April 2
MISSOURI:
Records Sought on Serial Killer's Execution
Courthouse News joined a dozen other media outlets in Larry Flynt's crusade to
unseal court records on the November 2013 execution of Joseph Franklin, a
serial killer who shot and paralyzed Flynt.
Flynt was denied the right to intervene, the court finding that Flynt had only
a generalized interest in the litigation.
Franklin shot Flynt, the publisher of Hustler magazine, in 1978, leaving him
confined to a wheelchair.
Franklin was executed by lethal injection on Nov. 20, 2013.
Flynt, an opponent of the death penalty, sought to have Franklin's sentence
commuted to life in prison.
Franklin's execution brought scrutiny to Missouri's execution process.
The state recently switched to using pentobarbital from an unidentified
compounding pharmacy.
Death penalty opponents argued that using improperly stored pentobarbital could
create cruel and unusual punishment.
Joining as plaintiffs were The Missouri Press Association, Advance
Publications, the American Society of News Editors, the Association of
Alternative Newsmedia, the First Amendment Coalition, The McClatchy Company,
MediaNews Group dba Digital First Media, the National Press Photographers
Association, The New York Times Company, the Newspaper Association of America,
Politico, The Washington Post and Courthouse News.
The American Civil Liberties Union filed amicus briefs on behalf of Flynt and
the media and 2 watchdog groups on Monday.
"Concerned citizens and the media are watchdogs of our government and often
seek access to sealed court documents," said Tony Rothert, legal director of
the ACLU of Missouri. "If the district court's decision is allowed to stand, it
would be nearly impossible for any member of the media or the general public to
challenge a decision to keep court records secret."
Despite numerous legal efforts to shed light on the execution protocol, a
federal appeals court ruled in January that unless a convicted murderer
suggests a more humane execution, the plaintiffs are not entitled to more
information.
Missouri has carried out 2 more executions, even after an apothecary shop in
Tulsa, Okla. stopped providing the drug under legal pressure.
Starting with Franklin, Missouri has executed 5 inmates in the past 5 months.
(source: Courthouse News)
OKLAHOMA:
Oklahoma plans to use untested 3-drug combination in 2 executions
Oklahoma will use a new and untried combination of compounded drugs in the
executions of 2 men, according to an email the state sent to attorneys on
Tuesday.
Assistant attorney general John Hadden said the state plans to employ a lethal
3-drug combination of midazolam, pancuronium bromide and potassium chloride.
The combination is believed never to have been tried before in US executions.
The disclosure is the latest development in an ongoing series of legal
challenges in several states, as lawyers for death row inmates seek to
challenge the methods proposed for their executions, and the secrecy
surrounding the sources of drugs. States, meanwhile, are battling shortages in
the supply of drugs, after an EU-led boycott severely limited their options.
In Texas, lawyers for 2 murderers on death row filed a lawsuit in a Houston
federal court on Tuesday attempting to stop the inmates' imminent executions on
the basis that the state department of criminal justice is refusing to reveal
details about the compounded pentobarbital to be used in the 2 lethal
injections.
In Oklahoma, Hadden declined to reveal the source of the drugs to lawyers. He
said the corrections department has purchased the drugs, and an unidentified
pharmacy is holding the drugs until within 24 hours of the executions. The
midazolam and pancuronium bromide is compounded, he said, and the state has
ordered an analysis of the drugs. The results would be provided to the defense
and redacted to conceal the identity of participants. The potassium chloride
was manufactured, and the state will call for no "special testing" on it, he
said.
Defense attorneys have raised questions about the efficacy and purity of
compounded drugs which lack federal approval.
"The drugs to be used are midazolam, pancuronium bromide and potassium chloride
in the dosages indicated in the protocol," Hadden wrote. "Also, DOC can make
additional disclosures on compounded drugs (which in this case are the
midazolam and pancuronium bromide) to answer questions regarding purity,
strength and competence of the pharmacy/pharmacist."
