Cory Maye free
July 1, 2011 1:18 PM   Subscribe

After spending ten years in prison for capital murder, most of it on death row, Cory Maye is to be set free.
posted by vivelame (32 comments total) 13 users marked this as a favorite
 
Radley Balko did a fine, fine thing by bringing this case to the attention of the public.
posted by vivelame at 1:19 PM on July 1, 2011 [1 favorite]


Presumably if Cory Maye had taken the time to establish whether the men invading his home were cops before pulling the trigger, he would have been shot on sight. The police error placed him in an impossible nightmare which this decision mitigates only partially. I am glad he is not going to be murdered by the state.
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 1:38 PM on July 1, 2011 [8 favorites]


Gods, the full story is terrible. Not only a bust on the wrong apartment, but a full-force entry on assurance from an informant that there was marijuana in the apartment? OK, it's an illegal substance, but is that much force necessary for pot?
posted by filthy light thief at 1:41 PM on July 1, 2011


Every time that I want to totally write off Reason I have to add Except for Radley Balko, may he live a thousand years under my breath after it.

Interesting that this happened in a county named after a traitor to the United States.
posted by atrazine at 1:45 PM on July 1, 2011 [3 favorites]


This July 4th, I'm going to cherish my right of vicinage.
posted by Renoroc at 1:52 PM on July 1, 2011


atrazine, Jefferson Davis is a more complex character than that. Sure, historians have criticized Davis for being a much less effective war leader than Abraham Lincoln, which they attribute to Davis being overbearing, controlling, and overly meddlesome, as well as being out of touch with public opinion, but in the end, he stood behind the united Union and spoke against repeating the same fight.

/derail
posted by filthy light thief at 1:54 PM on July 1, 2011 [1 favorite]


In the middle, he rose up in rebellion and took a leadership role in a war that spilled the blood of over half a million of his countrymen.

So yeah, let's stick with "traitor".
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 1:57 PM on July 1, 2011 [4 favorites]


You know horror movies don't bother much. This is the type of thing that frightens the crap out of me. Living a normal life all of a sudden due to circumstance.... BAM! Your up against the wall.
posted by Rubbstone at 2:04 PM on July 1, 2011 [6 favorites]


Every time that I want to totally write off Reason I have to add Except for Radley Balko, may he live a thousand years under my breath after it.

Since he's moved to Huffington Post you can drop that habit. I think that's just a different plate of stinky insanity (with an addition of a sidebar of gossip & upskirt skeeze) but I'm sure some people think it's an improvement.
posted by phearlez at 2:32 PM on July 1, 2011 [1 favorite]


He's free now, but he is still convicted of a manslaughter charge. His life is still ruined, though he is on the outside.
posted by Monday at 3:20 PM on July 1, 2011


He's free and he has a family. Yes, his life is nothing like it would have been if this hadn't happened but I'm pretty sure if you asked him today if he felt his life was "still ruined" he would be incredulous.
posted by Justinian at 4:25 PM on July 1, 2011


Life in post-racial America, eh?
posted by birdhaus at 4:49 PM on July 1, 2011


I like how one of the heroes of the story is the (former) county pubic defender Bob Evans. These stories are usually about how ineffective the PD was (case in point--the TX attorney who slept through parts of a death penalty trial).

In the longer article that filthy light thief linked, it discusses how the private attorney was inexperienced and should never have accepted the case. But I can see why families would assume a private attorney would automatically be better--I've seen it as a PD myself. Last fall I had a former client hire a kid just out of law school, no trial experience and only a month after his bar admission, on a gun minimum felony case! There are some great PDs out there, but the lousy ones give us all a bad name...
posted by janerica at 4:50 PM on July 1, 2011 [1 favorite]


One of the things that has always bothered me about this case is the certainty that I have that if Cory Maye had been shot with his hands up and a cry on his lips about not hurting his daughter, there would have been no consequence except maybe some embarrassment from the cops. Even if his daughter had been shot, all that would have happened would be administrative leave, at worst. We cut police a great deal of slack in these cases, but the moment a man, scared at the thought of a home invasion tries to defend himself, he finds himself on death row for years.

No-knock raids are a license for murder and mayhem.
posted by Hactar at 5:12 PM on July 1, 2011 [23 favorites]


...county pubic defender Bob Evans.

Spell checker will get you every time on that.
posted by marxchivist at 5:47 PM on July 1, 2011 [1 favorite]


Whoops! Though that is my favorite typo.
posted by janerica at 6:16 PM on July 1, 2011


If he hadn't had that gun, the officer would still be alive and he wouldn't have spent the last 10 years in prison.

I feel desperately sorry for people on death row for crimes they didn't commit, but this guy killed somebody to protect his fucking property. That gets you a murder conviction in Canada, because you CANNOT use deadly force here to protect your property. The cops would never have killed him without a fucking HANDGUN in his hands. No private citizen needs a fucking HANDGUN.

