Sept. 7
TEXAS:
Perry 'squashed' Texas execution probe, ex-official says
In February 2009, Sam Bassett got called to Gov. Rick Perry's office.
Bassett was then chairman of the Texas Forensic Science Commission, an agency
set up in 2005 to regulate state crime labs after a series of embarrassing
scandals. The first matter on its plate involved the 2004 execution of Cameron
Todd Willingham, whose murder conviction rested largely on testimony that many
arson experts now call outdated and incorrect.
Aides to Perry, who allowed Willingham's execution to go forward, started off
with general questions about how things were going at the commission, a
relatively new agency, Bassett said. But then they started asking about
Willingham, questioning whether the commission's review of the evidence in his
case was beyond its legal powers.
"As soon as we started discussing the Willingham investigation, the meeting got
more confrontational and more difficult," Bassett said.
About 6 months later, Bassett's term on the commission was up -- and despite
letters from members urging his reappointment, Perry replaced him and 3 other
appointees. The move came at what Bassett calls a "critical point," two days
before the commission was to hear from an expert who had delivered a scathing
report on the Willingham case.
The governor's new pick for chairman soon put the brakes on the investigation,
raising some of the same questions about the commission's authority that
Bassett said Perry's aides had.
And in July, with Perry gearing up for a run for president, the state's
attorney general delivered an opinion that appears to sharply limit the
commission's authority. The Forensic Science Commission is meeting Thursday to
decide what it can still do in light of that opinion.
For Bassett, an Austin defense lawyer, it's the culmination of what he now
calls a methodical campaign to shut down an investigation that might embarrass
Perry.
"At first, when I was replaced, I gave the governor the benefit of the doubt,"
he said. "But now that time has passed, I've seen this kind of endless drumbeat
of strategies and actions to stop this investigation, and it's been terribly
disappointing."
Perry's campaign dismissed Bassett's accusations Wednesday, repeating the
governor's characterization of Willingham as a "monster" who had sent his 3
young daughters to a fiery death.
"The case has been scrutinized and reviewed by a jury, state and federal
courts, the news media, anti-death penalty activists and the Forensic Science
Commission," Perry spokesman Mark Miner told CNN in an e-mail. "Willingham was
guilty of murdering his children."
The statement did not directly address Bassett's accusations.
Bassett's role in the matter ended in October 2009. He said Perry's office
called him just days before the commission was slated to hear from the expert
it hired to review the evidence in the Willingham case. He said a Perry aide
thanked him for his service, but told him Perry "wants to take the commission
in a different direction."
Though the shakeup was controversial at the time, it was barely mentioned in
Perry's 2010 re-election campaign. Perry is now seeking the Republican
nomination for president, and Bassett says the Willingham case is a window into
Perry's leadership.
"He's not always open to any contradictory viewpoints that could actually be
helpful," said Bassett, who describes himself as a Democratic-leaning supporter
of capital punishment in some cases.
When the Willingham last-minute plea for a stay came before him, "There was
nobody at the helm to raise a flag and tell him, 'This is serious ... this guy
may have been convicted on faulty science,' " Bassett said.
Bassett said July's opinion from Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott "provides
Governor Perry with the cover he probably needs to totally squash the
investigation." Representatives of the attorney general's office raised no
concerns about the Forensic Science Commission's jurisdiction when the panel
voted unanimously to take on the Willingham investigation, he said.
The Corsicana man was put to death in February 2004. It was one of 234
executions Perry has overseen as the longest-serving U.S. governor and the head
of the most death-penalty-friendly state.
Authorities in Corsicana say they remain convinced of Willingham's guilt,
arguing that other evidence beyond the now-challenged arson testimony supported
his conviction. The state fire marshal's office has told the Forensic Science
Commission it stands by the findings in his case.
Bassett said the commission was never looking into whether Willingham was
innocent -- but he said much of the evidence cited in his trial is now
considered "junk science."
