June 12 USA: New Criminal Record: 7.2 Million----Nation's Justice System Strains to Keep Pace With Convictions The number of people under supervision in the nation's criminal justice system rose to 7.2 million in 2006, the highest ever, costing states tens of billions of dollars to house and monitor offenders as they go in and out of jails and prisons. According to a recently released report released by the Bureau of Justice Statistics, more than 2 million offenders were either in jail or prison in 2006, the most recent year studied in an annual survey. Another 4.2 million were on probation, and nearly 800,000 were on parole. The cost to taxpayers, about $45 billion, is causing states such as California to reconsider harsh criminal penalties. In an attempt to relieve overcrowding, California is now exporting some of its 170,000 inmates to privately run corrections facilities as far away as Tennessee. "There are a number of states that have talked about an early release of prisoners deemed non-threatening," said Rebecca Blank, a senior fellow in economic studies at the Brookings Institution, a centrist think tank. "The problem just keeps getting bigger and bigger. You're paying a lot of money here. You have to ask if some of these high mandatory minimum sentences make sense." The bureau's report comes on the heels of a Pew Center on the States report showing 1 % of U.S. adults behind bars, a historic high. The United States has the largest number of people behind bars in the world, according to the Pew report. Black men, about one in 15, were most affected, and Hispanics, one in 35, were well represented among offenders. The number of women in prison "rose faster in 2006 than over the previous five years," mostly in Hawaii, North Dakota, Wyoming and Oklahoma, the Bureau of Justice Statistics report said. In 1980, about the time that tough sentencing laws, particularly for drug offenses, began to be passed by federal and state legislators, 1.8 million people were in the system and $11 billion was spent on corrections. "It's really like a runaway train," said Ryan King, policy analyst for the liberal Sentencing Project. "Nobody's taking a step back and asking where all these billions of dollars are going." With so much overcrowding, King said, states "need billions of dollars to build enough beds to catch up to where they need to be." Defenders of the system argue, however, that the rise in the prison population means that more dangerous criminals have been taken off the streets. "If you look at the fact that these are people who are committing a crime, creating a danger to the public, you can't look at it as wrong," said Scott Thorpe, chief executive of the California District Attorneys Association. "What is the appropriate number of people to be incarcerated to ensure public safety? I don't know if you can answer that." State contracts with private prisons to house offenders grew by 6 %, or about 6,000 inmates, the report said. Nearly 114,000 state and federal prisoners were in private institutions in 2006. Tim Lynch, director of the criminal justice project for the libertarian Cato Institute, called the numbers "scandalous" and said states have resorted to "tinkering" to solve prison overcrowding. "I think these numbers demonstrate that we've lost our way," Lynch said. "We've lost our way when our laws require such a massive scale of incarceration." Lynch and others said the drug war is destroying American inner cities almost as much as the drug trade. "When you lock up a bank robber, a child molester or a mugger, you're removing a career offender from the street. "When you lock up a drug dealer, he is immediately replaced," Lynch said. "We tried this with alcohol during Prohibition and it didn't work. We're not reaching the same conclusion with the drug war. It's slowly sinking in, but it will take politicians some time to turn this around." (source: Washington Post) ************************************* High Court: Gitmo detainees have rights in court The Supreme Court ruled today that foreign terrorism suspects held at Guantanamo Bay have rights under the Constitution to challenge their detention in U.S. civilian courts. The justices handed the Bush administration its 3rd setback at the high court since 2004 over its treatment of prisoners who are being held indefinitely and without charges at the U.S. naval base in Cuba. The vote was 5-4, with the court's liberal justices in the majority. Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for the court, said, "The laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times." It was not immediately clear whether this ruling, unlike the first 2, would lead to prompt hearings for the detainees, some of whom have been held more than 6 years. Roughly 270 men remain at the island prison, classified as enemy combatants and held on suspicion of terrorism or links to al-Qaida and the Taliban. The administration opened the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks to hold enemy combatants, people suspected of ties to al-Qaida or the Taliban. The Guantanamo prison has been harshly criticized at home and abroad for the detentions themselves and the aggressive interrogations that were conducted there. The court said not only that the detainees have rights under the Constitution, but that the system the administration has put in place to classify them as enemy combatants and review those decisions is inadequate. The administration had argued first that the detainees have no rights. But it also contended that the classification and review process was a sufficient substitute for the civilian court hearings that the detainees seek. In dissent, Chief Justice John Roberts criticized his colleagues for striking down what he called "the most generous set of procedural protections ever afforded aliens detained by this country as enemy combatants." Justices Samuel Alito, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas also dissented. Justices Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, David Souter and John Paul Stevens joined Kennedy to form the majority. The court has ruled twice previously that people held at Guantanamo without charges can go into civilian courts to ask that the government justify their continued detention. Each time, the administration and Congress, then controlled by Republicans, changed the law to try to close the courthouse doors to the detainees. In addition to those held without charges, the U.S. has said it plans to try as many as 80 of the detainees in war crimes tribunals, which have not been held since World War II. A military judge has postponed the 1st scheduled trial pending the outcome of this case. The trial of Salim Ahmed Hamdan, Osama bin Laden's onetime driver, had been scheduled to start June 2. 5 alleged plotters of the Sept. 11 attacks appeared in a Guantanamo courtroom last week for a hearing before their war crimes trial, which prosecutors hope will start Sept. 15. (source: Los Angeles Times) INDIANA: Death row inmate loses appeal over property lost in storage Death row inmate Matthew Eric Wrinkles has lost an appeal alleging the Department of Correction lost some of his property, including legal documents. Wrinkles was sentenced to death in 1995 for fatally shooting his estranged wife, brother-in-law and sister-in-law in Evansville in 1994. On Tuesday, the Indiana Court of Appeals ruled against Wrinkles in a case in which he complained the Indiana Department of Correction had lost items he had in storage. In a series of appeals, Wrinkles claimed the value of his lost personal property was $150, and he sought an additional $150 in damages. Appeals Judge Ezra H. Friedlander wrote that Wrinkles did not file his notice of tort claim within the required 180-day limit required by law. "The statute is clear, an offender who seeks to recover compensation for the loss of his personal property must file a notice of tort claim within 180 days after the date of the alleged loss," Friedlander wrote. Wrinkles, 48, said he was moved to the maximum-control complex at Westville Correctional Facility in Westville, Ind., in February 2003 while the death row unit at the Indiana State Prison was being renovated. Because of property restrictions at Westville, much of Wrinkles' property was stored at Indiana State Prison. In April 2004, Wrinkles reportedly requested the return of some of his property. Wrinkles claimed he requested those items 13 times in the following months but did not receive any boxes until June 2004. In October 2004, he was told some items were lost or unaccounted for. When he was returned to the Indiana State Prison in April 2005, more of his property was returned, but he noted that "at least one property box of paperwork, legal materials, as well as a blanket, ear buds and some other sundry items were missing." He began a formal grievance process in May 2005. (source: Courier Press) ******************* Death penalty case returns to Tippecanoe County A Tippecanoe County jury could help decide whether a Cloverdale man convicted of killing a 10-year-old boy he molested should again be sentenced to death. Last summer, a federal appeals court set aside the death penalty for Christopher M. Stevens, who admitted to strangling Zachary Snider because the boy threatened to tell his parents that they engaged in sexual acts. Stevens' murder conviction in 1995 still stands. But a trial, tentatively set to begin Feb. 1, 2010, was scheduled Wednesday in Tippecanoe