John McCain on the Death Penalty

John McCain supports the death penalty for federal crimes.
As senator from Arizona, he voted to prohibit the use of racial statistics in death penalty appeals and ban the death penalty for minors.
He also supported legislation to allow the death penalty for acts of terrorism and has said he would consider further expansion of capital punishment laws for other crimes.

Barack Obama on the Death Penalty

Barack Obama wrote in his recent memoir that he thinks the death penalty "does little to deter crime.
" But he supports capital punishment in cases "so heinous, so beyond the pale, that the community is justified in expressing the full measure of its outrage by meting out the ultimate punishment."

article

More Barack Obama on the Death Penalty on Youtube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcl-T0P7xYU

Dennis Fritz Featured Speaker at The Iowans Against the Death Penalty's 45th Anniversary Dinner

Dennis Fritz will be the featured speaker at the Iowans Against the Death Penalty's 45 th anniversary dinner Oct.27 th. Dennis Fritz, author of "Journey Toward Justice," the story of his wrongful conviction in the 1982 murder and rape of a waitress. He was freed when DNA evidence cleared him in 1999 after serving 11 years in prison. The other defendant convicted and later freed in the murder, Ron Williamson, was the subject of John Grisham's book "The Innocent Man."

James Benzoni, a Des Moines lawyer, will be honored at the anniversary dinner for his efforts to keep Iowa free of capital punishment. He once faced murder charges and became a lawyer as a result.

Others to be honored

In addition to James Benzoni, the following people will be honored:
• Former Gov. Tom Vilsack, who during eight years as governor fought attempts to reinstate the death penalty
• David Baldus , a University of Iowa law professor who conducted research on racial disparity in death penalty sentencing cases
• John Ely , a former state lawmaker who sought to abolish the death penalty in the 1960s and witnessed the last execution by hanging in Iowa in 1963.

Gallup's Poll Sixty-nine Percent Americans Support Death Penalty

Capital punishment is overwhelmingly supported by the American people.
Sixty-nine percent of Americans support the Death Penalty and the majority say death penalty is applied fairly. Highest point was in 1994, but its risen in the last 4 years.

The Oct. 4-7 Gallup poll indicates that 69% of Americans respond "yes" when asked this question: "Are you in favor of the death penalty for a person convicted of murder?" This level of support for the death penalty is generally in line with the level of support that Gallup has measured in 13 polls featuring this question since 1999.
Most people do not know the danger that innocent people will be executed because of errors in the criminal justice system. Most Americans do not know the reasons, why innocent people are wrongly convicted in capital cases. The reasons included:

eyewitness error - from confusion or faulty memory.
government misconduct - by both the police and the prosecution.
junk science - mishandled evidence or use of unqualified "experts."
snitch testimony - often given in exchange for a reduction in sentence.
false confessions - resulting from mental illness or retardation, as well as from police torture
other - hearsay, questionable circumstantial evidence, etc.

The current emphasis on faster executions by the government, and less resources for the defense, and an expansion in the number of death cases mean that the execution of innocent people is inevitable. There is an increasing number of innocent defendants being found on death row. That is a clear sign that our process for sentencing people to death is fraught with many errors which cannot be remedied once an execution occurs.

Two Great Quotes
"People are largely unaware of the information critical to a judgement on the morality of the death penalty . . . if they were better informed they would consider it shocking, unjust and unacceptable."

-- Former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall.

"Perhaps the bleakest fact of all is that the death penalty is imposed not only in a freakish and discriminatory manner, but also in some cases upon defendants who are actually innocent."
-Justice William J. Brennan, Jr., 1994

World Day Against The Death Penalty Oct.10

October 10th is to be observed as the ‘World Day against the Death Penalty’. UN members will vote on a While 130 countries have abolished the death penalty in law or practice, 69 countries retain and use the death penalty. But, the number of countries which actually executes prisoners in any one year is much smaller. Since 1990, more than 50 countries have abolished capital punishment for all crimes.

