May 25
OKLAHOMA:
Will Oklahoma Change Execution Methods?
Tucked inside last week's scathing Multicounty Grand Jury report was a
recommendation the state begin moving away from lethal injection. Instead
jurors suggested the state hire experts to take a look at moving to nitrogen
hypoxia; a suggestion that renewed arguments over the feasibility, legality and
moral efficacy of Oklahoma's back-up execution method.
The Grand Jury had been investigating Oklahoma's recent problems in the
execution of convicted murderer Charles Warner and scheduled executions of
convicted murderer Richard Glossip.
The method of using Nitrogen Hypoxia pipes pure nitrogen into a facemask or a
sealed hood around an inmate's head.
According to an unnamed doctor and unnamed professor who testified in front of
the jury, the method would be "easy and inexpensive," "simple to administer"
and "quick and seemingly painless."
The professor also gave anecdotal evidence from high altitude pilots who were
trained to recognize symptoms of nitrogen hypoxia and said they did not feel
"any feelings of suffocation, choking or gagging."
Oklahoma opponents of the method, and the death penalty as a whole, say there's
no good reason to think the state would get executions right with a different
method. The ACLU-Oklahoma linked the method to Nazi concentration camps and
human experimentation.
"As a state, we will stand on the shoulders of such lauded men and Reinhart
Heidrick and Adolf Eichman, pioneers in the Nazi SS, who developed technologies
like hypoxia as ways to kill, not just 1 person, but a whole lot of people,"
ACLU-OK's Legal Director Brady Henderson said in a press conference one day
after the report was released.
Hypoxia was signed into law as a back-up last spring, should lethal injection
be deemed unconstitutional or if the drugs used become too hard to find. The
latter has already begun to play out during a global shortage of key components
to the state's lethal cocktail.
Many major pharmaceutical companies in Europe have said they will not allow
their drugs to be used in lethal injections. Most recently the American
pharma-giant, Pfizer, said it will follow suit, calling the use of its
pharmaceuticals in executions a "misuse of medicines."
Currently, the Department of Corrections does not know how long it would take
for the state to switch methods and they have no plans to use nitrogen hypoxia
as a method, according to a spokesperson for the department.
(source: nenwson6.com)
NEBRASKA:
State Sen. Colby Coash: Reinstating the death penalty won't fix the system
Voting to reinstate the death penalty in November won't solve any of the
problems associated with executions, a Nebraska state senator who supports its
repeal says.
"I want the voters to understand they're not voting to fix a system," State
Sen. Colby Coash of Lincoln said. "They're voting to keep a system that hasn't
worked for 20 years and will continue to not work should the Legislature's
decision be reversed."
Coash made stops in Kearney, Hastings and Grand Island on Monday as part of a
tour for Retain A Just Nebraska, a public education campaign to urge the
retention of Legislative Bill 268, which the Nebraska Legislature approved to
end the death penalty. Voters will decide in November's general election if
they want to keep the measure because death penalty supporters gained enough
signatures to place the issue on the ballot.
Coash, a Republican, said he's touring the state to offer voters the same
information he had as a senator so they can make an informed decision at the
polls.
"The No. 1 message we've been sending is that this is a broken system,' he
said. "We can't get the drugs. It's getting more difficult to get drugs, and
now we've gotten ourselves into a situation where we're just not being fair to
victims on this issue."
Last year, the state tried to import 2 lethal injection drugs from India, but
the attempt was unsuccessful and cost $54,500. 1 of the drugs - sodium
thiopental - is no longer made by U.S. manufacturers and many foreign suppliers
having stopped providing it for use in executions.
Nebraska's last execution occurred in 1997, and 10 inmates currently sit on
death row. Repealing capital punishments doesn't mean that those inmates will
be eligible for parole, Coash said.
"Life means life," Coash said. "If they're sentence to that, they'll die in
prison. That's the important thing I want people to understand. I don't want
voters to go out there and think that they need to reverse what the Legislature
did just to keep people from getting out of prison."
Coash said he and the other legislators in support of the death penalty repeal
did not come to their decision lightly, and that Nebraskans across the state
have also voiced their support for the decision for a variety of reasons, from
faith-based to economic and practical concerns.
"It's indisputable that this is a broken system. If we executed somebody 3
years ago, I couldn't stand here and say, 'No, we're not doing it, so it's not
working,'" he said. "We may feel good about having it (the death penalty) on
the books, but that doesn't mean it will be used. That's something both sides
have to weigh."
(source: omaha.com)
***********
'They die in prison.'
Nebraskans who want to keep the death penalty off the books in Nebraska took a
proactive step last week to reassure Nebraskans that when a murderer is
sentenced to life in prison, it means just that.
The anti-death penalty group included some Nebraskans who can speak with
consummate authority.
Here's what retired District Court Judge Ronald Reagan had to say:
"I want to make sure there is no legal confusion," Reagan said. "Life
imprisonment means life in prison, no chance of parole. Anything else is legal
posturing and has no grounding in the legal realities."
Reagan ought to know. He's the judge who sentenced John Joubert to death. John
Joubert, a sadistic serial killer convicted of stabbing 2 boys to death, died
in the electric chair in 1996. He was one of the last people to be executed in
the state.
"I have seen the worst of the worst cases in Nebraska and I have studied the
laws very carefully," Reagan said. "Let me be perfectly clear about what
happens when someone is sentenced to life imprisonment in Nebraska - they die
in prison.
Coincidentally, a few days after Reagan spoke to the news media, inmate Randy
Reeves died at age 60 in the Nebraska State Penitentiary. Reeves was serving a
life sentence for killing 2 women in Lincoln in 1980.
Reagan's point was underscored by 2 Nebraska lawmakers - Sens. Colby Coash and
Adam Morfeld -- who serve on the judiciary committee.
The public statements from experts with authoritative credentials were needed
because some advocates in the pro-death penalty crowd have been spreading doubt
about the meaning and efficacy of life imprisonment in Nebraska.
For example, pro-death penalty spokesman Bob Evnen at a panel discussion at
Western Nebraska Community College claimed, according to the Scottsbluff Star
Herald, "There is no such thing as life without parole anyway. There is no such
thing as life without release."
