March 31 PUERTO RICO: Boricuas say no to the death penalty The subject of the death penalty has heated up in Puerto Rico, where capital punishment is prohibited by the Constitution of 1952. In theory, because it`s never been tested, residents of Puerto Rico who commit a federal crime that carries the death penalty could be sentenced to die. Such is the case with two Puerto Ricans who have been tried and convicted of killing a security guard and who, on April 11, will go before the same jury that found them guilty to determine whether they will be sentenced to the death penalty. On March 22 a federal jury found Hernando Medina Villegas and Lorenzo Cataln Romn guilty of killing the security guard in 2002. The U.S. Attorney's Office has said it has jurisdiction because the case involves interstate commerce. If the 2 men are condemned to die, the federal criminal justice system would have to take the extraordinary step of bringing them to the mainland to execute them. Despite the high crime rate in Puerto Rico, opinion polls have consistently found that the people are opposed to the reinstatement of the death penalty. On Tuesday, the governor, Anbal Acevedo Vil, formally asked the U.S. to refrain from imposing the death penalty in Puerto Rico. People from the civic sector, religious organizations ranging from the Roman Catholic Church to conservative groups, people who support independence and people who support statehood, and those in the labor movement have all come out against the death penalty on the island. Yesterday, the Association of American Jurists, a non-governmental organization acting as a consultant at the United Nations, released a statement opposing the application of the death penalty on the island. The Puerto Rican people -and the Puerto Rican constitution- are clear in their opposition to the death penalty. The federal government must not impose its will on the island nation. Puerto Rican justice must prevail. (source: El Diario) CONNECTICUT: Westport's Representatives Split on Death Penalty Abolition Vote Westport's 2 state representatives split their votes on Wednesday's unsuccessful attempt to abolish Connecticut's death penalty. The measure was defeated 89-60. Democrat Joe Mioli, a freshman representative whose district covers all but a sliver of Westport, vote yes. Republican Cathy Tymniak, whose district includes a portion of the Greens Farms area, voted no. The five-hour debate came with New England's first execution in 45 years looming. The bill would have replaced the death sentence with life in prison without the possibility of release -- a move that leaves serial killer Michael Ross' fate up to the courts. Legislators who want to end capital punishment had acknowledged for weeks that the abolition bill had no chance of passing. However, they said the House vote allowed them to debate the public policy before Ross' scheduled May 11 execution by lethal injection. (source: WestportNow.com) **************** House defeats bill to abolish death penalty After more than four hours of impassioned speeches and heart-wrenching tales of murder yesterday, the state House of Representatives defeated a bill to abolish the state's death penalty, 89-60. The bill would have commuted the death sentence to life in prison with no possibility of release for murder with special circumstances, including killing of police, serial murders and killing of children. The bill was introduced by state Rep. Michael Lawlor, D-East Haven, who spent 47 minutes outlining 10 reasons why the state should abolish the death penalty. "We do know there have been innocent people on death row," Lawlor said, citing recent cases where DNA evidence has resulted in exoneration for death row inmates in Illinois. "We know that innocent people have come within hours of execution. Though I can't prove it, I'm sure there have been innocent people put to death in this country in the last 50 years." Connecticut has not put anyone to death since Joseph "Mad Dog" Taborsky was sent to the electric chair in 1960 for killing five men and one woman during a 10-week robbery spree of liquor stores and gas stations in the Hartford area. The state is preparing to put serial killer Michael Ross to death by lethal injection May 11. Ross is on death row for the murders of four young women in eastern Connecticut in the early 1980s. His arrest in 1984 ended a 3-year spree of attacks that stretched from Connecticut to New York, North Carolina, Illinois and Ohio. He raped most of his victims and killed 8 of them, 6 in Connecticut. Lawlor said most other countries have abandoned capital punishment as barbaric, and noted that countries are not allowed to join the European Union unless they abolish the death penalty and remove it from their constitutions. Lawlor said studies show it is not less expensive to impose the death penalty compared to keeping someone in prison for life. And he said the argument that it brings victims' families closure is not true -- they wait for year upon year of appeals and postponed execution dates, he said. The most impassioned plea to end capital punishment