Perry's campaign also noted that Willingham's ex-wife now believes in his
guilt. And his state office told CNN that Willingham "had full access to every
level of the appeals process, and his conviction was consistently upheld."
"His conviction was reviewed and upheld by multiple levels of state and federal
courts, including nine federal courts -- four times by the U.S. Supreme Court
alone over the course of more than a decade," deputy press secretary Lucy
Nashed said in a written response to questions by CNN.
In Willingham's case, Perry's office says the governor was briefed on a
last-minute filing by Austin-based fire science expert Gerald Hurst that found
the deadly blaze was likely not arson, but he refused to grant a stay of
execution for further investigation.
Nashed told CNN that Hurst's review of investigators' findings in the
Willingham fire was also reviewed by appeals courts and the state Board of
Pardons and Paroles, which rebuffed a plea for clemency. State and federal
appeals courts "agreed that the new opinion by Gerald Hurst was simply an
opinion and did not merit reopening the case," she wrote.
Two subsequent reviews have backed up Hurst's conclusions, finding that
advances in the science of arson investigation since Willingham's trial
rendered obsolete most of the signs that fire marshals pointed to as evidence
of arson in the case.
In the 1990s, researchers determined that several of the things cited in
Willingham's trial were likely to be produced in fully involved accidental
fires. The appearance of spider web-like cracks in panes of glass, once
believed to have been the result of fires started with flammable liquids,
turned out to be caused by the rapid cooling of windows sprayed with water.
Experiments conducted during that period showed burn patterns once thought to
show multiple points of origin -- another possible indicator of arson -- also
appear when the intense heat of even an accidental blaze radiates downward and
sets items like furniture and carpet afire.
The most recent review was conducted by Maryland arson expert Craig Beyler at
the request of the Forensic Science Commission. Beyler, then chairman of the
International Association of Fire Safety Science, sharply criticized the
testimony against Willingham and questioned whether it met even the standards
of the day.
Beyler ultimately appeared before the commission in January 2011, 15 months
after he had been scheduled to answer questions about his report.
The commission began looking into Willingham's conviction at the request of
Willingham's family and The Innocence Project, which works on behalf of inmates
it believes are wrongly convicted. The group has blasted Perry over his role in
the issue, accusing him of trying to shut down the probe.
Stephen Saloom, the group's policy director, told CNN that the investigation
should go forward for the sake of hundreds of other prisoners now serving time
for arson, some of whom also may have been convicted based on outdated fire
science.
"The Willingham case really demonstrates how severe the consequences can be
when you use bad forensic evidence," Saloom said.
(source: CNN)
******************
Rick Perry On Death Penalty And 'Ultimate Justice' In Texas: 'I've Never
Struggled With That'
Brian Williams becomes the next reporter to almost, but not quite, hold Rick
Perry to account for the execution of Cameron Todd Willingham. During the GOP
debate Wednesday night, Williams asked without naming Willingham, or going at
Perry armed with the science that undermined the prosecution's case. (A pity:
this came on the heels of the moderators trying to get Perry in a spat with Jon
Huntsman about who was "anti-science.")
Williams simply asked in general if Perry had ever struggled with the idea that
someone who was killed via capital punishment was innocent. The weak sauce
allowed Perry to wriggle off the hook: "No, sir. I've never struggled with that
at all. The state of Texas has a very thoughtful, a very clear process in place
of which -- when someone commits the most heinous of crimes against our
citizens, they get a fair hearing, they go through an appellate process, they
go up to the Supreme Court of the United States, if that's required.
"But in the state of Texas, if you come into our state and you kill one of our
children, you kill a police officer, you're involved with another crime and you
kill one of our citizens, you will face the ultimate justice in the state of
Texas, and that is, you will be executed."
