May 26
TEXAS:
Stop the execution of Jeff Wood in TX!
Please sign and share this petition for Jeff Wood. TX has set his execution for
August 24th - despite the fact that he killed no one. Jeff's sister sits on the
CEDP's board and is a fierce advocate against the death penalty.
https://www.change.org/p/governor-abbott-and-the-texas-board-of-pardons-and-parole-demand-justice-for-jeff-wood-5807b015-014a-4a21-8c6ee34be865c27c
Jeff was sentenced under the Law of Parties - which allows the death penalty
for those who aid in felony murder. Even if a person did not harm anyone, they
can still get the death penalty if they were involved in a crime where someone
else killed a person, because they should have "anticipated that a human life
would be taken."
For more information:http://savejeffwood.com
https://www.facebook.com/LawofParties/?fref=ts
https://www.facebook.com/AustinCEDP/?fref=ts
(source: CEDP)
CONNECTICUT:
State Supreme Court Ruling On Abolishment Of Death Penalty Expected Thursday
The Connecticut Supreme Court is expected to release its ruling Thursday on
whether to uphold or overturn its decision last year to abolish the state's
death penalty, including for inmates on death row.
The justices ruled 4-3 last August that the death penalty was unconstitutional
for all - including 11 convicts on Connecticut's death row - following the
legislature's abolition 3 years ago of capital punishment in Connecticut.
Lawmakers made the law prospective, meaning it applied only to new cases and
kept in place the death sentences already imposed on those facing execution
before the bill was passed.
Attorneys for those on death row challenged the law, saying it violated the
condemned inmates' constitutional rights. The ruling last August came in the
case of Eduardo Santiago, who had faced the death penalty for the December 2000
killing of Joseph Niwinski in West Hartford. Santiago has been resentenced to
life in prison without the possibility of release.
In the August ruling, the justices in the majority wrote that executing an
inmate "would violate the state constitutional prohibition against cruel and
unusual punishment" and that the death penalty "no longer comports with
contemporary standards of decency."
In October, the high court denied a request by the chief state's attorney to
postpone the Santiago decision, a ruling that followed its denial of a request
by prosecutors to re-argue Santiago.
Prosecutors then filed briefs arguing for the Santiago decision to be overruled
in the pending appeal of Russell Peeler, who was sentenced to death for
ordering the 1999 killings in Bridgeport of 8-year-old Leroy "B.J." Brown Jr.
and his mother, Karen Clarke. The justices heard arguments on those briefs in
January.
Prosecutors said in deciding the Santiago case, the court "did not confine its
analysis" to the actual claim raised -- whether enacting the 2012 law
invalidated the death sentences of those sentenced before the law went into
effect. The court made its ruling, prosecutors said, "for reasons having little
or nothing to do with" enactment of the 2012 law and "erred in its ruling on
lines of analysis and authorities the parties had not discussed."
Prosecutors also argued that the justices relied on "flawed historical
analysis" to justify their "departure from well-established principles of law"
and incorrectly determined that state residents prior to the 1818 constitution
gave the high court the authority to act independently to invalidate a penalty.
Prosecutors said the justices' "new insights" into Connecticut history came
from Lawrence B. Goodheart's book "The Solemn Sentence of Death: Capital
Punishment in Connecticut," which actually says, according to prosecutors, that
the legislature, not the court, "has been the historical source for both
limiting capital punishment and providing relief to those sentenced to death."
Chief Justice Chase T. Rogers, who joined with Justice Carmen E. Espinosa and
Justice Peter T. Zarella in the August dissents, wrote then that "every step"
of the majority's opinion was "fundamentally flawed." During the arguments last
January, both the majority and minority raised concerns about the idea of a
reversal following the retirement of Justice Flemming Norcott Jr., who had
joined with justices Richard N. Palmer, Dennis G. Eveleigh and Andrew J.
McDonald to ban capital punishment. Norcott was replaced by Justice Richard A.
Robinson.
"Why shouldn't the court be concerned that every time there's a hotly contested
4-3 decision ... that this isn't just going to become a numbers game, that the
parties will then wait until somebody retires or leaves the court and raise the
issue again?" Rogers said. "It just seems like a very slippery slope."
"At a minimum," Palmer said, "it looks awfully odd to have a case of this
magnitude decided differently within months simply because the panel changes.
That's really what would be happening here."
