March 23
PENNSYLVANIA:
Mom to daughter Grace Packer as she's choked to death: It's 'OK to go'
The mother of a girl who was raped, murdered and dismembered testified
Wednesday that she helped plot the attack and carry it out, telling her
daughter before her death that "I can't help you anymore."
Appearing to smirk at times, Sara Packer calmly recounted how she watched her
boyfriend sexually assault her daughter, 14-year-old Grace Packer, then
strangle her in a hot attic outside Philadelphia. She said Grace looked at her
as she was being choked to death, and Sara Packer took her hand and told her it
was "OK to go."
"Grace had become, for lack of a better word, a non-entity," Sara Packer said
in a monotone. "She just didn't exist anymore. I wanted her to go away."
Sara Packer's testimony came at a sentencing hearing for Jacob Sullivan, who
pleaded guilty to rape, first-degree murder and other offenses in Grace's
death. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty for Sullivan. The defense is
seeking life in prison.
Sara Packer has agreed to plead guilty to first-degree murder in exchange for a
life sentence.
Dismembered teen's family testifies about impact of death. Sharrie Williams
reports during Action News at 4 p.m. on March 20, 2019.
On Wednesday, she told the jury that her daughter was a discipline problem - a
"very difficult child" -and she wanted her dead. She admitted she hated Grace,
shared a rape-murder fantasy with Sullivan, and helped hack up her daughter's
body and dispose of it months later.
Bucks County District Attorney Matthew Weintraub told the jury that he agreed
to a life sentence for Sara Packer in exchange for her confession and guilty
plea because the physical evidence against her was weak, because it was
Sullivan who raped and killed Grace, and because her crimes did not qualify for
the death penalty.
But Weintraub made it clear what he thought of Packer.
"Is it fair to say you are an utter and miserable failure at being a worthwhile
human being?" he thundered at her.
Dozens of people filled the New Life Presbyterian Church Monday afternoon to
say goodbye to Grace Packer.
Relatives testified about the impact of the killing early Wednesday.
"It sickens me to know that Grace was abused, tortured and literally thrown
away like she was a piece of trash," said her cousin, Karie Heisserer, with
whom Grace lived for a time in 2015. "Grace is in a better place now, free from
evil and pain."
Jurors saw photos of the bubbly child in happier times: Sitting in the cab of
her uncle's big rig, frolicking in the sand at her first trip to the beach,
delighting in birthday cake at a pool party. But all of that happened with
relatives, not with Sara Packer, a former county adoptions supervisor who
prosecutors say spent years physically and mentally abusing the little girl she
fostered and then adopted.
Sara Packer testified that she and Sullivan tried to kill Grace with an
overdose of over-the-counter medicine, thinking the pills and the heat of the
attic would kill her. She also admitted helping bind her daughter with zip ties
and stuffing a ball gag in her mouth.
The couple left her to die.
Grace eventually managed to escape some of her bindings and spit the gag out.
But she was unable to make it out of the vacant house before Sullivan and Sara
Packer returned overnight - some 12 hours later - and Sullivan strangled her.
Sara Packer and Sullivan stored Grace's body in cat litter for months, then
hacked it up and dumped it in a remote area where hunters found it in October
2016.
In a statement read by a detective, Grace's younger brother, Josh Packer, now
14, said the only way he can bear his loss is if adults know her story and then
act to prevent child abuse.
He said that if his big sister was told she could save other kids' lives by
giving her own, she would have asked, "What do I have to do?"
"Watch out for all the kids so that a loss like Grace's loss never happens
again," Josh wrote. "Do your best to help kids who can't help themselves."
That's not what happened in Grace's case.
Sara Packer and her husband at the time, David Packer, adopted Grace and Josh
in 2007. The couple cared for dozens of foster children before David Packer was
sent to prison for sexually assaulting Grace and a 15-year-old foster daughter
at their Allentown home, about an hour outside Philadelphia.
Sara Packer lost her job as a Northampton County adoptions supervisor in 2010
and was barred from taking in any more foster children. But child welfare
authorities did not remove Grace from the home, despite evidence of abuse.
The Pennsylvania Department of Human Services launched an investigation after
Grace's murder but its findings have not been made public.
(source: ABC News)
GEORGIA:
Columbus Ledger-Enquirer Logo----Defense challenges grand jury in death penalty
case of man’s slain girlfriend, infant son
Columbus’ only pending death penalty case could become tangled in the issue of
how Muscogee County chooses its grand juries.
Accused of killing his girlfriend and infant son before setting their home
afire in 2014, Brandon Conner was indicted a year later for the murders by a
grand jury whose composition his state public defenders are challenging.