Human rights organizations like Amnesty International express their unconditional opposition to death penalty as a violation of the right to life and the right to be not subjected to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. In fact, the death penalty has never been shown to be a more effective deterrent than other, more humane forms of punishment.
The World Coalition against the Death Penalty (WCADP), of which organizations like Amnesty International are members, is organizing a day of local action around the world on October 10, celebrated as the World Day against the Death Penalty.
Read more here

International Issues and Capital Punishment Podcast

A great podcast from Dr. Michael Blankenship.
International Issues & Capital Punishment Episode 9 International Issues & Capital Punishment
The U.S. is part of a shrinking minority of countries that retain the death penalty. It has also engaged in repeated treaty violations while ignoring both the laws of other countries and international courts. This episode explores issues such extradition, consular law, and growing world opposition to the death penalty. (Length 9:46)
For more information about capital punishment, visit the Death Penalty Information

Michael B. Blankenship is currently a professor of criminal justice at Boise State University. He served as Dean of the College of Social Sciences and Public Affairs from June, 2002 until December, 2006. Prior to his arrival at BSU, he served as Chair of the Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology, Associate Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, and Director of the Teaching and Learning Center at East Tennessee State University.
Dr. Blankenship is a native of Asheville, North Carolina. He earned a B.S. degree in criminal justice and a M.P.A degree from Western Carolina University, and a Ph.D. in criminal justice from Sam Houston State University. Prior to his graduate studies, Dr. Blankenship served as a police officer for seven years in his home town.
Dr. Blankenship has taught online courses on capital punishment, white-collar crime, policing, statistics, and introductory criminal justice and Web-enhanced courses on white-collar crime and management. He is coauthor of a statistics text and has edited a volume on corporate criminality. His empirical research has focused on capital punishment and white-collar crime.
Dr. Blankenship served previously as editor of the American Journal of Criminal Justice, President of the Southern Criminal Justice Association, and as program chair for the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences.

Dennis Fritz "IF" There Were No Flowers

Dennis Fritz, author of "Journey Toward Justice", read the poem "If" by Rudyard Kipling to the lone juror who saved him from the death penalty.
The poem was read to Bonnie Flowers at a book signing in Ada, Oklahoma. Fritz told the audience, that if Bonnie had not had the courage to stand up for him then he was sure he would have been put to death.


Dennis Fritz read the Rudyard Kipling poem “If”, to Bonnie Flowers as it had special meaning to him. The poem was given to him early in his prison sentence by his aunt who died just eight days before he was released. In his book dedication he writes-
"To the lord for giving me the emotional strength and perseverance to endure, and to my mother, Aunt Wilma, and Elizabeth for their continued strength and support" -

Here is the Poem
"IF" by Rudyard Kipling

If you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

But make allowance for their doubting too;

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting

Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,

Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,

And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;


If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;

If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;

If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;

If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,

And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

And never breath a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,

Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;

If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -

Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,

And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!

Life On The Row Crime and Social Issues Discussion Forum

Here is a great website I thought many of my readers would be interested in. Has loads of information on many current and controversial issues.
Life on the Row is a crime/social issues discussion forum with a primary focus on Capital Punishment.
The Row welcomes all sides of the debate and strives to educate its members thru the fair and open sharing of opinion.Everyone is welcome at the Row.
Here is the link for
Life On The Row

Plea Against the Death Penalty

Look, examine, reflect. You hold capital punishment up as an example. Why? Because of what it teaches. And just what is it that you wish to teach by means of this example? That thou shalt not kill. And how do you teach that "thou shalt not kill"? By killing.

I have examined the death penalty under each of its two aspects: as a direct action, and as an indirect one. What does it come down to? Nothing but something horrible and useless, nothing but a way of shedding blood that is called a crime when an individual commits it, but is (sadly) called "justice" when society brings it about. Make no mistake, you lawmakers and judges, in the eyes of God as in those of conscience, what is a crime when individuals do it is no less an offense when society commits the deed.

Victor Hugo, Speech at the Constituent Assembly, September 15, 1848

Abolish the Death Penalty: Innocent and Executed

Today I noticed this on Abolish the Death Penalty Blog: and found it very interesting. This is from their Blog -
Innocent and Executed
Today we launched the online version of Innocent and Executed: Four Chapters in the Life of America's Death Penalty. This report tells the story of four men -- Larry Griffin of Missouri and Ruben Cantu, Carlos De Luna and Cameron Todd Willingham, all of Texas -- who were executed despite being almost certainly if not demonstrably innocent. You can see the "micro site" we created here.

