Oct. 31
TEXAS----impending execution
Texas to carry out 250th execution under Governor Rick Perry
The US state of Texas is set to carry out its 250th execution under the
governorship of Rick Perry.
The execution - of 41-year-old Donnie Roberts, convicted of murder in 2004 -is
scheduled for 6pm on 31 October.
In less than a dozen years, Texas has executed more than twice as many
prisoners than any other state in the USA has executed in 3 1/2 decades.
"Capital punishment is inescapably cruel and incompatible with human dignity
wherever and whenever it occurs," said Rob Freer, USA Researcher at Amnesty
International.
"Any jurisdiction that still employs the death penalty is utterly at odds with
the global abolitionist trend."
Amnesty International has repeatedly criticized the Texas authorities for
failing to lead their state away from the death penalty and has highlighted
arbitrariness, discrimination and error in the application of the punishment in
this and other states of the USA.
In his 1st "State of the State" address on 25 January 2001, a month after
becoming Governor, Rick Perry said: "Like most Texans, I am a proponent of
capital punishment because it affirms the high value we place on innocent
life."
Since then, the exercise of his power of reprieve has been vanishingly rare,
and clemency recommendations from his appointees on the state Board of Pardons
and Paroles have been few and far between.
In 2004, in the case of a prisoner suffering from serious mental illness,
Governor Perry allowed the execution to proceed despite a rare recommendation
from the Board.
"Even if one were to accept the notion that taking a prisoner from his or her
cell, strapping them down and killing them, can somehow promote respect for
life rather than erode it, the state's 'high value' label apparently attaches
only to the lives of a few murder victims," Freer pointed out.
Under a US Supreme Court precedent, the death penalty is supposedly reserved
for the "worst of the worst" crimes and offenders.
Since January 2001, there have been about 15,000 murders in Texas and 249
executions.
"If the 'worst of the worst' claim conjures images of rational, calculating,
remorseless killers going to their execution under a capital justice system
that reliably weeds out errors and inequities, this picture rapidly dissolves
when one takes a look at who ends up in the death chamber and how they got
there," said Freer.
In a report to mark the upcoming 250th execution, Amnesty International
highlights the executions in Texas this year of another man with serious mental
illness, one with a strong claim that he had "mental retardation", and another
who was 19-years-old at the time of the crime and sentenced to death by a jury
which had only a partial picture of the severe abuse, poverty and neglect he
had endured as a child.
1 in 6 of the prisoners put to death in Texas since January 2001 was aged 17,
18 or 19 at the time of the crime.
"After he took office in 2001, Governor Perry acknowledged there was room for
improvement in the Texan justice system - a dozen years and 249 executions
later, it is still doing its worst," Freer said.
"All Texans - including authorities at all levels and the electorate ??? should
recognize that the only way to eradicate the discrimination, error, unfairness
and cruelty associated with the death penalty is to abolish it."
Texas accounts for 38 % of executions carried out in the USA since the US
Supreme Court - in Gregg v. Georgia in 1976 - allowed executions to resume
under revised capital laws.
Texas has carried out 11 of the 34 executions so far this year in the USA and
is heading for its 500th since the Gregg ruling.
Amnesty International opposes the death penalty in all circumstances as being
the ultimate cruel and unusual punishment.
see: http://www.amnestyusa.org/news/news-item/
usa-texas-to-carry-out-250th-execution-under-governor-rick-perry
(source: Amnesty International)
********************
The Fatal Flaws of Texas Justice
Good News: Californians are currently debating the various dysfunctions that
plague their capital punishment system, and could in fact bring that failed
experiment to a merciful end on November 6.
Bad News: The political leadership of the state of Texas continues to
myopically ignore (or deliberately conceal) the massive flaws in their own
heavily used death penalty. And today, Halloween, the Lone Star State is set to
kill its 250th prisoner under Governor Rick Perry.