came from New Haven Democrat William Dyson. Dyson, who is black, said he would not bring race into the argument, as had others who said the death penalty has been disproportionately imposed on blacks. Instead, he brought up the economic and class disparities in how it is imposed. "This is one punishment we cannot apply fairly and without discrimination. It can't be done," Dyson said. He implored his colleagues to vote in favor of the bill, paraphrasing U.S. Supreme Court Justice William Douglas, saying, "You can search in vain, but you'll never, ever, find that we've executed anyone wealthy." "Under any name, killing is wrong," Dyson said. "I believe the quotation, 'Thou shall not kill.' I believe it! I believe it! I believe it!" Deputy Minority Leader Lawrence Cafero Jr., R-Norwalk, led opposition to the bill, supporting the death penalty during 42 minutes of questions to Lawlor and arguments why the penalty should remain. Cafero brought up Ross' victims. "We do not hear from them because he killed them," Cafero said of the victims. Dyson countered Cafero's argument. "In this country, we have (executed) some innocent people. And guess what? They're not here to talk about it," he said. The broader death penalty debate began across town yesterday as Vivian Dobson of Plainfield, the only known victim of Ross to survive, broke a nearly 20-year silence and told a room full of reporters that despite her rape and near strangulation by Ross, she opposes the death penalty. "I can't sit back in my (emotional) prison and watch everything that's happened in the last 18 years with Michael Ross," Dobson said as tears streamed down her face in the office of state's victims' advocate, James Papillo. "It doesn't help me. I can't really say how the families feel. But I don't think it really helps them either. To take a life for a life is wrong." Dobson said she felt sorry that she didn't use a knife that she had to kill Ross during the attack, because four of his victims were killed after he raped her. "I'm so sorry to the families because I lived and their babies died," said Dobson, who did testify at Ross' trial at the urging of victims' families. "And I can't change that. But I don't want to be a part of killing somebody else. And I don't think we should be either. Because that's not what we're here for." State Rep. James Shapiro, D-Stamford, evoked the names of Ross' victims during his arguments. "I'm going to vote for April Brunias, Robin Stavinsky, Wendy Baribeault and Leslie Shelley," Shapiro said. "The manner in which these women lost their lives convinces me that there are still crimes for which we must reserve the ultimate penalty . . . We must take this act of self defense. We must speak for these four women because Michael Ross made sure they can no longer speak for themselves." Some representatives had more personal stories. State Rep. Al Adinolfi, R-Cheshire, said he still thinks about the murder 30 years ago of his 23-year-old nephew and the effect it has had on his sister all these years. "The only way there would have been closure for my sister, the only thing that would make her satisfied, is to execute his killer," Adinolfi said. "I would vote to do away with the death penalty if we could come up with a more severe punishment, like solitary confinement." State Rep. Christel Truglia, D-Stamford, who grew up in Germany during World War II, urged her colleagues to ban the death penalty on moral grounds. "To allow the state to put someone to death is no more right than the original crime," Truglia said. "I am guided by a reverence and respect for life. I grew up in war-torn Germany, where there was no respect for life. I am happy to say Germany no longer has the death penalty." State Rep. Joseph Mann, D-Norwalk, also appealed to his colleagues to vote in favor of the bill to abolish capital punishment. But House Minority Leader Robert Ward, R-North Branford, used morality to argue the death penalty is just, particularly in the Ross case. "The state of Connecticut does have the moral authority to take a life when it comes to certain heinous murders and certain heinous crimes," Ward said. "Rape and murder, in this case multiple times, does deserve the limited authority for taking life." Gov. M. Jodi Rell issued a statement after the vote. "I am opposed to repealing Connecticut's death penalty statute, but I believe it was important for the House of Representatives to have the debate it had today," she said. She then implored lawmakers to get moving on the thousands of other bills that await action. The legislative session ends June 8. (source: Stamford Advocate) *********************** Death Penalty Survives----After 5-Hour Debate, House Votes 89-60 Against Proposed Repeal Of Capital Punishment The state House of Representatives rejected a proposal Wednesday to abolish the death penalty and spare the lives of serial killer Michael Ross and 6 others on Connecticut's death row. By an 89-60 vote, the House defeated a bill that would have made what are now capital crimes punishable by life in prison without possibility of release. The outcome never