Many thanks to Josh Hilgart and Jason Zanon, friends and old colleagues of mine, for providing the technical assistance that allowed this to happen. END

Great Job, Josh Hilgart and Jason Zanon and Friends. From Barbara's Journey Toward Justice
Here is The Link Again
Abolish the Death Penalty: Innocent and Executed

Alan Bock's Blog: Journey Toward Justice

Click here to Read - Alan Bock's Blog: Journey Toward Justice

Alan Bock's Blog, Writer for the Orange County Register, and author of Waiting to Inhale, and Ambush at Ruby Ridge. Please read his Great Blog. A Wonderful Writer with A Great Blog Roll. Contributors to Blog Alan Bock - Steve Bock

Check out his Blog Rolls and I am sure he won't mind reading his books also.
Blog Roll
Albert Jay Nock -- essential "superfluous" man
Anti War
BBC News
Capitol Hill Blue -- nicely cranky
Cato Institute -- sort of like the Mother Ship
Chronicles - cranky paleocons
Chronicles magazine -- crusty paleocons
Counterpunch -- Alex Cockburn et. al.
Declan McCullagh -- technoliberator
Declaration of Independence
Digg - use it
Drudge Report - good news links
Frank Chodorov - pioneer libertarian polemicist
G.K. Chesterton - Father Brown and more
Harmless as Doves - Christian pacifists/anarchists
History News Network -- perspective from GMU
Hoover Institution -- I'm a media fellow
http://www.anthonygregory.com/
Independent Institute -- hard core enough to make me a media fellow
Institute for Study of Capitalism and Morality
Joe Bob Briggs -- drive-in movies etc.
Journal of Libertarian Studies
Karen De Coster -- blogging for freedom
Lew Rockwell
Liberty Watch
Lysander Spooner
Minaret of Freedom -- calling Muslims to liberty
Mises
National Review
OC Register
Opinion Journal -- Wall St. Journal edit pg.
Randolph Bourne - "War is the health of the state"
Reason magazine
Richard Cobden (1804-1865)
Robert LeFevre -- pioneer and friend
Salon.com
Slate.com
The Independent Review
Walter Block -- controversialist economist
War is a Racket
Weekly Standard -- Neocon's Pravda
Whiskey & Gunpowder -- investing for freedom
Wikipedia
World Net Daily

The Growing Crisis In The Adminstration Of Capital Punishment

As I was researching the pros and cons abouth the Death Penalty, I came across this in The Congressional Record.For people who are visiting my blog for the first time. I decided after reading the book Journey Toward Justice, Author Dennis Fritz, to join his Journey Toward Justice. I started this blog to bring about Public Awareness of major issues in his book. This is one of them. I do wish Dennis Fritz a Wonderful Journey in his Journey Toward Justice. He was in prison for a unwarranted prosecution and wrongful conviction and spent 12 tortuous years in prison as a innocent man. Please pass my blog along and join My Journey.
Here is what I read: Since it is from The Congressional Record I can Post the entire text.
[Page: S198]

Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I wish to call attention to a growing national crisis in the administration of capital punishment. People of good conscience can and will disagree on the morality of the death penalty. But I am confident that we should all be able to agree that a system that may sentence one innocent person to death for every seven it executes has no place in a civilized society, much less in 21st century America. But that is what the American system of capital punishment has done for the last 24 years.

A total of 610 people have been executed since the reinstatement of capital punishment in 1976. During the same time, according to the Death Penalty Information Center, 85 people have been found innocent and were released from death row. These are not reversals of sentences, or even convictions on technical legal grounds; these are people whose convictions have been overturned after years of confinement on death row because it was discovered they were not guilty. Even though in some instances they came within hours of being executed, it was eventually determined that, whoops, we made a mistake; we have the wrong person.

What does this mean? It means that for every seven executions, one person has been wrongly convicted. It means that we could have more than three innocent people sentenced to death each year. The phenomenon is not confined to just a few States; the many exonerations since 1976 span more than 20 different States. And of those who are found innocent--not released because of a technicality, but actually found innocent--what is the average time they spent on death row, knowing they could be executed at any time? What is the average time they spent on death row before somebody said, we have the wrong person? Seven and a half years.

