[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----USA, US MIL.
April 17 USA: We should preach about the death penalty on Good Friday To avoid preaching about the evil of the death penalty on Good Friday is akin to not preaching about the joy of the resurrection on Easter Sunday. The central scriptural context of the liturgical readings is focused on the state execution of Jesus Christ. And yet, if previous experiences are any indication, anecdotal evidence suggests that few Catholics will hear their pastors deliver a homily this Friday in which the Passion of the Lord is connected to the sin of capital punishment. The very nature and purpose of the Good Friday homily begs such an engagement. As the General Instruction of the Roman Missal makes clear, the homily ought to be an explanation of the readings that ties together the mystery we celebrate in faith and the needs and contexts of the people gathered in assembly. But the homily is not merely an opportunity for exegesis or catechesis, it is meant to inspire, challenge, lift up and embolden the faith of the hearers. The important 1982 U.S. bishops' conference document "Fulfilled in Your Hearing," on the role of the homily in liturgy, reminds us that "the homily is preached in order that a community of believers who have gathered to celebrate the liturgy may do so more deeply and more fully — more faithfully — and thus be transformed for Christian witness in the world" (no. 43). Likewise, in 2012, the U.S. bishops' conference issued another document on the homily on the 30th anniversary of "Fulfilled in Your Hearing." This text, titled "Preaching the Mystery of Faith," states: "The purpose and spirit of the homily is to inspire and move those who hear it, to enable them to understand in heart and mind what the mysteries of our redemption mean for our lives and how they might call us to repentance and change" (p. 30). Given the purpose and place of the homily, the subject of the death penalty in the context of the United States offers both the preacher and the assembly an important opportunity. For the former, while it takes courage to discuss a subject that will surely find a mixed reception in many congregations, it is an opportunity to directly address the continued and pressing relevance of the church's teaching on the inexcusability of capital punishment as borne witness to in the Lord's passion and in the many hundreds of death-row inmates today. For the assembly, it is an opportunity, as the U.S. bishops' conference documents on preaching recall, to grow in understanding of the faith, see the connection between that faith and an injustice in our midst, and thus move toward greater transformation in order to be Christian witnesses in the world. Beyond the homiletic impetus for it, the need to address capital punishment as a pressing moral issue in our day is heightened by the recent Amnesty International report on global trends in the death penalty, which was published just last week. While some of the statistics will not be surprising — the greatest number of state executions took place in nations like China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Vietnam, and Iraq — some of the report should be a particularly disturbing reminder of how unjust the United States' judicial system remains. For example, the report says that: "For the 10th consecutive year, the USA remained the only country to carry out executions in the region [of North and South America]." Think about that for a minute. The national narrative and accompanying rhetoric used by politicians on both sides of the aisle often claims that the United States is a beacon of democratic hope and a model of integrity for the world. Furthermore, many of our leaders and ordinary citizens alike enjoy thinking of our country as a "Christian nation," but one of the starkest signs of our moral hypocrisy is witnessed in the data that show we are the only nation in the Western Hemisphere that sentences its own citizens to death. And, according to the Amnesty report, as of 2018 the number of death sentences and executions increased in the United States from 2017. We are in the worldwide minority of countries that still maintains the death penalty, and those with whom we share that appalling company include an embarrassing collection of dictatorships and promoters of state terrorism. One of the traditional go-to justifications for supporting the death penalty among American Catholics had been a clause in the 1992 Catechism of the Catholic Church that acknowledged the possibility that state execution of criminals could be justified as a last resort and for the sake of the common good. That document was promulgated under St. John Paul II, who was an outspoken critic of the death penalty (including in the United States) and who, according to reporting by Jesuit Fr. Thomas Reese, didn't want to include the exception and would have preferred to see the practiced entirely abolished. "But some in the Vatican
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----USA, US MIL.
