Eddie Ray Routh Found Guilty in 'American Sniper' Murder Trial

[Snowman78]

A Texas jury has found Eddie Ray Routh guilty of murder in the killings of "American Sniper" Chris Kyle and Kyle's friend, Chad Littlefield.
The jury announced its verdict at around 10:20 p.m. E.T. at a Stephenville courthouse. They were given the case at 7:36 p.m. E.T.
Prosecutors did not seek the death penalty, and Routh was sentenced to life in prison without parole.
Routh, 27, admitted to killing both men at the shooting range of Rough Creek Lodge and Resort, southwest of Dallas, on Feb. 2, 2013.
Routh pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity to capital murder. His attorneys have said Routh, a former Marine corporal who served in Iraq but not in a combat role, was in the grip of a medically diagnosed psychosis at the time of the killings.
Prosecutors said that Routh was drinking and smoking marijuana on the morning of the crime. They argue that he was paranoid because he was high, and that he was angry about living with his parents, relationship problems, money and his job — then finally exploded when Kyle and Littlefield snubbed him.
Prosecutors said that Routh was drinking and smoking marijuana on the morning of the crime. They argue that he was paranoid because he was high, and that he was angry about living with his parents, relationship problems, money and his job — then finally exploded when Kyle and Littlefield snubbed him.
Experts for the prosecution have testified that Routh knew what he was doing was wrong when he killed the two men.
Earlier Thursday, jurors heard a recording in which Routh told a reporter nearly four months after the killings that, "It tore my (expletive) heart out what I did. I don't know why I did it, but I did it."
Routh, speaking to a reporter from The New Yorker magazine on May 31, 2013, said, "I feel so (expletive) about it. I guess you live and learn, you know."
"American Sniper," the movie based on Kyle's account of his experiences as a Navy SEAL, was nominated for best picture at the Oscars. Kyle's widow, Taya, attended the ceremony on Sunday night before flying back to Texas for the rest of the trial.

[beast556]

Good news, to bad he didnt get the needle.

[Jeffrey Lebowski]

Good news, to bad he didnt get the needle.

Honestly, better to live long and lonely with the guilt.

[Irving]

Hmmm, I was always under the impression that he killed himself at the time as well. Guess I never really followed the story. Glad to hear he was found guilty.

[Spdu4ia]

Firing squad?

[RCCrawler]

Hopefully Bubba is good to him

[Big E3]

We the people will be paying for appeal after appeal. Hope he stays that way.

[KestrelBike]

Asshat just scored free welfare for life.

[Rooskibar03]

Now put a bullet in him.

http://i1382.photobucket.com/albums/ah253/Rooskibar03/caf9a0da59034ff4bab6102bd07ddbbc_zpseaa3b342.jpg

[sniper7]

It really is a shame Kyle didn't drop him right there. At least justice is being served, not as harshly as I would like, but it is still being served.

[Fentonite]

Honestly, better to live long and lonely with the guilt.

I disagree. End him. Why should we (tax-payers) keep spending our money to keep him alive? He will never be a contributor to our society, so I don't think we should spend money keeping him alive. Quite simply, it's bad economics.

[mcantar18c]

Normally... every other time... I agree with that sentiment. Why waste the taxpayer's money.
But in this case, my initial reaction is to say let him live out his sentence. As Marcus Luttrell said, if he thought he had PTSD before, just wait till the boys in the Texas Penitentiary System find out that he murdered a Texas hero. I'd say it's worth the money.

[Jeffrey Lebowski]

I disagree. End him. Why should we (tax-payers) keep spending our money to keep him alive? He will never be a contributor to our society, so I don't think we should spend money keeping him alive. Quite simply, it's bad economics.

Because you are going to spend at least as much if not more to "end him." It is "bad economics" either option with this guy.
http://deathpenalty.procon.org/view.answers.php?questionID=001000

What would YOU rather have if you did something horribly wrong? Decades of confinement, guilt, surprise buttsecks, miscellaneous prison fights from zero-liability humans, or a quick end?
I know my answer.