As Amnesty International's new report points out, Governor Perry, in his 1st
state of the state address in January 2001 (he's been Governor since December
2000), touted Texas executions, somewhat perversely, for "affirm[ing] the high
value we place on innocent life." But he then did at least say that the state's
justice system "can be better."
Now, 249 executions later, it's hard to believe he meant that.
Texas executed Cameron Todd Willingham after ignoring key evidence that may
have proved his innocence.
In 2004, when presented with the case of Cameron Todd Willingham and the flawed
arson investigation that convicted him, Governor Perry allowed the execution to
proceed anyway, and in 2011 actively attempted to quash a re-investigation into
the case. Needless to say, the value placed on Willingham's almost certainly
innocent life was not high, and the lack of interest in making Texas justice
better is self-evident.
As early as his 1st year as Governor, Rick Perry was already showing his true
colors, when he vetoed a bill that would have ended the execution of persons
with "mental retardation." This act allowed Texas to affirm the value of life
by continuing to kill prisoners with IQs under 70. The next year the U.S.
Supreme Court outlawed the practice nationally as cruel and unusual punishment,
though Texas has found ways to circumvent that ruling.
From 2001-2002 Governor Perry oversaw the execution of 4 of the last 5 juvenile
offenders killed in the U.S., before the Supreme Court banned that practice in
2005. He and his state continue to kill teenage offenders however (1 out of 6
of the 249 people executed under Perry so far have been 17, 18 or 19 at the
time of the crime).
In 2004, Governor Perry willfully ignored a rare recommendation of clemency
from the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles in the case of Kelsey Patterson.
Patterson was a paranoid schizophrenic who, according to a federal judge,
believed "outside forces control him through implants in his brain and body."
Earlier this month, Perry allowed the execution of Jonathan Green, another
severely mentally ill man who, according to another federal judge, "stuffed
toilet paper in his ears to try to stop the voices in his head."
There is little evidence that Governor Perry is seeking to make Texas justice
better. In fact, as Amnesty's report makes clear, killing of the young, the
intellectually disabled, and the mentally ill persists in Texas with no sign
that Governor Perry cares at all.
But unlike their political leadership, the people of Texas do seem to care, and
are turning away from this creepy enthusiasm for state killing. Death sentences
issued by Texas juries have dropped precipitously during the dozen years Rick
Perry has been governor.
So as Californians vote, perhaps, to end their state's death penalty, and
Texans vote, as jurors, for sentences other than death, maybe it's time for
political leaders in the Lone Star State to catch up with the people and
realize that the state's justice system "can be better", and will be better,
without executions.
(source: Amnesty International USA)
USA:
My Childhood Pen-Pal Was an Innocent Man on Death Row
Last spring, my friend Paris Carriger was diagnosed with liver disease and told
he had just a few months to live. His voice from the hospital was weak but
calm. "This isn't the 1st time I've been sentenced to die," he said with a
raspy chuckle, "though I don't expect I'll beat this one."
35 years ago Paris was sentenced to death for robbing an Arizona jewelry store
and killing the owner. Paris said he had been framed by the real killer, a
shady acquaintance named Robert Dunbar; he was arrested after police received a
tip from a man who identified himself only as "Bob." Years later, Dunbar
admitted to the crime, but despite this confession Paris was denied a new
trial, and remained on death row.
Paris grew up with a poor, abusive mother who sent him to reform school at 10.
He led a chaotic life. But faced with execution for another man's crime, he
focused his energy. He wrote letters, dozens and dozens of letters to
reporters, lawyers, activists and academics -- anyone who might be interested
in his case.
Eventually he began to correspond with my mother, a professor of psychology and
law with a humanitarian heart and an old-school appreciation of good letter
writing. Paris was a smart, engaging correspondent. My mother came to believe
in his innocence, and to care about him. When I was 4, with my parents'
blessing, Paris first wrote to me.
I don't remember the first letter I got from Paris. I don't remember him coming
into my life at all. He was just always there; a far-away pen pal, a friendly
grownup presence who I knew only through letters and one greenish Polaroid of
him standing with arms crossed in front of a metal grate.