Conner is charged in the slayings of Rosella “Mandy” Mitchell, 32, whose
charred body was found Aug. 21, 2014, in her 1324 Winifred Lane home along with
that of her son, 6-month-old Dylan Ethan Conner. Investigators have said
Mitchell was stabbed to death. They have not said how the baby died.
Conner’s is at least the 2nd pending murder case here in which defense
attorneys are claiming the county’s list of potential grand jurors illegally
was altered in violation of Georgia’s Jury Composition Rule, which took effect
July 1, 2012.
Muscogee County uses a Canadian vendor named Courthouse Technologies to manage
its jury lists. Fulton County used the same vendor before its jury lists were
challenged in a case called Ricks v. State.
In that case, the Georgia Supreme Court in 2017 ruled against Fulton County,
saying Courthouse Technologies in 2013 and 2014 illegally altered the county’s
jury lists in violation of the Jury Composition Rule.
Conner was indicted on April 14, 2015, by a grand jury chosen from a Courthouse
Technologies list of jurors supplied the previous year.
“It is impossible to imagine that the methodologies used to manipulate the jury
list in Fulton County in 2014 were not used in Muscogee County during the same
year,” Conner’s attorneys Emily Gilbert and Brad Gardner wrote in a motion
asking Judge William Rumer to dismiss Conner’s indictment.
The rule
Georgia established the Jury Composition Rule to ensure jury pools are
representative of a county’s overall population and demographics.
Previously, counties would collect a database of eligible jurors from voter
rolls and “force-balance” it to match the race and gender ratios reflected in
census figures. Muscogee County once used a six-member commission appointed by
the chief Superior Court judge to do that.
In 2012, the state changed the process on the rationale that if the database of
prospective jurors were sufficiently broadened, the jury pool automatically
would reflect the county population, and no additional balancing would be
required.
Under the Jury Composition Reform Act passed by the state legislature, the
State Council of Superior Court Clerks collects potential jurors’ names from a
database of residents 18 and older who’ve obtained driver’s licenses or state
ID cards issued at license bureaus, and of people who registered to vote.
The council compares that to other lists to determine who’s ineligible for jury
service because they’ve been convicted of a felony, or have died, or moved away
or been declared mentally incompetent. With those names removed, the corrected
list is sent to the county to use for jury summons.
Defense attorneys maintain that under Georgia law, that list is certified to be
accurate, and once received, the county should not alter it. But Courthouse
Technologies makes changes to that list, adding and deleting names in violation
of the Ricks ruling, the attorneys argue.
After the Ricks decision, Fulton County first instructed Courthouse
Technologies to stick to the master jury list it got from the state, and later
ended its contract with the vendor.
Gilbert and Gardner were the defense attorneys in the Ricks case. Now
representing Conner, they want to see Muscogee County’s jury management data
for review, and they want Rumer to hold an evidentiary hearing on their
challenge to Conner’s indictment.
During a pretrial hearing Friday, Gilbert told Rumer that Conner’s defense team
expects to challenge the selection of Conner’s trial jury on the same basis.
Rumer asked the defense attorneys and prosecutors with the district attorney’s
office to file proposed orders on the grand jury question by April 9, and to
respond to each other’s filings by April 12.
Muscogee County is expected to get a new jury list from Courthouse Technologies
this year. That list likely would be the one from which jurors would be chosen
for Conner’s trial, and his defense team wants to review it, too. Rumer
scheduled a hearing on that for Aug. 19.
The judge also set a court session for updates on the overall progress of the
case for May 9, saying he wants to hold a hearing to keep track of the case
every 30 to 45 days.
The cold case
Whether Muscogee County’s use of Courthouse Technologies violates the Jury
Composition Rule also is an issue in the murder case against Rebecca Haynie and
Donald Keith Phillips, who await trial in the 2005 cold-case homicide of
Haynie’s estranged husband Kirby Smith, found slain in his Jacqueline Drive
business, Kirby’s Speed Shop.
Arrested in 2014, Haynie and Phillips were indicted in 2016, by a grand jury
picked from a list supplied by Courthouse Technologies.
Erin King, who represents Haynie, argued Feb. 21 that Courthouse Technologies
illegally altered the master jury list Muscogee County got from the state, in
violation of the Jury Composition Rule and the Ricks precedent.
Hearing that case is Judge Gil McBride, who has yet to rule on the defense
motion to quash the indictment.
(source: ledger-enquirer.com)
FLORIDA:
Death row convict re-sentenced to 3 life terms for 2000 Merritt Island samurai
sword double-killing
Formerly sentenced to death for the killing of a Merritt Island couple nearly 2
decades ago, Anthony Welch was re-sentenced to 3 life terms in prison Thursday.
