Montana’s Death Penalty, Part 2

The cruel and unusual punishment argument again surfaced in 2006 with the impending execution of David Thomas Dawson. Dawson kidnapped and killed Monica and David Rodstein along with their eleven-year-old son Andrew in a Billings motel room in 1986; police rescued their fifteen-year-old daughter Amy who survived. Dawson fought his conviction for years, but gave up the fight in 2004 to become a willing participant in carrying out his death sentence. A month before Dawson’s scheduled execution,...