This would be disturbing enough if the eventual exonerations of these death row inmates were the product of reliable and consistent checks in our legal system, if we could say as Americans, all right, you may spend 7 1/2 years on death row, but at least you have the comfort of knowing that we are going to find out you are innocent before we execute you. It might be comprehensible, though not acceptable, if we as a society lacked effective and relatively inexpensive means to make capital punishment more reliable. But many of the exonerated owe their lives to fortuity and private heroism, having been denied commonsense procedural rights and inexpensive modern scientific testing opportunities--leaving open the very real possibility that there have been a number of innocent people executed over the last few decades who were not so fortunate.

Let me give you a case. Randall Dale Adams. Here is a man who might have been routinely executed had his case not attracted the attention of a filmmaker, Earl Morris. His movie, `The Thin Blue Line,' shredded the prosecution's case and cast a national spotlight on Adams' innocence.

Consider the case of Anthony Porter. Porter spent 16 years on death row. That is more years than most Members of the Senate have served. He spent 16 years on death row. He came within 48 hours of being executed in 1998, but he was cleared the following year. Was he cleared by the State? No. He was cleared by a class of undergraduate journalism students at Northwestern University, who took on his case as a class project. That got him out. Then the State acknowledged that it had the wrong person, that Porter had been innocent all along. He came within 48 hours of being executed, and he would have been executed had not this journalism class decided to investigate his case instead of doing something else. Now consider the cases of the unknown and the unlucky, about whom we may never hear.

Last year, former Florida Supreme Court Justice Gerald Kogan said he had `no question' that `we certainly have, in the past, executed . . . people who either didn't fit the criteria for execution in the State of Florida, or who, in fact, were, factually, not guilty of the crime for which they have been executed.' This is not some pie-in-the-sky theory. Justice Kogan was a homicide detective and a prosecutor before eventually rising to Chief Justice.

This crisis has led the American Bar Association and a growing number of State legislators to call for a moratorium on executions until the death penalty can be administered with less risk to the innocent. This week, the Republican Governor of Illinois, George Ryan, announced he plans to block executions in that State until an inquiry has been conducted into why more death row inmates have been exonerated than executed since 1977 when Illinois reinstated capital punishment. Think of that. More death row inmates exonerated than executed.

Governor Ryan is someone who supports the death penalty. But I agree with him in bringing this halt. He said: `There is a flaw in the system, without question, and it needs to be studied.' The Governor is absolutely right. I rise to bring to this body the debate over how we as a nation can begin to reduce the risk of killing the innocent.

I hope that nobody of good faith--whether they are for or against the death penalty--will deny the existence of a serious crisis. Sentencing innocent women and men to death anywhere in our country shatters America's image in the international community. At the very least, it undermines our leadership in the struggle for human rights. But, more importantly, the individual and collective conscience of decent Americans is deeply offended and the faith in the working of our criminal justice system is severely damaged. So the question we should debate is, What should be done?

Some will be tempted to rely on the States. The U.S. Supreme Court often defers to `the laboratory of the States' to figure out how to protect criminal defendants. After 24 years, let's take a look at that lab report.

As I already mentioned, Illinois has now had more inmates released from death row than executed since the death penalty was reinstated. There have been 12 executions, and 13 times they have said: Whoops, sorry. Don't pull the switch. We have the wrong person. This has happened four times in the last year alone.

In Texas, the State that leads the Nation in executions, courts have upheld death sentences in at least three cases in which the defense lawyers slept through substantial portions of the trial. The Texas courts said that the defendants in these cases had adequate counsel. Adequate counsel? Would any one of us if we were in a taxicab say we had an adequate driver who was asleep at the wheel? What we are saying is with a person's life at stake the defense lawyer slept through the trial, and the Texas courts say that is pretty adequate.

Meanwhile, in the past few years, the States have followed the Federal lead in expanding their defective capital punishment systems, curtailing appeal and habeas corpus rights, and slashing funding for indigent defense services. The crisis can only get worse.

The States have had decades to fix their capital punishment systems, yet the best they have managed is a system fraught with arbitrariness and error--a system where innocent people are sentenced to death on a regular basis, and it is left not to the courts, not to the States, not to the Federal Government, but to filmmakers and college undergraduates to correct the mistakes. History shows that we cannot rely on local politics to implement our national conscience on such fundamental points as the execution of the innocent.

