[Deathpenalty] death penalty news-----MD., N.J., ARIZ., ARK., USA

[Rick Halperin]

Mar. 2



MARYLAND:

Maryland governor speaks out against death penalty


WHILE SENS. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama were engaged in the first
official hissy fit (the technical term) of the 2008 presidential campaign,
another Democrat was actually engaged in a matter of important public
policy.

In this case, the stakes were not money, but life and death.

Martin O'Malley, the youthful new governor of Maryland, made an emotional
plea to a state Senate committee to repeal the death penalty.

That is one long march from the scene at a 1988 presidential debate when
Michael Dukakis was pilloried for giving a lawyerly answer to a
hypothetical question about whether he would impose the death penalty on a
man who had raped and murdered his wife. Dukakis' dispassionate rejection
of capital punishment became a ready emblem for the Republican narrative
that Democrats were soft on crime.

>From that point on, most Democrats with higher ambitions rushed to be seen
as state-sanctioned Grim Reapers. None did it with as much flourish as
then-Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton, who jetted back to his state just before
the New Hampshire primary to preside over the execution of Ricky Ray
Rector, a brain-damaged man who told prison officials he wanted to save
the dessert from his last meal until after his execution.

Few Democrats since have been willing to take forceful public action that
would make it appear as if they were not tough on criminals. In fact, it
was not until a Republican, then-Illinois Gov. George Ryan, imposed a
moratorium on the death penalty that any movement to repeal capital
punishment statutes gained significant traction. In fact, O'Malley cited
during his testimony the 18 death row inmates who have been released in
Illinois after their innocence was proved.

O'Malley has been on the short list of rising Democratic stars for several
years. Telegenic, smart and the leader of his own Irish band, O'Malley's
March, he was mayor of Baltimore before being elected governor in
November. Before that, he had been chosen to speak at the Democratic
National Convention in 2004 -- and, fortunately for him, in a very
forgettable time slot, given a delivery that dripped with emotion far more
than sincerity.

His push to repeal the death penalty is perhaps his highest-profile move
since taking office, and it is one that carries abundant political risk,
particularly because he is seen as a politician with national ambitions.

But on this issue, O'Malley is resolutely righteous, making a moral and
theological argument as much as a political or legal one to support his
thesis that the death penalty is neither a "just punishment" nor an
"effective deterrent" to murder.

"Notwithstanding the executions of the rightly convicted, can the death
penalty ever be justified, then, as public policy when it inherently
necessitates the occasional taking of a wrongly convicted and innocent
life?" he said. "Is any one of us willing to sacrifice a member of our own
family -- wrongly convicted, sentenced and executed -- in order to secure
the execution of five rightly convicted murderers? And even if we were,
could that public policy be called 'just'? I believe it cannot."

He was just getting wound up.

"Individual human dignity is the concept that leads brave individuals to
sacrifice their own lives for the lives of strangers," O'Malley said.
"Individual human dignity is the truth universal that is the basis of all
ethics. Individual human dignity is the fundamental belief upon which all
laws of this state and this republic are founded. And absent a deterrent
value, I truly believe that the damage done by our conscious communal use
of the death penalty to the concept of human dignity is greater than the
benefit of even a justly drawn retribution."

It was a gutsy approach, even in a heavily Democratic state. And O'Malley
will find out if his risk is rewarded. Maybe David Geffen would bankroll
the movie.

(source: Commentary, Michael Tackett, Contra Costa Times)






NEW JERSEY:

Death-penalty study unbalancedProponents had little chance to testify.


My father, a 70-year-old retired Navy officer, and my mother, a retired
postal worker aged 65, were savagely murdered 6 years ago during an
invasion-robbery of their Pleasantville home. Our family still grieves
their inhumane deaths.

Their killer was sentenced to death three years ago. Given the
circumstances, it was a just penalty.

But now the New Jersey Death Penalty Study Commission has recommended that
the death penalty be replaced with life without parole.

The governor and many in the Legislature favor the recommendation.