But Senior Assistant State's Attorney Harry Weller countered that citizens'
confidence in the judicial system is harmed if a wrong decision stays in place
and that it is the court's job to fix it.
"This court's ultimate responsibility is to uphold the Constitution and to get
the law right," he said.
Public defenders for Peeler made several arguments against overruling the
Santiago decision in court briefs, pointing foremost to the legal doctrine of
"stare decisis" -- letting decided issues stand. Senior Assistant Public
Defender Mark Rademacher told the justices that the state faced an "uphill
battle" in getting the ruling reversed.
"What the state is asking this court to do ... is simply breathtaking,"
Rademacher said at the January hearing. "It is asking this court to overrule a
long line of cases that have affirmed the court's authority as a constitutional
matter to protect the citizens of this state against cruel and unusual
punishment."
(source: Hartford Courant)
VIRGINIA:
Death penalty weighed in Easter double homicide in Henrico
A Henrico man could face the death penalty in the double slaying of his parents
on Easter Sunday.
William Roy Brissette, 22, is charged with 2 counts each of capital murder and
use of a firearm in the deaths of his parents, Henry J. Brissette III, 59, and
Martha B. Brissette, 56. He appeared in Henrico Circuit Court on Wednesday for
a hearing.
His face was emotionless when he entered the courtroom. After he was released
from handcuffs, William Brissette hugged himself as if he were cold and broke
into visible tremors throughout the hearing.
His fiery red hair, which he inherited from both parents, was buzzed close to
his scalp, and he wore a thin beard. The back of his neck was covered in red
blemishes.
When Judge James Stephen Yoffy asked Brissette if he understood he faced the
possibility of life in prison or the death penalty if convicted on the capital
murder charges, he spoke so softly it was difficult to hear.
Several family members attended the hearing, including Martha Brissette's
brother and Henry Brissette's sister; the couple's daughter was not in court.
They sat on the far side of the courtroom gallery opposite from William
Brissette, who kept his eyes forward.
Capital murder is a 1st-degree murder under a specific set of circumstances -
in this case, the killing of more than 1 person and the killing of more than 1
person within 3 years. It is punishable by death or life imprisonment.
Whether Brissette faces the death penalty is left up to Henrico Commonwealth's
Attorney Shannon Taylor. After the hearing, Taylor said the death penalty
hasn't been "taken off the table."
Taylor said there are multiple psychological and mental health issues, which
may prove to be "an aggravating factor or a mitigating factor."
Police responded to mental health calls at the Brissette home in the 3800 block
of Forge Road, where Brissette lived with his parents, on 2 occasions within 5
months of the deaths of Martha and Henry Brissette. William Brissette was
arrested at the home on March 27 shortly after a 911 call was made.
The court appointed Doug Ramseur, a capital defender, to help in Brissette's
defense, which is led by veteran attorney Jeffrey Everhart. Ramseur said nearly
all capital cases involve a mental health component, and that Brissette would
be evaluated before a trial.
Ramseur told the judge it could take up to 2 years to prepare the case for
trial.
Another hearing was set for June 2 to set a trial date.
(source: Richmond Times-Dispaptch)
GEORGIA:
Suspected priest killer to face death penalty trial
The man accused of killing a Florida priest in Burke County has been indicted
and District Attorney Ashley Wright filed notice this week that she intends to
seek the death penalty.
The Burke County grand jury on May 19 indicted Steven James Murray, 28, on
charges of murder and weapon violations in the April 18 fatal shooting of the
Rev. Rene Robert of St. Augustine, Fla.
Investigators believe Murray tricked Robert, who was trying to counsel the
former Aiken resident, into going to Aiken to visit Murray's children on April
10. When Murray was denied access to the children, Murray forced Robert into
the trunk of Robert's Toyota and proceeded to commit a number of burglaries and
an arson in Aiken, according to earlier reports.
Murray told investigators that he pulled off the side of the road at one point,
took Robert from the trunk and shot him there. The following week, Murray
agreed to show law enforcement where he killed Robert, which was off River Road
in Burke County.
According to the notice of the intention to seek the death penalty, Wright
listed 4 statutory aggravating circumstances: the slaying was committed while
Murray was committing kidnapping with bodily injury, Murray killed the priest
while engaged in aggravated battery, that Murray killed Robert for money or
something of value, and Robert's slaying was outrageously or wantonly vile,
horrible or inhuman in that it involved torture, depravity of mind, or
aggravated battery on the victim.
