The Senate Courts of Justice Committee
yesterday rejected a House version of a bill that would have expanded
those eligible for the death penalty to include accomplices and
accessories to the murder of a law-enforcement officer.
But it approved an expansion of the death penalty for the murder of fire marshals and auxiliary police officers.
House Bill 502, sponsored by Del. C. Todd Gilbert, R-Shenandoah, was
a narrower version of a previously defeated Senate bill that would have
repealed the so-called "triggerman" law. The "triggerman" law
stipulates, with limited exceptions, that only the actual killer can be
eligible for the death penalty.
Gilbert's bill, defeated 9-6, would have applied only to law-enforcement officers.