Evnen apparently was basing his claim on the fact that the Nebraska Pardons
Board has the authority to commute life sentences.
The Pardons Board has commuted three life sentences in the past 25 years.
But what Evnen did not say is that the Pardons Board also has the power to
commute death sentences. And Nebraska history shows it has also exercised that
power.
Only the Pardons Board - currently made up of Gov. Pete Ricketts, Attorney
General Doug Peterson and Secretary of State John Gale -- can commute a death
sentence or a sentence of life imprisonment.
Don't be misled by the exaggerations and fear-mongering of death penalty
supporters. Take the word of retired Judge Ronald Reagan, who actually has
imposed sentences in 1st degree murder cases. Nebraskans can be assured that a
life sentence in Nebraska means that the convict will die in prison.
(source: Lincoln Journal Star Editorial Board)
CALIFORNIA:
Attorney: Williams says 'death sentence is fine with him'
A Berkeley man found guilty of 2 murders earlier this month, who could face the
death penalty, asked an Alameda County Superior Court judge Monday to dismiss
the jury and make his own ruling on sentencing.
Both attorneys for 25-year-old Darnell Williams Jr. strongly advised him not to
waive his rights to a jury trial, they said. But Williams had other ideas.
"He would like the proceedings to end," defense attorney Deborah Levy told
Judge Jeffrey Horner on Monday afternoon. He said he would waive his rights and
accept the judge's sentence, said Levy, adding, "The death sentence is fine
with him."
Defense attorney Darryl Billups told the judge he had advised Williams he
"didn't think it was a good idea" to waive the jury trial, which is designed to
lead to a sentencing recommendation for the judge. The jury is slated to decide
between the death penalty and life in prison without parole.
The jury was not present when the attorneys made the request to Horner on their
client's behalf.
Williams also raised a question, through Levy, about how the decision might
affect his appeal prospects. He had asked the judge to provide insights into
the possible ramifications, which Horner said he would not do.
Horner said he felt it was "totally inappropriate" for a judge to offer legal
advice to a defendant in a criminal proceeding.
Levy then said her client withdrew his request for advice, and was simply ready
to be done with the jury.
Prosecutor John Brouhard said he had nothing to say about the request.
After a short recess to "do a little thinking on this and a little research,"
Horner returned to the bench and denied Williams' request.
"I very carefully considered it," Horner said. "I'm not going to allow a
waiver."
Horner described the jury as the "trier of fact" and said it would be up to
jurors to hear the evidence and make their recommendation.
In response to the ruling, Williams dropped his head and let out a loud sigh in
a rare showing of emotion. Levy comforted him by rubbing his shoulder.
Monday, Williams' grandfather and uncle testified about some of the
circumstances he faced growing up in Long Beach and Berkeley. Tuesday, the
uncle is expected to continue testimony, and Williams' mother is slated to take
the stand, along with a forensic psychologist who specializes in death penalty
cases and related issues.
The defense could be done presenting its case by Wednesday.
Williams was found guilty earlier this month of fatally shooting 8-year-old
Alaysha Carradine at a sleepover and, less than 2 months later, fatally
shooting 22-year-old Anthony "Tone" Medearis III, whom he had known since
childhood.
(source: berkeleyside.com)
USA:
Announcing ....
STARVIN' FOR JUSTICE 2016
The 23rd Annual Fast & Vigil to Abolish the Death Penalty
June 29 through July 2
Outside the U.S. Supreme Court - Washington, DC
There are 2 areas we need your help with!
1.--Spread the word in your networks and to your membership. Include a blurb
about the event in your newsletters, online communications and emails. You can
access sample text that you are welcome to edit and customize in the attached
PDF. You can also easily do this by connecting with us on Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/fastandvigil.
2.--Cosponsor the event. We annually have more than 50 national and state death
penalty abolition groups that support the Fast and Vigil, making this perhaps
one of the most multi-organizational supported events in the abolition
movement. Join Amnesty International USA, the German Coalition to Abolish the
Death Penalty, Equal Justice USA, MVFR, Pax Christi, the Journey of Hope,
Witness to Innocence and many more in cosponsoring this year. Info at
http://www.abolition.org/fastandvigil/sponsor.html. Online registration is
open: http://www.abolition.org/fastandvigil/register.html. Sign up before June
1st and get a free t-shirt.
MORE ABOUT THE FAST AND VIGIL:
We hope you will consider joining the nearly 100 anti-death penalty activists
who come regularly from across the U.S. and Canada - from Florida to Alaska and
everywhere in-between. Participation can be intermittent. Some people come for
all 4 days. Some locals come for a few hours here and there. Some just attend
our evening teach in programs outside the court. Some fast, some do not. We
welcome all levels of participation.
This year there will be a RALLY at Noon on July 2 at the Court to mark the 40th
anniversary of the Gregg v. Georgia decision, which allowed executions to
resume in the United States. Plus all the usual events, including a last meal
together on June 28th, and teach ins each night with death row exonerees,
murder victim family members, death row family members and more.Full schedule
of events is at http://www.abolition.org/fastandvigil/schedule.html.
For the full schedule of events, including details on lodging, travel and other
logistics, visit http://www.abolition.org/fastandvigil/. To help with funding,
or to volunteer, please contact the Abolitionist Action Committee at
518-768-1867 or a...@abolition.org.
Background: The Abolitionist Action Committee (AAC) has held a 4 day vigil at
the Supreme Court every summer since 1994, from the dates of June 29 to July 2,
to mark 2 very important court decisions about the death penalty. The AAC is an
ad-hoc group of individuals committed to highly visible and effective public
education for alternatives to the death penalty through non-violent direct
action. Visit them online at www.abolition.org.
(source: Abolitionist Action Committee;
http://www.abolition.org/fastandvigil----TWITTER:
https://twitter.com/AbolitionAAC)
***************
Federal authorities to seek death penalty against Dylann Roof
Nearly a year since gunfire interrupted a Bible study at Emanuel AME Church,
federal prosecutors said Tuesday that they will seek the death penalty against
Dylann Roof, the 22-year-old suspect in the attack that killed 9 people.