An Oklahoma county district court judge ruled last week that a state law
keeping the source of the drugs a secret is unconstitutional and denies the men
their right to access the courts to argue against their own executions.
Oklahoma plans to execute Clayton Lockett on 22 April and Charles Warner on 29
April. Both have been convicted of rape and murder. Hadden acknowledged in his
email to lawyers that he was sharing the information about the drugs to be used
because "time is a factor".
Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center,
said Oklahoma's planned 3-drug method is similar to what Florida has used in
its executions. Florida has used midazolam, vecuronium bromide and potassium
chloride.
Florida and Ohio are the only states to use midazolam in lethal injection. The
January execution of Dennis McGuire using midazolam and hydromorphone took
longer than 20 minutes.
Jen Moreno, staff attorney at the Berkeley Law Death Penalty Clinic, said
Florida's protocol using vecuronium bromide and Oklahoma's using pancuronium
bromide are essentially interchangeable. "It will function no different than
the paralytic Florida is using," Moreno said.
A main difference in the protocols is the dosage of midazolam. The dosage in
Oklahoma's protocol is much lower than Florida's, Moreno said. The purpose of
midazolam would be to cause unconsciousness so the prisoners would not feel
paralysis, suffocation and pain.
"With a lower first dose, it increases the risk he will be conscious and
experience the effects of the 2nd and 3rd drug," Moreno said. "There would be
serious concerns it wouldn't operate as it's intended to operate in the
protocol."
Madeline Cohen, an attorney for Warner, said it is unclear how a compounded,
lower dosage of midazolam would perform. "This is a very, very troubling
protocol," she said. The inmates' lawyers plan to file for a stay of execution.
Oklahoma revised its lethal injection protocol in March to allow 5 different
ways to kill condemned inmates by lethal injection. There are 4 3-drug methods
or a single large dose of pentobarbital. The warden can choose the method,
according to the protocol.
Oklahoma changed the protocol after the state announced in court documents it
could not find a drug supplier.
Dieter said states have turned to compounding pharmacies as a source for
execution drugs, as major drug companies have objected to states using their
federally approved drugs in executions.
"The drugs are prepared from raw ingredients by a pharmacist who may not be
familiar with all the secondary factors such as temperature, sterility and
timing that would be used by a manufacturer in pristine conditions," Dieter
said.
"Each pharmacist may prepare the drug slightly differently, and even one day's
dose may differ from another. Moreover, there has been recent evidence of
contaminated drugs from compounding pharmacies causing severe and deadly
reactions. Any of these factors could cause the 1st drug in a lethal injection
to be less than 100% effective, thereby exposing the inmate to the risk of
observing his own slow death."
In the Texas case, a judge in Austin last week ordered state officials to
disclose information about the drugs and suppliers to the attorneys for Tommy
Sells and Ramiro Hernandez. However, Texas officials appealed and on Friday
another court issued a stay pending a full hearing. That may not take place
until mid-April at the earliest, but Sells is set to die this Thursday and
Hernandez 6 days later.
Their lawyers are arguing that Texas law says the information should be public
and that not knowing the origins of the drugs and being able to make an
assessment about their quality potentially exposes their clients to an
unnecessarily painful execution that would violate their constitutional rights.
Maurie Levin, one of the attorneys, said that she is prepared to appeal to the
US supreme court if necessary.
(source: The Guardian)
SOUTH DAKOTA:
Lawyers lay out their case in Sioux Falls death penalty trial for carjack
killing of woman
Jurors in Sioux Falls must decide if a man should die by lethal injection for
killing a woman as part of what he says was a plan to assassinate the
president.
Opening statements are scheduled for Wednesday in the case against 43-year-old
James McVay.
He pleaded guilty but mentally ill to first-degree murder for the July 2011
stabbing death of 75-year-old Maybelle Schein.
McVay was arrested in Madison, Wis., and said he killed Schein and stole her
car as part of a plot to drive to Washington and assassinate President Barack
Obama.
10 men and 5 women will serve as a jury and three alternates.
They'll decide if McVay qualifies for the death penalty and, if so, whether he
deserves the death penalty or life in prison.
