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Monday, September 29, 2008
They call this justice?
I covered enough murder trials as a cops reporter to understand the value of a plea bargain - in theory, at least. It’s almost always better to take a guilty verdict from a suspect than put the question in the hands of 12 people you’ve never seen before.
But theories have to go out the window at times. I’m just as bumfuddled as everyone else at the plea bargain granted to Mark Bowling. Rose Vincent received 29 years in her “deal” in exchange for testifying against the man who asked her to do the killing. Bowling may be out of prison by the time he’s 50. That’s justice?
Look at it this way. If Rose Vincent had never been part of the picture, chances are that Julie Bowling would be dead anyway. A stripper who talked to the Telegram last year told us Mark Bowling had offered her money to kill Julie. Who knows how many other women he propositioned the same way? Or how many he would have asked before he found someone else to do the dirty work?
Rose Vincent is no innocent victim in the case. But even if she was the one who pulled the trigger, it was only because Mark Bowling was pulling the strings that made her do it.
Bowling is a jerk, a coward, a liar and every other name you want to throw at him. Thank goodness there’s a place in prison for him. It’s a criminal shame he won’t be there for the rest of his life.
