Feb. 21 NORTH CAROLINA: Murderers I Have Known----An award-winning essay on working with defendants in capital trials Is that dog chained? It was winter in North Carolina. I was standing outside a trailer sunk in weeds. Rain had turned the driveway into a muddy ditch, which coursed into the muddy creek that was the road. A pit bull striped like a tiger glared at me, a rusted Chevy Impala the only thing between us. The woman watching me from her trailer next door shrugged in answer to my question. I was looking for the friend of a man charged with 3 shooting deaths in a trailer just like the one the pit bull was defending. Stripes, I decided to call him. He growled and took a step forward, and I heard the comforting rattle of a chain. Last year I started working as an investigator in capital punishment cases. My job is to find personal information that might convince juries not to impose the death penalty on defendants who have been charged with 1st-degree murder; I also help defendants who have been sentenced to death and are appealing, hoping for a new trial. I conduct interviews with the families of accused murderers, their teachers, their doctors, their friends, looking for any evidence of mental retardation or early abuse, among other things. I decipher 30-year-old notes made by psychiatrists about a mother's mental illness. I parse obituaries for clues to an overdose or alcoholism within a defendant's family. Lawyers can use such personal details to show a jury how a defendant's mental state or past may have impaired his ability to understand the consequences of a violent act, a necessary component of a 1st-degree conviction. At the very least, evidence of severe abuse can help move a jury to mercy. Since I took this job, my list of things I've done for the 1st time in my life has grown. Once, I called a man to tell him about a son he never knew he had. After he absorbed this, I told him that his son was 35 years old and on death row. That is some news for a Tuesday morning. I told him he could help his son by talking to his son's lawyers. The man declined, then hung up. In another case, I worked with lawyers defending a young man from a Latin American country. Victor (not his real name) was charged with killing a prostitute. I speak Spanish and translated for his attorneys. Victor was so thrilled to talk with someone in his own language that his life story came out like hail on a tin roof. The 2 lawyers and I sat knee to knee in the sweltering visitors' booth where glass separated us from Victor. He spoke in excruciating detail. My violence verbs, I realized, needed updating. As I struggled to distinguish between "knife" and "dagger," "slap" and "punch," the lawyers grew wide-eyed. "Tell him he faces a possible death sentence," one told me. Inadvertently, I laughed. "You mean he doesn't know?" The lawyer frowned, dismayed at my reaction. There is no death penalty in most of Latin America - or much of the rest of the world - but it had never occurred to me that I would have to relay this particular bit of news. It hadn't occurred to Victor, either. I told him that if his case went to trial, he could be sentenced to death. To defend him, I continued, we needed to ask him about his past. After a pause, he said, "May I ask a question?" "Por supuesto." Of course. "Can you ask them when I can go home?" He hadn't comprehended the threat of death at all. Since that day, Victor has written me several letters from jail, where he is being held pending trial. He decorates them with elaborate pencil drawings of a grinning, winged heart wearing a halo, pictures like the kind a high schooler doodles on his spiral notebook. As my husband noted, the heart looks like a gang tattoo. But the drawings are the only gift Victor is capable of giving to say thank you for my visits. Jails are stinking, dirty and incredibly loud places. Once, I interviewed a client's cousin while the cousin was incarcerated for a minor crime. I wanted to find out what he remembered about my client when they were boys. While answering my questions quite calmly, the cousin started masturbating under his Popsicle-orange jumpsuit. It took me a minute to understand what was happening, especially because the cousin was also cheerily greeting other inmates with his free hand. Once I got over my initial shock, it turned out to be a useful interview. On the same case, my client's sister agreed to talk about her brother's early involvement with drugs. As we settled in her living room for the interview, her children ate quietly in the kitchen. Their awards for academic and sports accomplishments decorated the walls. On the porch, however, their father sold crack. To get the most out of the interview, I felt I had to ignore this and did. But as a mother myself, I had a powerful urge to cross the room and give the sister one hard slap. Just such an environment had led her brother to the threshold of death row; now she seemed oblivious to its effect on her children. My work is not all so strange. There are unexpected moments of grace. During one trial, I stood on the rainy courthouse steps as members of my client's family took a smoke break. Several family secrets - a mother's attempted suicide, a robust family history of alcoholism and domestic abuse - had just been revealed during testimony and would be on the front page of the local newspaper by morning. There was quiet contemplation and some shrugs. One of the uncles caught my eye. A mill worker, he had thick hands roughened by the machines he had operated 6 days a week for the past 30 years. "Is that Calvin Klein you're wearing?" He was referring to my perfume. We began discussing the merits of various scents, from Poison to Carolina Herrera. He told me hed just switched to Comme de Garons. We laughed when we discovered that both of our fathers used Old