Roof's substantial planning before the assault, his expressions of hatred
toward black people and his lack of remorse after the slayings helped drive the
decision, a notice in U.S. District Court stated.
The move is a relatively rare one for the federal government since it
reinstated capital punishment nearly 3 decades ago. Of thousands of eligible
cases since then, the U.S. Attorney's Office has authorized prosecutors to seek
execution in about 500.
Attorney General Loretta Lynch said in a statement that she arrived at the
decision after a "rigourous" of the case's factual and legal issues.
"The nature of the alleged crime and the resulting harm compelled this
decision," she said.
If he's convicted, Roof will face the ultimate penalty in 2 different
courtrooms. In state court, he is set to be tried in January, but his federal
trial has not been scheduled.
Surviving victims of the June 17 attack, considered one of the most heinous
hate crimes in recent memory, and family members of those who died had
differing stances on whether Roof should face execution.
They learned of Lynch's much-awaited decision during a conference call with
federal authorities Tuesday afternoon, less than a month before the 1-year
anniversary of the shooting. The federal trial has been delayed 4 times as
Lynch considered the case.
Steve Schmutz, a Charleston attorney who represents family members of 3 of the
slain victims, said the development was not surprising.
"The families will support this decision," he said. "Really, I think the
families have mixed emotions about the death penalty. But if it's ever going to
be given, this case certainly calls for it."
Roof, an Eastover resident, was indicted in July on 33 federal charges,
including the hate crimes. But accusations that he violated the parishioners'
right to freely practice a religion are the charges that carry the death
penalty.
Officials said he penned an online manifesto about white supremacy before
sitting for an hour through the Bible study at the Calhoun Street church, then
opening fire.
The shooting left the church's pastor, the Rev. Clementa Pinckney, and 8 others
dead. 3 adult women and 2 children in the church at the time survived without
physical wounds.
In the federal notice Tuesday, Assistant U.S. Attorney Jay Richardson wrote
that Roof's actions met the legal threshold for the death penalty because he
intended to kill the people he shot: Pinckney, Sharonda Coleman-Singleton,
Cynthia Hurd, Susie Jackson, Ethel Lance, DePayne Middleton-Doctor, Tywanza
Sanders Daniel Simmons Sr. and Myra Thompson.
The prosecutor also listed 8 aggravating factors, including: multiple deaths,
extensive premeditation, the targeting of people more than 70 years old, an
intent to incite violence by others, the deaths' impact on the victims' loved
ones, endangering the safety of people besides those who were slain, racial
motivation and a lack of remorse.
Roof also targeted Emanuel AME, the filing stated, "in order to magnify the
societal impact" of the crimes.
(source: The Post and Courier)
***************
Bernie Sanders Opposes Death Penalty For Dylann Roof----The senator sticks with
his principles.
The Justice Department announced on Tuesday it would seek the death penalty in
the case of accused South Carolina mass murderer Dylann Roof.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) opposes the Justice Department's decision to seek
the death penalty in the case of Dylann Roof, the accused killer of nine
parishioners at a church in South Carolina last year.
The Democratic presidential candidate has long been an opponent of capital
punishment, arguing that it doesn't fit with America's moral values or deter
crime. And though the circumstances of the Roof case have prompted cries for
severe punishment, his campaign reiterated his position in an email to The
Huffington Post.
"Sen. Sanders opposes the death penalty," Sanders spokesman Michael Briggs
wrote. "He believes those who are convicted of the most horrible crimes should
be imprisoned for the rest of their lives without the possibility of parole."
Attorney General Loretta Lynch announced on Tuesday that the Justice Department
would seek the death penalty in the Roof case, following a "rigorous review
process to thoroughly consider all relevant factual and legal issues." State
authorities had earlier said that they would seek the death penalty for Roof,
who they allege was motivated by racial animus and carefully planned the
massacre at the Emanuel AME Church. Roof is charged both with federal hate
crimes and 9 counts of murder and three counts of attempted murder.
Several prominent Republican South Carolina officials praised Lynch's
announcement, including Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) and Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.)
Less clear, however, was how Democrats would approach the debate, considering
the horrific nature of the incident and the national outrage it sparked.
President Barack Obama has called capital punishment "deeply troubling" but
something he can rationalize.
"There are certain crimes that are so beyond the pale that I understand
society's need to express its outrage," he told the Marshall Project in 2015.
Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Clinton, likewise, has said she
supports the death penalty in "certain egregious cases." Aides to Clinton did
not respond to requests for comment on the Roof case.
(source: Sam Stein, Senior Policy Editor, Huffington Post)
*****************
United States death penalty's inhumanity revisited
To the Editor:
The Supreme Court recently rejected an appeal from an Orange County murderer to
overturn the California death penalty.His plea rested on his contention that
the sentence, first made in 1984 and overturned because of a police error, but
reinstated after a 2nd trial in 1992, has been psychologically inhumane. Out of
743 prisoners on death row in California, only 13 have been executed in 40
years, and none since 2006.
On the same page (Minneapolis Star Tribune, May 3, 2016) is the headline
"Exonerated After 50 Years" the story of a Virginia man, convicted of a New
York City murder, who accepted a guilty plea with a sentence of 30 years to
life, as an alternative to pleading "not guilty" and facing the death penalty
if convicted. 11 years later evidence surfaced of his innocence.
The sentence was commuted and he was released from prison. His exoneration
marks the 20th time in Brooklyn alone that a review board has cleared
defendants who had been found guilty of crimes they did not commit.
Miscarriages of justice have a long, sad history in the United States. Many
"more civilized" countries have long since abandoned the death penalty with no
apparent effect on the rate of murder and violent crimes. On the contrary, in
the U.S., where states (excluding Minnesota, thank God) have retained the death
penalty, murder has remained relatively frequent.
The history of our nation, settled largely by Caucasian Europeans with
concomitant slaughter of Native Americans, enslavement and torture and murder
of blacks, exploitation of Orientals, persecutions of Jews and Muslims and the
suppression of women is long and violent.
For a country which many like to call "Christian" and which proclaims respect
for its Constitution and its laws, we have an ungodly acceptance of violence
and often scorn the peacemakers.