What about the Supreme Court? In a 1993 case, it could not even make up its mind whether the execution of an innocent person would be unconstitutional. Do a referendum on that one throughout the Nation. Ask people in this Nation of a quarter billion people whether they think executing an innocent person should be considered constitutional or unconstitutional. Most in this country have no doubt that it would be unconstitutional, but that really does not matter: executing an innocent person is abhorrent--it is morally wrong. Whether you support the death penalty or not, executing an innocent person is wrong, and we in this body have the moral duty to express and implement America's conscience. We should be the Nation's conscience. The buck should stop in this Chamber where it always stops in times of national crisis.

How do we begin to stem the crisis? I have been posing this question to experts across the country for nearly a year. There is a lot of consensus over what must be done. In the next few weeks, I will introduce legislation that will address some of the most urgent problems in the administration of capital punishment.

Two problems in particular require our immediate attention. First, we need to ensure that defendants in capital cases receive competent legal representation at every stage in their case. Second, we have to guarantee an effective forum for death row inmates who may be able to prove their innocence.

In our adversarial system of justice, effective assistance of counsel is essential to the fair administration of justice. It is the principal bulwark against wrongful conviction.

I know this from my own experience as a prosecutor. It is the best way to reduce the risk that a trial will be infected by constitutional error, resulting in reversal, retrial, cost, delay, and repeated ordeals for the victim's family. Most prosecutors will tell you they would much prefer to have good counsel on the other side because there is less apt to be mistakes, there is less apt to be reversible error, and there is far more of a chance that you end up with the right decision.

Most defendants who face capital charges are represented by court-appointed lawyers. Unfortunately, the manner in which defense lawyers are selected and compensated in death penalty cases frequently fails to protect the defendant's rights. Some States relegate these cases to grossly unqualified lawyers willing to settle for meager fees. While the Federal Government pays defense counsel $125 an hour for death penalty work, the hourly rate in many States is $50 or less, and some States place an arbitrary and usually unrealistically low cap on the total amount a court-appointed attorney can bill.

New York recently slashed pay for counsel in capital cases by as much as 50 percent. They might say they are getting their money's worth if they cut out all the money for defense counsel. The conviction rate is probably going to shoot up. Let me tell you what else will go up--the number of innocent people who will be put to death.

Congress has done its part to make a bad situation worse. In 1996, Congress defunded the death penalty resource centers. This has sharply increased the chances that innocent persons will be executed.

You get what you pay for. Those who are on death row have found their lives placed in the hands of lawyers who are drunk during the trial--in some instances, lawyers who never bothered to meet their client before the trial; lawyers who never bothered to read the State death penalty statute; lawyers who were just out of law school and never handled a criminal case; and lawyers who were literally asleep on the job.

Even some of our best lawyers, diligent, experienced litigators, can do little when they lack funds for investigators, experts, or scientific testing that could establish their client's innocence. Attorneys appointed to represent capital defendants often cannot recoup even their out-of-pocket expenses. They are effectively required to work at minimum wag or below while funding their client's defense out of their own pockets.

Although the States are required to provide criminal defendants with qualified legal counsel, those who have been saved from death row and found innocent were often convicted because of attorney error. They might not have had postconviction review because their lawyer failed to meet a filing deadline. An attorney misses a deadline by even 1 day, and his death row client may pay the price with his life.

Let me be clear what I am talking about. I am not suggesting that there is a universal right to Johnnie Cochran's services. The O.J. Simpson case has absolutely nothing to do with the typical capital case, in which one or possibly two underfunded and underprepared lawyers try to cobble together a defense with little or no scientific or expert evidence and the whole process takes less than a week. These are two extremes. You go from the Simpson case, where the judge let the whole thing get out of control and we had a year-long spectacle, to the typical death penalty case which is rushed through without preparation in a matter of days. Somewhere there must be a middle ground.

Let me give three examples of some of the worst things that have happened--but not untypical.