Spice. Later, I thought about how skin color, money and culture make us so different, yet we can all be moved by a scent and the memories it carries with it. The job I had before this one was not exactly sheltered either. I investigated and wrote about human rights abuses in Peru and Colombia for an international human rights group. I interviewed paramilitaries and guerrillas, argued with generals, slipped into parishes to take down the stories of people with bounties on their heads. Occasionally, I lived the diplomatic high life, chatting up U.N. pashas, sipping cocktails at foreign embassies and mulling dessert lists at fancy restaurants. It was exciting work, exotic and full of the danger that puts a quasi-cosmetic glow on my cheeks. But after a while, I felt empty. Like the proverbial guest with good gossip, I felt that I was dining out too often on the misery of others. And I missed home. I decided that I wanted to live in my country like the people I admired in Colombia live in theirs - fully engaged, clear-eyed and willing to take on unpopular causes. Honestly, it is hard to pick a more unpopular cause than defending accused murderers. My mother was not pleased. For years, she had worried as I flew into war zones and came back without a single story she could bear to hear. "What happened to saving the whales?" she asked me, remembering my teen passion. I could have trotted out a spiel on how it is critical in our democracy to fight for a fair justice system for all. Even for people who do despicable things. Especially when they do them. But a high ideal isnt what motivates me. It is the value of human life tucked like a note into the stories I hear. Behind the stone face, the tattoo, the swagger is the child who at 5 years of age would search out his drunken mother, coax her out of a ditch and guide her home. Here is the man whose first memory is of his father's fist moving toward his face like the Apollo rocket, last launched the year he turned four. Here is the spelling bee champion who, at nine, was beaten senseless for moving the TV Guide. Here is the toddler whose mother sold him to pedophiles in exchange for drugs. These stories do not excuse murder. A murderer causes unspeakable pain in the families and the communities he harms. Murderers should be punished. Sometimes, they are so damaged that they cannot be allowed to rejoin society and must be imprisoned for the rest of their lives. But for every seemingly remorseless killer like Scott Peterson, there are a hundred men on death row consumed with self-loathing and the inner torture of their own pasts. Their stories have taught me that their crimes are not committed in an instant, but created over years. In fact, in my son's elementary school, I can spot the children who may make my client list one day. A spectral hand seems to hang over them. They are the ones whose faces are closed at 5 years old. They are quiet but can erupt suddenly. For them, the English word "tantrum" is inadequate; what they have is rabia, rage. Friends assume I am working to free the wrongly accused, and there are some innocents in jail and on death row. But there are more men who admit their crimes. What is so compelling, at least to me, is how so many of them were made into criminals by their circumstances, assembled piece by piece, like Lego toys. Of course, there is free will and redemption and examples of people who overcome their lot and fashion law-abiding lives and even excel. But don't be fooled. Most of us are pulled down by hardship. Some of us don't survive. Sometimes the deck is stacked so thoroughly that it is a living miracle that any human feeling lingers in a drug-addled, abused and neglected brain. But the human spirit is hard to extinguish. With one client now on death row, I have an extensive and energetic correspondence about this very issue. He killed a woman, then turned himself in to the police. He says he regrets what he did every single day and every waking hour. But he rejects any suggestion that his upbringing "in a household riddled by physical and sexual abuse, in one of the most violent urban slums in the United States - had anything to do with it. He is a true believer in the American ideal, the concept of an individual unhampered by race or gender or economic circumstance. And what about the victims? I also talk to their families to find out where they stand on the death penalty. A familys opposition can help gain clemency from a governor and save a clients life. But this is by far the most wrenching aspect of the work. Many families are not interested in talking to me, and that is their right. Others are, if only to find out what is going on with the case. Prosecutors represent the state, not the victims of crimes, and they spend little time keeping grieving families informed about new developments. Not long ago, I visited the mother of a woman shot and killed by one of my clients, the woman's live-in boyfriend. The mother graciously allowed me into her home. We talked about her daughter and the status of my client's appeal. Around us swirled children and grandchildren, including the 2 boys left orphaned by my client's rage. While washing supper dishes, the younger boy feigned indifference but was intently listening to the adults talk. From the couch, the older boy glowered. He was the angry one, his memories of his mother still fresh. Still, I was comforted by their presence. I saw nothing of that spectral hand on these boys. Their grandmother wept. I wept. I touched their deepest wound, covered but never to be healed. The victim's brother, a thick-set, powerful-looking man, told me he wanted my client to die and cited the Bible as support. His mother also cited the Bible, but to express forgiveness and a desire that my client live. There was no struggle or argument - they each had their