In my opinion, the study was flawed because of the makeup of the
commission. The outcome was anticipated by legislators. The governor and
legislators should not accept its recommendation without input from
voters.

Most of the commission's 13 appointees - except possibly one - apparently
were against the death penalty for various reasons from the start, were
frustrated (like most of us) and surrendered their position, or simply
succumbed to the rhetoric that the death penalty "is not working, so let's
get rid of it."

My family and I have followed New Jersey's death-penalty controversy since
our parents' murders and attended the commission's public hearings. As a
victim survivor, I testified before the panel.

We found that publicly fighting for justice on the side of the death
penalty is a difficult, unpleasant, exhausting and lonely fight. We were
strikingly in the minority at hearings. Those against the death penalty,
speakers and supporters, packed the room.

Some of them represented, were invited by, or were transported to the
hearings by anti-death-penalty organizations with apparently strong
membership and financial backing.

Many who testified were from outside New Jersey and referred to other
states' death-penalty issues and statutes. The few pro-death penalty
people were not permitted to speak at the final hearing.

No member of the commission adamantly advocated the death penalty.

What about the concern that innocent people sometimes end up on death row?

The commission found that out of 228 capital murder trials since 1982,
juries returned unanimous death sentences in 60 cases, the court
overturned 57 of them, and today only 9 inmates are on death row. (One got
off death row just as the commission began its proceedings.)

But not one person in New Jersey has claimed or has been released because
of innocence.

The judicial system forces victims' survivors, such as my family, to
endure repeated trials and appeals only to see sentences overturned by the
state Supreme Court. Often the murderer eventually is even released.

Before Brian P. Wakefield, the killer of my parents, was sentenced to
death, there were 13 people on death row. Now there are 9.

The commission should have studied and reported on what is really wrong
with the administration of the death penalty in New Jersey.

How can nearly every death sentence, since the restoration of the penalty,
be commuted, overturned or repealed? What is really driving the costs of
implementing the death penalty? What can and should be done about the
penalty for the sake of justice for victims, survivors, the state and the
law?

The moratorium on executions, ordered during the course of the
commission's work, wasn't necessary because no one was being executed. But
now that it is in place, it should be kept until the real issues are
acknowledged and studied.

There needs to be another, more comprehensive study and input from voters
before the legislators and governor vote on the penalty.

Polls in and out of New Jersey continue to affirm that the majority of
people are for the death penalty for some murderers and terrorists.

For an overview of the New Jersey Death Penalty Study Commission's report,
visit http://go.philly.com/penaltystudy.

Kent Scheidegger of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, testifying in
favor of the death penalty, said that some of the more than 11,000 people
who were murdered in New Jersey between 1977 and 2004 might be alive today
if the state had an effective death penalty - one that wasn't continually
blocked by the state's high court.

(source: Philadelphia Inquirer; Sharon Hazard-Johnson works in the
health-insurance industry and writes from South Jersey)






ARIZONA:

Death-penalty hearing in limbo


When Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas and other officials debate the
region's record number of death-penalty cases today, it's unclear whether
the public will be allowed to watch.

On Wednesday, Thomas and other officials asked Superior Court Judge James
Keppel to switch today's scheduled court hearing, which would have been
open to the public, to a closed-door conference. Keppel granted the
request.

Over the past few days, the players in the legal battle over how to handle
the high volume of cases have made progress during private talks, said
Thomas' attorney, Dennis Wilenchik. A hearing with the media present would
erode that progress, he argued.

"It would be more productive to work in that fashion," Wilenchik told the
judge. "We will get into tangents, sideshows and circuses" in a public
hearing, he said.

Before the change, Keppel planned to hold a rare court hearing that probed
the shortage of death-penalty defense attorneys. Thomas and other
high-ranking county officials were ordered to testify.

This morning, Arizona Republic attorneys will ask Keppel to keep the
county officials' gathering open to the public.

Thomas and the 4 county groups that provide attorneys for the poor are
locked on a legal battle over death cases. The dispute could have a major
impact on taxpayers.