Ronald Keith Williamson. In 1997, a Federal appeals court overturned Williamson's conviction on the basis of ineffectiveness of counsel. The court noted that the lawyer, who had been paid a total of $3,200 for the defense, had failed to investigate and present a fact to the jury. What was that fact? Somebody else confessed to the crime. If I were the defense attorney, I think one of the things that I would want to bring to the jury is the fact that somebody else confessed to the crime; Williamson's lawyer did not bother. Then, two years after the appeals court decision, DNA testing ruled out Williamson as the killer and implicated another man--a convicted kidnapper who had testified against Williamson at trial. Of course, he did. He is the one who committed the crime.

Let's next consider George McFarland. According to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, McFarland's lawyer slept through much of his 1992 trial. He objected to hardly anything the prosecution did. Here is how the Houston Chronicle described what happened as McFarland stood on trial for his life. This is not for shoplifting. He is on trial for his life.

Let me quote from the Houston Chronicle:


[Page: S199]

Seated beside his client . . . defense attorney John Benn spent much of Thursday afternoon's trial in apparent deep sleep. His mouth kept falling open and his head lolled back on his shoulders, and then he awakened just long enough to catch himself and sit upright. Then it happened again. And again. And again.

Every time he opened his eyes, a different prosecution witness was on the stand describing another aspect of the Nov. 19, 1991, arrest of George McFarland in the robbery-killing of grocer Kenneth Kwan.

When state District Judge Doug Shaver finally called a recess, Benn was asked if he truly had fallen asleep during a capital murder trial. `It's boring,' the 72-year-old longtime Houston lawyer explained. . . . Court observers said Benn seems to have slept his way through virtually the entire trial.

Unfortunately for McFarland, Texas' highest criminal court, several of whose members were coming up for reelection, concluded that this constituted effective criminal representation.

I guess they felt because the lawyer was in the courtroom, even though sound asleep, that would be effective representation. If you read the decision they probably would have ruled the same way if he had been at home sound asleep, so long as he had been appointed at some time.

McFarland is still on death row for a murder he insists he did not commit, on the basis of evidence widely reported by independent observers to be weak.

Then we have Reginald Powell, a borderline mentally retarded man who was 18 at the time of the crime. Mr. Powell was eventually executed. Why? Because he accepted his lawyer's advice to reject a plea bargain that would have saved his life.

There were a number of attorney errors at the trial. The advice he received seems to be very bad advice. Some may feel this advice, the advice given to this 18-year-old mentally retarded man, was affected by the flagrantly unprofessional conduct of the attorney, a woman twice Powell's age, who conducted a secret jailhouse sexual relationship with him during the trial. Despite this obvious attorney conflict of interest, Powell's execution went ahead in Missouri a year ago.

I ask each Member of the Senate when you go home tonight, or when you talk to your constituents, and when you consider the bill I will be introducing, to remember these cases and consult your conscience to ask whether these examples represent the best of 21st century American justice.

The judge who presided over McFarland's trial summed up the Texas court's view of the law quite accurately when he reasoned that, while the Constitution requires a defendant to be represented by a lawyer, it `doesn't say the lawyer has to be awake.' If your conscience says otherwise, maybe we ought to do something.

My proposal rests on a simple premise: States that choose to impose capital punishment must be prepared to foot the bill. They should not be permitted to tip the scales of justice by denying capital defendants competent legal services. We have to do everything we can to ensure the States are meeting their constitutional obligations with respect to capital representation.

Can miscarriages of justice happen when defendants receive adequate representation? Yes, they can still happen. So I think it is critical to ensure that death row inmates have a meaningful opportunity--not a fanciful opportunity but a meaningful opportunity--to raise claims of innocence based on newly discovered evidence, especially if it is evidence that is derived from scientific tests not available at the time of the trial.

Perhaps more than any other development, improvements in DNA testing have exposed the fallibility of the legal system. In the last decades, scores of wrongfully convicted people have been released from prison--including many from death row--after DNA testing proved they could not have committed the crimes for which they were convicted. In some cases the same DNA testing that vindicated the innocent helped catch the guilty.

Most recently, DNA testing exonerated Ronald Jones. He spent close to 8 years on death row for a 1985 rape and murder that he did not commit. Illinois prosecutors dropped the charges against Jones on May 18, 1999, after DNA evidence from the crime scene excluded him as a possible suspect. It was also DNA testing that eventually saved Ronald Keith Williamson's life, as I discussed earlier. He spent 12 years as an innocent man on Oklahoma's death row.