David Harris
Red Wing
(source: Letter to the Editor, Republican-Eagle)
*******
US drug giant will no longer supply lethal injection drugs
Pfizer has moved to stop its drugs being used for executions by imposing strict
distribution controls that will stop them reaching execution chambers across
the US. This means that all US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved
manufacturers of potential execution drugs have blocked their sale and use for
the death penalty in the US.
In a statement, Pfizer says it 'makes its products to enhance and save the
lives of patients' and 'strongly objects to the use of its products as lethal
injections for capital punishment'. It will now introduce a new monitoring
system to ensure that its drugs do not end up being used in executions. Pfizer
will enforce distribution restrictions on pancuronium bromide, potassium
chloride, propofol, midazolam, hydromorphone, rocuronium bromide and vecuronium
bromide, selling them only to 'select' purchasers under the condition that they
will not resell them for use in lethal injections. Government purchasing
entities must certify that products are not for any penal purposes.
The human rights organisation Reprieve hailed the move as a critical turning
point in the history of capital punishment in the US, reflecting widespread
unease about the use of lethal injection, and raising fundamental questions
about the administration of the death penalty. 'Pfizer's actions cement the
pharmaceutical industry's opposition to the misuse of medicine,' comments Maya
Foa, director at Reprieve. 'Over 25 global pharmaceutical companies have now
taken action to prevent the misuse of their medicines in executions.'
"It's very significant that the pharmaceutical industry is speaking with a
unified, singular voice saying we don't want our products used this way and
actually taking steps to ensure that they aren't," says Megan McCracken, a
lawyer at the Death Penalty Clinic at the University of California, Berkeley,
School of Law in the US.
It has been getting increasingly difficult for states to obtain lethal
injection drugs. This has driven US states to seek alternative, and in some
cases illegal, sources for these drugs, and has caused legal challenges in
numerous states. Meanwhile, countries around the world have blocked the use of
drugs in lethal injection. Some states have resorted to using unapproved
manufacturers from countries such as India or obtained them from 'compounding
pharmacies', which mix or alter drugs but whose products are not FDA-regulated.
Many states have put laws in place that prevent or prohibit the disclosure of
information about the source of drugs and how they're obtained. According to
the Death Penalty Information Center, lawsuits have been brought in Texas,
Georgia, Arkansas and Missouri to try to force states to identify drug
suppliers.
Now, says Foa, instead of passing secrecy laws intended to undermine the
safeguards put in place by drug companies, it is up to the states 'to respect
the legitimate commercial interests of the pharmaceutical industry and agree to
stop misusing their medicines in lethal injection executions'.
(source: rsc.org)
************
Will Pharmaceutical Companies Kill the Death Penalty?----Pfizer's move to
prohibit their drugs from being used in executions has made it even more
difficult for states to administer lethal injections.
Last week, Pfizer became the latest and largest pharmaceutical company to ban
the use of its products in lethal injections.
The ban marks another in a series of setbacks to the implementation of the
death penalty. According to a Gallup poll last fall, the death penalty is still
favored by 6 out of 10 Americans.
Lethal injection is the preferred means of execution on the federal level and
in the 31 states where capital punishment is legal. Typically, the condemned
person is first given an anesthetic to make them unconscious. Then they're
given drugs that stop breathing and induce cardiac arrest.
Because the person is asleep at the time of death, lethal injection is
generally considered the most humane means of execution.
Since lethal injection was introduced in the 1970s, sleep has been induced by
an anesthetic called sodium thiopental. But the last U.S. manufacturer of
sodium thiopental, Hospira, closed its North Carolina plant in 2009.
Since then, American prisons have experimented with other anesthetics,
including several still produced by Hospira. Pfizer acquired Hospira last year,
assuming control of those products.
Now, they will only be available to buyers who certify that the drugs won't be
resold to prisons, Pfizer officials say.
Ethical Objections
In a statement, the company described its policy as ethically necessary.
"Pfizer makes its products to enhance and save the lives of the patients we
serve. Consistent with these values, Pfizer strongly objects to the use of its
products as lethal injections for capital punishment," the statement reads.
Similar ethical considerations are cited by professional medical organizations,
such as the American Medical Association and the American Nurses Association.
Both groups discourage their members from participating in executions.
However, Dudley Sharp, an outspoken death penalty advocate, says the notion
that medical professionals are ethically required to steer clear of execution
is false.
"Neither the Hippocratic Oath nor 'do no harm' have anything to do with
executions," he wrote in a 2015 blog post.
According to medical historian Dr. Howard Markel, Hippocrates wrote, "As to
disease, make a habit of 2 things - to help, or at least, to do no harm."
Sharp points out that Hippocrates was speaking about treating disease
specifically. The issue is about criminal justice, not medical ethics, he says.
Seeking Other Methods
According to the Death Penalty Information Center, there are currently almost
3,000 prisoners on death row in the United States.
To carry out the death penalty, corrections officials are turning to
compounding pharmacies, which are more loosely regulated than large
pharmaceutical suppliers.
Some states are falling back on older execution methods. Utah, for example,
reauthorized use of the firing squad last April.
Sharp says it's up to the Supreme Court to say which methods of execution are
acceptable and which are unacceptable.
"The best method appears to be nitrogen gas - well known as painless, even
causing euphoria, acts very quickly, easily accessible, impossible to restrict,
easy to administer, using only an oxygen mask and a tank of nitrogen gas, no
gas chamber needed, extremely inexpensive," he told Healthline in an email.
Having 2nd Thoughts
Recent, highly publicized "botched" lethal injections - in which the condemned
person writhed, moaned, or took longer to die than expected - have contributed
to the death penalty's decreasing popularity, David Weiss, a lawyer for the
Center for Death Penalty Litigation in Durham, North Carolina, told Healthline.
"Even for the folks that agree it should be done they would also say it should
be done with care and with dignity and respect for human life. But when you
pull back the curtain it's very cavalier," he said. "They're writing these
protocols and not following the protocols."
But it's not just the process of execution that is turning people off, Weiss
said. The public is also rethinking the fairness and sureness of the judicial
system.
