[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----N.C., ILL. WIS., FLA.

[Rick Halperin]

April 19


NORTH CAROLINA----impending execution

Lawyers ask 2 courts to halt Brown execution


Lawyers for a man convicted of a 1983 slaying have asked a federal appeals
court and the U.S. Supreme Court to stop his execution scheduled for this
week, citing different reasons in each court.

In a filing with the 4th U.S. Circuit of Appeals in Richmond, Va., lawyers
for Willie Brown Jr. argued that there's a chance he could be awake and
suffer pain during his execution. The appeal filed with the nation's
highest court argued that Brown was poorly represented by his trial lawyer
and that the judge gave the jury erroneous instructions.

Both appeals were filed Monday. Earlier that day, U.S. District Judge
Malcolm Howard declined to issue a stay for Brown, saying the state had
taken sufficient precautions to ensure that Brown would remain asleep
during his execution. Howard had said in an earlier order that he would
stop the execution without that assurance.

In the appeal before the 4th Circuit, defense lawyers contend that the
state's plan to require that a doctor and a nurse observe a monitor from
an adjacent room is insufficient. The defense also questions the medical
team's credentials.

(source: Associated Press)






ILLINOIS:

Death penalty foes lament lost legacy


A longtime friend and associate of former Gov. George Ryan is lamenting
the taint this week's corruption conviction is placing on Ryan's record.

And an opponent of the death penalty who worked with Ryan on that issue
thinks the former governor was sincere in his concern about the capital
justice system and that history will focus on his steps toward abolition
of capital punishment.

The views of Tony Leone and Rob Warden offer a look at another side of
Ryan from the man a federal jury found guilty Monday of mail fraud and
racketeering conspiracy, including steering government contracts to
friends.

Leone, of Springfield, has known Ryan for three decades and first met him
when Ryan, as Republican leader in the Illinois House, appointed Leone to
the state's election laws commission. Ryan later hired him, and Leone
served as clerk of the House when Ryan was House speaker.

"It's really tragic that a conviction will probably overshadow what any
non-biased observer would believe was Ryan's long governmental record of
accomplishment," Leone, a businessman who also does some lobbying, said
Tuesday.

"I feel sorry for his family, especially his devoted wife, Lura Lynn, who
has been his partner in life dating back to high school. Whether you agree
or not with all of his stands, no one can deny he was a very effective
leader. He is a victim today of trusting some staff and friends who took
advantage of the access for their own personal benefit."

Leone noted that it is a year since the dedication of the Abraham Lincoln
Presidential Museum and that Ryan was a strong advocate of the museum and
the adjoining library.

"All of us in Springfield should recognize (that) without George and Lura
Lynn's enthusiastic support, we would not have (an) Abraham Lincoln
Presidential Library and Museum as it exists today," Leone said.

"I am disappointed, as I am sure George is, with some past friends and
staff that have turned their back on him. I'm not one of them. But for
now, shame on those who see this tragedy with hatred in their hearts."

Leone noted that when he emceed the unveiling of Ryan's portrait at the
Statehouse in November 2003 - at a time when Ryan had yet to be charged
with a crime but people close to him had been convicted - there was an
outpouring of bipartisan praise for Ryan. Former Republican Gov. James
Thompson, GOP state Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka, Democratic Secretary of
State Jesse White and the Democrats who lead the legislature, Senate
President Emil Jones Jr. and House Speaker Michael Madigan, were among
speakers.

Warden, executive director of the Center on Wrongful Convictions at
Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago, said that while he
attended a couple of days of Ryan's trial, he really knows Ryan only in
the context of his actions involving the death penalty. Ryan issued a
moratorium on executions in 2000 after 13 Illinois death row inmates had
been exonerated since 1977, the year when legislators - including Ryan -
voted to reinstate the ultimate punishment in Illinois.

Ryan also used his clemency powers to empty death row just before leaving
office in 2003.

"I know a lot of people have said that he did this only in some sort of a
cynical effort to distract attention from his problems, but I am
absolutely certain that that was not the case," Warden said.

"Here was a man who was genuinely moved and troubled," he said, with the
release of Anthony Porter, a death row inmate who came within 48 hours of
being executed and whose innocence was proved with the help of college
students from Northwestern.

Warden noted that Ryan, after leaving office, became an "out-and-out
abolitionist," seeking an end to the death penalty.

Warden, who also opposes the death penalty, said Ryan's corruption
conviction "pretty obviously tarnishes his legacy."

"I do believe that he will be remembered for the stance that he took on
the death penalty, which in my view is the most courageous thing that an
Illinois governor had done since ... John Peter Altgeld pardoned the
surviving Haymarket defendants," Warden said.

Altgeld, who was governor from 1893 to1897, pardoned 3 remaining
defendants of the 1886 pro-labor Haymarket riot in Chicago, on grounds of
unfair convictions.

"Altgeld's action, like Ryan's, was very unpopular," Warden said. "Yet
Altgeld is lionized today for ... taking a principled stand against
overwhelming public opinion."

Warden also noted that Ulysses S. Grant is remembered as the general who
won the Civil War, not as a president with a drinking problem and "rampant
corruption" in his administration.

"When you're on the right side of history, positive accomplishments are
chiseled into stone, and anything that may have been done to distract from
that is written in water. Not that it's totally forgotten; it's there, but
it doesn't loom as large," Warden said.