Sept. 2 USA: These Are The Only 13 Women Executed In America In The Past 40 Years A jury will likely decide this month whether notorious murder defendant Jodi Arias should get the death penalty for murdering her ex-boyfriend. It would be unusual if she were executed. In the last century, only 40 women have received the death penalty in America - 13 have been executed since 1976, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. The total number of executions in the United States since 1976 is 1,343. BI looked into the stories of the 13 women on death row since the mid-'70s, many of whom killed their lovers. 1.) Velma Barfield, a drug addict from North Carolina, forged her boyfriend's checks to fund her habit. Fearing he might find out about a $300 forged check, she poisoned his beer, the Associated Press reported. As the 1st woman sentenced to die in 22 years, Barfield eventually confessed to killing 3 others, including her own mother, The New York Times reported. She died by lethal injection in 1984. 2.) Karla Faye Tucker and an accomplice wanted to end three days of drug-induced shenanigans by stealing a motorcycle. So they killed the owner of the bike and his friend with a pickax in 1983, CNN reported. Sentenced to die for her crimes, Tucker became a born-again Christian and waited for a pardon until hours before her lethal injection. 3.) Judy Buenoano poisoned her husband and drowned her son, earning her the name black widow, CNN reported. Buenoano attempted to bomb her fiance's car in 1983, which then led investigators to realize she had drowned her partially paralyzed son and poisoned her husband years earlier. She died in 1998 in Florida's electric chair. 4.) Betty Lou Beets shot and killed her 5th husband in 1983, CNN reported. She claimed she was a battered wife and killed him in self-defense in an attempt to get clemency from then-Gov. George W. Bush. He rejected that claim. In 2000, Beets became the 2nd woman executed in Texas since the Civil War. 5.) Christina Riggs tried and failed to kill her 5-year-old son and 2-year-old daughter by injecting them with potassium chloride, BBC reported. Instead, she smothered them with pillows. She died in 2000 - the 1st woman Arkansas executed in 150 years. 6.) Wanda Jean Allen got the death penalty by lethal injection for killing her lover Gloria Leathers, whom she met in prison, USA Today reported. The American Civil Liberties Union wrote a letter for her clemency. The letter said she had severe, untreated mental disabilities that prosecutors knew about but never revealed during court proceedings. When she died in 2001, she became the 1st black woman executed since 1954. 7.) Marilyn Plantz plotted with her lover and another man to kill her husband and collect on his $300,000 life insurance policy, BBC reported. The 2 men bludgeoned her husband to death while her children sat in another room. She died from lethal injection in 2001 in Oklahoma, which attracted attention from Amnesty Intentional as the state with the highest rate of capital punishment. 8.) Lois Nadean Smith stabbed and killed her son's 21-year-old ex-girlfriend, Cindy Baillie, by shooting her 9 times and stabbing her in the throat, The Philadelphia Daily News reported. Smith died at the age of 61 from lethal injection in Oklahoma. 9.) Aileen Wuornos, working as a prostitute along Florida's interstate highway, killed one of her male clients in 1989. Over the next year, she murdered 5 more. During her decade on death row, she garnered many titles: a man-hating lesbian killer or a feminist hero who murdered in self-defense, The New York Times wrote. Her life inspired the major motion picture, Monster, starring Charlize Theron. She died from lethal injection in 2002. 10.) Frances Newton, the 1st woman Texas executed since the Civil War, killed her husband and 21-month-old daughter, the Austin Chronicle reported. Newton maintained her innocence, speculating that a drug dealer whom her husband owed money did the crime. The state refused her a pardon, and she died by lethal injection in 2005. 11.) Teresa Lewis plotted to kill her husband and stepson and collect the insurance money. Instead of pulling a trigger on a gun, she pulled a couple of young men in to pull the trigger for her, Prosecutor David Grimes told a judge at the time, The Washington Post reported. Virginia sentenced her to die by lethal injection. She was the 1st woman executed in the state in more than 100 years. 12.) Kimberly McCarthy got the death penalty in Texas for killing her 71-year-old white neighbor, the Guardian reported. Lawyers attempted to get her pardoned because the police might have used her race as a factor to gain evidence. As the 500th person to die since capital punishment's reinstatement in the U.S. in 1976 as well as a black female, her case caused a bit of a frenzy. (source: Business Insider) US MILITARY:
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----USA, US MIL.