"I think jurors are starting to understand that you can never be 100 % sure
whether a person is guilty no matter what the evidence looks like at trial," he
said. "And for that reason it doesn???t make sense to impose a final,
irrevocable punishment."
Those who oppose the death penalty say it's imposed disproportionately on
minorities and the mentally ill.
Sharp argues against the notion that executions have been "botched." He thinks
that the availability of pentobarbital, another anesthetic, will allow for
death by lethal injection to continue.
Weiss, however, sees the practice, however it's performed, as an aging form of
justice.
"I think the big thing we can say is either it's over or it's heading in that
direction. There are just so many things that point to problems with it," he
said. "It's not a fixable institution."
(source: healthline.com)
**********************
Is Hillary Clinton The Last Democratic Presidential Candidate To Support The
Death Penalty?
In 1977, 2 years after he was convicted of robbing a shoe store and stabbing a
clerk to death, 22-year-old Henry Giles sat on death row at Arkansas' Cummins
Prison Farm, awaiting his execution by electric chair.
Psychologists had termed Giles "grossly retarded." With an IQ of just 59, it
was unclear at the time of trial if the young, black defendant fully understood
the severity of the charges against him.
"I really didn't know what the death penalty was," Giles wrote in a letter this
year.
15 years later, another black inmate, with a similarly low IQ of just 63, sat
on the same death row at Cummins. Rickey Ray Rector had been convicted of
murdering 2 men - 1 a police officer - and in 1992, the 42-year-old was
awaiting his execution by lethal injection.
But Rector had no knowledge or memory of the crimes he had committed. After
killing the officer who had come to arrest him for the 1st murder, Rector shot
a bullet through his own brain, essentially giving himself a frontal lobotomy.
During his trial, experts testified that he was "severely impaired" and lacked
the ability to grasp the concepts of past or future. He was only able to
respond to immediate sensations.
"When you'd ask him a question, you could tell he was trying to answer but it
was kind of like a skipping record," said John Jewell, 1 of Rector's appellate
lawyers. "He'd just keep coming back to the same questions. He couldn't
communicate clearly, articulately. I had no confidence that anything he was
telling me he actually knew."
Rector's attorneys filed numerous appeals, but the timing was not on their
side. Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton was also running for president, and he was
desperate to send the message that he was tough on crime - an issue that had
plagued him in previous campaigns. So he decided to take a break from the
campaign trail in New Hampshire to fly home to Arkansas, where he would oversee
Rector's execution.
From the governor's mansion, where he repeatedly denied pleas for a stay of
Rector's execution, Clinton was joined by the same person who, less than 2
decades earlier, was largely credited with saving Giles' life: Hillary Clinton.
The stories of Henry Giles and Rickey Ray Rector - both black, and both
severely mentally disabled - have dramatically different endings. Their fates
can be attributed partly to the political climate at the time of their
scheduled deaths and perhaps partly to when they crossed paths with the
Clintons.
But much of their experiences can be chalked up to the completely arbitrary
nature in which capital punishment is applied in the United States - an
argument that Clinton herself made in the 1970s. That one mentally disabled
black man is living, while another was put to death, tells the story of the
criminal justice system in a country in which an inmate's race, zip code, jury
composition, and attorney competence are all more likely to determine whether
he lives or dies than his crime.
Since launching her campaign for the White House last year, Hillary Clinton has
become a vocal supporter of comprehensive criminal justice reform. She has had
to apologize for aspects of her husband's '3 strikes' crime bill and has
backtracked on some of the 'tough-on-crime' language she used during the 1990s.
But there remains one area in which she is reluctant to embrace progressive
reform.
On multiple occasions this year, Clinton has expressed her support for the
death penalty. She usually qualifies her support, saying she believes capital
punishment should be used for certain federal crimes, like terrorist attacks
and mass shootings. And she says she doesn't think states should be able to
carry out capital punishment because of the arbitrary nature in which it's
applied and the possibility for human error. Nonetheless, she still believes
that the federal government should maintain a "very limited" use of capital
punishment.
"Maybe it's a distinction that is hard to support, but at this point, given the
challenges we face from terrorist activities in this country that end up under
federal jurisdiction for very limited purposes, I think it can still be held in
reserve for those," Clinton said of the death penalty during a March town hall
event.
Her support for the practice distinguishes her from the Democratic challengers
she's faced throughout the race. It also distinguishes her from the Democratic
electorate.
Just 56 % of Americans say they support capital punishment - a 40-year low,
down from 78 % just t2 decades ago. And just 40 % of Democrats favor the death
penalty, while 56 % are opposed. Being opposed to capital punishment is no
longer a handicap for Democratic presidential candidates; in fact, taking a
strong stance against the death penalty may even be beneficial in both a
primary and general election. And experts say we can expect to see a time in
the near future when support for the practice could actually be a liability.
But Clinton has not always supported allowing the government to end lives. In
fact, she launched her legal career by representing a death row inmate and
arguing the very opposite.
She has never mentioned it on the campaign trail and her campaign declined to
comment on her involvement, but as a young public interest lawyer with the
University of Arkansas' legal aid project in the 1970s, Clinton - then Hillary
Rodham - served as the lead attorney on the Cummins Prison Project, which
worked to defend prisoners at the notorious maximum security detention center.
The group frequently sent attorneys and students to Cummins to meet prisoners
in need of legal help.
One of those inmates was Henry Giles.
There is no evidence that Giles, who was 17 years old at the time of his crime,
planned his attack. According to court documents, he was walking down the
street in Forrest City, Arkansas when he noticed through the window of a Shoe
Outlet that Evelyn Drummond, a clerk, was alone. He then entered the store,
wrapped a wire around her neck, dragged her to the rear of the building, and
stabbed her twice with a knife. With the store empty, he rifled through the
cash register and pocketed the money. Immediately after, he found his brother,
Everett, and told him he had done something wrong.
In a signed confession, Giles told law enforcement he killed Drummond because
"something came over me to make me do something wrong." But his attorney said
Giles had no idea he was signing a confession.
"Those police wrote down what they wanted and I thought they were writing down
what I was saying," Giles wrote in a letter. "And I sign it. They didn't give
me no lawyer or said anything about one."