Murray has been previously represented by the public defender office for the
Augusta Judicial Circuit. Since his case is now a death penalty case, it will
be assigned to the Atlanta-based Capital Defender office.
(source: Augusta Chronicle)
**************
District Attorney to seek death penalty against man accused of kidnapping,
killing St. Aug priest
Steven James Murray is accused in the death of Father Rene Robert of St.
Augustine back in April could face the death penalty.
Murray was indicted by a Grand Jury in Burke County, Ga. last Thursday and on
Wednesday of this week, the District Attorney filed a letter of intent to seek
the death penalty against Murray.
Murray faces 1 count of murder in Father Rene's death, 1 count of aggravated
battery, 1 count of felony false imrpisonment 1 count of possession of a
firearm while committing a crime and one count of possession of a firearm by a
convicted felon, according to court documents
(source: firstcoastnews.com)
FLORIDA:
State appeals in case overturning death penalty law
The state has filed an appeal in a Miami-Dade County case in which a circuit
judge struck down a law that allows death sentences to be imposed without
unanimous jury decisions.
The appeal, which had been expected, was filed last week in the 3rd District
Court of Appeal, according to an online docket.
Circuit Judge Milton Hirsch ruled May 9 that unanimous jury decisions are
required in imposing death sentences, rather than recommendations from
majorities or super-majorities of juries.
The issue deals with the sentencing phase of death-penalty cases after
defendants are found guilty.
Hirsch's ruling came after a series of events that started in January when the
U.S. Supreme Court found that Florida's death-penalty sentencing system was
unconstitutional because it gave too much power to judges, instead of juries.
State lawmakers then passed a measure to revamp the sentencing process to try
to address the Supreme Court's ruling.
As part of that new law, judges cannot impose the death penalty without
receiving a recommendation from at least 10 jurors.
In the past, a majority of jurors could make such a recommendation.
Hirsch wrote that unanimity is required, as he ruled in a 1st-degree murder
case involving defendant Karon Gaiter.
*****************************
Local mother voicing her concerns
The fight over Florida's death penalty procedures will stretch into the summer.
The state supreme court is expected to hear arguments on one of the biggest
issues in the debate. One local mother will continue her push to see the death
penalty thrown out in the murder trial of her daughter's accused killer.
On Thursday night, Darlene Farah will talk about the death penalty and the
trauma inflicted on victims of crime. The event is called "Not in My Name". Her
daughter Shelby would have turned 23-years-old today.
Police say she was shot and killed by James Rhodes during a robbery at the
Brentwood cell phone store where Farah was working at in 2013.
Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty. Farah's mother wants Rhodes to spend
the rest of his life behind bars. It's all part of the debate causing a lot of
confusion in Florida courtrooms.
On what would have been Shelby Farah's 23rd birthday, her mother Darlene,
prepares for another chance to be her voice.
Farah is speaking about something very personal, something she believes to be
right- a chance to make a difference.
"It's going to be non-stop. It's to bring awareness to the death penalty," said
Farah.
Awareness and compassion- for Farah, every time she sees the man charged in
Shelby's murder, she feels victimized all over again. She says the trauma of
not being able to move forward is real. She's not alone. "The victim's families
are reaching out to me to let their story be heard. They've been pushed away,"
said Farah.
With Florida's death penalty now in the legal forefront, the process is drawn
out more.
Back in January, the United States Supreme Court ruled Florida's death penalty
sentencing process unconstitutional. Florida lawmakers rushed to make changes
after that, the current law says 10 of 12 jurors must recommend death.
Since then, a circuit judge in Miami-Dade struck that down, saying the
recommendations need to be unanimous. Lawmakers are expected to discuss that in
June.
The process is still ongoing. But for Farah, this is about something much
bigger than legalities. She also wants to see changes in the system. That
starts with juveniles who've been in trouble.
"12-year-olds, 15-year-olds, that are being tried as adults and they get 25, 30
years and we all know what's going to happen. I mean they're going to end right
back in the system," said Farah. "It's basically, to break the silence. They
are their loved one's voice and they need to be heard."
"Not in my Name" starts at 6:30 p.m. Thursday at Mount Sinai Baptist Church and
will last about 2 hours. A lot of people are speaking- including 2 men who were
on death row but have since been exonerated. We'll also hear from someone
specializing in behavioral health to talk about trauma this puts on families.