This is all kinds of fucked up and I'll say it once again- I am SO HAPPY not to be living in that shithole called the USA anymore.
posted by ethnomethodologist at 6:35 PM on July 1, 2011


I am SO HAPPY not to be living in that shithole called the USA anymore.

Hope you didn't let the door hit you on the way out.
posted by Justinian at 6:48 PM on July 1, 2011 [10 favorites]


ethno,

He was protecting his fucking daughter.
posted by effugas at 6:49 PM on July 1, 2011 [2 favorites]


To protect his property? You think shooting an armed intruder who is in your house is protecting property? Who not only kicked your front door in, but then decided to go for you in the bedroom? Things really must be different in Canada.
posted by wierdo at 6:51 PM on July 1, 2011 [3 favorites]


Oh, and by the way, I'm not aware of any state where it's legal to shoot someone in defense of property, unless that person is in your home. Maybe there is one, but I live in one of the gun-lovingest places on the face of the Earth and that's not legal here.
posted by wierdo at 6:52 PM on July 1, 2011


but this guy killed somebody to protect his fucking property.

No he didn't. RTFA.

No private citizen needs a fucking HANDGUN.

Unidentified people kicking in your door at 3AM is in no way an argument against owning a handgun.

That gets you a murder conviction in Canada, because you CANNOT use deadly force here to protect your property. The cops would never have killed him without a fucking HANDGUN in his hands.

No unarmed person has ever been shot by the cops. This is based on my careful research into the issue.

No private citizen needs a fucking HANDGUN.

Safety scissors for all!

I am SO HAPPY not to be living in that shithole called the USA anymore.

Well, since you left, it's just a hole.
posted by Inspector.Gadget at 7:09 PM on July 1, 2011 [10 favorites]


There are some great PDs out there, but the lousy ones give us all a bad name...

a good lawyer, a good doctor, a good teacher, a good politician, and yes a good policeman is worth their weight in gold. These are people who day after day hold the lives of others in their hands and therefore must be held to a higher standard - and respect when they hold that standard - than those who just move money around.
posted by any major dude at 7:31 PM on July 1, 2011


The cops would never have killed him without a fucking HANDGUN in his hands.

You don't think that happens in Canada too?
posted by chaff at 8:06 PM on July 1, 2011


The cops do something completely asinine, a guy ends up in jail over it, and amazingly it becomes an argument against handguns.

Really? Do you listen to yourself?

If only the victim in the case had been polite enough to allow the intruders to do whatever they wanted to him! Then everything would be fine!
posted by sonic meat machine at 8:22 PM on July 1, 2011 [4 favorites]


The reason these raids are often conducted late at night or very early in the morning is to catch suspects while they’re sleeping and least capable of processing what’s going on around them.

This is exactly why they should NOT be conducted at night.
posted by XhaustedProphet at 9:09 PM on July 1, 2011


ethnomethodologist writes "The cops would never have killed him without a fucking HANDGUN in his hands. No private citizen needs a fucking HANDGUN."

This exact same scenario could play out with a Canada legal long gun. In fact pretty well any rifle will punch through standard cop body armour increasing the danger.
posted by Mitheral at 2:50 AM on July 2, 2011


I feel desperately sorry for people on death row for crimes they didn't commit, but this guy killed somebody to protect his fucking property.

Not true. He wasn't exactly taking a carefully aimed shot at a trespasser here.

That gets you a murder conviction in Canada, because you CANNOT use deadly force here to protect your property. The cops would never have killed him without a fucking HANDGUN in his hands.

Many Canadians have shotguns, but to be fair it is unlikely that a shotgun would punch through body armor and many fewer Canadians keep them loaded.

People in England, with its strict gun laws, have shot intruders and not been convicted. Notable exceptions have been the farmer who shot a boy in the back as he was fleeing. They're just about to change the law to further clarify the right to use any available force against burglars (obviously not if they're outside or running away - which is not relevant here). Although that force does not include handguns in the UK, it does include other lethal weapons.

The real problem here, and the focus of Radley Balko's campaign, is the militarisation of American policing. Paramilitary style raids like this are becoming more and more routine and violence is the inevitable consequence of that.
posted by atrazine at 3:07 AM on July 2, 2011


atrazine wrote: The real problem here, and the focus of Radley Balko's campaign, is the militarisation of American policing. Paramilitary style raids like this are becoming more and more routine and violence is the inevitable consequence of that.

This. There are times when paramilitary style raids may be appropriate, but they're entirely overused here in the US.
posted by wierdo at 5:41 PM on July 2, 2011




Cory Maye Update
posted by homunculus at 5:36 PM on July 15, 2011


Cory Maye Comes Home
posted by homunculus at 12:45 PM on July 26, 2011


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