He was convicted of murder 4 months before his 18th birthday, and in May 1975,
an all-white jury sentenced him to die.
"I never understood any of it anyway," Giles wrote about his trial. "It was
something like me against the world ... The hole [sic] court room was white, so
you can see how that turn out."
From the start of his trial, questions were raised about his mental competence.
Giles had a verbal IQ of just 51, and Dr. Arthur Rogers, a clinical
psychologist employed by the Veteran's Administration in North Little Rock,
testified that his mental capacity was "quite, quite low, to put it mildly."
"Rogers was of the opinion, from his testing, that Giles had the intelligence
of an average seven or 8 year old person," court documents stated. "He said
that Giles' knowledge of arithmetic was essentially nonexistent. He thought
Giles could count up to 7 and could subtract 1 from 3, but could not figure out
change, even from 10 cents for a 6-cent purchase."
The doctor also testified that "Giles was on the borderline between a moron and
an imbecile," that he "tends to react immediately without thinking ahead," and
that it was very possible he did not understand his right to an attorney or the
charges he was facing.
In their motion to appeal, his attorneys wrote that "Henry Giles does not know
the degree of the charges against him ... [he] does not know he has been on
trial." They also argued that the jury left his age and mental deficiencies off
of the verdict forms - both factors that should have lessened his sentence.
Giles' memory of the trial has faded, and in a letter this year he wrote that
he never fully grasped what was happening in the courtroom anyway.
"I really didn't understand what the judge said," he said of first learning of
his death sentence. "I thought he said that you are sentence to 16 year in
prison. That what he sound like to me. I didn't know until the other lawyer
told me what he said."
After his sentencing in 1975, the Cummins Prison Project decided to take up
Giles' case. As its lead attorney, Clinton orchestrated the effort to have
Giles' sentence commuted to life in prison without parole. The project
submitted an amicus brief in Giles' appeal before the state supreme court,
arguing that because of his mental retardation, killing him would prove the
unconstitutional and arbitrary application of the death penalty.
According to the Arkansas Supreme Court's opinion from April 1977, Clinton and
her 2 co-counsel claimed in their brief that the state's capital punishment
statute "permits arbitrary selectivity in determining whether a defendant
charged with a capital felony murder shall live or die."
"Because the imposition of the death penalty is discretionary with the jury...
[and] because of the allegedly uncontrolled selective discretion of prosecuting
attorneys, trial judges, juries and the governor in choosing which defendants
will live and which will die in cases in which the death penalty might be
imposed," Giles should not be put to death, they argued.
The Arkansas Supreme Court sided with Clinton's prison project, and commuted
Giles' sentence to life without parole. Bill Clinton signed that commutation in
April 1977, as Arkansas' attorney general. The current Democratic presidential
front-runner's legal work was largely responsible for sparing Giles from
execution.
"The brief was credited with saving the life of Henry Giles, a retarded man
convicted of murder," wrote David Brock in his 1996 book, The Seduction of
Hillary Rodham.
Timing was another factor that spared Giles from the death chamber. At the time
Giles narrowly avoided the death penalty, the practice was not politically
popular. The U.S. Supreme Court effectively reinstated it just 2 months after
Clinton submitted her brief (4 years earlier, in 1972, it ruled that the death
penalty qualified as cruel and unusual punishment because states employed
execution in "arbitrary and capricious ways" and had imposed a temporary ban).
At the time, states were still reluctant to go through with the ultimate
punishment.
"We're in no hurry to bring the electric chair out of storage," Arkansas prison
spokesperson Tim Baltz told the AP in 1975. "No one is anxious to take a life."
But this was all about to change. After a crime wave in the 1970s stoked
people's panic about violence in their communities, Democrats began to fear
being labeled as soft-on-crime. In 1986, both parties helped pass legislation
creating mandatory minimum sentences for drug offenses - the effects of which
are still being felt today.
Clinton herself seemed to be aware of the forthcoming shift in public opinion.
Though she led the effort to save Giles from execution, she left her name off
the brief that was filed with the Arkansas Supreme Court. She has never
explained the decision, but Jeff Rosensweig, a friend of Bill's and a longtime
Arkansas criminal defense attorney, pointed out that Bill was running for
attorney general at the time and "it would be a problem" for the attorney
general's wife to be on the opposite side of a case against the state.
After securing a victory in Giles' case and leaving the Cummins Prison Project,
Clinton went on to work at a private law firm. She has since served as First
Lady of Arkansas and of the United States, U.S. Senator, Secretary of State,
and is now the leading candidate for the Democratic nomination to the
presidency.
Meanwhile, Giles, who is nearly deaf and stutters when he speaks, has now spent
more than 40 years incarcerated for his crime. "I been in prison longer than I
been home, or whatever that is," he wrote this year. Most of the time - except
for a few short stays in "the hole," or solitary confinement - he sleeps on one
of 50 beds in the north barrack of the East Arkansas Regional Unit, known to
the inmates as Brickeys.
"Life in prison is no life," he wrote in one five-page letter of looping
script. "You live in fear most of the time. There are time you never know what
the next person sitting by you may do. He may flip out anytime. I done seen it
happen so many time, it have you on edge, wondering if you next."
Giles said he no longer speaks with any family members and has not received
letters or visitors in years. Because of his hearing impairment, he is unable
to speak on the phone - the prison has an accessibility machine to help deaf
people use the phone, but Giles can't use it because he doesn't know how to
type. "In here you have nothing. Know [sic] family, friend, nobody really care
about you," he wrote. "But after so long, you know it only you and God."
Though he said he remains grateful that he escaped the electric chair, Giles
refers to life in prison without parole as "a death sentence, just a slow death
sentence." He writes a lot about what life might be like on the outside. "The
world would be a strange place," he said. "Everything is different now." But he
emphasizes that any situation on the outside would be better than being locked
up.
"If I have to live under bridges, cardboard boxes, that what I do. Or beg for
small change. It beat the hell out of coming back to prison."
"I don't feel I would make the same mistakes again," he continued in another
letter. "I was still a kid when I came here, never have a life, and I would
like to spend the rest of my life a free man. I don't know how much longer I
have left but I would like to be free."