(source: Associated Press)
**************
Juror Reflects On Last Death Penalty Case
It's been 7 years since a group of Minnehaha County residents have been asked
to consider executing a violent criminal. Wednesday, a group of 15 will again
be asked to weigh that fate for James McVay.
A jury of 10 men and 5 women were seated Tuesday and opening arguments will be
heard Wednesday morning.
McVay pleaded guilty but mentally ill for the July 2011 murder of Maybelle
Schein and now faces execution.
The last jury to hear a capital case was a group that decided to sentence
Daphne Wright to life in prison instead of the death penalty in 2007. Erin
Frost-Elshami was the jury foreperson.
"You really just need to keep an open mind," Frost-Elshami said.
Frost-Elshami and her fellow jurors were asked to consider the death penalty
for Wright after she murdered Darlene VanderGiesen and dismembered the body
with a chainsaw.
Frost-Elshami says they were not allowed to talk with other jurors about the
case until deliberations began, so they got to know each other personally
before the life or death decision was made.
"You really get to know each other as people and then all of a sudden you're
talking about the balance of someone's life, and the loss of someone's life in
our case, and you can feel the weight of it," Frost-Elshami said.
Frost-Elshami says one of the biggest factors in deliberations was the
forgiveness and kindness VanderGiesen's family showed despite the harm Wright
caused.
She adds that when faced with the weight of deciding whether someone will live
or die, jurors consider the facts but the ultimate decision comes down to what
a juror feels in his or her heart that guides the decision.
"You have to weigh it in your own heart and just decide what as a human you
would truly think another human would be the right punishment for them,"
Frost-Elshami said.
The McVay case starts Wednesday morning. Jurors will first be asked if McVay's
crime qualifies for capital punishment under South Dakota law. If it does, then
they will be asked to sentence him to life in prison or the death penalty.
(source: KELOLAND TV)
**************
Lawyers To Open SF Death Penalty Trial
Jurors in Sioux Falls must decide if a man should die by lethal injection for
killing a woman as part of what he says was a plan to assassinate the
president.
Opening statements began Wednesday in the case against 43-year-old James McVay.
He pleaded guilty but mentally ill to 1st-degree murder for the July 2011
stabbing death of 75-year-old Maybelle Schein.
McVay was arrested in Madison, Wis., and said he killed Schein and stole her
car as part of a plot to drive to Washington and assassinate President Barack
Obama.
10 men and 5 women are serving as a jury and 3 alternates.
They'll decide if McVay qualifies for the death penalty and, if so, whether he
deserves the death penalty or life in prison.
(source: Associated Press)
ARIZONA:
Trial of Arizona Woman Accused of Beating Her Husband Reminiscent of Arias
Trial
A trial for Marissa DeVault, an Arizona woman accused of fatally beating her
husband with a hammer in 2009, is linked by some to the Jodi Arias trial.
The DeVault trial, which resumed on Tuesday, is happening in the same courtroom
as the Arias trial.
The Maricopa County Superior Court jury began deliberating Monday.
Marissa Suzanne Devault claims she killed her husband in self-defense at their
Gilbert home.
She told investigators that Dale Harrell had physically and sexually abused her
in the past. It's a similar defense to the one claimed by Arias, who was
convicted last year for brutally killing her longtime lover Travis Alexander.
"DeVault's trial began in early February, and now her fate is in the hands of
the jury. Just like Arias, whom she reportedly befriended in jail, she faces
the death penalty if convicted. Arias was convicted of 1st-degree murder in
May," reported ABC.
The sentencing phase of the Arias trial is set to begin in September.
Prosecutors contend the January 2009 attack by DeVault on Harrell was
premeditated, with the cited motive that DeVault wanted to get life insurance
money to pay back her alleged boyfriend, from whom she borrowed about $300,000.
They say the 36-year-old Devault has given conflicting accounts of her
husband???s death and that people who the woman claimed had witnessed some of
the past abuse didn't back up her claims.