(source for both: news4jax.com)
NEBRASKA:
Death penalty battle reaches high court
A legal battle over whether the death penalty question will be put to Nebraska
voters in November reached the state's highest court Wednesday.
Death penalty opponents Christy and Richard Hargesheimer of Lincoln contend the
petition drive that gathered some 169,000 signatures should be deemed invalid
because those behind it had failed to disclose Gov. Pete Ricketts as a sponsor.
But the state and a pro-death penalty group both contend that even though
Ricketts and his father contributed one-third of the $913,000 raised by
Nebraskans for the Death Penalty and his close allies took roles to promote it,
it didn't make the governor a sponsor.
Last year, the Hargesheimers sought an injunction to keep Secretary of State
John Gale from placing the question on the ballot. In February, Lancaster
County District Judge Lori Maret dismissed it, and the couple appealed to the
Nebraska Supreme Court.
In oral arguments Wednesday, an attorney for the couple got 15 minutes to make
his case for why Maret's decision should be reversed and to answer questions
from the Supreme Court justices before attorneys for Nebraskans for the Death
Penalty and the state got a shared 15 minutes to argue why the decision should
stand.
Nebraska law requires proponents to file a sworn list of every sponsoring
person, company or association of a referendum prior to gathering signatures
but it does not define how one qualifies as a sponsor, and many of the
justices' questions went to that issue.
Lincoln attorney Alan Peterson, who represents the Hargesheimers, made 2
arguments. One, that Ricketts was a sponsor; and two, that the statement wasn't
sworn.
Asked how he would define sponsor, Peterson said a reasonable approach would be
to define it as the primary initiating force.
He said to meet the requirements set out in the 2003 decision in Loontjer v.
Robinson, "it seemed to us ... the public has to be informed who is behind the
initiative or referendum."
"Who is the initiator, the instigator?"
But Assistant Attorney General Ryan Post argued that Peterson's proposed
standard is "unworkable and would chill involvement in the democratic process."
He and Omaha attorney Steven Grasz, who represents the pro-death penalty group,
said sponsors are those who assume statutory responsibility for a referendum
once a petition process begins.
"It's a question of law. It's not a moving target," Grasz said.
He said the other side was "grasping at straws" in raising one additional
issue: Alleging it was an error for Judge Maret to consider a sworn statement
of petition sponsors in her decision to dismiss the lawsuit.
He said Peterson hadn't raised the issue of whether the document was sworn
until a reply brief to the Supreme Court, so he couldn't raise it now.
"It's very clear that the decision in this case really had nothing to do with
whether she took judicial notice of the document or not. It's a question of law
and it was decided on the face of the complaint," Grasz said.
At most, he argued, it was harmless error, and therefore not worth a reversal.
Peterson said he raised the issue in response to a misstatement of facts. He
argued the statement listing sponsors was not sworn because those who signed it
were not under oath and that the judge was wrong to rely on it in reaching her
decision.
"There is a difference," Peterson said, "and it is critical."
The Supreme Court took the case under advisement.
Last week, Maret heard arguments in a 2nd suit involving the same petition. In
that case, Beatrice attorney Lyle Koenig is challenging the title and
explanatory statement, drafted by Attorney General Doug Peterson, that would
appear on the ballot if it does go before voters.
She hasn't yet ruled on that case.
(source: Lincoln Journal Star)
CALIFORNIA:
In shock move, convicted Berkeley murderer says he'll take the stand
Darnell Williams Jr. has been found guilty of 2 murders and faces either the
death penalty or life in prison without the possibility of parole. Today, as it
was winding up, his trial took a new, surprising turn. Williams who has
extensive and longstanding impulse-control problems suddenly said he wanted to
testify - against the advice of his attorneys.
His attorneys said it wasn't the 1st time they had discussed the subject, but
were not expecting the announcement Wednesday, just as they were about to rest
their case in the "penalty phase" of the trial.
At the end of testimony, the Alameda County jury that found Williams guilty
earlier this month of 2 murders will make a sentencing recommendation to Judge
Jeffrey Horner: either the death penalty or life in prison without the
possibility of parole.
The 2-person defense team had just completed questioning the woman they said
would be their final witness - forensic psychologist Gretchen White - when the
attorneys and judge said they needed to have a brief discussion out of the
presence of the jury.