Jan. 30 USA: Executing Women In the USA Very few, or at least relatively few, women have been executed in the United States. Kimberly McCarthy would have been the 13th woman put to death since reinstatement of capital punishment in 1976, had her execution not been delayed at the last minute to look into the question of improper jury selection at her trial. An African American woman, McCarthy was sentenced to die by a Dallas, TX jury that was predominantly (11-1) white. So as it stand now, out of 1,321 executions in the U.S. only 12 (less than 1%) have been women. Interestingly, according to the Death Penalty Information Center, while women are responsible for roughly 10% of murders, they receive only 2.1% of death sentences and make up only 1.8% of current death row residents, but have received over 4% of clemencies granted. Perhaps this represents yet another way the death penalty is disproportionately applied. Anyway, as a group that appears more likely to find their way out of the capital punishment system than their male counterparts, one would expect that all the women who actually do get executed would be the absolute worst of the worst. One would be wrong. For example: --3 of the women executed - Wanda Jean Allen, Aileen Wuornos, and Teresa Lewis - suffered from serious mental disabilities. Teresa Lewis, despite her low IQ and dependency disorder, was executed as the mastermind of a murder for hire. --Both Christina Riggs and Lynda Lyon Block assisted in their own execution, Riggs by refusing to allow her lawyers to mount a defense, and Block by serving as her own lawyer and giving up her appeals for reasons connected to her political beliefs. --2 others ??? Velma Barfield and Karla Faye Tucker - inspired calls for clemency from highly influential religious figures like Billy Graham, Pat Robertson, and Pope John Paul II. --Like Teresa Lewis, Marlyn Plantz was executed for conspiring in a murder committed by someone else. She was also executed despite the involvement in her case of the notorious Joyce Gilchrist, who was found to have grossly mismanaged the forensics lab where she worked. --Frances Newton died professing her innocence. Retesting of evidence that might have bolstered her claim could not be carried out because the state had mishandled and contaminated the evidence. The issues in these cases are the same ones we see regularly in the cases of men who are put to death. Executions routinely take place despite a prisoner's genuine remorse or mental disability, despite doubts created by prosecutorial misbehavior or the prisoner's volunteering for death, and despite unresolved claims of innocence. Executions of women in the U.S. may be rare; but the flaws in their cases are all too common. (source: Brian Evans, blog, Amnesty International USA) *** Accused 9/11 plotters boycott hearings at Guantanamo 5 accused 9/11 plotters boycotted their pre-trial hearing Tuesday in a Guantanamo courtroom, a day after authorities censored part of the proceedings. The self-proclaimed mastermind of the September 11, 2001 attacks, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and 4 other defendants face the death penalty if convicted of the murder of nearly 3,000 people on September 11, 2001 in the worst ever attack on US soil. But they chose not to attend Tuesday's hearing, the second in the latest round of proceedings that will prepare the way for a trial at the remote naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The 5 detainees are not present in the courtroom today, said military Judge James Pohl. An officer from the prison at Guantanamo, where the accused and other terror suspects are detained, said the defendants informed him verbally and in writing that they would not attend the proceedings on Tuesday. They were very clear to me both in their oral statement and by signing the waiver, said the officer, whose name was not released. One of the suspects, Yemeni Walid bin Attash, said at Monday's hearing that the defendants had no motivating factor to come to court. Our attorneys are bound and we are bound also, he said. The government doesn't want us to say anything, to do anything. The hearings at the high-tech, maximum security court are broadcast over a closed-circuit television feed with a 40-second delay for journalists and others observing the proceedings in a nearby room, a media centre and at Fort Meade in Maryland, outside Washington. But a portion of the hearing was censored Monday and the feed was cut off when lawyers began discussing the sensitive subject of CIA prisons where the 5 accused were detained and interrogated before being transferred to Guantanamo. The defence maintains that the CIA black sites, whose location remains classified, should be preserved because they constitute potential evidence that the 5 were tortured at the prisons. The 5 suspects underwent harsh interrogations before they were
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----USA, US MIL., CALIF., UTAH, COLO.