Welch, now 40, was 22 when on Dec. 14, 2000, he used a souvenir samurai sword
to stab and hack his 2 neighbors to death before going on a date. He murdered
Suntree couple 69-year-old Rufus Johnson and 60-year-old Kyoko Johnson while
they were celebrating Kyoko's birthday at the couple's North Courtenay Parkway
home. According to reports, Welch tied up the couple, tried to extort money,
tortured and killed them.
An extortion note with his fingerprint was found in Kyoko's pocket by
investigators.
Welch pleaded guilty in 2005 to the double murder and was sentenced to death in
2006. The sentence was overturned on appeal in 2008. Welch had been waiting for
his re-sentencing trial ever since.
The Florida Supreme Court issued new guidelines in late 2016 requiring a
unanimous jury recommendation for a death sentence. They were implemented prior
to Welch's penalty phase hearing that began March 4.
The new guidelines meant Welch was spared the death sentence when the Brevard
County jury came back split Thursday evening.
Welch will now serve 3 consecutive life terms in state prison.
(source: Florida Today)
ALABAMA:
Despite Possible Innocence and Intellectual Disability, Alabama Intends to
Execute Rocky Myers
Robin “Rocky” Myers may be innocent and intellectually disabled. His jury did
not think he should be sentenced to die. Alabama intends to execute him anyway.
Myers’ case is rife with legal issues, but he received no federal court review
because his appellate lawyer abandoned him without notice, letting the filing
deadline for challenging Myers’ conviction and death sentence expire. In a
recent feature story in The Nation, reporter Ashoka Mukpo tells the story of
how the intellectually-disabled Myers was convicted and sentenced to death for
the 1991 murder of his neighbor, Ludie Mae Tucker, even after his jury
recommended 9-3 that he should be sentenced to life.
Mukpo reports that the prosecution evidence against Myers was problematic. Two
informants initially told police that, on the night of the murder, another
man—Anthony “Cool Breeze” Ballentine— had traded a VCR stolen from Tucker’s
house for crack cocaine. Another witness corroborated their story, informing
police that she had seen Ballentine, wearing a white shirt stained with blood,
run into an alley near Tucker’s house. Weeks later, another man, Marzell Ewing,
who had known Ballentine for 30 years, came forward to claim a reward for
information about the murder. He told police he’d seen a short, stocky man near
the crime scene, carrying the stolen VCR. After his statement, the original
informants changed their stories, naming Myers as the man who had traded the
VCR for drugs. Myers later admitted that he had found the VCR in an alley next
to his house—a common drop spot for stolen goods. Because of his intellectual
disability, Myers was unable to tell police when he had found the VCR, leading
police to conclude he was lying. In 2004, Ewing recanted his story. In a signed
statement, he revealed that a detective had offered to eliminate the record of
a prior arrest if Ewing testified against Myers. Ewing’s statement admitted
that his testimony was “not truthful. I did not see who brought the VCR to the
shot house that night.”
Other evidence also suggested Myers is innocent. Before she died, Tucker was
able to describe her assailant to the police and the clothing he was wearing.
Although Tucker knew Myers, she did not identify him as her attacker. Multiple
witnesses testified at Myers’ s trial that he had been wearing a dark shirt the
night of the murder, not the light shirt described by Tucker. No physical
evidence linked Myers to the murder and none of the fingerprints found at the
crime scene matched his. Mae Puckett, one of the jurors in Myers’ case, said
she and a few other jurors were not convinced of his guilt but felt pressured
by the majority of the jury to vote for guilt. One white juror later spoke to
Myers’ defense team, referring to him as a “thug” and describing him with a
racial slur. “I never thought for a moment that he did it,” Puckett said, but
she and the other jurors who doubted his guilt agreed to vote for convict if
the jury would recommend a life sentence. Nonetheless, exercising a
since-repealed power to override a jury’s vote for life, the trial judge
sentenced Myers to death.
After Myers was sentenced to death, a Tennessee attorney, Earle J. Schwarz,
agreed to represent him pro bono in his post-conviction appeals. But when the
state courts denied Myers’ appeal, Schwarz never told Myers and never filed a
federal habeas corpus petition, causing Myers to miss the federal filing
deadline. “Mr. Schwarz decided that he could no longer represent Rocky, but
unfortunately he just sat in a room and said that quietly to himself,” said
Kacey Keeton, who now represented Myers. “He didn’t tell Rocky, he didn’t call
the courts and let them know, he didn’t tell the prosecutors, he just quit
doing anything.” On behalf of Myers, Keeton is now seeking clemency from
Governor Kay Ivey, Myers’ last chance to avoid execution. “The fact that we are
potentially executing a man who did not have his day in court because an
attorney screwed up should give everybody pause,” Keeton said.