As the decades passed and harsh sentencing legislation made its way through
Congress, people's perception of the death penalty also changed. By the late
1980s, Americans were obsessed with crime and were willing to go to any length
to lock away potential predators.
The Willie Horton ad from the 1988 presidential campaign is perhaps the most
memorable moment from that alarmist period. That year, Massachusetts Gov.
Michael Dukakis (D) was locked in a close race against George H.W. Bush (R). A
few months before Election Day, Bush's campaign released an ad called "Weekend
Passes" which attacked Dukakis using the case of Horton, a convicted felon who
raped a woman during a weekend furlough program that Dukakis supported.
"Dukakis not only opposes the death penalty, he allowed 1st-degree murderers to
have weekend passes from prison," a man's voice booms in the 30-second ad,
featuring grainy shots of Horton and Dukakis above bolded words like
"kidnapping," "stabbing," and "raping."
During that same election, Dukakis suffered another major blow: When he was
asked during a debate what he would do if his wife was raped and murdered, he
gave an unemotional response explaining his opposition to capital punishment.
It didn't sit well with the public.
Just how important was the death penalty to voters at the time? More
respondents to a poll said they would consider a candidate's support for
capital punishment when deciding who to vote for than they would his party.
Bush ended up defeating Dukakis by a landslide.
Going into the 1992 election, Bill Clinton was well aware of how Dukakis'
stance on criminal justice issues had hurt him with the electorate and that
dynamic had only become clearer: Polls at the time showed that nearly 80 % of
Americans approved of the death penalty. 1 commentator declared, "There is no
way the Democrats can nominate somebody against the death penalty and be
viable."
As 1 of Rector's earlier attorneys put it: "Poor ole Rickey Rector's timing
just happened to be real bad."
In 1981, 29-year-old Rector was at a dance hall in Conway, Arkansas. After
getting into a dispute about the entrance fee, he pulled a gun from his
waistband and shot 3 men, killing 1. He then ran from law enforcement for
several days before deciding to turn himself in to authorities. But when
Patrolman Robert W. Martin arrived at Rector's mother's house, where he was
waiting, Rector shot him in the jaw and neck, killing him almost immediately.
Rector then walked out of the house, held the gun to his own head, and shot
himself straight through his brain. Doctors at Little Rock's University
Hospital removed the bullet from behind his ear, and with it, about 3 inches of
his frontal brain tissue.
After the surgery, Rector suffered from "gross memory loss" and became "totally
incompetent" to assist any attorney who took his case, according to his
doctors. Psychologists testified in the ensuing trial that he "seemed unable to
grasp either the concept of past or future."
John Jewell represented Rector in his habeas corpus appeal - he was one of many
attorneys who took on the case and got to know Rector throughout the appeals
process. Jewell said he felt pity and sorrow for his client, but never a deeper
personal connection "because there wasn't anyone there to connect to."
Jewell never doubted Rector's guilt. Instead, he had serious doubts about a
system in which an all-white jury could condemn a mentally incompetent black
inmate to die. His focus was on commuting Rector's sentence to life in prison.
"That's all that we ever asked for - that he not be executed," he said. "Our
argument was that he wasn't competent to stand trial to begin with because of
the brain damage from when he tried to kill himself."
But multiple judges denied his appeals and Rector's execution was set for
January 1992. For Bill Clinton, who had privately wavered on his support for
the death penalty, the event was the perfect opportunity for him to look like
the tough-on-crime lawmaker he knew the country wanted. With the execution
falling right before the New Hampshire primary and Clinton looking to distract
voters from allegations about his personal life, Bill and Hillary flew home
from the campaign trail in order to be in Arkansas to oversee the execution.
It wasn't the 1st time Clinton scheduled a killing around his own campaigns -
his 2 previous executions were both held in an election year, and his next
execution would come a few months later - but it was the 1st time a
presidential candidate had made a spectacle over an execution.
"Never - or at least not in the recent history of presidential campaigns - has
a contender for the nation's highest elective office stepped off the campaign
trail to ensure the killing of a prisoner," the Houston Chronicle remarked at
the time.
From the governor's mansion, Clinton received multiple calls and pleas from
Rector's attorneys for stays of execution and pardons. But he denied all of
them.
"There were, I don't remember how many judges that had ruled the same way as
Clinton, saying no, I'm not going to pardon him," Jewell said. "It wasn't like
he did anything to change the direction of things. He just didn't do anything
to stop the execution."
The next year, Jeff Rosensweig, another of Rector's attorneys, would tell the
New Yorker that Clinton's decision was likely entirely political. "I think in
his heart of hearts Clinton would not have wanted to go through with Rickey's
execution," but "he figured he had to," Rosensweig said.
Hours before his death, Rector watched a news report about Clinton on the
prison TV. "I'm gonna vote for him. Gonna vote for Clinton," he said to those
present. That same execution night, Rector put the pecan pie from his final
meal to the side, saying he would save it for later.
Around 9:30 p.m., Carolyn Staley, a close friend of Bill Clinton's, found out
that Rector had not yet been killed - medics were having trouble locating a
vein and the execution had been delayed. Staley, who strongly opposed the death
penalty, decided to call the governor, according to her interview with the New
Yorker that year. When Clinton called her back that night, he spoke in a low
whisper, saying, "I'm not able to breathe, I'm destroyed."
"It's just awful. Just terrible, terrible," he continued.
At 10:09 p.m. on January 24, 1992, after he yelled out 8 times while medics
searched for a vein, Rector was pronounced dead.
There's no way of measuring the impact of the execution on the election, but
there were many who questioned why Clinton made the decision he did, when he
did.
A New York Times headline the day of the execution read: "Arkansas Execution
Raises Questions on Governor's Politics." "The case of Mr. Rector - the 3rd
execution to go forward during Mr. Clinton's tenure - raises knotty issues that
go beyond general support or disapproval of the death penalty," the article
noted, adding that Clinton was playing with the "undeniable politics of death."
The Washington Post also questioned Clinton's motives. "It seemed at odds with
his progressive, compassionate image, and it appeared to contradict his own
acknowledgment that capital punishment was not a deterrent," Richard Cohen
wrote in 1993.