was in doubt. Death penalty opponents began the day with 54 firm votes for abolition. After a 5-hour debate, they were joined by a half-dozen freshman Democrats. "It's the best we've ever done," said Kim Harrison, a lobbyist for the United Church of Christ, a member of the anti-death penalty coalition. The vote underlined a sharp partisan divide on capital punishment that could reverberate in the 2006 elections for governor and the General Assembly. The 52-member Republican minority strongly embraced the death penalty, voting 48-4 against repeal, while the 99-member Democratic majority split. Democrats voted 56-41 for abolition, with 2 absences. The debate began at 1:40 p.m. with 50 spectators, mostly opponents of capital punishment, watching an afternoon and evening of political theater from the House gallery. Rep. Michael P. Lawlor, D-East Haven, the co-chairman of the judiciary committee, urged the House to remove Connecticut's singular status in the Northeast: It is the only state from New Jersey to Maine with prisoners on death row. Lawlor said Connecticut, which has not executed a prisoner since 1960, should abolish capital punishment in favor of a certain sentence of life without possibility of release. "In effect, the key would be thrown away, and they would never see the light of day," Lawlor said. Lawlor offered familiar arguments for abolition: The U.S. is alone in the Western world as a practitioner of capital punishment; court systems are imperfect, meaning an innocent person might be executed; the drawn-out process of putting a prisoner to death is unfair to victims' families; and Connecticut never will have a workable death penalty. "I don't think the death penalty is truth in sentencing," Lawlor said. Ross faces a scheduled execution May 11 only because he has waived further appeals and volunteered to die. The ranking Republican member of the judiciary committee, Rep. Robert Farr of West Hartford, did fulfill his usual role of debating partner for Lawlor. He was 1 of 4 Republicans to vote for repeal. The others were Marilyn Giuliano of Old Saybrook, Diana Urban of Stonington and Julia Wasserman of Newtown. Opponents of abolition focused on Ross, his victims and their families. "For 20 years, they have waited for justice," said Rep. Lawrence Cafero, R-Norwalk. "This is not about vengeance, this is about justice." Ross confessed to killing eight young women and teenage girls in the early 1980s. 6 of the killings took place in eastern Connecticut, and 2 were out of state. Cafero mocked those who suggest conditions are harsh on death row, saying some of the condemned manage websites. Other lawmakers complained that death row inmates have cable television. Both those characterizations are false, according to the state Department of Correction. Any websites related to inmates have been created by people outside prison. "Inmates have absolutely no access to the Internet," said Brian Garnett, a department spokesman. Rep. Steven Mikutel, D-Griswold, who represents a part of the state that was terrorized by Ross, defended the death penalty as a punishment reserved for "only the worst of the worse." "These people deserve to die," he said. Rep. David K. Labriola, R-Naugatuck, called the repeal effort "an insult and a cold slap in the face" to the families of the victims of every killer on death row. Then he allowed that opposition to capital punishment on moral or religious ground was "a respectable point of view." Labriola promised to propose separate legislation streamlining the appeals process in capital cases, perhaps speeding the journey to execution in Connecticut. "It would make it more workable," he said. Rep. William Dyson, D-New Haven, who has held anti-death penalty vigils in the atrium of the Legislative Office Building, reacted to lawmakers who professed to speak for the victims. Dyson said there is evidence that innocent men have been executed in other states. "We have killed some innocent people," Dyson said. "And guess what? They're not here to talk about it." By 6 p.m., when Rep. Minnie Gonzalez, D-Hartford, talked about her opposition to execution despite the murder of a nephew, most of the members had left to eat. She addressed 24 colleagues and 127 empty chairs. (source: Hartford Courant) MARYLAND: Death sentence sought for suspect in 1988 killing Anne Arundel County prosecutors will pursue a death sentence for an imprisoned convicted murderer recently linked to the slayings of three women who lived near him more than a decade ago. The death sentence will be sought for Alexander Wayne Watson Jr., 35, in the May 23, 1988, rape and slaying of Mary Elaine Shereika. The 37-year-old mother left her Gambrills home for her morning jog and never returned. Her body was found in a nearby rye field. "If the death penalty is for anyone, it is for Mr. Watson," Anne Arundel County State's Attorney Frank R. Weathersbee said yesterday. The victim's family agrees, said daughter Jennifer Shereika, who was 16 when her mother was slain. "I have two daughters that my mother didn't get to meet," she said. "Somehow, stacking more life