Opinion ID: 2344370
Heading Depth: 5
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: Anthony McDougald.

Text: Summary: McDougald and a thirteen-year-old accomplice killed the parents of another thirteen-year-old, with whom he had been having sex. He attacked the parents in their bedroom, cutting the man's throat, stabbing him, and hitting him with a baseball bat. When the co-defendant proved unable to kill the woman quickly enough, McDougald hit the woman with a cinderblock, hit her with the bat, and then cut her throat. He then pulled off her underpants and violated her with the bat. For each victim, the jury found aggravating factors 4(c), [intent to cause suffering], 4(f), [escape detection (to cover up his statutory rape of their daughter)], and 4(g) [murder within the course of burglary]. The jury also found that McDougald acted under extreme mental or emotional disturbance and the catch-all mitigating factor. Because the jury determined that the aggravating factors outweighed the mitigating factors, he was sentenced to death. We overturned the death sentences because the instruction on the 4(c) intent to cause suffering aggravating factor was flawed. State v. McDougald, 120 N.J. 523, 577 A. 2d 419 (1990). In the penalty phase re-trial, the jury found that, as to the male victim, the murder was committed to escape detection; and, as to the female victim, that the murder was committed to escape detection and that the murder involved an aggravated battery and depravity of mind. The jury also found that McDougald was under extreme mental or emotional disturbance, suffered from mental disease, defect or intoxication, and had established some catch-all mitigating factors. The jury also found that while in the Marines, McDougald spent time in a Japanese prison and that he had sought help before the offense. The jury could not decide whether the aggravating factors outweighed the mitigating factors. Accordingly, McDougald was sentenced to consecutive life terms, with sixty years of parole ineligibility, to run consecutive to his sentences on the non-capital crimes. Comparison: Defendant contends that McDougald's case, although characterized by rage and lacking robbery as a motive, is similar to his case, except with more victimization. According to defendant, there is no rational reason McDougald ultimately received a life sentence while defendant remains on death row. The State freely acknowledges that the brutality in McDougald's case was equal to that of defendant's. However, the State argues that defendant is more blameworthy for having intentionally selected older  and, hence, more vulnerable  victims. The State also argues that because McDougald's murders were essentially motivated by rage, jealousy, and passion[,] he is less blameworthy, although the jury's finding that McDougald committed the murders to escape detection belies the State's claim in this regard. The State further points out that the jury found two mitigating factors in McDougald's case that were not found in defendant's case: extreme mental or emotional disturbance and mental disease, defect, or intoxication. McDougald's crime was horrifying. But, because McDougald was initially sentenced to death and because the jury found the existence of two important mitigating factors that defendant's jury rejected, it cannot be said that McDougald's ultimate life sentence indicates that defendant was unfairly singled out for capital punishment.