For what it's worth, here's an article from the Houston Chronicle, Oct. 27,
2010:
After 18 years of incarceration and countless protestations of innocence,
Anthony Graves finally got a nod of approval from the one person who mattered
Wednesday and at last returned home -- free from charges that he participated
in the butchery of a family in Somerville he did not know and free of the
possibility that he would have to answer for them with his life.
The district attorney for Washington and Burleson counties, Bill Parham, gave
Graves his release. The prosecutor filed a motion to dismiss charges that had
sent Graves to Texas' death row for most of his adult life. Graves returned to
his mother's home in Brenham no longer the "cold-blooded killer," so
characterized by the prosecutor who first tried him, but as another exonerated
inmate who even in the joy of redemption will face the daunting prospect of
reassembling the pieces of a shattered life.
"He's an innocent man," Parham said, noting that his office investigated the
case for 5 months. "There is nothing that connects Anthony Graves to this
crime. I did what I did because that's the right thing to do."
It's worth worrying about!M
Williams plodded ahead with a sentimental follow-up, asking Perry to react to
the fact that members of the audience applauded when hearing Perry has executed
234 individuals. Perry replied, "I think Americans understand justice. I think
Americans are clearly, in the vast majority of -- of cases, supportive of
capital punishment. When you have committed heinous crimes against our citizens
-- and it's a state-by-state issue, but in the state of Texas, our citizens
have made that decision, and they made it clear, and they don't want you to
commit those crimes against our citizens. And if you do, you will face the
ultimate justice.
But what if scientists say you sent a man to his death for having committed no
crime at all?
There's still an opportunity for some reporter somewhere to ask Perry about
this case, if they're interested!
(source: Huffington Post)
******************
To applause, Perry defends Texas death penalty
Texas Gov. Rick Perry is defending the death penalty in Texas and says he's
never struggled with whether any of the inmates executed during his time as
governor might have been innocent.
“No sir, I’ve never struggled with that at all.” Rick Perry’s response to the
question of whether he’s ever had trouble sleeping at night over the 234 people
he’s executed and the chance that anyone of them might be innocent.
When Perry defended capital punishment, he drew strong applause from the scores
of people in the audience at the Republican debate Wednesday night at the
Ronald Reagan Presidential Library.
As of today, 234 people have been executed in the 10-plus years that Perry has
served as governor of Texas. That's the highest number of any American
governor.
The audience first applauded when NBC News anchor Brian Williams cited the
number of executions in Texas. Perry says he believes that such a response
reflects how much Americans support capital punishment for particularly heinous
crimes.
(source: Associated Press)
****************************
Hank Skinner Seeks DNA Testing Under New Law
Lawyers for death row inmate Hank Skinner filed a motion Friday seeking DNA
testing under a new Texas law that expands access to such testing. And they
have asked the state to withdraw the Nov. 9 execution date set for Skinner.
“Texas is wrong to seek Hank Skinner’s execution without allowing for DNA
testing," Rob Owen, one of Skinner's lawyers and director of the University of
Texas School of Law's Capital Punishment Clinic, said in a statement. "The
state should be leading the search for truth, instead of continuing to waste
taxpayer dollars on its 11-year-long campaign to block testing of critically
important scientific evidence.”
Skinner was convicted in 1995 of killing his live-in girlfriend and her 2 sons
in Pampa. He has proclaimed his innocence from the start, arguing that he was
too inebriated from a mixture of vodka and codeine to overpower the 3 victims.
DNA evidence presented at his trial showed Skinner’s blood was at the scene,
and an ex-girlfriend — who later recanted her testimony — told jurors that he
confessed to her. But not all the available DNA evidence was tested. A rape
kit, biological material from his girlfriend's fingernails, sweat from a man’s
jacket resembling one that another potential suspect often wore, a bloody towel
and knives have never been tested. Skinner's original trial lawyers did not
seek testing on the items, because they worried the results might be
incriminating.
