recent the decision is to allow women jurists! In 1947, Fay v. New York, 332 U.S. 261 (1947), the U.S. Supreme Court says women are equally qualified with men to serve on juries but are granted an exemption and may serve or not as women choose. It wasn't until the 1950s that we see women serve on juries again.

Sorry, Harry, I didn't mean to shanghai your post, I just thought this info was interesting. Imagine Lizzie being tried by a true jury of her peers, that would have been something to see and read about!

You can read further about the Wyoming story here:
http://www.americanheritage.com/article ... 3_62.shtml

Well I chose death sentence because, if guilty, there is unquestionably premeditation.

Too bad Lizzie dear,
done to death by the noose, I fear.

I voted for life with no porole.

Death. The crime was heinous, clearly premeditated, and, IMNSHO, guilt was proved beyond reasonable doubt, even without the excluded evidence. 'Nuff said, I think.