Charles Skelton: “If you want to be tough on terrorists, pass a statute that will meet the scrutiny of the Supreme Court of our country.…”

“If you want to be tough on terrorists, pass a statute that will meet the scrutiny of the Supreme Court of our country. If you want to be tough on terrorists, let's not pass something that rushes to judgment and has legal loopholes that will reverse a conviction. Once a conviction occurs, you want it to stick. Mr. Speaker, I had the privilege of practicing law a good number of years as a small town country lawyer, and part of that I was prosecuting attorney for Lafayette County, and I know what it is to obtain a hard-fought conviction of a criminal. And the specter that hangs over every prosecuting attorney on every case that is tried is a specter of that case being reversed on appeal. There are two manners by which a case may be reversed. One is, of course, something went wrong in the evidence or the instructions, something occurred during the trial, maybe even a comment by one of the counsel. The other is a constitutional question regarding the statute on which the defendant was convicted. That's what we deal with here. I am concerned that portions of the statute that you are attempting to pass will give an appellate court the opportunity to reverse the case and send it back. That bothers me.”