Skinner for years has asked the state to release the evidence now for testing,
but Texas courts have repeatedly rejected those requests. Citing restrictions
in Texas' 2001 post-conviction DNA testing law, they ruled that Skinner should
have had the evidence analyzed in 1995. They have also agreed with prosecutors
who argue that more tests wouldn’t prove that Skinner was innocent.
Last year, though, less than an hour before he was scheduled to be executed,
the U.S. Supreme Court stayed Skinner's punishment. The high court sent the
case back to the federal district court to decide whether Skinner is entitled
to additional DNA testing. A decision is expected in the coming months on
whether Texas courts arbitrarily and unconstitutionally applied the state's
2001 post-conviction DNA testing law.
During the legislative session this year, though, lawmakers approved a
modification to that law, allowing more access to post-conviction DNA testing.
The original legislation allowed testing only in cases in which DNA tests were
not conducted during the original trial because the technology was unavailable
or for some other reason that was not the fault of the defendant. This year,
lawmakers repealed those restrictions. As of Sept. 1, post-conviction testing
is available for DNA evidence not previously analyzed, and for DNA evidence
that was tested but that can be re-examined with newer technology. “The new law
was intended to make advanced DNA testing available in all cases where it can
aid the truth-seeking process, and Skinner's case falls squarely within that
category,” said state Sen. Rodney Ellis, D-Houston, who helped write the law.
“Testing the evidence will serve the public interest by providing certainty in
this case,” said Nina Morrison, staff attorney at the Innocence Project. “It’s
just common sense to test the DNA evidence.”
The Texas attorney general's office did not immediately respond to a request
for comment.
(source: Texas Tribune)
***********************
With days to go, lawyers seek promised death penalty review
Attorneys for a Texas man who was sentenced to death after a state witness
relied on race in his testimony are fighting to get his sentence changed, or at
least get him a new hearing.
When Duane Edward Buck was on trial for capital murder in 1997, a psychologist
told jurors that because Buck was black, he was more likely to be violent in
the future. His case was 1 of 7 that former Texas Attorney General John Cornyn
wanted reviewed because of the state's unconstitutional reliance on race.
New punishment hearings were ordered for the other cases, which were at the
federal appellate stage. But because Buck's case was still in state court, it
slipped through the cracks. He was never given a retrial and is scheduled to
die Sept. 15 for the murders of Debra Gardner and Kenneth Butler.
He also shot Phyllis Taylor, who survived, and is now asking for Buck's life to
be spared.
Attorneys for Buck call his case another in a series of chronic mishandlings of
the death penalty in Texas, the nation's busiest death penalty state.
"This case is an affront to justice," Kate Black, a lawyer for Buck, said at a
Capitol news conference Wednesday. "This is just another shocking example of
the fundamental flaws in the Texas death penalty. Racism played an intolerable
role in a life-or-death decision."
Cornyn filed a petition with the U.S. Supreme Court in 2000 admitting the
state's wrongful use of race in the case of Victor Hugo Saldano, one of the
other men who had been given the death sentence in part based on the
psychologist's racially charged testimony.
"The infusion of race as a factor for the jury to weigh in making its
determination violated (Saldano's) constitutional right to be sentenced without
regard to the color of his skin," he wrote. Cornyn identified six other cases,
including Buck's, in which a constitutional error had occurred.
Buck's attorneys filed an appeal in federal court. They are seeking to have his
sentence reduced to life in prison without the possibility of parole or for a
stay of execution so courts to grant him a new sentencing trial.
They also filed a clemency petition with Texas Gov. Rick Perry's office and
asked current Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott and the state Board of Pardons
and Paroles to intervene. Buck's attorneys said they haven't gotten a response
from Abbott's office.
Perry, the leading candidate for the GOP presidential nomination, is known for
his tough stance on the death penalty. The governor has overseen more than half
of the state's executions since the death penalty was reinstated in the 1970s.
Perry has rarely used his power to grant clemency, although he can't do so
without a recommendation from the board.