Studies suggest that wrongful capital convictions are more likely in cases of
judicial override or non-unanimous jury votes for death. 5 of Alabama's 6 death
row exonerations, involved either judicial override or non-unanimous jury votes
for death In 2002, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty cannot
be imposed on intellectually disabled defendants.
(source: Death Penalty Information Center)
IDAHO:
Convicted killer Joseph Duncan loses appeal to escape death sentences
Convicted killer Joseph E. Duncan III just got a fresh seat back on death row.
U.S. District Court Judge Edward Lodge ruled against Duncan on Friday on a
12-argument appeal by the killer, who initially pleaded guilty to all state and
federal charges. In 2008, a jury sentenced Duncan to 3 death penalties that
attorneys later challenged.
Except for one pending legal matter, Lodge found against Duncan in all
arguments and affirmed 2 of 3 death penalties against him.
“Duncan claims the combination and cumulative effect of the problems and errors
he alleges occurred from the beginning to the end of his case, deprived him of
his constitutional rights to a fair and reliable proceedings and due process
and, as a result, his conviction and death sentence should not be allowed to
stand,” Lodge wrote on Friday. “For the reasons stated in this order, except as
to count 7, the court finds Duncan’s claims are without merit.”
Duncan became one of the region’s most notorious outlaws in 2005 when he saw
8-year-old Shasta Groene wearing a swimsuit while playing in her yard east of
Coeur d’Alene. That prompted the registered sex offender to stop as he drove by
on Interstate 90.
Duncan then used duct tape and zip ties to bind Brenda Groene, 40, her
boyfriend, 37-year-old Mark McKenzie and her 13-year-old son, Slade Groene,
before using a claw hammer to bludgeon them to death. Duncan then kidnapped
Shasta and 9-year-old Dylan Groene and drove them to Montana where he sexually
molested them multiple times before killing Dylan.
In 2008, after pleading guilty, the federal jury handed down 3 separate death
sentences, one each for the convictions of kidnapping, sexual exploitation and
use of a firearm resulting in the death of Dylan.
On Nov. 15, 2008, Duncan sent a letter to Lodge stating “if any appeal is
initiated on my behalf, it is done contrary to my wishes” and Lodge later
concluded after a hearing that Duncan did, indeed, seek to waive his right to
appeal the death penalty sentences.
“Nevertheless, the Ninth Circuit heard the appeal ‘for the limited purpose of
reviewing the district court’s competency determinations’ and concluded that
(Lodge) erred by not holding a competency hearing to determine whether Duncan
competently waived his right to appeal,” court records state.
In 2009, after weeks of testimony in connection to a separate child murder case
in California, a judge and jury determined that Duncan was competent.
Lodge later ruled in 2013 that Duncan was competent at the time he waived his
appeal in 2008, which the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed in 2015.
Then in 2016, the U.S. Supreme Court denied a request by Duncan’s attorneys to
consider the case. In 2017, Duncan filed the most recent petition, which Lodge
ruled on Friday.
Lodge’s order Friday “denies Duncan’s post-conviction claims and upholds
Duncan’s convictions and sentences on all counts with the exception of one,”
wrote Stephon Kenyon, the clerk of U.S. District Court in Idaho. “Duncan’s
sentences on 2 of the 3 death penalty counts are affirmed as are his multiple
life sentences and additional terms of imprisonment on all of the non-capital
crimes.”
In the California case, Duncan was convicted of killing 10-year-old Anthony
Martinez, bringing him a total of 11 life sentences in addition to the death
sentences.
Duncan, now 56, awaits his death sentence while residing in a federal prison in
Terre Haute, Indiana.
(source: The Spokesman-Review)
CALIFORNIA:
Governor Gavin Newsom turned over the tables when he announced a moratorium “on
the death penalty ..., a reprieve for all people sentenced to death in
California.”
He supplemented the moratorium with a bold declaration, “I do not believe that
a civilized society can claim to be a leader in the world as long as its
government continues to sanction the premeditated and discriminatory execution
of its people ..., the death penalty is inconsistent with our bedrock values.”
Newsom’s comments echo those of Albert Camus. Winner of the Nobel Prize for his
“clear-sighted earnestness illustrating the problems of the human conscience of
our time,” Camus wrote a series of influential essays on capital punishment.
These followed the Nuremberg trials (1945-46), which closed World War II in
Europe with the execution of 10 Nazis.