Maricopa County is struggling to deal with more than 135 death-penalty
cases that are in trial or headed toward trial.

There are so many cases that there aren't enough specially trained defense
attorneys to lead them, attorney groups have argued.

Some inmates' lawyers have asked Keppel to delay cases until qualified
attorneys can be found.

Thomas has argued that defense attorneys are lazy. His office has asked
Keppel to order public defenders to take more capital cases.

Maricopa County, which has 3.6 million residents, has far more pending
death-penalty cases that many other communities in the country. Los
Angeles County, which has nearly 10 million residents, has fewer than 40
death-penalty cases.

The record number of death-penalty cases could have a ripple effect on the
justice system.

Just providing the legally required defense for one capital trial can cost
the county up to $250,000, according to one estimate. Most murder suspects
can't afford to pay attorneys, and taxpayers must foot the bill. Also, the
Arizona Supreme Court, which currently handles roughly a dozen death cases
annually, is not equipped to process the incoming wave of automatic
appeals, an Arizona Supreme Court justice has said.

At the Wednesday hearing, Thomas Irvine, the county manager's lawyer,
suggested that the county may consider financial incentives to entice
expert lawyers to take on the complex, time-consuming cases.

"We have found that there are lots of things that can be done," he said.

(source: Arizona Republic)

**************************

Hearing on Death Penalty Backlog Canceled


A judge today canceled a scheduled court proceeding on legal
representation of death penalty defendants in Maricopa County after the
news media tried to gain access.

Judge James Keppel agreed to a request by one of the public defender
agencies involved to cancel a scheduled settlement conference to avoid the
possibility of protracted court battles over the access issue.

Instead the Maricopa County Attorney's Office and the public defender
offices will meet privately and outside of court before reporting back to
Keppel next week on whether they have a settlement. At issue is a
136-defendant backlog of death penalty cases pending in Maricopa County
Superior Court.

Defense attorneys say the number of death sentences sought by County
Attorney Andrew Thomas outstrips the number of qualified defense attorneys
and other defense personnel.

Thomas says defense lawyers stall and don't work hard enough.

(source: Associated Press)






ARKANSAS:

Arkansas denies man's execution request


In Little Rock, the Arkansas Supreme Court ruled Thursday that it was
premature for a death row inmate to seek his immediate execution and noted
that the man's federal lawsuit challenging the way Arkansas executes
prisoners is still pending.

Over the past three months, Terrick Nooner, 35, has attempted to exit the
federal lawsuit and has asked the state Supreme Court to order his
execution.

"The petition is unclear," but seems to complain about Arkansas' attorney
general's office and asks that petitions filed by Nooner's federal public
defender be ignored, the state Supreme Court said Thursday.

In a motion challenging Nooner's attempt to drop his lawsuit challenging
Arkansas' execution methods, federal public defender Julie Brain wrote
Jan. 3 that Nooner suffers from severe mental illness and believes
Arkansas prison officials are abusing him.

"His overriding goal is to seek redress for, and relief from, the physical
harm that he perceives is being repeatedly inflicted on him," Brain wrote.

She said Nooner claims that the prison has implanted a device in his body
by which it controls him, and that the prison staff is contaminating his
food.

Brain also said that Nooner has a delusional belief that seeking his own
execution would somehow result in a "hidden" lawsuit that would exonerate
him.

U.S. District Judge Susan Webber Wright hasn't ruled on Nooner's attempt
to drop his lawsuit.

Nooner was convicted and sentenced to death for the March 1993 robbery and
murder of Scot Stobaugh, 22, at a Little Rock laundromat. Stobaugh was a
student at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.

(source: Associated Press)





USA:

New study on capital punishment


A death penalty study commissioned by the U. S. Justice Department fails
to support charges the capital punishment system is hopelessly broken.

Instead, a draft copy of the report challenges an earlier inquiry that
concluded more than two-thirds of all death penalty cases end up being
overturned on appeal, USA Today reports.