"What we've seen over the last 10 years is a real failure in (death penalty)
cases representing compelling injustices," said Andrea Keilen, executive
director of Texas Defender, the group helping fight for a new hearing for Buck.
"This is one we're hopeful about because it is an obvious injustice."
Anthony Graves, a Texas exoneree who spent 18 years behind bars for murders he
didn't commit, is speaking out in Buck's favor.
"I am the perfect example of our flawed system in Texas," Graves said. "This is
a case of basic racial profiling, and I'm asking everyone who can to jump up
and scream that this is enough."
(source: Bellilngham Herald)
GEORGIA----new execution date:
Human rights group protests imminent execution of Georgia man
The human rights group Amnesty International renewed its call for clemency
Wednesday for a man on Georgia's death row, citing continued doubts about his
guilt.
Troy Davis, 42, is set to be executed on September 21.
Davis "could very well be innocent," said Laura Moye, the head of Amnesty's
Death Penalty Abolition Campaign. "It's difficult to believe that a system of
justice could be so terribly flawed."
In March, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected Davis' request that his execution be
delayed in order to gain more time to prove his "actual innocence."
Davis has gained international support for his long-standing claim he did not
murder an off-duty Savannah police officer more than two decades ago. He was
granted a stay of execution by the Supreme Court 2 hours before he was to be
put to death in 2008, and the court in 2009 ordered the federal district court
to take another look at the case.
That court, after holding a hearing to review evidence, ruled in August 2010
that Davis "failed to show actual innocence" in the case.
Witnesses have said Davis, then 19, and 2 others were harassing a homeless man
in a Burger King parking lot in 1989 when off-duty officer Mark MacPhail came
to the man's assistance. They testified that Davis shot MacPhail twice and
fled.
Since Davis' conviction in 1991, 7 of the 9 witnesses against him have recanted
their testimony. No physical evidence was presented linking Davis to the
killing of the policeman.
But upon reviewing Davis' claims of innocence, the U.S. District Court for the
Southern District of Georgia found last year that Davis "vastly overstates the
value of his evidence of innocence."
"Some of the evidence is not credible and would be disregarded by a reasonable
juror," Judge William T. Moore wrote in a 172-page opinion. "Other evidence
that Mr. Davis brought forward is too general to provide anything more than
smoke and mirrors," the court found.
Prominent figures ranging from the pope to the musical group Indigo Girls have
asked Georgia to grant Davis a new trial.
Other supporters include celebrities Susan Sarandon and Harry Belafonte, world
leaders such as former President Jimmy Carter and former Archbishop Desmond
Tutu, and former and current U.S. lawmakers Bob Barr, Carol Moseley Braun and
John Lewis.
(source: CNN)
************************
URGENT ACTION APPEAL
- From Amnesty International USA
----------------------------------
For a print-friendly version of this Urgent Action (PDF):
http://www.amnestyusa.org/actioncenter/actions/uaa11011.pdf
Take online action now!
http://takeaction.amnestyusa.org/siteapps/advocacy/ActionItem.aspx?c=6oJCLQPAJiJUG&b=6645049&aid=12
970
Further information on UA 110/11 (12 April, 2011)
Issue Date: 7 September 2011
Country: United States
TROY DAVIS FACING IMMINENT EXECUTION IN GEORGIA
A Georgia judge has signed a death warrant in the case of Troy Davis,
authorizing the state to
execute him in the week of 21 to 28 September. Doubts persist about Troy Davis'
guilt in the crime
for which he was sentenced to death two decades ago.
The county judge signed the death warrant of Troy Davis on 6 September. The
Georgia Department of
Corrections will set the actual date and time for the execution. The
Department's usual strategy is
to set it on the first day authorized under the warrant, in this case 21
September.