Can you imagine how any one of us would feel, day after day for 12 years, never knowing if we were just a few hours or a few days from execution, locked up on death row for a crime we did not commit?

Some of the major hurdles to postconviction DNA testing are laws prohibiting introduction of new evidence--laws that have tightened as death penalty supporters have tried to speed executions by limiting appeals. Only two States, New York and Illinois, require the opportunity for inmates to require DNA testing where it could result in new evidence of innocence. Elsewhere, inmates may try to get DNA evidence for years, only to be shut out by courts and prosecutors.

What possible reason could there be to deny inmates the opportunity to prove their innocence--and perhaps even help identify the real culprits--through new technologies? DNA testing is relatively inexpensive. But no matter what it costs, it is a tiny price to pay to make sure you have the right person.

The National Commission on the Future of DNA Evidence, a Federal panel established by the Justice Department and comprised of law enforcement, judicial, and scientific experts, issued a report last year urging prosecutors to consent to postconviction DNA testing, or retesting, in appropriate cases, especially if the results could exonerate the defendant.

In 1994, we set up a funding program to improve the quality and availability of DNA analysis for law enforcement identification purposes. The Justice Department has handed out tens of millions of dollars to States under this program. Last year alone, we appropriated another $30 million for DNA-related grants to States. That is an appropriate use of Federal funds. But we should not pass up the promise of truth and justice for both sides of our adversarial system that DNA evidence holds out. We at least ought to require that both sides have it available.

By reexamining capital punishment in light of recent exonerations, we can reduce the risk that people will be executed for crimes they did not commit and increase the probability that the guilty will be brought to justice. We can also help to make sure the death penalty is not imposed out of ignorance or prejudice.

I learned, first as a defense attorney and then as a prosecutor, that the pursuit of justice obliges us not only to convict the guilty, but also to exonerate the wrongly accused and convicted. That obligation is all the more urgent when the death penalty is involved.

Let's not have the situation where, today in America, it is better to be rich and guilty than poor and innocent. That is not equal justice. That is not what our country stands for.

I was proud to be a defense attorney. I was very proud to be a prosecutor. I have often said it was probably the best job I ever had. But there was one thought I always had every day that I was a prosecutor. I would look at the evidence over and over again and I would ask myself, not can I get a conviction on this charge, but will I be convicting the right person. I had cases where I knew I could get a conviction, but I believed we had the wrong person, and I would not bring the charge. I think most prosecutors feel that way. But sometimes in the passion of a highly publicized, horrendous murder, we can move too fast.

I urge Senators on both sides of the aisle, both those who support the death penalty and those who oppose it, to join in seeking ways to reduce the risk of mistaken executions.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.

The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.


[Page: S200]

Mr. SMITH of New Hampshire. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

END

The Growing Crisis In The Adminstration Of Capital Punishment
Senate - February 01,2000

Capital Punishment Survey

This is a Great Survey
click here
Take part in our anonymous on line death penalty survey. From Capital Punishment USA

Book Recommendation - Journey Toward Justice Author Dennis Fritz click here On Amazon Here
International Orders Order Here Journey Toward Justice by Dennis Fritz From Around The World click on here Amazon International Just type in Journey Toward Justice Author Dennis Fritz

The Religious Organizing Against the Death Penalty

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The Religious Organizing Against the Death Penalty Project was created to galvanize and empower the religious community in the United States to work against capital punishment. Coordinated by the American Friends Service Committee's criminal justice program, the Project provides people of faith with the tools and resources they need to become effective advocates for abolition.

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Capital Punishment - A Jewish Perspective What The Torah Clearly Says

Capital Punishment - A Jewish Perspective

The Torah clearly says that there are crimes, which deserve the punishment of death. However, Jewish tradition makes it equally clear that only under the most exceptional circumstances can a human court be so certain of the guilt of the accused that an execution can be carried out. These restrictions include the requirement of two eyewitnesses of unquestionable character and the prohibition of circumstantial evidence and of self-incrimination, even confession. These and other rules make a death sentence virtually impossible in a Jewish court. The procedures and rules governing capital cases in the judicial system of the United States is entirely unacceptable according to Jewish tradition.

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