Camus knew it would be crazy to think we could ever rid ourselves of murder,
but, he argued, capital punishment, is simply as premeditated a killing as can
be imagined, and as long as governments legitimize it, we will remain captives
of the cycle of violence, no different from the individuals or groups who carry
out homicidal plots from personal avarice or political agenda.
Taking a page from the abolitionist playbook, Newsom’s moratorium exposes the
many systemic problems (innocence claims, police misconduct, attorney
incompetence, discriminatory prosecutions, etc.) that have divided California
voters almost evenly for the past 2 decades. He joins governors in
Pennsylvania, Oregon, Colorado, and Washington, who have also declared
moratoriums, and reiterated what the bipartisan Commission on the Fair
Administration of Justice called a “dysfunctional” system in 2008.
Fresno County sheriff responses to executive order on death penalty
Death penalty never seems to die
White Nationalists find ways to justify the mass murder of innocent men, women
and children, Jews in Pittsburgh, African-American Christians in Charleston,
and Muslims in Christ Church, New Zealand. Osama bin Laden hijacked Islam in
the cause of killing as many “infidels” as possible.
Whoever the mastermind or the perpetrator of murder may be, and whatever their
reasons, victims are violently taken from life, leaving behind traumatized
families, including shocked members of the murderer’s family.
Sometimes motives elude us entirely, as in the Las Vegas Massacre, or when
disturbed teenagers wield military-class firearms against students at
Columbine, Sandyhook, and Parkland.
Taking a stand against the death penalty in no way demeans the memory of
victims or their families, but acknowledges its failure. Victims of violence
are not healed by those who fan the flames of vengeance. Retributive justice
leaves victims and offenders in passive roles. Restorative justice programs may
be our best hope to heal the suffering of victims caused by lethal violence.
Newsom easily won election in 2018. It should come as no surprise that no
person will face execution so long as there is a chance that an innocent one
might be wrongly condemned to death. His grandfather and father helped
exonerate a falsely accused friend, so he has first-hand experience in botched
justice.
As Camus put it, “real generosity to the future is giving all to the present,”
and Newsom’s moratorium on the death penalty takes a step towards stimulating
Americans to be leaders and partners of peace, reconciliation, and
compassionate justice for all.
(source: Editorial; Phillip H. Cherney of Visalia is a retired lawyer,
specialized in capital defense litigation at trial and for death row appeals
and is adjunct professor of Criminal Law and Evidence at San Joaquin College of
Law----Visalia Times Delta)
USA:
5 counties are responsible for 21 % of executions across the country
While the governor of the country's most populous state halted death penalty
executions, that decision may not have a national impact.
Within two southern states, Texas and Oklahoma, 5 counties are responsible for
1 in 5 executions since the death penalty was reinstated by the Supreme Court
in 1976, according to data from the non-profit Death Penalty Information Center
(DPIC).
Those counties - Harris, Dallas, Bexar and Tarrant Counties in Texas and in
Oklahoma County, Oklahoma - are responsible for 315 out of the 1,493 executions
that have taken place in those 43 years.
Prior to California Gov. Gavin Newsom's moratorium on executions, his state
performed 13 executions during the same time frame. Data from the DPIC show
there are 11 individual counties across the country that had the same number or
more executions themselves during that time period.
"It doesn't really make sense to talk about the death penalty in the United
States. The death penalty is exclusively a Southern phenomenon," said Evan
Mandery, a professor at the John Jay College for Criminal Justice.
There are 30 states that have the death penalty in the U.S., though four of
those states - now including California - have governors who have issued
suspensions on executions.
New Hampshire has the death penalty, but hasn't executed anyone since 1939.
Since the 1976 ruling, there have been 56 executions in Ohio, 7 in Utah, 4 in
South Dakota, 3 in Montana and 1 in Utah, according to data from the DPIC. By
comparison, there were 72 executions in Georgia, 97 executions in Florida, 112
executions in Oklahoma, and 113 executions in Virginia, the data shows.
To date, the largest amount of death penalty executions occurs in Texas, where
there have been 560. That represents 37.5 % of the total 1,493 executions in
the United States since 1976.
"Texas is an outlier among outliers," Mandery said.
Mandery said that in spite of its prevalence in certain counties, the death
penalty on the whole is "an extraordinarily rare event - many, many things have
to go wrong for someone to be executed in the United States."
"No rich white murderer has ever been sentenced to die, so you need to be
almost certainly a person of color, probably killed a white person who did it
in a state with the death penalty, who did it in a county within that state
where the prosecutor aggressively supports the death penalty and where that
prosecutor isn't replaced in office during the time you're on death row by
someone who either opposes the death penalty or takes seriously the appellate
process," Mandery said.