Dec. 11 USA: States put brakes on capital punishment For just the second time since 1984, Virginia and Maryland will end the year without executing a single death row inmate - reflecting a national trend of states using capital punishment less often over the past decade. Maryland has long been reluctant to use its death penalty. Virginia, which ranks only behind Texas in the number of executions over the past 35 years, has put fewer people to death in recent years as many cases are tied up in appeals and as juries become less likely to recommend the punishment in capital murder cases. Analysts say executions have plummeted nationwide and are banned in some states because of rising concerns over heavy court costs, biased sentencing and, perhaps most prominently, the fear that a state could - or already has - killed an innocent person. The advent of science in the world of criminology has showed that the justice system makes mistakes, said Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center. That, I think, is a real shocker for the public and jurors, and they're now less likely to give a death sentence. Yearly executions in the U.S. have decreased by more than 50 % since 1999, when 98 people were put to death - the most since the Supreme Court placed an effective moratorium on capital punishment in 1972, and reaffirmed its legality in 1976. This year, 42 convicts have been executed in a total of nine states, even though 33 states allow the death penalty and more than 3,000 inmates are on death row nationwide. The year's final execution is scheduled for Tuesday in Florida, where former South Florida police officer Manuel Pardo, 56, is scheduled to be executed for killing 9 people in 1986. The execution would bring the nationwide total to 43, matching last year's total but falling short of the 46 inmates who were executed in 2010. Mr. Dieter said execution rates rose steadily in the 1980s and 1990s as reducing crime rates became a major political issue but have since declined largely because of prosecutors' and juries' reliance on life without parole as a common alternative. Slow appeals process David Muhlhausen, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation, said he thinks the drop in executions largely has been a result of a national decline in murder rates and longer appeals processes for death row inmates. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, inmates executed in 2010 - the most recent year for which statistics were available - had been under sentence of death an average of 14 years and 10 months, which was 9 months longer than those executed in 2009. Mr. Muhlhausen, who supports the death penalty, said he does not expect executions to increase anytime soon unless the legal process is expedited. Although he is reluctant to call for such reforms because they could increase the likelihood of wrongful executions, he said, the death penalty should be kept in place to punish the nation???s most violent offenders and serve as a deterrent. Each additional execution, in fact, saves lives, he said. And that's something opponents don't consider. While a declining crime rate has led to fewer executions, Mr. Dieter said, another major factor has been a number of high-profile exonerations of death row inmates. Sentence overturned Since 1973, 141 people have been sentenced to death but subsequently had their convictions overturned for reasons including withheld evidence by prosecutors, coerced confessions and false or unreliable witness testimony, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. About half of those exonerations have occurred in the past 15 years, and 18 took place after the discovery of DNA evidence that contradicted court testimony or pointed to other assailants. None of the 1,319 people executed since 1976 has been legally exonerated after execution, although activists and legal groups have argued for their innocence in numerous cases. You can release an innocent person from prison, but you can't release them from the grave, former Illinois death row inmate Randy Steidl told Northern Kentucky University's the Northerner newspaper last month. He spent 17 years in prison for double murder before he was acquitted in a 2004 retrial because of a lack of evidence and a recanted witness statement. Another factor in declining executions over the past 2 years has been a national shortage of sodium thiopental, a barbiturate once commonly used in 3-drug lethal injection cocktails. The drug was pulled off the market in 2011 after its only U.S. producer moved operations to Italy. The Italian government prevented the product from being exported for use in executions. States including Ohio and Virginia have countered by using pentobarbital, a powerful barbiturate that can be used for single-drug executions, instead of sodium thiopental. Public sentiment While polls show that
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----USA, US MIL., GA., NEV., LA.
Aug. 28 USA: Just how fair does justice have to be? The U.S. Supreme Court is getting ready to hear argument in the upcoming term on a core issue of the nation's legal system, one that goes to the heart of fairness in criminal cases -- under what circumstances do prosecutors have to reveal evidence that might help defendants show innocence? First, a disclaimer: You're about to read material on issues that should be of concern to every American who cares about the quality of U.S. society but usually dismissed by the average person. It largely concerns the rights of people who may be guilty of horrendous crimes. Technically, it comes under the heading of legal stuff. A major purveyor of legal stuff, the American Bar Association, says it's time to broaden the obligations of prosecutors who would just as soon Brady material -- evidence held by the prosecution that might help a defendant -- never see the light of day. Over the years, the courts have recognized that some prosecutors and police are so convinced of the guilt of some defendants, they are unwilling to introduce evidence that might needlessly confuse the issue in the minds of jurors. The Supreme Court's opinion in Brady vs. Maryland has been settled law for nearly 5 decades. In the case, a prosecutor had withheld from the defense evidence that might have helped John Brady, the defendant convicted in a murder trial, avoid the death penalty. The high court ruled 7-2 that suppression by the prosecution of evidence favorable to an accused who has requested it violates constitutional due process -- where the evidence is material either to guilt or to punishment, regardless of the good faith or bad faith of the