[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

April 21


ENGLAND:

Bad trip that shocked the world


On August 9, 1969, hippy followers of Charles Manson brutally murdered 5
people in a Bel Air house on Cielo Drive, including the director Roman
Polanski's pregnant wife Sharon Tate.

The following night, a wealthy couple - the LaBiancas - were also stabbed
and shot in LA. The crime scenes were daubed with bloody slogans Pig, War,
Rise and Helter Skelter.

Just as 35-year-old Manson intended when he ordered his "family" to carry
out the murders - the crimes repulsed and shocked the world, heralding the
bloody end to a decade of counter-cultural revolution.

In America, the new decade was dominated by the 7-month media circus of
Manson's trial, and growing opposition to the Vietnam War.

Although all defendants were given death sentences, they were later
commuted to life in prison when capital punishment was abolished in
California.

The killings carry mythic status in the States as a metaphor for evil, and
the iconography of the wild-eyed Manson and his shaven-headed devotees is
burned into the public consciousness.

Denver-based theatre company LIDA has boldly tried to deconstruct the
myths in a devised show based on the lives of Manson's young family of
followers.

Using interviews and trial transcripts, the experimental theatre group
combines puppetry, cartoon, projections, historic film footage, and
creative live staging to imaginatively portray the murders and their
aftermath.

LIDA artistic director Brian Freeland was interested in the phenomenon of
media-saturated public trials and the creation of America's 1st "pop
culture media villain".

"Even nearly 40 years later, Manson is still quite a taboo subject. It's
like a car crash, people still want to stare and point at," he says.

"For us the story was a vehicle to talk about the media made monster and
origin of turning on the TV at night to watch court trials or celebrity
reports.

"The Manson trial was one of the most widely broadcast and publicised
trials of all time.

"For the first time, broadcast journalists nightly fed you information and
the followers of Manson knew that. They whipped the media up into a
frenzy, giving them soundbites and visuals.

"It's interesting to look back at the birth of our culture of
sensationalised nightly news and fear."

When it was performed in Denver some of the audience were disappointed
because they wanted more "murder and mayhem".

While others lambasted the local newspaper objecting that an article about
the show had given Manson the further oxygen of publicity.

"It is not a historic piece but a meditative piece," insists Freeland, who
also admits to exploiting "eerie echoes" between the Nixon era and
unpopular Vietnam war and the Bush presidency and Iraq war of 2003 when
the show opened.

Freeland's own "armchair psychology" after researching the murders is that
Manson was a charismatic figure, who manipulated naive and often
vulnerable followers with an average age of 18 or 19.

"We need to demystify this, he was really not anything special but he
could make people do things they wouldn't normally do. He used an
incredible amount of drugs which predisposed people to cross the line,
told them what they want to hear and used the group dynamic."

Although Manson has always denied ordering the killings, in court his
motive was reputedly to spark a race war in which the blacks would
liquidate the white race.

"He did want notoriety," says Freeland. "He was in the middle of trying to
become a recording artist - he was a media hungry guy. For him it really
didn't matter whether he was a mass murderer or a rock and roll star, the
attention was still the same."

The show fast-forwards to The Family's parole hearings to juxtapose what
they said at the time of the trial with their feelings now.

"Have they changed or not?" asks Freeland. "It's eerie to listen to
someone at the time of the murders saying 'It was like an orgasm. I
couldn't get enough of it,' and 30 years later say 'I am sorry for the
victims, I have found Jesus', it's like night and day."

Freeland and fellow college graduates formed the "multimedia art
collective" 10 years ago amid frustration at the scarcity of experimental
theatre in the States.

Aiming to challenge the structure of performance while strengthening
community and culture, they have created several imaginative adaptations
including Woyzeck, The Scarlet Letter, Caryl Churchill's The Skriker and
Orwell's 1984.

"Looking at career choices in American theatre after college, there wasn't
a lot of progressive new radicalised work.

"We realised that in the spirit of punk rock radicalism, we would have to
DIY and create if for ourselves."

"Modern theatre is becoming less and less of a place where the voice of
the community can be heard and more and more about ticket prices - with
people not even attempting to create work unless it is a "hit".

Manson/Family Values runs at the Camden People's Theatre in Hampstead
Road, Euston from April 18 until May 8.

(source: Ham&High (UK))






IRAQ:

Death sentence for man convicted of 2003 Iraq UN attack


A man believed to have ties to the al-Qaeda network has been sentenced to
death by an Iraqi state court for his role in the 2003 bombing of the
United Nations headquarters in Baghdad, it was announced Friday.

The man, from the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, is set to appeal the
decision, the head of the UN human rights mission in Iraq Gianni Magazzeni
said in Geneva.

22 people, among them the former UN high commissioner for human rights and
head of the Iraq mission Sergio Vieira de Mello, were killed in the August
19, 2003 blast.

The convicted man had links to Jordanian-born terrorist Abu Musab
al-Zarqawi, the head of al-Qaeda in Iraq, Magazzeni said.

(source: Deutsche Presse-Agentur)