From Deseret News:
Robert Stott, a veteran prosecutor with the Salt Lake County District Attorney’s Office, has screened and prosecuted plenty of murder cases in his career.
Without question, the capital cases are the toughest to take on.
…
The general public understandably gets outraged at horrific crimes, but once people are seated on a jury, the hot rhetoric fades away and individuals sometimes struggle with the gravity of ending another human life.“What I have found is that since the statute was changed to offer life without the possibility of parole, it’s more difficult to get a death penalty verdict,” Stott said. “Jurors realize that instead of having to make that terrible decision (voting for the death penalty), they can vote to put someone in prison and ensure that defendant is no longer a harm to society. It makes it easier for them to return a verdict of life without the possibility of parole.”
Stott said in the past 24 years, only two death penalty sentences have been returned by Salt Lake County juries: Eugene Floyd Maestas, who was convicted in 2004 of killing Donna Lou Bott; and Ralph Leroy Menzies, who was convicted of killing Maurine Hunsaker in 1986.