prosecution. But the court majority also said when the Maryland Court of Appeals restricted the defendant's new trial to the question of punishment -- the guilty verdict would stand -- it did not deny him due process or equal protection of the laws under the 14th Amendment, since the suppressed evidence was admissible only on the issue of punishment. Justice William O. Douglas wrote the majority opinion, but Justice William Brennan announced it. Petitioner and a companion ... were found guilty of murder in the 1st degree and were sentenced to death, their convictions being affirmed by the Court of Appeals of Maryland, Douglas wrote, adding, Their trials were separate, petitioner being tried first. At his trial Brady took the stand and admitted his participation in the crime, but he claimed that (Donald) Boblit (the companion) did the actual killing. And, in his summation to the jury, Brady's counsel conceded that Brady was guilty of murder in the 1st degree, asking only that the jury return that verdict without capital punishment.' Before trial, petitioner's counsel had requested the prosecution to allow him to examine Boblit's extrajudicial statements -- those statements not admitted as evidence. Several of those statements were shown to him; but one dated July 9, 1958, in which Boblit admitted the actual homicide, was withheld by the prosecution and did not come to petitioner's notice until after he had been tried, convicted, and sentenced, and after his conviction had been affirmed. A constitutional violation, but the parameters of that violation weren't infinite. Douglas concluded: A sporting theory of justice might assume that if the suppressed confession had been used at the first trial, the judge's ruling that it was not admissible on the issue of innocence or guilt might have been flouted by the jury just as might have been done if the court had first admitted a confession and then stricken it from the record. But we cannot raise that trial strategy to the dignity of a constitutional right and say that the deprival of this defendant of that sporting chance through the use of a ... bifurcated trial ... denies him due process or violates the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment. 48 years after Brady, the Supreme Court is scheduled to hear argument in November in a Louisiana case that revisits the Brady issue. The ABA says it may be time to recognize obligations beyond the constitutional level. In that Louisiana case, Smith vs. Warden Cain, Juan Smith was convicted of five counts of murder in the Morrison Road case and sentenced to life in prison without parole. The state trial court, the state 4th Circuit Court of Appeal and the state Supreme Court all denied Smith's petition for review. Smith contends that the Louisiana courts disregarded established precedents on Brady material. There was plenty of murder to go around in the case. On the evening of Feb. 4, 1995, Tangie Thompson, her boyfriend, Andre White and her 3-year-old child were killed in their New Orleans residence on Roman Street. Juan Smith was convicted in the Roman Street case and sentenced to death for the 3 murders. On the evening of March 1, 1995, 3 armed men entered
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news-----USA, US MIL., N.H., N.J.
Dec. 14 USA: Death penalty ban distant, despite state vote New Jersey's abolition vote this week highlights scrutiny of the death penalty in America, and analysts say it could be a small step in the direction of an eventual nationwide ban. But with capital punishment still on the books in 36 states, a conservative majority on the Supreme Court, and broad political support for putting the worst offenders to death, the road to abolition will be long. Ultimate abolition is indeed a long way off, said Stuart Banner, a professor at the UCLA School of Law and author of The Death Penalty: An American History. I'd be very surprised if the (Supreme) Court casts any doubt any time soon on the constitutionality of capital punishment in general. New Jersey on Thursday became the first state legislature since the 1960s to abolish the death penalty. Coming on top of an unofficial moratorium on executions, some had questioned whether the move by New Jersey was a step toward national abolition. The unofficial moratorium has been in place since just after the Supreme Court said on September 25 that it would decide an appeal by two death row inmates from Kentucky arguing that the three-chemical cocktail used in lethal injections inflicted unnecessary pain and suffering. One convicted killer was executed in Texas hours later but none have been since then. Lethal injection has come under increased scrutiny after executions in Florida and California in which inmates took up to 30 minutes to die. All but one of the states with the death penalty and the federal government use lethal injection for executions. The court's decision is not expected before the middle of next year but if it decides that the current cocktail is unconstitutional, states could seek alternative methods. Still, capital punishment opponents have taken heart because of 2 trends: declining numbers of both executions carried out and death sentences being handed down. The number of death sentences imposed in 2005 -- the last year for which there is complete data -- was 128, way down from 317 in 1996. And if the moratorium holds as expected until the end of this year, America will have executed 42 inmates in 2007, the lowest number since 1994, when 31 were put to death. One of the main reasons for this newfound hesitancy is concern about wrongful convictions, many related to perceived racial bias against black defendants. No U.S. court has found that anyone has been executed in the past three decades for a crime they did not commit, but DNA and other evidence has exonerated 125 inmates since 1973 who were awaiting execution on death row, according to the Washington-based Death Penalty Information Center. There is broad political support for the death penalty, especially for the most heinous crimes. This spans the political spectrum, from liberals who do not want to be seen as soft on crime to conservative Christians who see Biblical sanction for taking an eye for an eye. All the Republican presidential candidates with the exception of Texan maverick Ron Paul support the death penalty. On the Democratic side, the three front-runners, Senators Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards all back it. And political support is strongest in the South, which is expected to keep executing people until the Supreme Court tells it otherwise. The South is a region with a