own way of resolving the loss. Out of respect and a shared pain, neither presumed to dictate what the other should feel. It was one of the gentlest expressions of love between a mother and son that I have seen. I don't know how long Ill keep doing this work. Sometimes the weight of it feels real, like a load I cannot set down. But then, other times, when I least expect it, it lifts me. (source: Duke University - Robin Kirk, coordinator of the Duke Human Rights Initiative, was the winner of Glamour magazine's 2005 essay contest. The contest was judged by Susan Orlean, author of The Orchid Thief. In her essay, she discusses her work as a mitigation specialists, working with defendants in capital murder cases attempting to bring evidence that might keep them off of death row. The essay was published in the November 2005 Glamour magazine) ARIZONA: Execution supporter apologizes to ex-con In Phoenix, the head of the Senate Judiciary Committee publicly apologized Monday to a man who spent two years on death row after being wrongfully convicted of murder. But it has not shaken his belief in the death penalty. Sen. John Huppenthal, R-Chandler, called the 1992 conviction of Ray Krone "a truly tragic case." He said none of the evidence readily available pointed to him as a suspect, much less the murderer. "In a way, it's a lesson for us all that this can happen in a modern society," Huppenthal said in the public apology on the floor of the Senate. "When we think we have foolproof systems where this would never, never happen, it has happened," he said. The apology came as members of the Coalition of Arizonans to Abolish the Death Penalty brought Krone, who now lives in Pennsylvania, to the Capitol to lobby for their cause. He will appear in Tucson this morning at a breakfast sponsored by the Law, Criminal Justice and Security Program and Students Against the Death Penalty at the University of Arizona. "I had thought about tracking him down personally to try and give him some sense of closure just by talking to him and telling him that I cared about his case and care about him," Huppenthal said. Krone was sentenced to death for the 1991 murder of the bartender at a Phoenix lounge where he played darts. His conviction was based largely on expert testimony that supposedly matched his teeth with bite marks found on the victim. That 1st conviction was overturned on technicality. A 2nd trial resulted in a new conviction. But this time the judge refused to impose the death penalty, saying there were questions about whether Krone was the real killer. That later proved to be the case when DNA found at the scene pointed to another man. Lawsuits by Krone against Phoenix and Maricopa County resulted in settlements totaling $4.4 million. Asked if that compensates him for his time behind bars, he responded, "How long would you go to prison for a million dollars?" ****************** Judge, exonerated inmate to discuss death penalty in talk at NAU A retired judge and a man who was exonerated after 19 years in prison will discuss Arizona's death penalty Thursday at 7 p.m. in Cline Library Assembly Hall. Rudolph Gerber, retired Maricopa County Superior Court judge and judge for the Arizona Court of Appeals, will discuss "A Death Penalty We Can Live With." Darryl Hunt spent 19 years in a North Carolina prison. The presentation is sponsored by the Department of Criminal Justice. Gerber served on the Superior Court from 1979 through 1988, and on the Court of Appeals from 1988 until 2001. (source for both: Arizona Daily Star) NEW MEXICO: Real-life Role Model: The other side----She's devoted her life to justice, traveling the state to fight for accused killers from the fringes of society Lelia Hood sits eyeball to eyeball with men and women who give most people nightmares. They are people like Zacharia Craig, a mentally deficient man accused of running down a State Police officer in 2001; Phillip Busey, a transient who could face the death penalty if convicted of raping and bludgeoning a Nob Hill woman last year; and Karen Smallwood, who is also facing execution if convicted of killing a young Santa Fe mother in 2004. Hood is their ally and, in most cases, the only hope they have for avoiding lethal injection or a prison sentence that could put them away for the rest of their lives. It's a role Hood, 46, does not take lightly. Indeed, if she were any more passionate about being a public defender in the state Capital Crimes Unit, she could easily overwhelm a courtroom. "I am very proud to do this work," said Hood, who moved to New Mexico from her native South Dakota 3years ago to do death penalty defense work. "If I don't stand up in court every day and stand up for someone accused of urder, then we might as well take them outside and shoot them." Obviously, there are those who wouldn't mind that, and Hood said she ealizes the life of a public defender is hard, underpaid, usually misunderstood and often maligned. But it's a calling, she said, and perhaps a necessary evil. Justice would not be possible without someone on the other side of the courtroom. "Our country affords us constitutional rights, and the right to have a lawyer sets us apart," said Hood, a divorced mother of three grown children. "If I don't, and we don't, stand up for their rights, none of us have rights." The Capital Crimes Unit has four lawyers on staff, which means Hood is on the go across the state to defend accused killers who would otherwise have no money to pay for a lawyer. "Poor people don't get the Dream Team," she said. "They get us." Hood's empathy for those on the fringe of society, especially those who are there because of mental illness, comes from her upbringing on the fringe. As the oldest of 6 children born to impoverished and alcoholic parents, it fell to her to raise her younger siblings. Her drive to