Warden believes Ryan will "be seen as somebody who was in the vanguard of
the death penalty abolition movement, which I think our posterity will
applaud similarly as the way we applaud our ancestors who were active in
the slavery abolition movement."

(source: Springfield State Journal Register)






WISCONSIN:

Death penalty is an injustice


The murder of Teresa Halbach has me thinking. I'm disgusted and reviled by
the incomprehensible acts committed against her. How could one human being
do that to another? Is a person born evil (nature) or does one learn evil
(nurture)?

The answers won't bring Teresa back. We're left with the fact that evil
acts were committed, so what should we do?

Some in Wisconsin would like to see the death penalty reinstated. There's
a push for a special referendum by September.

This idea also disgusts me. I don't believe in the death penalty. One life
for another is not the answer. We lower ourselves to the standard of the
murderer when we seek death.

Capital punishment is not penalty enough, especially in the case of
premeditated murder. Keep the killer alive. Let him spend the rest of his
life caged and denied the freedoms civil human beings deserve.

Spend time, money and energy at the legislative level making sure a life
sentence means life with no possibility of parole. Society could breathe
easier knowing a murderer would remain behind bars forever. A lifetime in
prison seems much more punishment than an injection of a lethal cocktail.

I've asked if I could kill someone. My answer is "no." Yet a death-penalty
mentality asks a fellow human being to do it for me.

Ask yourself if you could kill. Just because a person works in a prison,
he or she should not be subjected to performing an evil against another
human being, even if that human being has committed a terrible crime.

We're eroding the moral character of our country if we hide behind "the
state" and force our citizens to kill each other in the name of justice.

Often, capital punishment is proposed as a deterrent to crime. Research
shows that the homicide rate in states with the death penalty is almost
double the rate in states without the death penalty.

It's clear to me that showing people what can happen to them if they
commit murder doesn't stop them from killing.

>From the standpoint of economics, much has been written about the cost of
the death penalty. Historically, those convicted and sentenced to die
aren't killed immediately. Many inmates live decades on death row and tax
dollars are spent on multiple appeals.

An article published in the Nov. 21, 2005 issue of Newsday states: "New
Jersey taxpayers over the last 23 years have paid more than a
quarter-billion dollars on a capital punishment system that has executed
no one. Since 1982, there have been 197 capital trials in New Jersey and
60 death sentences, of which 50 were reversed. There have been no
executions, and 10 men are housed on the state's death row.

"Michael Murphy, former Morris County prosecutor, remarked: 'If you were
to ask me how $11 million a year could best protect the people of New
Jersey, I would tell you by giving the law enforcement community more
resources. I want the tools for law enforcement to do their job, and $11
million can buy a lot of tools.'"

Any discussion about capital punishment must include the argument that
innocent people may get killed. Men and women, wrongly convicted, sit in
our prisons all across this land.

A study conducted by the United States Department of Justice and the U.S.
Senate, along with the Columbia Law School, estimated a 5 % failure rate
in the U.S. justice system. This 5 % translates into about 100,000 falsely
convicted prisoners.

Our system is what it is and until changes are made, the thought of
killing even one innocent person is enough to fight against capital
punishment.

Patrick Sonnier was executed in Louisiana on April 5, 1984. In an article
titled, "Would Jesus Pull the Switch?" Sister Helen Prejean, author of
"Dead Man Walking" who accompanied Patrick to his electrocution, states,
"I am not saying that Patrick Sonnier was a hero. I do not want to glorify
him. He did the most terrible crime of all. He killed. But he was a human
being, and he had a transcendence, a dignity. He - like each of us - was
more than the worst thing he had done in his life. In his last words he
expressed his sorrow to the victims' family. But then he said to the
warden and to the unseen executioner behind the plywood panel, 'but
killing me is wrong, too.'"

(source: Column, Mary Pribbenow, Appleton Post Crescent)






FLORIDA:

Defense asks to move trial of man accused of killing Lunsford


Defense attorneys for the convicted sex offender accused of raping and
killing 9-year-old Jessica Lunsford have asked to move the trial elsewhere
because of the publicity the case has drawn.

The motion on behalf of John Evander Couey, 47, was filed Monday and could
be heard Friday at a status hearing before Circuit Judge Ric Howard.

"The pretrial publicity in this case has been and is so extensive that the
community in Citrus County has been exposed ... so pervasively that
prejudice, bias and preconceived opinions are the natural result," defense
attorney Dan Lewan wrote in the motion.

Couey is accused of kidnapping, raping and killing the Homosassa girl,
whose body was found last March behind a home the suspect shared with his
sister. Couey has pleaded not guilty to charges of premeditated murder,
burglary, kidnapping and sexual battery. The state is seeking the death
penalty.

Prosecutors say they will concede it's necessary to move the trial.

"I would be hard-pressed to find members of the (community) who haven't
been impacted by her death and will be able to be a legally fair and
impartial juror," Assistant State Attorney Pete Magrino said.

Outrage over the crime prompted the Legislature to pass a bill
establishing a mandatory sentence of 25 years to life behind bars for
people convicted of certain sex crimes against children 11 and younger,
with lifetime tracking by global positioning satellite after they are
freed.

(source: Associated Press)