traditional political culture which sees the death penalty as a means of maintaining social order, said Cal Jillson, a political scientist at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. According to the Death Penalty Information Center, the South has carried out 901 of the 1,099 executions, since the U.S. Supreme Court lifted a ban on the practice in 1976. Texas had led the way by far with 405, while the Northeast has only carried out 4, highlighting the regional divide. New Jersey had not executed any convicted criminals since 1963, making its vote mostly symbolic. However, some commentators see the possibility of a domino effect from New Jersey's move, albeit over a period of years. States have often looked to their neighbors in deciding whether to modify or abolish capital punishment. If several states were to abolish the death penalty over the next decade, the constitutional basis for attacking the death penalty would be substantially strengthened, said Jordan Steiker, a professor at the University of Texas at Austin School of Law. If death sentencing rates continue to decline, execution rates remain low, and several states abandon the penalty as a matter of law (and not just practice), judicial abolition would become a very real prospect, he said. (source: Reuters) US MILITARY: Death penalty is possible in court-martial on Suffern captain's slaying A military authority presiding over the court-martial of an Army soldier accused of slaying two officers in Iraq has ruled that it will remain a death penalty case. Lt. Gen. Lloyd J. Austin III's ratification of a
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----USA, US MIL., ARIZ., KY., S.C.
March 7 USA: The Attorney-Client Privilege and the 'Complete Lawyer': More than Mere Legal Advice The complete lawyer, in order to best serve the client, often does more than provide only legal advice in a narrow sense. A valuable attorney frequently provides specific guidance and recommendations concerning changes to a client's policies and practices. The client does not lose the protection of the attorney-client privilege when an attorney offers such practical advice. A skilled lawyer takes the time to get to know his client well, whether that client is an individual or a public or private corporate entity, so that the lawyer does not provide the client with legal advice in a context-free vacuum. For example, a lawyer who understands the industry in which a corporate client operates is equipped to do more than merely recite starchy legal precepts to the client. The well-informed and well-prepared lawyer -- the complete lawyer -- can provide nuanced guidance and direct the client down a path that is sensible from both a legal and a business perspective. That lawyer becomes a valuable and trusted business advisor, and not a narrow specialist brought in to address discreet legal issues and then expected to retreat to the shadows until summoned again. ATTORNEY-CLIENT PRIVILEGE AND THE 'COMPLETE LAWYER' In a recent decision, Pritchard v. Erie County, No. 06-2459-op (Jan. 3, 2007), the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals held that a client does not forfeit the protection of the attorney-client privilege merely because that client has the good sense or good fortune to have hired a lawyer who is able not only to tell the client what the law is, but can also make recommendations and advise the client on how the client should proceed given the status of the law. Pritchard is a class action filed on behalf of people who had been arrested and subjected to strip searches by the defendant, Erie County, N.Y. During discovery, the county, on the basis of the attorney-client privilege, withheld from production a series of e-mails between county officials and a county attorney. In the e-mails, the county attorney, who herself had no policy-making authority, did more than tell county officials what the law was; she, after explaining the status of the law, also assessed the County's current search policy, recommended alternative policies, and monitored the implementation of these policy changes. The trial court held that the attorney-client privilege did not protect the e-mails from disclosure because the county attorney, by proposing policy changes and then monitoring the implementation of those policy changes, went beyond rendering legal analysis. In essence, the trial court concluded that the attorney-client privilege did not apply because the county attorney was acting as a policy maker, not as a lawyer. The 2nd Circuit reversed, holding that the county attorney was merely doing her job as a lawyer, and doing it well, when she went beyond a mere rendering of legal analysis, and that the client did not lose the protection of the attorney-client privilege because she did so. The 2nd Circuit acknowledged, of course, that the privilege applies only to communications between client and counsel made for the purpose of obtaining or providing legal assistance. And clearly, the attorney-client privilege would not apply if, for instance, county officials sought media relations advice from someone who happened to be a lawyer. In Pritchard though, the 2nd Circuit, upon an in camera review of the documents, held that the predominant purpose of the e-mails at issue was legal in nature. The fact that the e-mails included policy recommendations, assessments and oversight did not transform the county attorney into something other than a lawyer; nor did that fact render the attorney-client privilege inapplicable. Instead, the county attorney was merely doing what her client had a right to expect her to do as a complete lawyer. According to the court, the: complete lawyer may well promote and reinforce the legal advice given, weigh it, and lay out its ramifications by explaining: how the advice is feasible and can be implemented; the legal downsides, risks and costs of taking the advice or doing otherwise; what alternatives exist to present measures or the measures advised; what other persons are doing or thinking about the matter; or the collateral benefits, risks or costs in terms of expense, politics, insurance, commerce, morals, and appearances. So long as the predominant purpose of the communication is legal advice, these considerations and caveats are not other than legal advice or severable from it. Pennsylvania law is consistent with the 2nd Circuit's treatment of the attorney-client privilege in Pritchard. In order to qualify for the protection of the privilege, a communication from client to counsel must be for the purpose of obtaining legal advice. See Commonwealth v. Mrozek, 657 A.2d 997, 998 (Pa. Super.