The study by 2 professors at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New
York tracked 1,676 death sentences in 14 representative states from 1992
through 2002.

Authors Barry Latzer and James Cauthen found only 11 % of cases overturned
during the first level of the appeals process had problems with their
underlying murder convictions.

The most common reason for reversal had to do with sentencing errors.

Of the states studied, Virginia settled death penalty appeals the fastest
while Ohio, Tennessee and Kentucky took the longest.

For every prisoner executed, the study says states pay an average of
$274,000 in housing costs.

(source: UPI)

******************

Former death-row inmate wants to abolish penalty


Juan Melendez lists a number of reasons why people should support
abolishing the death penalty.

But the best reason is one he has experienced. He knows that an innocent
person is at risk of being killed by any state that has the death penalty
because he is one of those people, he told an audience at St. Louis
University last week.

Anti-death penalty arguments offered

As Juan Melendez fights for the abolition of the death penalty, he focuses
on injustices he saw in his own case.

Included is the risk of the death penalty being imposed on innocent
people, the almost exclusive application to the poor and its
disproportionate application on the basis of race and ethnicity.

A summary of the arguments includes:

Innocent people have been convicted and sentenced to death.

The death penalty is applied unfairly and arbitrarily.

Scientific research indicates capital punishment is not a deterrent to
homicide or other violent crimes. States without the death penalty have
lower homicide rates.

The death penalty is more expensive than life imprisonment.

Many family members of murder victims dont want the death penalty and
actively oppose it.

The United States is the only Western country that still imposes it.

The vast majority of religions and mainline faith groups oppose the death
penalty, including many leaders of the Catholic Church.  Alternatives to
the death penalty exist.

Melendezs Voices United for Justice Project urges people to visit
www.deathpenaltyinfo.org. The native of Puerto Rico spent 17 years on
death row in Florida after being convicted of the first-degree murder and
armed robbery of Delbert Baker, a beauty-shop owner.

In 2001, Judge Barbara Fleischer overturned the conviction. She noted
there was no physical evidence which connected Melendez to the murder and
that additional information attacked the credibility of the states key
witnesses testimony.

Evidence that was not presented at the trial showed that three witnesses
provided an alibi. Another man had been seen at the home of the murder
victim on the night of the homicide, had been wearing bloody clothes and
admitted to other witnesses that he had killed Baker.

"The evidence also helps to substantiate the defense theory that someone
other than the defendant committed the homicide," the judge wrote.

The St. Petersburg Times reported that prosecutors withheld evidence from
defense lawyers. A tape that emerged contained the confession of the real
killer, now deceased, who said Melendez was not present.

"Check the record. Its all in black and white," Melendez said of those who
might doubt his innocence.

Surviving 17 years on death row, knowing he did not commit the crime,
tested Melendez, a Catholic. "Without God I never would have made it. I
wanted to commit suicide. But God sent me beautiful dreams. That gave me
hope that one day I would be out of there, that I would be free."

Melendez was interviewed by the Review while in St. Louis Feb. 22 for a
talk at SLU about his experiences. When he was released from prison Jan.
3, 2002, he became the 99th death-row inmate in the United States to be
released since 1973.

Now, 123 people have been let off death row. Another 1,062 have been
executed since the death penalty was reinstated, he said. "Only God knows
the (innocent) ones who did not have the luck I had," Melendez noted.

Catholic News Service recently carried the story of Kirk Bloodsworth,
convicted of a brutal 1984 rape and murder of a 9-year-old near Baltimore.
Sentenced to die in the gas chamber, Bloodsworth was the first person to
be exonerated by DNA testing. In 2003, another man was identified as the
killer. He pled guilty and is serving a life sentence.

On death row, Melendez said, "I was like a little kid who is learning to
walk. Id walk, fall down and get up again. Every time I had an appeal and
it was denied, I took a step down. Sometimes I lost hope but I was able to
pick it up again."

He is thankful for his appeals attorneys who believed in his innocence and
that the case eventually came before a judge who took the time to study it
carefully. Her 72-page opinion chastised the prosecutor, law-enforcement
officers and the defense lawyer, he said.