Harrell died at a hospice nearly a month after the attack of complications from
his head injuries.
Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty against Devault.
(source: Epoch Times)
OREGON:
Man who spent 27 years in prison could face death penalty at aggravated murder
trial in Eugene
A man who spent 27 years in prison for a Lane County murder is facing
aggravated murder charges in a new trial in Eugene that could put him on death
row.
Jury selection began Tuesday for David Ray Taylor.
The 58-year-old is accused of killing 22-year-old Celestino "Tino" Gutierrez of
Eugene in August 2012 and then using his car in a bank robbery.
The Register-Guard reports (http://is.gd/gLhXHK ) a 2nd defendant, A.J. Scott
Nelson, is awaiting trial, and a 3rd, Mercedes Crabtree, pleaded guilty to
murder and has agreed to testify against Nelson.
Prosecutors say Crabtree posed as a woman in distress to lure Gutierrez from a
bar to Taylor's house where he was killed.
Taylor was convicted of killing a gas station attendant in 1977 and was
released in 2004.
(source: Associated Press)
USA:
The Death Penalty Violates Conservative Values
Beyond the inevitable mistakes, the inherent racism and the crushing costs, the
death penalty represents the ultimate power a government can exercise against
its own citizens. It is what makes totalitarianism total. It is the antithesis
of conservative principles. That is the undeniable lesson in Egypt's decision
to sentence more than 500 of its citizens to the final solution. It is a lesson
that every former dictatorship has learned through bitter experience.
Shortly after the Republic of South Africa freed Nelson Mandela and repudiated
Apartheid in favor of a democratic republic (like ours), its Constitutional
Court, in its 1st substantive decision in 1995, declared capital punishment
unconstitutional. Other countries recently freed from oppressive governments
had already made that decision: post-Fascist Italy in 1947, post-Nazi Germany
in 1949 and Austria in 1950, post-Samoza Nicaragua in 1979, post-Khmer Rouge
Cambodia in 1989, post-colonial Angola in 1992, and the list goes on. After the
fall of the Soviet empire in Eastern Europe, Romania, Estonia, the Czech
Republic, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Armenia, Romania and more all decided they could
live without the death penalty.
Each of these young democracies understood the obvious connection between
giving government the ultimate tool of control, the death penalty, and its
inevitable use for that purpose.
The recent history of the United States has also seen an increasing number of
states making the decision that South Africa made in 1995. New Jersey abolished
the practice in 2007, New Mexico 2 years later, Illinois 2 years after that,
Connecticut in 2012 and Maryland last year. Other states, most recently Oregon
in 2011 and Washington in 2014, have declared a moratorium on the death
penalty.
Ironically, though, the states which kill more of their citizens under law than
all the others are the same states whose political leaders are the loudest to
denounce the power of government. Yet, far from denouncing this ultimate
government power, 6 states, all in the deeply red conservative South, account
for nearly 1/2 of all executions that have taken place in this country since
the death penalty was resumed in 1976.
Texas governor Rick Perry most recently denounced the power of the federal
government at CPAC, the annual gathering of conservatives meeting in Maryland
earlier this month. "Contrast that with red states," he railed, "where the
freedom of the individual comes first and the reach of government is limited."
But fully 1/3 of all executions in this country have taken place in Texas, and
the "limited reach" of the Perry Administration is responsible for more than
half of those executions.
When then Russian President Boris Yeltsin commuted the death sentences of all
716 prisoners on his country's death row in 1999 (17 fewer than currently
occupy California's death row), he described it as "a big step in the direction
of democracy and civilization..." While countries like Egypt, Iraq and Syria
retreat in the opposite direction, it is long since time that we take that big
step.
(source: About the writer: Michael A. Kroll is a writer and activist, and the
1st Director of the Death Penalty information Center. He lives and writes in
Oakland, California---OTSE)
*****************
High Court Weighs Standards for Intellectual Disability
The Supreme Court wants to know if a convicted murderer's cognitive abilities
can be encapsulated in a single number that makes him eligible for the death
penalty.
