A federal judge in Newark on Monday ruled an alleged city gang leader is ineligible to face the death penalty, curtailing the second federal capital prosecution in the state's history.
Farad Roland. (Essex County Correctional Facility)
In a comprehensive opinion filed Monday afternoon, U.S. District Judge Esther Salas said Farad Roland's intellectual disability made him ineligible for the death penalty under the Eighth Amendment -- which prohibits "cruel and unusual punishment" -- and the Federal Death Penalty Act.
The Justice Department in 2015 had authorized then-U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman to seek the death penalty against Roland, 33, the alleged leader of a Bloods-affiliated drug-trafficking gang in the Newark's South Ward.
Among other crimes, Roland faces charges of murder in aid of racketeering in connection with five killings in which he is alleged to have taken part as a member of the South Side Cartel.
Investigators said the gang, based out of two apartment buildings known as the "twin towers," controlled the drug trade on Hawthorne Avenue for much of the 2000s.
Seeking to shield their client from the death penalty, the defense in September filed a motion pursuant to a 2002 U.S. Supreme Court ruling, which held that executing those with intellectual disabilities violated their Eighth Amendment rights.
In granting the motion, Salas said expert witness testimony and extensive evidence submitted on Roland's behalf "abundantly satisfied his burden of proving his intellectual disability by a preponderance of the evidence."
Salas specifically cited Roland's numerous academic and developmental struggles as a child, including being labeled "mentally retarded" by the Social Security Administration at age 14, in granting the motion.
"Judge Salas today issued a thorough, detailed, thoughtful 135 page opinion that speaks for itself," Richard Jasper, Roland's lead defense attorney, said in an email to NJ Advance Media. "The written opinion is a comprehensive analysis regarding the issues before the Court."
A spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney's Office said prosecutors had no comment on the ruling.
The death penalty was abolished in New Jersey at the state level in 2007, 44 years after the last execution was carried out here, but remains a possible sentence under federal criminal law.
According to the Death Penalty Information Center, just three federal prisoners have been executed since 1988, when the first federal death penalty statute was enacted following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision to reinstate the death penalty. Among that trio was Timothy McVeigh, who was put to death in 2001 for bombing a federal building in Oklahoma City, killing 168.
Those sentenced to death in federal court await execution on death row at USP Terre Haute in Indiana.
Just one other federal death penalty case has been tried in the District of New Jersey. That 2007 trial of a Newark drug dealer, William Baskerville, ultimately convicted of ordering the killing of an FBI informant, ended with a sentence of life in prison after the jury could not agree on whether the defendant deserved to die.
Opening statements for Roland's trial in Newark had been scheduled to begin Jan. 29, but Salas previously granted a continuance to allow attorneys to address pre-trial motions in the case.
Roland is currently being held at a federal detention center in Brooklyn, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
Thomas Moriarty may be reached at tmoriarty@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter at @ThomasDMoriarty. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
Have a tip? Tell us. nj.com/tips