Troy Davis was sentenced to death in 1991 for the murder of police officer Mark
Allen MacPhail in
Savannah, Georgia in 1989. No physical evidence directly links him to the
murder – no murder weapon
was ever found. The case against Troy Davis primarily rested on witness
testimony. Since his trial,
seven of nine key witnesses have recanted or changed their testimony, some
alleging police coercion.
In 2009, the US Supreme Court ordered a federal evidentiary hearing to review
Troy Davis' innocence
claim. At the 2010 hearing, US District Court Judge William Moore addressed
whether Troy Davis could
show “by clear and convincing evidence that no reasonable juror would have
convicted him in the
light of the new evidence" that had emerged since his 1991 murder trial. Under
this “extraordinarily
high" standard, Judge Moore wrote in his August 2010 opinion, “Mr. Davis is not
innocent". Elsewhere
in his ruling, he acknowledged that the new evidence presented by Troy Davis
cast “some additional,
minimal" doubt on his conviction, and that the state's case was not "ironclad".
In 1991, the jury
had found Troy Davis guilty "beyond a reasonable doubt," Judge Moore noted,
"but not to a
mathematical certainty".
In 2007 Troy Davis was less than 24 hours from execution when the Georgia Board
of Pardons and
Paroles issued a stay. The Board said that it would not allow an execution to
go ahead "unless and
until its members are convinced that there is no doubt as to the guilt of the
accused". Since then
Troy Davis has faced two more execution dates, both in 2008, which were stayed
by the courts.
Please write immediately in your own language:
-Acknowledge the seriousness of the crime for which Troy Davis was sentenced to
death;
-Note that doubts persist in the case even after the federal evidentiary
hearing in 2010;
-Point out that the Board acts as a failsafe against irreversible error, and
recall its statement in
2007 that it would not allow any execution to proceed where there was any doubt
about the guilt of
the prisoner;
-Point to the substantial evidence of the fallibility of the capital justice
system;
-Call on the Board to grant clemency and to commute the death sentence of Troy
Davis.
PLEASE SEND APPEALS AS SOON AS POSSIBLE, AND BEFORE 21 SEPTEMBER 2011 TO:
State Board of Pardons and Paroles
2 Martin Luther King, Jr. Drive, SE
Suite 458, Balcony Level, East Tower
Atlanta, Georgia 30334-4909
USA
Email: clemency_informat...@pap.state.ga.us AND
webmas...@pap.state.ga.us
Fax: 1 404 651 8502
Salutation: Dear Board members
Please check with the AIUSA Urgent Action Office if sending appeals after the
above date.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
In the past four years, three states in the USA – New Jersey, New Mexico and
Illinois – have
legislated to abolish the death penalty. Signing the bills in law, the three
governors pointed to
the risk of irreversible error in an imperfect system as a reason to support
abolition. In 2007, New
Jersey Governor Jon Corzine said that "government cannot provide a fool proof
death penalty that
precludes the possibility of executing the innocent". In 2009, Governor Bill
Richardson of New
Mexico said that to carry out an irrevocable punishment, "we must have ultimate
confidence – I would
say certitude – that the system is without flaw or prejudice." This, he added,
"is demonstrably not
the case". In March 2011, Illinois Governor Pat Quinn said that the capital
justice system was
"inherently flawed", and that it was "impossible to devise a system that is
consistent, that is free
of discrimination on the basis of race, geography or economic circumstance, and
that always gets it
right." He said that, "as a state, we cannot tolerate the executions of
innocent people because such
actions strike at the very legitimacy of a government."
More than 130 people have been released from death rows across the USA since
1976 on the grounds of
innocence. In each case, at trial the defendant had been found guilty beyond a
reasonable doubt.
Among other things the cases reveal the frequent unreliability of witness
testimony. The Troy Davis
case is one in which most of the witnesses who testified against the defendant
have since retracted
or contradicted their trial testimony in sworn statements. Nevertheless, a
prisoner seeking to rely
on revised witness testimony faces a high hurdle in the face of deference to
the original jury
verdict. At the June 2010 evidentiary hearing in US District Court, the Georgia
prosecutor argued
that "every court in the United States at every level has said, recantations
are not favored, they
are looked at with great skepticism, they're unreliable." She concluded about
the Troy Davis case:
"This was their chance. The standard is extremely high…, they have not met it".