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----USA, US MIL., OHIO, MD., OKLA.
Feb. 17 USA: After Innocence: DVD Documents Plight of the Guilty till Proven Innocent This revealing documentary is essentially ten different stories, each a tragic case of mistaken identity and a rush to judgment. For all of the men profiled here can thank their lucky stars that evidence was preserved, otherwise theyd still be in jail. For example, Herman Atkins had been sentenced to 45 years for rape and robbery despite having an alibi and no previous criminal record. In the film, his father, a cop, admits that he now regrets never visiting his son even once during his 11-year incarceration, explaining that, as an officer of the law, he had believed in the justice system. Another of the unfortunate subjects, Scott Hornoff, was a police officer when he found himself arrested for murder. Although he sat on death row for over 6 years till his conviction was overturned, the State of Rhode Island still refuses to pay him any damages or back pay. A common theme running through each of the frightening tales told here is that none of the victims have been compensated for the ordeals they had to endure. Without money to get back on their feet, they presently find themselves ill-equipped to cope in a world which has moved on without them. We also see the toll that the time in jail has exacted on their families, from wives having to work and to raise children alone to kids feeling alienated to relatives not living long enough to see a sons name cleared before they passed on. One mother wonders why the jury had so callously dismissed her passionate testimony, under oath, that her son had been with her at the time that the crime had been committed. Meanwhile, one false accuser contritely tries to explain away her regrettable mistake of identifying the wrong man as her rapist. By shining a scientific spotlight on the criminal justice systems dirty little secret, After Innocence leaves no doubt that thousands of other wrongly-imprisoned persons must currently be rotting away behind bars, with only the ability to afford a Dream Team of DNA experts standing between them and their freedom. Excellent (4 stars) Unrated Running time: 95 minutes Distributor: New Yorker Video DVD Extras: Deleted scenes, bonus footage, updates, interviews, Pearl Jam performance, media coverage, footage from the Sundance and theatrical premieres, MTV and Larry King Live coverage, website and contact info, and a theatrical trailer. (source: Insight Magazine) ** The Chief Justice's Quest for Less Fractured Supreme Court Rulings The U.S. Supreme Court plays an essential role in resolving splits that have arisen among lower federal and state courts on questions of federal law. Often, the correct answer in these cases is far from apparent; if the question presented had an easy answer, no lower court division of authority would have occurred. Because the vast bulk of the Supreme Court's workload consists of cases that present the most difficult and important questions of federal law, it does not come as any great surprise that many of those cases produce sharply divided rulings from the Supreme Court itself. But while sharply divided high court rulings provide countless hours of enjoyment to the media and other Court watchers, they don't offer the same promise of legal stability that unanimous decisions or nearly unanimous decisions provide. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. recently addressed this matter at length in a very interesting interview with law professor Jeffrey Rosen that is the subject of an article in the January/February 2007 issue of The Atlantic Monthly. According to the article, Roberts said, There was a question from one of these [tour] groups that come in here: 'How do you decide who's going to be the swing vote?' The chief justice jokingly responded to Rosen, I don't know, we rotate, before remarking more seriously that the question to him identified a steady wasting away of the notion of the rule of law, a personalization of it. The article went on to quote Roberts as saying, The whole notion that it's functioning as a Court doesn't seem to appeal to anyone ... I think it's bad, long-term, if people identify the rule of law with how individual justices vote. In the aftermath of the interview, disagreement has arisen among commentators over whether the chief justice's remarks were meant for two of his most unyielding colleagues on the Court's conservative wing, Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas, or whether they targeted the Court's newly perceived centrist, Justice Anthony Kennedy. My guess, for what it's worth, is that the chief justice was aiming his remarks more at Kennedy than at the other 2 justices. Any discussion of the high court's current output must begin with the recognition that the Court presently enjoys a remarkable amount of unanimity in many cases and that the outlook of the justices is not all that divergent on many important issues of the day.