The decrease in executions in Texas may indicate a slow change in attitudes in
the state - as well as the qualms that jurors may now have as science advances
as well as reporting of wrongful convictions continue - but experts still point
to racism at the root of the use of capital punishment as something that would
need to be addressed in conjunction with any major changes.
"One idea is that [the use of the death penalty is] tied to the culture of
lynching in the South and that the dehumanization of prisoners is an artefact
of the commodification of people, and there's clearly something to that,"
Mandery said.
McCann echoed that - while not unique to Texas - the origin and use of the
death penalty are tied to "mostly racism and corruption, but that's my personal
view."
"I think the more difficult problem in every state - and this goes from
Pennsylvania and Philadelphia to Houston to Los Angeles - is that we as a
people don't want to acknowledge the vast problems we have in overcoming a
legacy of racism that still infects the death penalty," McCann said.
As for Texas specifically, McCann said that capital punishment is "deeply
ingrained in the culture here."
McCann said that while the rate of executions "may slow, I don't see it
stopping, short of a national decision by someone like the Supreme Court, that
we are simply incapable of doing this properly," he said.
Mandery agreed, and handicapped the odds of such a ruling happening with the
current bench of justices unlikely.
"The only mechanism that would end the death penalty in Texas is Supreme Court
action. Five years ago, I would have said that was unlikely but possible [that
such an action be handed down]. Now it seems quite unlikely," Mandery said.
"The fate of the death penalty rests with the balance of power on the Supreme
Court, and that's hanging by a thread," he said.
(source: ABC News)
****************************
2020 presidential candidates want to abolish the death penalty. Experts want
them to think bigger. Experts say the discussion on capital punishment has
focused too much on politics, not nearly enough on policy.
Several Democratic presidential contenders have taken to Twitter recently to
express their enthusiastic approval of California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s (D)
announcement earlier this month that he plans to suspend executions in the
state.
“Inspired!” said Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ), calling the death penalty “immoral”
and “ineffective.” Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) wrote that capital punishment is
“immoral, discriminatory, ineffective, and proven to be unequally applied.” And
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), said the announcement was “very good news.”
Ending the death penalty is one of the few issues that has received the
unanimous support of the current field of Democratic presidential candidates.
It hasn’t always been so.
Former President Bill Clinton, a supporter of the death penalty during his
presidency, was roundly criticized while he was governor of Arkansas for
carrying out the execution of Ricky Ray Rector, a mentally ill black man.
Former President Barack Obama called the death penalty “deeply troubling” but
still supported its use in the United States.
Even during the last presidential cycle there was no consensus among Democratic
presidential contenders on the issue. When the Justice Department announced it
would seek death for Charleston shooter Dylann Roof, Hillary Clinton said she
supported the decision, meanwhile Sanders — who was running against her in the
primaries at the time — said he was opposed.
It reflects how dramatically, and how rapidly, views on the issue are evolving.
“Clearly, the politics of death have changed in the last 20 years,” said John
Blume, director of the Cornell Death Penalty Project.
Those changing politics, he said, are due to the rising cost of sentencing
someone to death, the thousands of exonerations, and stories in recent years
about botched executions. “I’m not sure we’re at the end of the line with the
American death penalty, but you can see the finish line,” Blume said.
But experts say the conversation about the death penalty following Newsom’s
announcement has been simplistic, focusing too much on politics and not enough
on policy.
“I think that with the attention that the moratorium imposed by Governor Newsom
has attracted, there has been almost a media feeding frenzy about the impact on
the death penalty on the 2020 election,” Robert Dunham, the executive director
of the Death Penalty Information Center (DCPI), told ThinkProgress. “I love
talking about the death penalty, but as a practical matter, it’s not going to
affect the election.”
“The better thing to be thinking and talking about, is the whole concept of the
exercise of federal power in the administration of criminal laws,” said Robert
Dunham, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center.
As of July, across the United States there were 2,738 people on death row,
according to DCPI. There are just 63 people on federal death row, less than 2 %
of the death row population.
California had 737 people on death row ahead of its moratorium. Florida has
353, Texas has 232, and Alabama has 185. “A federal moratorium doesn’t change
any of that,” Dunham said. “The death penalty is largely a creature of state
law.”
He said the most notable aspect of the federal death penalty is that it is
disproportionately used in states that either don’t have the death penalty or
that have a moratorium on capital punishment.
“I think the better thing to be thinking and talking about, is the whole
concept of the exercise of federal power in the administration of criminal
laws,” Dunham said. “You see the use of the federal death penalty as a way to
disrespect state judgements that the death penalty is an inappropriate
punishment.”