sentences doesn't seem adequate." In July, Watson was charged with three murders. DNA matches ignited the cold cases, police said. His attorneys could not be reached yesterday. Prosecutors are seeking life in prison without the possibility of parole in the other 2 cases. Watson is charged with the 1986 stabbing, strangulation and rape of Boon Tem Anderson, 34, a mother of 2. Watson was 17, a year too young to be considered for a death sentence in that case. When Shereika was slain, Watson was 18. His family had bought a home in 1985 near where Anderson and Shereika lived in Gambrills. In 1993, Lisa Kathleen Haenel, a straight-A ninth-grader, vanished after leaving for Old Mill High School from her mother's Glen Burnie apartment. Watson, who lived in the same complex, is charged with killing her. Prosecutors said there were no aggravating circumstances that would allow them to seek the death penalty. He is serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole in the 1994 stabbing death of a Forestville office manager. (source: The Baltimore Sun) USA: American Journal of Psychiatry----Book Review "Are You There Alone?" The Unspeakable Crime of Andrea Yates, by Suzanne O'Malley. New York, Simon & Schuster, 2004, 281 pp., $25.00. When a mother kills her children, how much does mental illness matter when the mother's guilt is judged in the courtroom? The case of Andrea Yates, who drowned her 5 children on June 21, 2001, suggests that in some cases the verdict falls before the trial starts. Although abundant evidence exists to prove that Ms. Yates suffered severe mental illness in the 2 years before and at the time of the tragedy, psychosis and delusional hopelessness were not enough for her to be judged not guilty by reason of insanity in court. The case took an unexpected turn recently when the trial court's verdict was overturned on appeal. Although the appeals court's reasoning focused on an error by the testifying forensic psychiatrist, it is a reasonable inference that the court's ruling was based on the assumption that, other things being equal, the jury was at a tipping point. Given the facts presented, for the jury to have been at a tipping point can be understood as a reflection of a folk psychology whereby people are predisposed by the horror of an act itself to use judgmental heuristics. It is thus no wonder that Andrea Yates's acts are understood more easily as bad rather than mad, regardless of the fact pattern. The puzzling story of Andrea Yates has now received a much needed recounting from journalist Suzanne O'Malley. "Are You There Alone?" is a heartfelt account of the events that led to the tragic deaths of Noah, John, Paul, Luke, and Mary Yates. O'Malley argues that psychosis with manic features, combined with medical mismanagement, stressful circumstances, and religious obsessions masking delusions, resulted in the tragedy. Her reading of the health records presents Andrea Yates's treatment as a litany of misdiagnoses, poor treatment, wrong medications, and the role of the health insurance company rather than the clinician as the key decision maker in care. Nonetheless, despite being fragmented and confusing, the medical records documented that Andrea Yates suffered serious psychotic illness and delusions before and after she drowned her children. Mentally ill or not, however, she appeared to admit to knowing that what she did was legally wrong in videotaped interviews shown in court, and the death-qualified jury found her guilty and sane according to Texas laws. The verdict will continue toward further appeal and a potential retrial or plea bargain. O'Malley's account gives rise to questions on which a potential appeal ruling or any retrial could turn. One such question is, How valid are videotaped interviews for forensic purposes with psychotic individuals? Especially when the psychoses of those individuals before they committed the acts in question included that they were being videotaped! Moreover, by the time the videos were shot, Andrea Yates had already been repeatedly interviewed. In her aloneness with the terror of psychosis, with her delusions masking guilt and grief over her abhorrent deed and unimaginable loss, might she not seek nonverbal cues and guidance for how to maintain connection? We do not read that there was any serious exploration as to whether, in her suffering, she might have had a natural need to turn her interviewers into unwitting directors to absolve her of an otherwise unbearable confrontation with the horror. Although forensic psychiatrists are trained to examine accused persons such as Andrea Yates for feigning madness, it is far more difficult to detect the accused feigning badness or filling in the blanks as we might expect them to. Some accused would rather present themselves as bad than mad, more terrified of the aloneness of the latter than the legal consequences of the former. In this instance, if a trained, thoughtful, and experienced forensic psychiatrist could, as any human being might, become confused in the heat of cross-examination between what he was told and his observations, then