[Hound]

He will live in hell till he actually dies. I have no problem with that as long as he stays in TX.

[Chad4000]

Normally... every other time... I agree with that sentiment. Why waste the taxpayer's money.
But in this case, my initial reaction is to say let him live out his sentence. As Marcus Luttrell said, if he thought he had PTSD before, just wait till the boys in the Texas Penitentiary System find out that he murdered a Texas hero. I'd say it's worth the money.

totally agreed here....

[roberth]

Good news, to bad he didnt get the needle.

Yes, a needle, the black plaque, something heinous and painful.


Honestly, better to live long and lonely with the guilt.

Guilt? I'm certain that POS only feels bad about two things and those are getting caught and convicted.

[Jeffrey Lebowski]

Guilt? I'm certain that POS only feels bad about two things and those are getting caught and convicted.

I'm less certain of that myself. He'll have a lot of time to think about this.



Earlier Thursday, jurors heard a recording in which Routh told a reporter nearly four months after the killings that, "It tore my (expletive) heart out what I did. I don't know why I did it, but I did it."
Routh, speaking to a reporter from The New Yorker magazine on May 31, 2013, said, "I feel so (expletive) about it. I guess you live and learn, you know."


Maybe he is feigning that for teh court, I don't know, but I'm certain of nothing.

I believe, however, he is getting the worst possible punishment, or at least what I would consider worst if I were in that situation.

[sellersm]

My comments in no way are intended to take away from Kyle or Littlefield. The whole thing stinks to me. A guy toking & drinking can put multiple shots into two victims, both highly skilled & trained, and then get away with it? Something isn't right here...

Kyle was supposedly shot 6 times and Littlefield 7 times, all from a drug/alchohol induced Routh... Perhaps, but it seems to me that something else was going on that day. Would you just stand by and let your friend get 6 shots put into him?

Dallas medical examiner testimony: http://crimeblog.dallasnews.com/2015/02/testimony-continues-thursday-in-american-sniper-trial.html/


Update at 5:48 p.m.: A Dallas County medical examiner testified Thursday that ex-Navy SEAL Chris Kyle had been shot six times, and his friend, Chad Littlefield, had been shot seven times.Chief Dallas County Medical Examiner Jeffrey Barnard was the final witness to testify Thursday. The trial will resume 9 a.m. Friday.
Barnard and prosecutor Jane Starnes went over diagrams before the jury showing the multiple gunshot wounds on Littlefield’s and Kyle’s bodies. Starnes kneeled before Barnard so that he could point to a spot on the top of her head to indicate one of the first gunshot wounds Littlefield suffered.

Again, I'm not saying anything against the victims. Just wondering if it wasn't someone else (or others) who should have been found guilty?

[Fentonite]

Because you are going to spend at least as much if not more to "end him." It is "bad economics" either option with this guy.
http://deathpenalty.procon.org/view.answers.php?questionID=001000

What would YOU rather have if you did something horribly wrong? Decades of confinement, guilt, surprise buttsecks, miscellaneous prison fights from zero-liability humans, or a quick end?
I know my answer.

I clicked the link, kinda interesting. Thanks for posting it. Seems like most (not all) of the opinions stated there were regarding the cost of the initial trial, not necessarily the entire cost of lifelong incarceration, multiple repeated appeals from a bored inmate, etc. There were reasoned arguments on both sides. Maybe my "bad economics" argument doesn't hold water, maybe it does, I'm not convinced either way now. I get your point.

Regardless, I still prefer that scumbags like this are put down. Granted, if I was in their shoes, I (like you) would prefer a quick end. But I'm not convinced that psychopaths think like you or me. Many times they have agreed to a life sentence without parole, so that they could avoid the needle. These scumbags are so megalomaniacal that their own existence is all-important. I don't think that they have the capacity for self-reflection or meaningful feelings of guilt, let alone actual rehabilitation.