Beyond that, the death penalty is “a canary in the coal mine of criminal
justice,” according to Dunham, who added that a conversation about the death
penalty that doesn’t include comprehensive reform is futile.
“When it’s about politics, you have broad statements about narrow practices,”
he said. “When counties, states, and countries adopt meaningful criminal
justice reform, the use of the death penalty drops, and when counties, states,
and countries look at abuses in the use of the death penalty, they discover
that everything that is wrong with the rest of the criminal justice system is
worse when it comes to capital punishment.”
Blume, the Cornell professor, used another metaphor: Sometimes talking about
the death penalty is like the “tail wagging the dog.”
“Death penalty elimination is only a piece of a larger, needed conversation
about criminal justice reform,” he said. “Thousands — millions — of people are
doing life sentences or the equivalent, many of them for crimes where
punishment is too harsh. Millions of people are incarcerated for low level drug
offenses. There has been some movement on the latter, but there really hasn’t
been a comprehensive criminal justice reform.”
More than 1/2 of all American executions took place in Texas
On the other hand, Blume argued, letting the tail wag the dog — starting
comprehensive criminal justice reform with abolishing the death penalty — could
create the necessary space to rebuild the system.
And, certainly, in an effort to shift the conversation presidential candidates
often weigh in on issues they wouldn’t have much power over if elected as
president, something Blume said is worth acknowledging in the capital
punishment debate.
“If the president of the United States suspended the federal death penalty or
commuted sentences… it would not be insignificant. It would be an important
statement,” Blume added. “It might help push some states who are now
effectively abolitionist… to go ahead and repeal.”
And it’s certainly a conversation worth having. A DCPI report from 2 years ago
found that in 2017 there was significant evidence of mental illness, brain
damage, intellectual disability, severe trauma, or possible innocence in nearly
90 percent of capital punishment executions in the United States.
The report also found that 5 of the 23 people executed by the state in 2017
received “glaringly deficient legal representation” or were denied substantial
judicial review.
(source: thinkprogress.org)
*******************
Beto O’Rourke Regrets Voting For Pro-Death Penalty Bill: ‘That Was A Poor
Decision’----“If I could have that vote again, I would not vote for it,” the
Democratic presidential hopeful said in South Carolina.
Democratic presidential hopeful and former Congressman Beto O’Rourke, who
recently came out against capital punishment, said Friday that he regrets
voting for a bill that would make it easier to give the death penalty to a
defendant who attacked law enforcement.
“That was a poor decision on my part. I’ve never supported the death penalty,”
O’Rourke told HuffPost following a campaign stop at South Carolina State
University, his first visit to a historically black university since announcing
his campaign for president.
2 years ago, in May 2017, O’Rourke broke with the majority of his Democratic
House colleagues and voted for legislation that expanded the federal “list of
statutory aggravating factors in death penalty determinations” to include the
murder or “targeting” of a law enforcement officer, firefighter or other first
responder. In effect, the bill, titled The Thin Blue Line Act, would have made
it easier to seek the death penalty in such cases. The bill passed the House
but has not been taken up in the Senate.
O’Rourke voted for the bill just 2 months after launching his bid for Senate in
Texas, seeking to unseat Republican Ted Cruz in the red state.
On Friday, as a new contender in the crowded race for the Democratic
presidential primary, however, O’Rourke said he had some misgivings about the
vote.
“I think attacking a police officer should be an aggravating factor, but I
don’t think that should contribute to taking someone else’s life. And so that
was a mistake on my part, and if I could have that vote again, I would not vote
for it,” he said.
O’Rourke announced his campaign for president earlier this month in a video to
supporters. He has been barnstorming the country at a breakneck pace, with an
official campaign kickoff scheduled in El Paso, Texas, at the end of the month.
The former congressman held 6 campaign events in South Carolina alone on
Friday, reprising the furious pace of his 2018 Senate campaign, one that left
him hoarse by the end of the day. His speeches in the early primary state
placed heavy emphasis on the need to address voter suppression, police
brutality, the “Charleston loophole” on gun background checks, and
congressional gerrymandering.
(source: Huffington Post)
****************
Why Conservatives Should Oppose the Death Penalty
Recently, I watched a movie with my University Students for Life organization
called “Dead Man Walking“. The story of the film is based on the book of the
same title, by Sister Helen Prejean, a Roman Catholic Nun and a Sister of Saint
Joseph of Medaille. She is seeking to get a convicted man named Matthew
Poncelet exonerated, as she believes he is innocent. I won’t spoil the movie,
but I highly suggest everyone view the full film for themselves as it gives a
deep, and slightly emotional, glance into the criminal justice system regarding
death row and the death penalty as a punishment. As a former supporter of the
death penalty, roughly 2 or 3 years ago I became an opponent. This film is what
inspired me to write this in an effort to stop this awful act in America.