Just how intellectually disabled must a convicted murderer be before the state
is barred from executing him?
That might seem like a complex question to a psychiatrist, but Supreme Court
justices spent most of their time one cold March morning asking not about the
man who spent 35 years on Florida's death row but about statistical aspects of
his IQ tests.
Freddie Lee Hall was convicted of the rape and murder of a 21-year-old woman in
1978. In a prior case, Atkins v. Virginia, in 2002, the Supreme Court held that
executing a mentally retarded (now termed "intellectually disabled") person
violated the Eighth Amendment to the Constitution, which prohibits "cruel and
unusual punishments."
The Court in Atkins left it up to the states to determine standards for
intellectual disability. Florida set the bar at an IQ of 70, along with
deficits in adaptive behavior and an onset before age 18. Hall had scored 71 or
higher on several IQ tests, making him eligible for the death penalty.
Allen Winsor, Florida's solicitor general, argued that once the prisoner scored
above 70, the other 2 criteria became irrelevant. Furthermore, the state
couldn't have its laws governed by the subjective - and changeable - views of
clinicians.
The statistical argument revolved around whether a score of 70 was a "bright
line," a number that must be adhered to inflexibly.
"Because of the standard error of measurement that is inherent in IQ tests, it
is universally accepted that persons with obtained scores of 71 to 75 can, and
often do, have mental retardation when those three prongs are met," argued
Hall's attorney, Seth Waxman, at the March 10 hearing. "If a state conditions
the opportunity to demonstrate mental retardation on obtained IQ test scores,
it cannot ignore the measurement error that is inherent in those scores that is
a statistical feature of the test instrument itself."
APA joined with other mental health organizations in filing an amicus curiae
brief with the Court on Hall's behalf.
"We are saying that if a state relies on some definition of mental illness or
intellectual disability, then that definition should reflect current research
and current thinking," said Colleen Coyle, J.D, APA's general counsel. That
definition requires more than just a pass/fail grade on an IQ test.
APA's position calls for not only recognizing the standard error of measurement
but for applying all 3 criteria - IQ, functionality, and age of onset - in the
context of a full evaluation of the person facing execution.
"Using a single IQ score goes against how we think about intellectual
disability," said Richard Frierson, M.D., a professor of psychiatry at the
University of South Carolina School of Medicine and director of its forensic
psychiatry fellowship. Frierson was not involved in the Hall case.
"It is possible to diagnose a person with an IQ score above 70 but who has
difficulties with adaptive functioning - their ability to care for themselves
or live independently," said Frierson, in an interview with Psychiatric News.
"The oral argument underscored the differing perspectives with respect to the
death penalty," said APA Treasurer David Fassler, M.D., a clinical professor of
psychiatry at the University of Vermont. "A majority of the justices seemed
skeptical of the limitations imposed by the current Florida law. The prevailing
view was that judges and juries should have access to as much information as
possible when considering whether or not a defendant is eligible for the death
penalty."
APA and other mental health organizations and advocates may have more work
ahead of them, regardless of the Court's decision, which is expected later this
spring.
"We must better educate judges and lawyers about the role of adaptive
functioning to remind them that this is a gray area, not one that is simply
black and white," said Frierson. "There are still so many disparities regarding
persons on death row with mental illness and intellectual disability, and it
will be interesting to see if the Court takes them up in the future."
(source: Psychiatric News)
***************
Ex-soldier takes witness stand in death penalty case
Accused child killer Naeem J. Williams took the witness stand in his own
defense Tuesday afternoon in U.S. District Court.
Williams, 34, is on trial for capital murder for the July 16, 2005, child abuse
beating death of his 5-year-old daughter Talia.
He is facing the death penalty for killing a child through child abuse or as
part of a practice and pattern of assault and torture.
Williams said he knew that his daughter had bowel and bladder control problems
when he won custody of Talia in early-December 2004. He said his wife Delilah
followed a routine to minimize the chances of Talia accidentally soiling
herself.