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----USA, US MIL., N.C., CALIF., VER.
May 1 USA: Round Table TeensTeenagers weigh in on Supreme Court ruling The U.S. Supreme Court recently ruled that convicts cannot be executed for crimes committed before they turned 18. Some members of the 2004-2005 Courier-Journal High School Round Table see the ruling as a humane and decent decision, even as they struggle with the issue of whether teen defendants should really be held to a different standard. The ruling became a launching point for a recent round table discussion about the death penalty in general and about the ability of teens to make responsible and moral decisions. The High School Round Table is a yearly tradition that dates to 1983. This year's 12 members were chosen from more than 350 applicants. Here are excerpts from their recent conversation: Beverly Bartlett: What was your reaction to the ruling? Katie Shannon, 18, senior, Eastern High School: My initial reaction was one of surprise because we have such a conservative Supreme Court right now. However, I have mixed feelings on the subject. I think people do understand the consequences of their actions, and I think that if I was a family member of a victim, I might want that person put to death. However, when I really thought about it, I thought that (the ruling) kind of moves us toward becoming a more humane society and so I think it was a step forward. Keane Barger, 17, junior, Meade County High School: We are one of the only 1st- and 2nd-world countries that still had minors being killed and the Supreme Court ruled based on international law and evolving standards of decency. I think if they are 16 or 17, they probably do know the consequences of their actions, but I also think you are more easily influenced. Kurt Manning, 15, freshman, Louisville Collegiate School: I support the death penalty. (But) I'm not for (using it on) kids. Since you are not really an adult, they shouldn't consider you an adult and punish you and put you to death. Because I think when you are 15, 16, 17, you don't think as clearly. You just try to get along and you don't see the consequences. Bartlett: In the specific case the Supreme Court was ruling on, a guy broke into somebody's house and tied the woman up, stole stuff from the house, and then threw her in a river so that she drowned. What do you think would be the appropriate punishment? Duffy Smallwood, 18, senior, Our Lady of Providence: I know this sounds kind of bad, but I don't think it matters how heinous the crime is. I don't think anybody can make that call. I think God is the only one that can judge people. That aside, because I don't believe you should make national decisions based on religion, I think that's like the ultimate taking away of someone's freedom is killing them. I believe in rehabilitation for some things, but I think if someone murders someone, they should be in an institution for the rest of their life regardless if they are 17 or 27. Katie: I think what a lot of people who are outraged by this decision don't fully understand is that it doesn't mean that minors are going to be let out for their crimes. It doesn't mean that minors aren't going to be punished. I think that we need to make sure that we implement very severe punishments -- especially in the case of murder and premeditated murder -- so that the person is truly punished appropriately. As long as we continue to do that, I think that we will get the message across and it will be an effective way to handle this. Keane: I think it's easy for people to understand if someone does something impulsively that maybe the person was just confused. But I also think when something is premeditated like that case was, I still think someone can be confused. They may have been confused for, you know, their entire lives. It could be a whole lifetime of things building up that eventually leads to them getting to this point where they are going to kill somebody. And as far as the punishment is concerned, I think the job of our courts and the purpose of law is to protect every citizen. As long as people are being protected, I think they should just get life (in prison). Bartlett: Explain how you came to your opinion about the death penalty. Is it related to your religious beliefs, your feelings about deterrence? What? Sailee Gupte, 17, junior, Manual High School: I don't support the death penalty because basically (it makes us) an-eye-for-an-eye society and that's not really what America is about. It's not, well, you did this so I'm going to do this. It's a society based on justice. I think lifetime in prison -- without parole -- would suffice because they would have no chance at freedom. They have to live every day with what they have done. Mallory Sharp, 17, junior, New Albany High School: For a while, I used to think that the death penalty was OK because an eye for an eye, but then I thought what does that really solve? Who are we to say, you know, I have the right to take away a life? It