(source: berkeleyside.com)
USA:
Why We Must Stand Against The Death Penalty, Even In The Case Of Racist
Murderer Dylann Roof
Note: the following is adapted from a 2013 essay the author co-wrote with
former ThinkProgress reporter Zack Beauchamp, "The Case Against The Death
Penalty For Dzhokhar Tsarnaev."
Attorney General Loretta Lynch announced on Tuesday that federal prosecutors
will seek the death penalty against Dylann Roof. And, indeed, if anyone
deserves such a consequence for his actions, it is this particular individual.
Roof allegedly joined a Bible study group at an historic black church in
Charleston, South Carolina, waited for the parishioners to close their eyes in
prayer, and then opened fire upon them. 9 people died, including the church's
senior pastor, state Sen. Clementa Pinckney. Roof later confessed to the
killings. He told friends that he wanted to start a "race war."
So Dylann Roof presents one of the strongest possible cases for the death
penalty. He stands accused of a racist act of terror, and there is little doubt
about his guilt. And yet, even in this case, the argument for pursuing a death
sentence against Roof does not hold up.
We are a nation of laws, and our most fundamental law says we cannot create a
brutal, rarely applied punishment targeting just a handful of crimes.
The best argument for the death penalty is that it deters people from
committing homicides in the first place, an argument that suggests we should
execute far more people than just Dylann Roof. If you think the death penalty
is about deterrence, then more executions means less crime. By killing the
guilty, we can potentially save innocent lives.
The deterrence argument, however, is doubtful at best. According to Dartmouth
University statistician John Lamperti, "an overwhelming majority among
America's leading criminologists [have concluded that] that capital punishment
does not contribute to lower rates of homicide." While some studies do claim a
deterrent effect, these studies are based on tiny data samples that yield
doubtful results. As Yale Law Professor John Donohue explains, death sentences
are "applied so rarely that the number of homicides it can plausibly have
caused or deterred cannot reliably be disentangled from the large year-to-year
changes in the homicide rate caused by other factors." Murder rates in states
without the death penalty are consistently lower than those in states that do
sentence people to die.
Meanwhile, few institutions expose the hazards inherent in government-mandated
punishment more nakedly than the death penalty. Capital cases are difficult and
incredibly expensive for prosecutors. As a consequence, the wealthy and
privileged, who have the resources to hire outstanding legal counsel, are very
rarely executed. The people that are convicted, by contrast, tend to be poor
and disproportionately non-white. Nor is such arbitrariness limited to the way
we distinguish among defendants, as the way we dole out death sentences also
gives the lie to any claim that America values all human life equally.
According to one study, defendants who kill high-status white people with
college degrees are 6 times more likely to be sentenced to die than defendants
who kill black victims closer to the margins of society.
Indeed, there is simply no escaping the role that race plays in determining
death sentences. To take 1 demonstrative statistic from an ocean of them, 6 %
of murders in Alabama involved black defendants and white victims, but 10 times
that percentage of black death row inmates were convicted of murdering whites.
The death penalty also kills innocent people. Roughly 139 death row inmates
have been exonerated since 1973, 61 % of whom were people of color. At least 10
innocent people that we know of have been executed - and these are only the
ones that we know of.
These 3 realities - the impact of wealth, the disparate treatment based on
race, and the risk of killing innocents - are themselves reasons why the death
penalty should not exist. But are they arguments against applying it, so long
as it does exist, in the most heinous of cases?
Roof isn't just a white man, he is a white man who admits to committing a
brutal hate crime. Unlike many capital defendants, Roof has outstanding counsel
- 1 of his attorneys defended Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev as well
as 80 other individuals accused of homicide. And there is very little doubt
that Mr. Roof is guilty.
The Charleston massacre is as horrible a crime as one can imagine, so Roof???s
case raises the difficult question of whether America can limit executions to
only the most heinous crimes - at least under circumstances where the
defendant's guilt isn't in question and there's no evidence that his trial will
be conducted unfairly in any fashion. Can we limit death sentences only to
people as evil as Roof appears to be?
The simplest answer to this question is that we are a nation of laws, and our
most fundamental law says we cannot create a brutal, rarely applied punishment
targeting just a handful of crimes. The Constitution forbids "cruel and unusual
punishments. So as a punishment becomes more "unusual" - or, in the Supreme
Court's words, as it no longer can be squared with "evolving standards of
decency that mark the progress of a maturing society" - it stands on
increasingly weaker constitutional ground.