As an indigent man who at the time did not speak English, he was at the
mercy of the court, he said.

"Most attorneys who deal with death-penalty cases are appointed by the
state. They dont have enough experience, and they have too many cases.
They dont have funds for crime investigators, while the prosecutors have
the resources. The death penalty is arbitrary, racist, costs too much and
doesnt deter crime," Melendez said.

He has travelled the country to share his story and speak about the death
penalty. He works in construction in New Mexico for a man who gives him
time off to pursue the cause. He also spends time in Puerto Rico
counseling high-risk youth.

Many people on death row accept God or change for the good, he said. "We
are not killing the same people who committed the crime because people
change and redeem themselves. I dont say let them go. They committed a
crime and have to pay for it. Put them in prison where they can counsel
those who one day will get out."

Released from prison with nothing but a pair of pants, a shirt and $100,
Melendez chose the path of forgiveness.

"You either can hate them the rest of your life and be miserable or you
can forgive them and go on with your life. When you forgive them, youre
helping yourself."

Similarly, he said, the death penalty does not provide healing. Only after
forgiving, he said, can someone start to heal.

He said he appreciates the Catholic Churchs teachings against the death
penalty, and he pointed to statements from Pope John Paul II. "We
eventually will win. I just hope it will be in my lifetime. We have won
some battles. They no longer can kill young ones and the mentally
retarded. Its all about education."

(source: The St. Louis Review)

******************

Death penalty's barbarism plagues U.S.


ngel Nieves Daz was supposed to die a "painless" death. Sentenced to die
for a crime he swore he didn't commit (so insistent was he upon his
innocence that Daz refused to accept a guilty plea, which would have
resulted in life in prison), Daz faced Florida's lethal injection chamber.
Touted by its boosters as the most humane way to go about the ugly
business of capital punishment, execution by lethal injection proved
itself to be anything but in ngel Nieves Daz's case. Indeed, it showed
just how ugly our criminal "justice" system can get.

Daz lived for 34 long minutes after the lethal chemical cocktail entered
his veins. His cousin later described how Daz was "shaking suffering, he
was suffering a lot." His body was left with foot-long chemical burns on
his arms from this humane form of execution. Lethal injection victims are
supposed to be unconscious when the drugs are administered, and are
supposed to die 10-15 minutes after injection. Daz enjoyed neither of
these luxuries.>{? As disturbing as Daz's death is on its own, the
possibility that the state of Florida may have executed an innocent man is
even more so. Sadly, it is not an isolated case. All over the country,
executions like Dazs are prompting millions of Americans to question the
justice behind "the ultimate punishment." This can be seen in Florida Gov.
Jeb Bushs halting of the death penalty in his state after Dazs
torture/execution. The same day, in California, U.S. District Judge Jeremy
Fogel found that his states death penalty was "cruel and unusual
punishment." Maryland has recently gone on moratorium as well, opening up
its infamous justice system to public comment.

For the 1st time since the death penalty was reinstated in 1977, national
abolition seems to be on the agenda. The movement for abolition has
finally succeeded in bringing the systems worst aspects to public light.
For example, Dr. Mark Dershwitz testified that pancuronium bromide, one of
the drugs in the lethal injection cocktail, serves as a "chemical veil."
Touted as an anesthetic by executors, it actually only restricts its
victims' movement, not blocking any pain. As a result, "pancuronium will
prevent motor manifestations of physiological processes that could be
perceived by witnesses as unpleasant or suffering on the part of the
inmate," according to Dershwitz. In other words, prisoners don't remain
silent because they aren't feeling pain; they are silent because their
mouths are frozen shut to prevent them from screaming.

The barbarism of this method of execution is only the tip of the iceberg
in terms of the outrages of capital punishment. At its base you'll find,
as with most other controversial topics in America when you dig deep
enough, good old-fashioned racism. African Americans are about 12 % of the
general population, yet they make up 42 % of all prisoners on death row.
80 % of those awaiting execution are charged with killing a white person.
Of the more than 1,000 Americans executed in the last 30 years, only 12
have been charged with killing an African-American.