Most news coverage of the execution honed in on Rector's mental capacity. In
1986, the Supreme Court had ruled that defendants subject to execution must
understand that they are being sentenced to death and why, but at the time of
Rector's death, the court had not yet ruled against the killing of the mentally
disabled.
"It wasn't the law yet but I think it was probably a case in which people saw
there needed to be some changes in the law," Jewell said.
In 2002, a decade after Rector was killed, the U.S. Supreme Court would rule
that executing people with intellectual disabilities violates the Eighth
Amendment's ban on cruel and unusual punishment. And 12 years later, the court
would narrow the state's discretion to determine who has an intellectual
disability. Had Rector, a defendant with an IQ of just 63, been sentenced after
2002, it's likely he would still be alive today.
Other legal battles in recent decades have also pointed to the random and
arbitrary application of the death penalty. In response, courts have narrowed
the cases in which the punishment can be used. In 2005, the Supreme Court
banned the execution of juveniles; in 2006 it ruled that DNA evidence can be
considered in death penalty appeals; and in 2008 it said that states cannot
impose the death penalty for any crimes less than murder. In 2015, just 49
people were sentenced to death, a 50-year low.
While fewer people are being put to death because of the changes in the law,
those still facing the punishment are not the worst, guiltiest, or the most
threatening. Most executions are concentrated in a few jurisdictions where the
penalty is still disproportionately applied. And the non-partisan U.S. General
Accounting Office has identified "a pattern of evidence indicating racial
disparities in the charging, sentencing, and imposition of the death penalty."
More than 75 % of executions are for crimes against white victims, and African
American defendants receive the death penalty at three times the rate of white
defendants in cases where the victims are white.
As more information about the disparities surface and as its use has become
more infrequent, public support for the death penalty has also waned. A recent
study found that a majority of Americans prefer life without parole to the
death penalty and opposition to the practice has reached its highest level in
43 years.
It's also becoming more mainstream for world leaders and politicians to
champion its abolition. Last year, Pope Francis called for an end to capital
punishment worldwide, declaring its use "inadmissible, no matter how serious
the crime committed." And in June of last year, U.S. Supreme Court Justices
Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote a dissent in a capital case saying
the death penalty may be unconstitutional and calling for a "full briefing" on
"whether the death penalty violates the Constitution."
"If trends on the ground continue in the direction that they are going, and new
justices to the court either replicate or are further to the left of the
current court - which is not a tremendously left-wing court - we think that
it's likely there will be a constitutional invalidation of capital punishment,"
said Carol Steiker, a Harvard Law School professor and expert on capital
punishment.
Clinton herself has said recently that she would "breathe a sigh of relief if
either the Supreme Court or the states themselves began to eliminate the death
penalty." That vision may not be far off - 19 states have already eliminated
it, and the Supreme Court may not be too far behind.
The Democratic front-runner's indication that she'd be relieved if the high
court resolved the issue likely means that her support for the death penalty is
more political than personal, Steiker said. But even her political support
seems unnecessary given the current climate on criminal justice issues.
Both of the men who mounted serious challenges to Clinton during the nominating
process - Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and former Maryland governor Martin
O'Malley - came out strongly against the death penalty. "The state, in a
democratic, civilized society, should not itself be involved in the murder of
other Americans," Sanders said last October.
Though the issue didn't come up much during the 2008 presidential election,
bipartisan support for criminal justice reform in recent years have once again
raised the political profile of capital punishment. President Barack Obama has
expressed his conflicted feelings about the death penalty and has called it
"deeply troubling" in practice, but he hasn't yet disavowed it entirely.
Which leaves Clinton, who may be the last Democratic presidential candidate to
support capital punishment.
Even some conservative leaders are beginning to come out against capital
punishment, also citing its arbitrary application. Marc Hyden, the national
advocacy coordinator for Conservatives Concerned about the Death Penalty,
called the practice "a worthless and albeit expensive and dangerous government
program" and "quintessential big, broken government."
Hyden, who used to work for the National Rifle Association, noted that the
practice is not pro-life, does not promote fiscal responsibility, and does not
represent limited government. "I don't think there's anything limited about
giving an error-prone state the power to kill its citizens," he said.
Ben Jealous, the former president of the NAACP who has endorsed and is
campaigning for Sanders, suggested that Clinton could quickly fall behind the
status quo. He has called the death penalty "the spawn of lynching in our
country."
"If Hillary Clinton wants us to trust that she will strong on criminal justice
reform, she needs to break with the death penalty and she needs to get back
into the progressive mainstream on criminal justice reform," Jealous said in
March. "We will see the death penalty abolished in this country in your
lifetime."
If Clinton were to win the White House this November, she could very well
oversee that historic moment. After appointing another liberal justice to the
Supreme Court, it's even more likely that the 9 justices will take up and
decide on a case invalidating the practice during Clinton's term.
While Clinton has not been a leader on the issue, experts say they expect she
would get there eventually.
"Fewer and fewer Americans are confident that the government can be counted on.
And where public opinion goes, political leaders eventually catch up," wrote
Frank Baumgartner, a UNC-Chapel Hill researcher who has created a statistical
index of public support for capital punishment. His analysis shows public
opinion is currently at an all-time low.
"One of the things successful politicians are good at is figuring out in what
direction public opinion is going," said Robert Durham, executive director of
the Death Penalty Information Center. "And they can either lead public opinion
to try to change it, or they can ride public opinion for their own gain."
Henry Giles, for one, is grateful that Clinton took a stand against the death
penalty early in her career. Giles recently celebrated his 62nd birthday from
Brickeys maximum security prison, the 44th birthday he has celebrated behind
bars. Though he called his life sentence a slower death penalty, he remains
grateful that he escaped the electric chair.
"Sometime I think back to the old days, and how life been for me," he wrote in
a letter. "Yes it hurt real bad. It really make you cry inside. Know [sic]
family to call you [since] my mom + dad pass while I was here. The rest of
them, god only know where. But you know I give thank to almighty god for every
day. That I am able to get up and enjoy life. That really a blessing. Smile."
(source: thinkprogress.org)
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