One of the witnesses who appeared at the hearing was Benjamin Gordon, who in
2008 had signed a
statement that an alternative suspect (a relative of his by marriage) had told
him that he had shot
Officer MacPhail. At the hearing, Benjamin Gordon asserted for the first time
that he had actually
seen this individual shoot the police officer. Benjamin Gordon, who had just
turned 16 at the time
of the crime, again alleged that he had been coerced by police into signing a
statement implicating
Davis. He said that he had not come forward sooner with the assertion about
seeing who shot the
officer out of fear, and that he had decided to "come in today and just let the
truth be known."
Judge Moore concluded that Benjamin Gordon was "not a credible witness."
The international community has agreed safeguards for capital cases in those
countries that still
retain the death penalty. One of these concerns the burden of proof on the
death penalty state:
"Capital punishment may be imposed only when the guilt of the person charged is
based upon clear and
convincing evidence leaving no room for an alternative explanation of the
facts". The
"extraordinarily high" burden of proof chosen by Judge Moore is less protective
than this.
Executive clemency is meant to be a failsafe where the courts have been
unwilling or unable to act.
In September 2010, for example, Ohio's Governor commuted the death sentence of
Kevin Keith to life
imprisonment. The governor said that despite circumstantial evidence linking
Kevin Keith to the
crime, "many legitimate questions have been raised regarding the evidence in
support of the
conviction and the investigation which led to it" (see
http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/AMR51/079/2010/en).
Amnesty International opposes the death penalty in all cases, unconditionally.
There have been 1,266
executions in the USA since judicial killing resumed there in 1977, including
32 so far this year.
There have been 51 executions in Georgia, three this year. For further
information on the Troy Davis
case, see USA: 'Unconscionable and unconstitutional': Troy Davis facing fourth
execution date in two
years, May 2009, http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/AMR51/069/2009/en; USA:
Less than
'ironclad', less than safe, 27 August 2010,
http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/AMR51/077/2010/en
Name: Troy Davis (m)
Issue(s): Death penalty, Legal concern
----------------------------------
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END OF URGENT ACTION APPEAL
----------------------------------
************
http://takeaction.amnestyusa.org/siteapps/advocacy/ActionItem.aspx?c=6oJCLQPAJiJUG&b=6645049&aid=12
970&msource=W1109EADP01&tr=y&auid=9445278
************
USA (VERMONT)----federal death penalty case
Judge affirms Jacques to face death penalty
U.S. District Judge William Sessions III has turned aside a request by
attorneys for Michael Jacques to rethink whether Jacques should face the death
penalty if he’s convicted of kidnapping and later killing his 12-year-old
niece, Brooke Bennett of Braintree, in 2008.
Jacques’ defense team had asked Sessions to reconsider a decision allowing the
government to seek capital punishment, arguing that because kidnapping is
usually a state-level crime, and because Vermont has no death penalty, an
execution cannot be ordered just because the case is tried in federal court.
Sessions, in a 14-page decision issued Friday, wrote that to apply a
“state-based” standard in such instances “would effectively be sanctioning and
contributing to geographic disparities in application of the federal death
penalty.”
The case, which had been scheduled to go to trial this month, has been delayed
while the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals considers requests to reverse a set
of pre-trial rulings by Sessions on evidence, location of the trial and other
issues.
According to court documents, Jacques, 45, of Randolph, kidnapped Bennett in
June 2008 and then drugged, raped and killed her. Her disappearance triggered a
massive manhunt in the Randolph area and led to the discovery of her body a
week later about a mile from Jacques’ home.