There is a class element to the system as well. 90 % of those on death row
were too poor to afford their own attorneys at the time of their trials.
One in 4 prisoners was represented by an attorney who was disciplined for
misconduct at some point in his or her career. As one former prisoner put
it, "those without the capital gets the punishment."

Though it looks like this horrendous system won't be coming back in
Wisconsin, abolitionists in the Badger State shouldnt rest on their
haunches. Counting on the Democrats to oppose the death penalty is simply
not a winning strategy. Bill Clinton expanded the death penalty in his
1994 Omnibus Crime Bill, and limited the time for habeas corpus appeals to
one year after convictions. Furthermore, "liberal" Democrat Dianne
Feinstein based her 1990 California gubernatorial campaign on her being
the only candidate who was "pro-choice and pro-death penalty."

The current opening for abolition wasnt gained by waiting for politicians
to do the work that needs to be done. It's been gained by activists
refusing to compromise and doing the hard work of organizing to free
innocent prisoners. The abolitionist movement today must adopt the slogan
put forward by the grandfather behind another generation of abolitionists,
William Lloyd Garrison: We are in earnest, we will not equivocate, we will
not excuse, we will not retreat a single inch, and we will be heard!

There is tenderness only in the coarsest demand: that no-one shall go
hungry any more. Adorno

(source: Opinion, Paul Heideman is a graduate student in the Department of
African-American Studies and a member of the International Socialist
Organization; The Badger Herald)

****************

Study draft decries execution appeals process


Death-sentence appeals take too long, traumatize victims' families and
burden states with millions in extra costs for housing convicted killers,
a draft of a new study commissioned by the Justice Department shows.

The study also found that death penalty cases are not hopelessly flawed by
errors, as opponents of capital punishment have charged.

The study, which reviewed state death sentences issued in the 1990s, found
that 26% were reversed during the first level of the appeals process. Most
of those "direct appeals" were rejected because of sentencing errors. Some
of the death sentences were later reinstated.

In only 11% of those cases did the appeals court find problems with the
underlying murder convictions, says the unreleased study by Barry Latzer
and James Cauthen, professors at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice
in New York.

USA TODAY obtained a draft of the study.

The study challenges a 2000 report that concluded the capital punishment
system is "broken" because 68% of all death penalty cases from 1973 to
1995 were eventually overturned. The report, by a team led by Columbia
University law professor and death penalty foe James Liebman, also found
41% of cases were reversed during direct appeals.

The Liebman study provided a false picture of the death penalty because it
included many cases from the 1970s and 1980s, when the U.S. Supreme Court
rewrote death penalty rules and caused many sentences to be reversed, the
Justice Department's report says.

Latzer and Cauthen tracked 1,676 death sentences issued in 14
"representative" states from 1992 through 2002. Among the report's other
findings:

Half of all death penalty appeals take nearly 3 years to be decided by
state appeals courts. Federal review, which follows state appeals, can
extend the process by years.

Virginia settles death penalty appeals fastest, in a median time of 295
days.

Ohio, Tennessee and Kentucky were the slowest states, each taking more
than 3 years to resolve appeals.

States pay an average total of $274,000 in housing costs for every
prisoner they execute.

Death penalty supporters say the study shows that delays are part of a
strategy to undermine a sentence that most Americans support.

"Opponents of the death penalty can't get an outright repeal anywhere, but
are working to impede the process by slowing it down to a crawl," says
John McAdams, political science professor at Marquette University in
Milwaukee.

Capital punishment foes say the lengthy appeals process may in itself be
an argument for abandoning the death penalty.

"If you like bureaucracy, you'll love the death penalty," says David
Elliot, spokesman for the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty.

The death penalty study was commissioned in 2005 by the National Institute
of Justice, the Justice Department's research arm, to find ways to speed
up the execution process.

(source: USA Today)