He said Talia started soiling herself about a week after arriving in Hawaii
from South Carolina.
"It wasn't a big deal to me. I considered it an accident," he said.
Williams said he talked to his daughter and told her to try to get to the
bathroom next time.
By the end of the month Williams said he began to physically punish his
daughter for soiling herself. The court session ended for the day before
Williams told the jury how he punished his daughter.
The government claims that Talia died after Williams punched his daughter in
the chest and the girl fell backward and hit her head on the floor of the
family's military quarters at Wheeler Army Airfield. By then Talia had
withstood months of physical abuse at the hands of her father and stepmother.
(source: Star Advertiser)
************************
Father says he beat daughter for soiling herself
A minute into his testimony Naeem Williams reached for a tissue.
"Are you prepared to discuss what happened and why?" defense attorney John
Phillipsborn asked.
"Yes sir," Williams answered, choking back tears.
Williams said he met Delilah Williams in 2002. Despite a rocky relationship
they got married. He enlisted in the Army. He told the court he had never spent
a day alone with his daughter, Talia, but he and Delilah got custody of the
child in 2004.
"It was expected of me," he said. "I thought I was ready."
Williams talked about Talia's bladder and bowel control problems and how she
had accidents.
"It wasn't a big deal to me. I talked to her about it," he said.
He said he told her, "You're a big girl now. Try to make it to the bathroom."
But he said eventually he started to punish Talia for soiling herself by
hitting her.
"It was sometime toward the end of 2004," he told the jury.
Williams, 34, is an ex-Schofield soldier. He's charged with murdering Talia in
July of 2005 after months of physical abuse with a belt, a ruler and his fists.
Delilah Williams admits beating her 5-year-old step daughter. She testified
against her husband in exchange for a 20-year sentence.
If Naeem Williams is convicted he could face the death penalty.
(source: Hawaii News Now)
**************
Whites and capital punishment
We hear a lot about the racial disparity in death penalty sentencing, namely,
that black Americans are dramatically overrepresented on death row.
Less remarked on is the disparity in death penalty support, as revealed in a
new Pew Research Center survey. Overall, 55 % of Americans support capital
punishment, and 37 % are opposed. Among whites, however, support jumps to 63 %,
compared to 40 % for Hispanics and 36 % for blacks.
Religion - or at least, Protestantism - seems to increase the divide. At 67 %
in favor, white evangelical Protestants are more likely than any other group to
support the death penalty, followed by white mainline Protestants (64 %).
Catholics are the least likely among religious whites to support capital
punishment, though 59 % are in favor. Religious blacks and Latinos are less
likely than their peers to support the death penalty.
Before we get into why whites are so supportive of the death penalty, it's
important to remember this: There's no separating capital punishment from its
role, in part, as a tool of racial control. As Stuart Banner explores in his
book "The Death Penalty: An American History," one of the earliest
American-made capital statutes - as opposed to ones borrowed from England - was
passed in New York in the aftermath of a 1712 slave revolt.
Likewise, in Southern colonies like Virginia and South Carolina (where enslaved
blacks were close to 1/2 the population), legislatures imposed the death
penalty for a long list of offenses. For blacks to do anything to interfere
with their enslavement was to court death. "In 1740," writes Banner, "South
Carolina imposed the death penalty on slaves and free blacks for burning or
destroying any grain, commodities or manufactured goods; on slaves for enticing
other slaves to run away; and on slaves maiming or bruising whites." He
continues:
Virginia, fearing attempts at poisoning, made it a capital offense for slaves
to prepare or administer medicine. The Georgia legislature determined that
crimes committed by slaves... "could not fall under the provision of the laws
of England." Georgia accordingly made it a capital offense for slaves or free
blacks to strike whites twice, or once if a bruise resulted.
Move forward a century, and you have a retrenchment of capital punishment in
the Southern states, even as their Northern counterparts moved away from it. By
the middle of the 19th century, notes Banner, the death penalty had been
removed from "crime after crime until none of the northern states used it for
any offense other than murder."