I will be laying out the reasons conservatives should oppose the death penalty.
I’ll be doing this from 3 different perspectives: religious, fiscal, and moral.
I chose these 3 as I believe they are the 3 things most conservatives care
about. Religion, because roughly 85% of conservatives identify as some form of
Christian. Fiscally, I’ll be focused on reduced government spending, as
economically speaking, fiscal conservative literally means “low taxes, reduced
government spending, and minimal government debt.” Finally, from a moral
perspective because as conservatives, or conservatarians, I see no reason we
shouldn’t always seek the moral high ground.
For the non-religious conservatives reading this, if you’d like you can skip
this part. However, since the vast majority of conservatives identify as
Christian, it should be noted what Christianity has to say about this. Romans
12:19 says, “Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of
God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” For
humans (sinners ourselves), to take the power of God to end someone’s life into
our own hands for the sake of our own personal anger, in and of itself goes
against God’s teachings. Christ himself even says in Matthew 5:38-39, “You have
heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. But I say
to you, Do not resist the one who is evil. But if anyone slaps you on the right
cheek, turn to him the other also.” As Christians, no matter the denomination,
it is our duty to follow the path of Christ. While we are all corrupted by sin,
this is one action that we can actively take toward following His teachings.
Financially speaking, the death penalty might make some sense. You don’t have
to feed, house, or just in general take care of the criminal. However, that is
not how the United States justice system works, as someone can sit on death row
for decades before finally being executed. In short, the death penalty costs
more than allowing the criminal to live.
Morality. The one thing we as conservatives and conservatarians should always
have over our big government opponent is morality. They so often beat us in
this, though, as it’s easier to say that the government can take care of you
better than you can as an individual. The immorality of the death penalty is
somewhere we can have the upper hand.
In “Dead Man Walking,” on the day that the convicted man was set to be
executed, he had time with his family. He was meant to spend his final hours
with them, and was supposed to be with them until 6:45. The police came in and
forced his family out around 6:35. While ten minutes may not be much to you or
I, to a man with less than 6 hours to live, just 10 more minutes with his
family can mean a lot. To make it even worse, his mother approached him to give
him one last hug, and the police blocked her from doing so because of “security
reasons.” I found myself extremely frustrated with this, and after the film I
asked a friend of mine, “Why do you think they did that?”
Her response was so simple, yet so disheartening. “Probably to dehumanize them,
to make killing them easier.” How immoral is that? These police feel the need
to dehumanize someone because, even though they believe he is a murderer, they
still can’t kill him. If you ever have to dehumanize someone to kill them when
there is no imminent threat from them, how can you justify that? You can’t. If
you have to strip someone of their humanity in order to make yourself believe
they no longer have that most basic and intrinsic Right to Life, you are
violating that right given to us at the moment of our creation.
Now, can I 100% say this is how real world police act? No. However, this is
based on the experiences of Sister Helen. I believe for such an important
detail to be in there, it must have been significant to her and something she
observed in one way or another.
In another scene, Sister Helen is speaking to one of the police officers on the
“team” that carries out the procedure. The officer refers to himself as ‘the
left leg restrainer’. He speaks of another execution, and tells her after the
previous execution that night that he “didn’t sleep.” Again, if this act makes
someone not sleep, unless the convict is properly dehumanized, there must be
something morally wrong with the act.
Finally, just the sheer number of those wrongly accused and killed on death row
should be more than enough to end this awful practice. According to a study
done in 2014, roughly 4% of people killed on death row are later proven
innocent. Is that a small number? Of course. However, that’s still 1 of every
25 people sentenced to death that are innocent. This means several hundred
people lost their lives because our society is “safer” when a guy is 6 feet
under as opposed to inside a highly secured prison. The loss of any innocent
person’s liberty and life should automatically make this practice void, even if
it actually did make us safer – which it doesn’t. As Benjamin Franklin said,
“Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary
Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.”
I hope every version of conservatives get something out of this. From the
religious conservatives, to the fiscal hawks, to those who are just sick of
losing the morality fight against the left. For those motivated to stopping the
death penalty and all of the problems it causes, I highly suggest reaching out
to Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty, as they work all around the
country to end this heinous practice. With that, I would like to leave you with
this quote from the movie, that was incredibly moving for me.
“I think killin’ is wrong, no matter who does it. Whether it’s me, y’all, or
your government”-Matthew Poncelet (Dead Man Walking)
(source: thelibertarianrepublic.com)
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