The government says Jacques manipulated social media websites to make it look
like an international ring of pedophiles was involved in the crime, and to
mislead police into thinking Bennett had taken off for a rendezvous with a man
she met on the Internet.
Jacques has pleaded not guilty to a number of charges and is incarcerated
pending trial.
(source: Burlington Free Press)
********************************
Reagan Dunn defends death penalty as deterrent to crime
Not needed in a truly civil society
Attorney General candidate Reagan Dunn began his recent Times opinion piece in
support of the death penalty [“Death penalty shouldn’t be victim of local and
state budget woes,” Opinion, Sept. 3] with this paragraph:
“The most important function of local government is to protect the public
through enforcement of the rule of law. It is what separates a civil society
from lawlessness, keeps our neighborhoods safe and establishes an orderly
environment for commerce. That’s why it is essential that we as a society have
the death penalty as the ultimate punishment.”
According to Dunn, the very existence of the death penalty as the “ultimate
punishment” is “essential” to enforce the rule of law, and necessary for a
“civil society.”
States and foreign governments that do not have the death penalty are, in fact,
nevertheless able to enforce laws and have civil societies. Canada hasn’t
executed anyone in almost fifty years, and has somehow managed to not descend
into “lawlessness.”
Dunn laments the fact that the state Legislature denied King County $4.1
million it requested to pursue capital punishment. There are three people
currently on death row in King County. At a time when we can’t afford to hire
enough teachers, spending millions to unnecessarily kill three human beings is
a waste of scarce taxpayer dollars. The Legislature got that right.
I find no credible moral, fiscal or public-safety arguments for capital
punishment in Dunn’s piece, or anywhere else. In a truly “civil society,” the
death penalty would not exist.
— Robert Sargent, Newcastle
**
Other nations OK without capital punishment
Reagan Dunn’s priority for supporting the death penalty in these challenging
economic times totally ignores the morality of using capital punishment at all.
He states that having the death penalty is essential as the ultimate punishment
for a society in order to separate our civil society from lawlessness and keep
our neighborhoods safe.
With our threat of capital punishment, are our neighborhoods any safer than all
of the industrialized nations of this world that have banned capital
punishment? Is Dunn suggesting that those countries that have banned the use of
capital punishment do not have a civil society and are ruled by lawlessness?
Besides being a poor choice for any civilized nation on this planet, the use of
capital punishment under any circumstance is simply wrong. Whether we perceive
the culprit as a neighbor, an enemy or an evildoer, we are to love the person
as we ourselves have been loved by God. To do so does not mean that we love the
victim any less.
We can incarcerate the person for life and prevent the person from repeating
the heinous crime, but to kill the person intentionally is not an act of love,
but rather falls into the category of retribution, retaliation, revenge or
justified homicide.
— Ron Moe-Lobeda, Seattle
**
A matter of immorality and hypocrisy
As Reagan Dunn asserts, our state should not eradicate the death penalty purely
due to its economic woes. However, the death penalty should fall victim here
and everywhere to its own abhorrent immorality and hypocrisy.
Dunn writes, “The death penalty is reserved for the worst of the worst
offenders.” Does this “strict” category include the more than 130 wrongly
convicted Americans since 1973 who once awaited their ignominious end at the
gallows, but have since been exonerated, primarily due to DNA evidence?
While no one will ever know how many innocent citizens have fallen victim to
the death penalty, we do know that only 5 percent of criminologists believe the
threat of execution lowers homicide rates. Instead of being murdered by the
state, extremely violent offenders should be locked up in maximum-security
prisons for life with no chance of parole, fully ensuring public safety will
not suffer due to the eradication of capital punishment.
Dunn also neglects to mention the widely known racial disparities in
death-penalty cases: The murderer of a white American is three times more
likely to receive the death penalty than if his victim were a person of color.
Enough retribution. Let’s give restorative justice a try.
— Clayton Paschke, Seattle
(source: Letters to the Editor, Seattle Times)
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