Superior Court 2 for the penalty phase. "I did not try the case the first time. Attorneys on the other side didn't defend him last time," Putnam County Prosecutor Timothy Bookwalter said. "Both sides are new. This was a date we agreed upon so that everybody could have time to prepare." Stevens, now 35, had been on parole for a child molesting conviction in Marion County when he killed Zachary in 1993. The murder and molestation of the Cloverdale boy drew statewide attention and led to the creation of Zachary's law, which requires convicted sex offenders to register their addresses in a public database. The trial was held in Tippecanoe County because of pretrial publicity around Putnam County. A Tippecanoe Superior Court 2 jury recommended Stevens receive the death penalty, which was affirmed by former Judge George Heid. Superior Court 2 Judge Thomas Busch, who will preside over the new penalty phase, said Wednesday that jurors selected from Tippecanoe County will have to be sequestered to shield them from outside influences. Stevens' original sentence was set aside by the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals last June because the court ruled that his court-appointed attorneys were ineffective. Bookwalter in December filed paperwork requesting that Stevens again be sentenced to death. He said Monday that it will take some time for his office to review the evidence presented during the 1st trial. Stevens will be represented by Indianapolis attorney Joseph Cleary. A telephone status conference is scheduled for Sept. 29. The court also decided that Stevens will not have to be present at future hearings. "I spoke to Mr. Stevens, and he would rather not have to be shackled and brought to court," Cleary told the judge. Stevens remains in the Indiana Department of Correction. (source: Journal and Courier) SOUTH CAROLINA: Supreme Court to hear appeal of Greenville man sentenced to death The South Carolina Supreme Court is scheduled tomorrow morning to hear Freddie Eugene Owens' appeal to a 3rd death sentence he received in the 1997 killing of a convenience store clerk. In November 2006, a jury sentenced Owens to die in the shooting death of Speedway clerk Irene Grainger Graves, a mother of 3. The Supreme Court had overturned 2 previous death sentences, citing judges' errors. Owens was convicted in February 1999 of murdering Graves during a robbery. Hours later, a warrant alleges that he used a writing pen to kill Christopher Bryan Lee, an inmate who was in the Greenville County Detention Center on traffic violations. Owens hasn't gone to trial in the Lee killing. Thirteenth Circuit Solicitor Bob Ariail has said Owens won't be tried in the Lee case if the Graves sentence sticks because other cases await trial. However, if the Supreme Court overturns the Graves sentence for a third time, Ariail has said he "may seriously look at the option of trying the Lee case on its own rather than retrying this one." (source: Greenville News) ********************* Man To Appeal 3rd Death Sentence On Thursday morning the State Supreme Court is scheduled to hear an appeal from a man who has been sentenced to die 3 times. On Thursday morning the State Supreme Court is scheduled to hear an appeal from a man who has been sentenced to die three times. Freddie eugene owens was first convicted and sentenced to death in 1999 for killing convenience store clerk Irene Graves during a 1997 hold up. Owens received 2 more chances after the State Supreme Court granted him a new sentencing trial in 2001 and again in 2003 due to technicalities, but that was also overturned. Then in 2006 a jury sentenced him to death again. Thursday's hearing is scheduled to begin at 9:30am in Columbia. (source: WSPA News) CALIFORNIA: Death penalty sought in shooting death of East Palo Alto officer who was born and raised in SLO The San Mateo County District Attorneys Office has announced it will seek the death penalty in the case of a man charged with the 2006 fatal shooting of an East Palo Alto police officer and San Luis Obispo native. Alberto Alvarez is accused of shooting 38-year-old Officer Richard May on Jan. 7, 2006. May was born and raised in San Luis Obispo and had previously worked as a Lompoc police officer. Alvarez is set to go to trial Dec. 1. If he is found guilty of 1st-degree murder, the jury will deliberate whether he should receive the death penalty. Prosecutors believe Alvarez killed May after the officer responded to reports of a fight at a restaurant. A grand jury indicted Alvarez on Aug. 25, 2006. He remains in jail without bail. (source: Bay City News)
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----USA, IND., S.C., CALIF.
Rick Halperin Thu, 12 Jun 2008 16:15:52 -0500 (Central Daylight Time)