Paris wasn't used to people letting him befriend their children, and he was
deeply grateful to be allowed into my life. He was curious about my interests
and the books I was reading, and he told me about the things he loved to do as
a child -- fishing, riding horses, training dogs. He sent me gifts on my
birthday -- binoculars, a pair of moccasins and, when I was 10, a typewriter
that I began using to write to him.
In my child's mind, jail was a spare, cartoonish space where people ate from
compartment trays and wore stripes. I had no real sense of what his existence
must have been like. I completely accepted that he was innocent, and
understood, to some degree, that he was the victim of a great injustice. But
really, I didn't think about it that much. I sent him drawings and made him
cards for Valentine's Day and Christmas. I asked him how the food was (not
good). I told him all about our new puppy and my part in the school play.
Sometimes, Paris' insight into my experiences was better than my parents'. Once
in middle school, I was bullied daily by a girl who said I had hugged her
boyfriend -- myself the victim of a false accusation. This girl followed me
around the halls with a crew of friends, muttering insults and trying to trip
me. When she pushed me up against the lockers, I called her the "b-word" and
our parents were called in for a meeting with the principal.
My mother couldn't understand why I hadn't told her about this, but Paris
completely got it. He wrote to her, "Sasha's trouble looks different to me than
it does to you. The biggest defeat would be to tell. Then she is branded a
snitch and kids see her as the weaker one, the easy target."
In 8th grade, given an English assignment to write about a person I admired, I
chose Paris.
The reality of death row came into sharp focus when I was 14. Despite Dunbar's
confession, despite other witnesses who admitted they had lied, he had lost all
his appeals. He had been in prison for 18 years. An execution date was set:
Dec. 6, 1995.
My teenage mind focused on the horrors of execution itself. You exist today.
You exist tomorrow. But at 12:15 a.m. on Dec. 6, you will no longer exist. What
would it feel like to be informed precisely when you would be killed? It
chilled my bones and made me sick.
He called more often. His voice, as usual, was calm and soft with a gentle
southern drawl. I had no idea what to say to him. On my mother's advice, I told
him that. "Keep your chin up," he said. "We may get out of this yet." My mother
travelled to the prison in Florence, Ariz., for his clemency hearing. Paris was
there in a metal cage, his belongings already divided up among the guards, his
body afflicted with shingles, his spirit with humiliation and the fear of
death.
He wasn't executed. On, Dec. 4, the Supreme Court upheld a stay of the
execution to allow another appeal.
3 year later, with no advance warning, Paris was given $20 and a paper suit and
let out the jail door. He set to work building a life from scratch, moving to
Oklahoma to live with a long-lost half-sister. He came to visit us in Michigan.
Incredible as it was to see him in person, he also seemed perfectly familiar;
after all, I had known him forever.
My lifelong friendship with an innocent man on death row means that I have
always been deeply opposed to the death penalty. I talk to people about it a
lot these days with Proposition 34 and I urge them to vote "yes." Those who
favor it often say it's too slow and expensive. I always think: "If we had a
quick cheap death penalty, Paris would have been killed."
Unfortunately, Paris didn't live long enough to find out whether we will
replace the death penalty in California. He died on May 21, at home with
Sherrie, the woman he fell in love with and married several years after his
release. The hospice workers said they had never seen anyone accept the end of
life with such calm grace. Given how close he came to being executed for a
crime he didn't commit, I can imagine that dying at home was, in a sense, a
victory.
(source: Alexandra Gross.Investigative Researcher, National Registry of
Exonerations, Huffington Post)
_______________________________________________
DeathPenalty mailing list
DeathPenalty@lists.washlaw.edu
http://lists.washlaw.edu/mailman/listinfo/deathpenalty
Search the Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/deathpenalty@lists.washlaw.edu/
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A free service of WashLaw
http://washlaw.edu
(785)670.1088
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