succeed derives from her drive to survive. She has done both. "I went from welfare to college, the first in our family to graduate from college," she said. "I'm a success story. I consider myself an American hero, an everyday kind of hero." Her mother is dead, but recently she visited her father, brain damaged and destroyed by drink, in a Portland, Ore., homeless shelter. There is not much she can do for him. But she can do something for others. And she'll defend that right to the death. (source: Albuquerque Tribune) ILLINOIS: Sister hits bid for death penalty The sister of Eric Hanson said Monday that she objects to DuPage State's Atty. Joseph Birkett's plan to seek the death penalty for her brother in the slayings of their parents, sister and brother-in-law last year. "My mom and dad would never want that," Jennifer Williams said in a tearful phone interview. "They wouldn't want to see their son die. I am their voice." On Friday, DuPage prosecutor Robert Berlin told Judge Robert Anderson that prosecutors would seek capital punishment for Hanson, 29, of Naperville. He is Williams' sole surviving sibling. Hanson is charged with shooting his parents, Terrance and Mary Hanson, and fatally beating his sister, Katherine Hanson-Tsao, and her husband, Jimmy Tsao, in September after his sister found out he had stolen money from their parents. The bodies were found in the Tsaos' Aurora home, although prosecutors believe the Hansons were killed in Naperville. When Berlin was asked outside the courtroom Friday if the victims' families had been consulted, he would only say that they were "onboard." But Williams said Monday she is opposed to prosecutors seeking the death penalty and she does not believe she was given an adequate opportunity to share her views. "I was told on Friday morning, just before court, by Berlin that the decision had been made. If anyone says we knew or approved, that's not true," she said. Birkett said he doesn't comment publicly on private conversations with family members. "This was a heinous, gruesome crime, worthy of consideration as a capital offense," Birkett said Monday, saying he would not change his mind. "Initially I believe we have to treat this as a heinous capital case," he said. "This isn't something that my office could ask for at a later date." Illinois Supreme Court rules state that prosecutors must declare early in legal proceedings whether they intend to seek the death penalty, although they later could opt not to ask for it. It is not uncommon for prosecutors to state their intention to go for the death penalty to have leverage in plea bargain negotiations. Birkett said that before deciding to pursue it, prosecutors talked to relatives, including members of the Tsao family. "We consider what a family member has to say, but it isn't the only factor in making such an important decision," Birkett said. "I understand her [Williams'] feelings, and they will be taken into account. It is an important factor, but one of many factors." Williams said her brother has written her several letters from jail, "but I haven't responded. He wants to know why I don't believe him, that he didn't do this. "I believe he is guilty, but I don't believe he should be put to death," Williams said. "He is my brother. Maybe if I didn't know him I would feel differently, but that is how I feel. We are blood." When Hanson was arrested on a Wisconsin highway several days after the deaths, he reportedly was on his way to Minnesota to see his sister. Police believe her life might have been in danger at that point. Williams sat in the front row for Friday's 10-minute court session, as she has in her brother's previous appearances. Her brother never looked at her. "I believe he remains very angry at me. He blames me for calling police," Williams said. Hanson, who has pleaded not guilty, is being held without bail in the DuPage County Jail. (source: Chicago Tribune) ************* Sister of man accused in family's slayings protests death penalty The sister of a man accused of killing their parents, sister and brother-in-law said Monday she objects to DuPage County prosecutors' decision to seek the death penalty if her brother is convicted of murder. DuPage County Assistant State's Attorney Bob Berlin said Eric Hanson's family was "on board" with the decision when he filed the death-penalty motion Friday. Hanson, 28, is charged with 1st-degree murder, aggravated kidnapping, home invasion, theft and mail fraud. "My mom and dad would never want that," Hanson's sister, Jennifer Williams, told the Chicago Tribune for a story on its Web site Monday. "They wouldn't want to see their son die. I am their voice." Hanson pleaded not guilty in December and has denied involvement in the deaths of his sister, Katherine Hanson-Tsao, 31, and her husband, Jimmy Tsao, 34, of Aurora; and his parents, Terrance Hanson, 57, and Mary Lynn Hanson, 55, of Naperville. The 4 were found dead in the Tsaos' home last September. Authorities believe the Hansons were killed in their nearby home and then taken to Aurora. Williams, who lives in Minnesota, said did not believe she was given an adequate opportunity to share her opposition to prosecutors' decision to seek the death penalty. "I was told on Friday morning, just before court, by Berlin that the decision had been made. If anyone says we knew or approved, that's not true," she said. DuPage County State's Attorney Joseph Birkett said prosecutors talked to relatives, including members of the Tsao family. "We consider what a family member has to say, but it isn't the only factor in making such an important decision," Birkett said. "I understand (Williams') feelings, and they will be taken into account. It is an important factor, but one of many factors." Hanson is being held without bail in the DuPage County Jail. (source: Associated Press)
