|
|
||
|
THREE LIFE TERMS IN ZHANG DEATH Montgomery gets three life terms for delivery driver slaying Date published: 6/30/2009
BY KEITH EPPS Jermaine L. Montgomery will spend the rest of his life in prison for killing food delivery driver Yong Zhang last summer after luring him to a vacant building. Montgomery, 35, was sentenced yesterday to three life sentences after pleading guilty to capital murder, robbery and abduction. The plea agreement spares Montgomery the possibility of the death penalty and spares the state the estimated $1 million cost to proceed with the three-week trial that had been scheduled to start Aug. 31. The evidence shows that Zhang was abducted in Fredericksburg and stabbed to death in Spotsylvania. His body was later recovered in the woods in Sussex County. Marcey White, Montgomery's accomplice, has already pleaded guilty to six charges in Fredericksburg, including abduction and carjacking. She has not been sentenced. Tony Greene, the man accused of helping Montgomery dispose of the body in Sussex, is charged there with being an accessory after the fact. Both White and Greene were expected to testify against Montgomery had the case gone to trial. Commonwealth's Attorney William Neely abandoned his push for the death penalty following a recent hearing in which it was proven that vultures were responsible for Zhang's severed ear and gouged-out eye. Authorities previously believed that Montgomery caused that damage. The "depravity" demonstrated by such actions would have been key in Neely's effort to get the death penalty. After Judge David Beck ruled that the prosecution could not use the mutilation as a basis for seeking the death penalty, Neely determined there was little chance of winning a death verdict. "The triple life sentence imposed today is the toughest sentence imposed in Spotsylvania in over 27 years," Neely said. "It means that Montgomery will die in prison." The plea agreement outlines the overwhelming evidence against Montgomery. Zhang was working for his family's business, China Express in Fredericksburg, when the business received a telephone order for two dinners about 9 p.m. July 3. When Zhang had not returned more than an hour later, city police were called. Blood was found at the vacant apartment building at 202 Charles St., but Zhang was not. White told authorities that she and Montgomery, her on-again, off-again boyfriend, had taken a bus to Fredericksburg about a week earlier to seek work. They stayed briefly with White's sister, but the sister did not like Montgomery and told the couple to leave.
A lethal injection must be less expensive than 50 years in maximum security.
Thats the problem with our justice system....its great for keeping powers in check, but it makes it hard to execute this kind of slime in a back alley, or in a public square for that matter. What ever happened to shipping criminals to australia. No trial, just send them over there and fight it out, if they make it back give them a job. Too many criminals in the country, not enough of a deterrent to keep them from killing innocent people.
The thug had the audacity to shed tears in the courtroom. Gross!
because it's so hard to get and because justice is not swift when it does. Dirtbags like this guy will spend years in the courts and years on death row, all while the public and the victims (and their families) move on, only to be dragged back in many years later. When the day finally does come for them to answer for their crime, it's done "humanely" where they simply fall asleep and die. Instead, we should march these scum right out to be hanged in public upon sentencing. THAT will deter violent crime.
Justice is blind. Evidently It's also cheap and lazy.
|
|
||||||||||||||||