is it not as likely that Andrea Yates, in the midst of the unbearable grief that the death of her children brought to the surface, might have become confused between what she imagined she was supposed by society to say to the videotape-directing interviewer and what she actually remembered? Neither Andrea Yates nor Dr. Park Dietz should be scapegoated for the failures of the mental health and medicolegal systems. O'Malley succeeds in providing detailed, memorable descriptions of the horror, and she explicates formerly mysterious issues of the religious influences of Mr. Woroniecki, the role of Randy Yates, and the political and financial aspects of the trial. Psychiatric ethics courses can use "Are You There Alone?" to raise haunting questions regarding the injustice of a social and medical system where psychotic patients feel they need to present themselves as bad rather than mad. BEATA ZOLOVSKA -- Boston, Mass. (source: American Journal of Psychiatry) HAROLD J. BURSZTAJN, M.D. Cambridge, Mass. ********************* JURISPRUDENCE----U.S. courts impact others The U.S. Supreme Court this week heard arguments in the case of Jos Medelln, a Mexican national on death row in Texas whose rights were allegedly violated under an international treaty requiring that foreigners be given consular access to assist in their legal defense. The case underlines the debate on the relationship of foreign and U.S. law and pits the American court in potential conflict with the International Court of Justice, which already intervened last year in favor of Medelln and others like him. What is most remarkable about Medelln's case is that some 50 foreign governments, acting through collective organizations such as the European Union or in their individual capacities, have filed legal briefs in his favor. Their message is simple: Medelln's rights under the treaty must be respected, and to do otherwise would be a blatant breach of America's multilateral obligations. This is not the first time that foreign governments have loudly banged on the front doors of the high court trumpeting international law and norms. In cases involving the execution of mentally retarded criminal defendants to the scope of tort liability under the Alien Tort Statute, the Supreme Court has received legal briefs from countries in Latin America, Europe and Asia, as well as from regional bodies such as the Council of Europe. Just a few weeks ago, in a land-mark decision declaring the execution of minors aged 16 and 17 to be unconstitutional, Justice Anthony Kennedy's majority opinion revealed the persuasive impact of the overwhelming world consensus against executing minors: "The opinion of the world community, while not controlling our outcome, does provide respected and significant confirmation for our own conclusions."P> These days, the enigmatic nine justices of the high court may be the country's least well-known diplomats. This should come as no surprise. In an era of global integration, foreign countries see themselves more and more as stakeholders in the jurisprudence of the American legal system on issues related to economic regulation, individual rights and the war on terror, among others. Indeed, the informal network of governments, regulatory agencies and international organizations that shape international law has become a more-useful context for understanding international relations than the idea of national sovereignty itself. Perhaps the best example is that of the Medelln case. As several foreign governments have noted, disregarding the ruling of the ICJ or otherwise flouting the requirements of an international treaty will have important ramifications for American citizens living and traveling abroad. Implicit in this not-so-veiled threat is the warning that American citizens suddenly trapped tomorrow in the unpleasant confines of a foreign prison, languishing away in a legal black hole, will have no one else to blame but the 9 justices who chose to ignore international obligations. The fact that foreign governments see the need to approach the Supreme Court suggests that the justices have an underappreciated role in positively contributing to the development of international standards in a way that both safeguards American interests as well as compels respect for and adherence to international law. This is an opportunity that the justices must seize, not shy away from. They can no longer expect their decisions to operate in an American vacuum without consequences beyond America's borders. Political leaders must be mindful of this reality. While much of the American public focuses on the issue of abortion as a litmus test for judges to replace several members of the Supreme Court over the next 4 years, lawmakers should consider the various nominees' competence and views on international and foreign law as well. Like it or not, the justices must get used to their new role as de facto diplomats. (source: Miami Herald (Parag Khanna is a senior research analyst at the Brookings Institution. Fuad Rana is a law clerk on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit)