By contrast, in Louisiana - reflecting the incredible tension over slavery and
fear of revolt - "it was a capital crime to print or distribute material, or to
make a speech or display a sign, or even to have a private conversation, that
might spread discontent among the free black population or insubordination
among slaves." North Carolina had similar laws, imposing the death penalty for
- among other things - "concealing a slave with intent to free him" and
"circulating seditious literature among slaves."
Wide use of the death penalty against blacks would continue through the 19th
century and into the 20th, pushed by Southern whites who saw capital punishment
as necessary to restrain a dangerous black population. One pro-lynching
activist, speaking in 1897 during the heyday of lynching - an extrajudicial
form of capital punishment - was more explicit: "If it takes lynching to
protect woman's dearest possession from drunken, ravening human beasts ... then
I say lynch a thousand a week if it becomes necessary."
Indeed, it's noteworthy that as late as 1954, rape was a capital offense in
every state of the former Confederacy, and five retained the death penalty for
arson. Even now, most executions happen in the South, and Southern whites
continue to show strong support for capital punishment.
Our cultural attitudes are unconsciously shaped by our collective history as
much as they are consciously shaped by our current context. When the death
penalty is considered as a tool of racial control - a way for whites to
"defend" themselves from blacks - then Pew's poll results make sense. This is
the inevitable result of that history expressed through public opinion, and
influenced by racialized ideas on crime and criminality.
If you're still skeptical, consider this: In 2007, 2 researchers tried to gauge
racial differences on capital punishment and assess how blacks and whites
responded to arguments against the practice. In general, blacks were receptive
to any argument against the death penalty.
Whites, on the other hand, were not only immune to persuasion on the death
penalty, but when researchers told them of the racial disparity - that blacks
faced unfair treatment - many increased their support.
(source: Jamelle Bouie covers politics, policy and race for Slate. His work has
appeared in the Nation, the Atlantic and The Washington Post----The Charlotte
Observer)
**************
Adrianne Haslet-Davis backs death penalty for blasts
Adrianne Haslet-Davis, who became a symbol of Boston Strong when she made good
on her vow to dance again in a front-page Herald story after losing her lower
leg in the Boston Marathon bombings, has told prosecutors she wants accused
terrorist Dzhokhar Tsarnaev to get the death penalty if convicted.
"I didn't make (the decision) without thinking long and hard," the determined
ballroom dancer tells CNN's Anderson Cooper in an upcoming special report. "I
don't feel you can get away with something like that."
Haslet-Davis tells the cable news network she has "actively pursued"
participating in Tsarnaev's upcoming trial and that she and her husband, Adam,
who was also injured in the blast, have "gone through every gruesome detail" of
the bombing with the prosecution team.
Haslet-Davis, who suffered post-traumatic stress disorder after the attacks,
said she knows she will have to face Tsarnaev if she attends the trial, set to
begin in November.
"I know I'll see him and I know that it will be incredibly emotional," she
said. "But I also know that I am strong enough to do it and I need to do it."
Haslet-Davis revealed her decision in an upcoming special, "The Survivor
Diaries," set to air Tuesday night on CNN, less than 2 weeks before the
anniversary of the Patriots Day attacks.
Her determination to see justice served is not surprising in light of
Adrianne's steely resolve not to let the bombers make her a victim. Just days
after the attack, she vowed to Herald columnist Peter Gelzinis from her
hospital bed that she would dance again. Last month, in front of a stunned
audience at the annual TED conference in Vancouver, British Columbia,
Haslet-Davis performed for the first time publicly on a revolutionary
prosthesis designed by MIT genius Hugh Herr.
Haslet-Davis tells Cooper that she tries to focus on all that she has
accomplished over the past year and not let the horror again overwhelm her.
"On the hard days when I want to just stay in bed, I feel that if I did, then
that super horrible things-I-can't-say-on-TV man will win. And that's not going
to happen."
"CNN Special Report: The Survivor Diaries" premieres at 10 p.m. Tuesday on CNN.
(source: Boston Herald)
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