Besides, prisoners in the US have way too many rights. If we could send him to a Mexican or Turkish prison, that might be suitable. Sure, he's gonna have some miserable times in a US prison, but he's also gonna still be alive. He's gonna watch tv. He might make a friend. He will probably be a pain in the ass to a C.O., just for fun. The thought of him even laughing at a tv show one time, or being even a little bit happy that he gets Cheetos from the commissary, bothers me. He should never again have even the tiniest thing to find pleasure in.

That's just my opinion. We both agree that he's a POS who deserves nothing but badness in his future; we just see the details differently.

[Dave_L]

Who cares if ending it early is what the convict wants. The only people that want to die are people that have nothing left to live for. Giving that to the convict won't allow them to "win". They're dying, they lose. We can all move on knowing they aren't using our oxygen anymore. Keeping them in jail allows them to breathe, which is more than what the victims are able to do.

[Gunner]

I disagree. End him. Why should we (tax-payers) keep spending our money to keep him alive? He will never be a contributor to our society, so I don't think we should spend money keeping him alive. Quite simply, it's bad economics.
I agree 100% he could potentially spend the next 60+years behind bars. If we say it costs about 30k a year we could have spent upwards or 1.8 million to lock him up for the next 60 years assuming he lives that long. What a waste of money. We need to start executing people who commit murder. Code of Hammurabi eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth.

[TFOGGER]

In my mind, the argument that the Death Penalty provides a deterrent is moot. Totally irrelevant whether it is an effective deterrent or not. The death penalty may or may not deter someone from committing a similar crime, but it would be 100% effective in ensuring that THIS PARTICULAR SCUMBAG never, ever committed another murder. Sure, there's something to be said for keeping him alive and suffering in a prison somewhere, but the death penalty eliminates the possibility that (via pardon or clemency at some future date) he could ever pose a threat to anyone.

[Jeffrey Lebowski]

I clicked the link, kinda interesting. Thanks for posting it. Seems like most (not all) of the opinions stated there were regarding the cost of the initial trial, not necessarily the entire cost of lifelong incarceration, multiple repeated appeals from a bored inmate, etc. There were reasoned arguments on both sides. Maybe my "bad economics" argument doesn't hold water, maybe it does, I'm not convinced either way now. I get your point.

Regardless, I still prefer that scumbags like this are put down. Granted, if I was in their shoes, I (like you) would prefer a quick end. But I'm not convinced that psychopaths think like you or me. Many times they have agreed to a life sentence without parole, so that they could avoid the needle. These scumbags are so megalomaniacal that their own existence is all-important. I don't think that they have the capacity for self-reflection or meaningful feelings of guilt, let alone actual rehabilitation.

Besides, prisoners in the US have way too many rights. If we could send him to a Mexican or Turkish prison, that might be suitable. Sure, he's gonna have some miserable times in a US prison, but he's also gonna still be alive. He's gonna watch tv. He might make a friend. He will probably be a pain in the ass to a C.O., just for fun. The thought of him even laughing at a tv show one time, or being even a little bit happy that he gets Cheetos from the commissary, bothers me. He should never again have even the tiniest thing to find pleasure in.

That's just my opinion. We both agree that he's a POS who deserves nothing but badness in his future; we just see the details differently.

I would agree that this guy is probably sick beyond our comprehension. I also agree that prison in the US has probably swung too far the other way from the days of Alcatraz. Let alone TVs and cheetos, this guy will probably be working on a college (law?) degree like so many others.

I'm not against the death penalty per se, I'm against the unbelievable expense, the drama, the years to achieve, etc, etc. I agree that putting this guy in prison for life is costly. It also seems that the costs associated with a capital punishment trial would be heavily front-loaded by design, but from what I'm reading, it seems more expensive. There must be some sort of balance between the Chinese instant firing line and the current American system of 50 appeals and then 20 years later and injection. If the economics and system weren't what they were, I wouldn't be as anti death penalty as it stands.

