Allen County Prosecutor Karen Richards took her time and in the end made the right decision to seek the death penalty against Simon Rios. The death penalty isn't automatic in Indiana just because you kill someone in cold blood -- there have to be aggravating circumstances, in this case the fact that Rios is alleged to have killed more than one person and killed children younger than 12. If this case doesn't qualify for the death penalty, we might as well not have it, never mind that Rios is also charged in another case, the abduction, rape and killing of 10-year-old Alejandra Gutierrez. I thought this was interesting from the defense attorney:
Kraus also is seeking to have a jury selected from outside the Allen County area, contending there has been too much pretrial publicity. Kraus has said she wants the jury to come from somewhere with a Hispanic population similar to Allen County's.
I'm not sure about the value of getting a jury pool with a similar Hispanic population. Certainly Rios is entitled to a jury of his peers, but does Kraus really believe Hispanics are more tolerant of people charged with murdering their entire families?