Indeed, it is likely that the death penalty is already unconstitutional under
this rule. The number of death sentences has been on the decline in the United
States, but not principally because of legal reforms limiting the death penalty
to a small number of cases: it's a combination of full legal abolition in some
jurisdictions and the spread of anti-death penalty norms among citizens and
prosecutors in others. 60 % of U.S. counties have stopped seeking the death
penalty entirely as a punishment for any crime.
One study of death sentences and executions from 2004-2009 discovered that just
10 % of counties returned a single death sentence, and only 1 % of counties
produced more than 1 death sentence. Just 4 states made up 65 % of national new
death penalty convictions. In 2011, there were an estimated 14,612 murders in
the United States, but only 43 executions. In 2015, only 6 states performed
executions, killing a total of 28 individuals. That's down over 70 % from 1999,
when annual executions peaked at 98.
These data strongly suggests that executions no longer comport with our
"evolving standards of decency." We are increasingly uncomfortable with death
sentences, and unwilling to execute people.
But beyond the cold language of the law, there is a deeply personal reason why
we should not preserve the death penalty simply for the most heinous criminals
like Roof. If you think the death penalty is a just response to murder or
important to provide victims' families with closure, then trying to limit it to
a small number of multiple murders makes no sense. Why does taking one life not
merit death, while taking 2, 3, or any other arbitrary number does? Why is the
pain of one victim's family any less important to address than the pain of
families whose loved one was part of a multiple murder?
There are many families that deserve the satisfaction of knowing their loved
one's murderer received society's stiffest sanction for their crime, and it's
far from clear that the death penalty fills that need better than life without
parole - indeed, it may even prolong a families' grief. Yet the moment we say 1
victim, or set of victims, must be avenged by death, we lose the ability to
consistently limit the death penalty's application to rare cases - and the
uncertainty and arbitrariness that plagues capital sentencing generally comes
flooding back. When life without parole is the harshest penalty our courts dole
out, such a sentence will stamp everyone who receives it as among the very
worst criminals without opening the door to an unjust and unconstitutional
policy.
So the death penalty is arbitrary. It discriminates on the basis of race and
income. It kills the innocent. It is unconstitutional. And it may even deepen
the wounds of families already grieving from the most terrible tragedy
imaginable. Even in the worst of cases, it cannot be justified.
(source: Ian Millhiser, thinkprogress.org)
***************
Church slaying families accept pursuit of death penalty
Several family members of the 9 people gunned down at a historic black church
in Charleston say they support decisions by state and federal prosecutors to
seek the death penalty for the man charged in the slayings.
Steve Hurd, whose wife, Cynthia, was among those killed June 17 during Bible
study at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal, said he won't be at peace until
Dylann Roof is put to death.
"What would give me full closure would be if I were the one who pushed the
plunger on the lethal injection, or if I were the one to pull the switch on the
electric chair or if I was the one to open the valve on the gas chamber," he
told The Associated Press on Wednesday. When "Roof's body is cold, sleeping in
the ground - that's closure."
Roof, 22, faces 9 counts of murder in state court and hate crimes and other
charges in federal court. The killings reignited discussions about race
relations and led to the removal of a Confederate battle flag from the South
Carolina Statehouse. Roof, who is white, had previously posed for photos with a
rebel flag.
This week, U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch announced that federal
prosecutors would seek the death penalty. South Carolina Solicitor Scarlett
Wilson announced her decision in September. Roof's state trial is scheduled for
next year. No date has been set for his federal trial.
When Roof faced a judge last summer, family members of the victims told him
they forgave him for his alleged crimes. Their expressions of grace and
sympathy, in the face of their own monumental pain, moved many.
"As we said in Bible Study, we enjoyed you," said Felicia Sanders, whose son
Tywanza was killed. "But may God have mercy on your soul."
In a statement released through Roof's lawyer at the time, his family said they
had been "touched by the moving words ... offering God's forgiveness and love
in the face of such horrible suffering."
Both state and federal prosecutors have spent time consulting with relatives of
the shooting victims over the pursuit of the death penalty, and Roof's federal
attorneys have said their client would be willing to plead guilty if the
maximum punishment weren't on the table.