The arguments on it being a deterrent don't mean much to me. Besides, he may get swifter justice in jail, much like Dahmer. [Dunno] I do know I don't ever want to hear about him again, as we are certain to never stop hearing about James Holmes for the next decade.

[TFOGGER]

Besides, he may get swifter justice in jail, much like Dahmer.

One can only hope someone tries to feed him a urinal...

[Big E3]

I don't like him having any hope that he will ever get out. As long as he is alive and the death penalty is not on the table he has hope. If he is convicted and sentenced to death he gets to count down the days to the end. Yes he would get appeal after appeal, but every time he lost an appeal he gets to start counting down the days in despair. I don't want him to ever say "This ain't so bad they can't do anything to me I'm already here for life". He needs to feel every day is one day closer to a needle. I'm still pissed that every year or so Charles Manson gets to show up at the parole board and hope.

[osok-308]

Honestly, better to live long and lonely with the guilt.

Disagree. Now he can cost the tax payers for the next 60 years of his life.

[DAL357]

So if he had a secret saint who'd foot his total incarceration bill privately, would that be okay? Far-fetched? Sure. But it's not about the money, really, is it? That's just a rationalization. You don't need to justify wanting to ice this piece of human debris for his crime, the murders he committed are all the justification needed. When you bring up the money angle all you are doing is unwittingly handing the anti-death penalty crowd a way to fight against you; they will focus so much on your position on the costs that the heinous act itself is forgotten and, ipso facto, the killer somehow becomes a saint. Don't play their game.

Now, my idea would be life without the possibility of parole/pardon IF we had hard-labor prisons where you work for your keep, or you starve to death. No televisions, weights to build jailhouse muscle, or any other kind of entertainment or distraction. Work, eat, sleep, day after day after day, with only death to look forward to. Shaved heads all around, too. THAT would be real punishment.

BTW, the above type of prison does not apply to those locked due to malum prohibitum laws, only to those in for breaking malum in se laws: murderers, rapists, violent attackers, violent thieves, child molesters, corrupt politicians and cops, etc.

[Squeeze]

A lot of people here are complaining about having to "pay" a lot of money for this scumbag to rot in prison for the rest of his life. Many do not know that it actually costs more to put someone to death via death penalty in the U.S. than to give them life in prison. Something I picked up during my college days from a great law professor. The whole thing is, as soon as someone has been handed the death penalty, the appeal process starts. Every phone call, fax, correspondence exchanged, attorney(s) & judges time to review every legal document or assembly costs $$$ and they get paid well for all of that. Over the course of 20+ years those bills add up to a metric shit ton of money. For example; median cost for a death penalty case is $1.26 million. Non-death penalty case costs were counted through to the end of incarceration with a median cost $740,000. Just some food for thought.

Regardless of cost I would've like to have seen Routh get put to death. The fact he's stealing oxygen from a perfectly hard-working tree is just wrong.

[MarkUSMC88]

. The whole thing is, as soon as someone has been handed the death penalty, the appeal process starts. Every phone call, fax, correspondence exchanged, attorney(s) & judges time to review every legal document or assembly costs $$$ and they get paid well for all of that.

Actually, most capital defense lawyers I've known work for the state, and they don't get paid well at all. Decent salary, but not what most would expect a lawyer would get. Same with capital appeals lawyers. Most capital cases don't involve people with lots of extra money sitting around to pay a private lawyer. That's why most capital cases are defended by the public defender's office and appealed by the public defender's appeal division. No one is getting rich from these cases.

[sniper7]

Sounds like we need to fix it. You get convicted for the death penalty, you get one appeal. That one goes the same way....lights out.

[Spdu4ia]

Trial->verdict->death penalty->go out and shoot him behind the chemical shed-> done

All in one day

[roberth]

Trial->verdict->death penalty->go out and shoot him behind the chemical shed-> done

All in one day

Yup, guilty with swift execution of sentence.

[Bitter Clinger]

A bullet to the head is about 15 cents.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7iWRiIf3T8