Due in part to problems in obtaining lethal injection drugs, no one has been
executed in South Carolina since 2011. The federal government hasn't put anyone
to death since 2003.
"There is no room in our society for hatred and racism," Hurd's brother Malcolm
Graham said. "I support the attorney general's decision to seek the death
penalty. I believe he should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law."
On Wednesday, a portrait was set to unveiled in the South Carolina Senate to
remember Sen. Clementa Pinckney, the pastor at Emanuel who was killed in the
attack. Pinckney had been a state senator since 2001.
(source: Associated Press)
******************
Prosecutors Still Using Race to Choose Juries in Death Penalty Cases, Despite
Century of Supreme Court Rulings
Tuesday's 7-1 Supreme Court decision in Foster v. Chatman was a huge victory
for Timothy Foster, a 49-year-old Black man who has been on Georgia's death row
for 29 years. The ruling also reflects a systemic problem with the death
penalty: prosecutors' repeated, deliberate use of race to choose jurors. This
practice alone makes capital punishment so fundamentally unfair that we must
end it.
In 1987, Foster had been convicted of murdering a white woman and was sentenced
to death by an all-white jury. During jury selection, the prosecutors in his
case deliberately eliminated potential Black jurors based on their race. Those
prosecutors violated the Constitution when they excluded those jurors, and
yesterday the Supreme Court held them to account. The justices struck down
Foster's conviction and death sentence and ordered a new trial because it's
unconstitutional to choose jurors according to race.
While this ruling may save Foster's life, it doesn't represent a big advance in
the law. The court applied a legal doctrine that was already a settled
principle: prosecutors may not use race as a basis to select - or exclude -
jurors. In fact, the Supreme Court has been condemning racial bias in jury
selection in capital cases since 1880 when it outlawed the practice in Strauder
v. West Virginia. But more than 100 years after the court's 1st decision on
this problem, and 40 years into our modern experiment with the death penalty,
widespread racial bias continues in jury selection for capital cases. We
continue to send people to die from trials tainted by racial bias.
In criminal cases, prosecutors and defense counsel are each granted "peremptory
strikes," whereby each side is permitted to dismiss a set number of potential
jurors. A handful of studies have undertaken systemic investigations of
prosecutors' use of peremptory strikes in capital cases. Each one has uncovered
damning patterns of discrimination, showing disproportionate strikes of Black
jurors by prosecutors.
Most recently, a 2015 study of prosecutor strikes in Caddo Parish, Louisiana,
found that prosecutors struck Black jurors at 2 to 3 times the rates of other
jurors. An extensive study of strikes in capital cases in Philadelphia found
prosecutors struck Black jurors at twice the rates as other jurors. Here in
North Carolina, researchers conducted the only state-wide study and found the
same All across the state, city and country alike, discrimination against
qualified Black jurors remains depressingly constant.
During jury selection, if the defense can point to some signs that prosecutors
are using their strikes in a discriminatory manner, the prosecutors will be
required to give explanations for their strike decisions. In Foster, the
Supreme Court criticized the prosecutors' "concerted effort" to keep Black
people off the jury in the Georgia case, as well as their "shifting
explanations" and "misrepresentations" to the courts intended to camouflage
those efforts. Foster involved the rare indisputable proof of discrimination:
Prosecution notes showed a planned strategy to avoid selecting any Black
jurors.
.In North Carolina, we litigated extensively jury discrimination practices in
four capital cases. (All four were recently sent back from the North Carolina
court for new hearings on their claims alleging discrimination.) As in Foster,
we found handwritten notes showing racially influenced jury selection in
individual cases. Even worse, we uncovered evidence that several prosecutors
were trained in how to provide canned explanations for why they removed Black
jurors. A statewide prosecutor training handed out a cheat sheet with a list of
the top 10 explanations for use in responding to allegations of racial bias.
Prosecutors were instructed to complain of the juror's "age," or body language
- 2 of the very same explanations offered by the prosecutors in Foster to hide
their discrimination.
With so much evidence of racial bias in jury selection for capital cases, we
know the damage is too pervasive for our courts to rectify. After more than 100
years of racially biased jury selection, the inescapable truth is that capital
punishment can't be squared with the Constitution or any other commitment to
equality. It's time to shut it down.
(source: Cassandra Stubbs, Director, ACLU Capital Punishment
Project----aclu.org)
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