[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

2018-11-09 Thread Rick Halperin





Nov. 9



SOUTH AFRICA:

Ex-SA colonel returns home after escaping South Sudan death penalty


William Endley, the former South African defence colonel, is back home from 
South Sudan after being pardoned by President Salva Kiir last week after he was 
sentenced to death by hanging by a court in the capital Juba in February 
following his conviction on charges of espionage and conspiring to overthrow 
the government.


Speaking to the media on Thursday, Endley said he was enjoying drinking a cold 
beer and the freedom of being able to move around after being held in solitary 
confinement for long periods of time.


And despite his traumatic imprisonment, in what his family told the African 
News Agency (ANA) were appalling conditions, Endley said on Thursday he would 
have no problem returning to South Sudan if asked, adding that Dr Riek Machar, 
the leader of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement-In Opposition (SPLM-IO) 
had already requested him to return to help integrate rebels with the national 
army - the reason he said he went to the country in the first place.


He was arrested in August 2016 when renewed fighting between government troops 
and the SPLM-IO broke out after Machar had first returned from exile to take 
part in a transitional unity government.


His defence argued against the charges stating that Endley was only performing 
his duties as a security contractor to help Machar's forces integrate into the 
South Sudanese Army.


South Sudan won independence from Sudan in 2011 but plunged into a civil war in 
2013 after Kiir accused Machar - then vice president - of plotting a coup 
against him.


The 5-year civil war has killed an estimated 380 000 people and left nearly 2 
1/2 million others displaced.


(source: African News Agency)





LIBERIA:

UN Human Rights Committee Wants Liberia Repeal Death Penalty


The United Nations Human Rights Committee (HRC) has reiterated its
call to the Liberian Government to abolish the death penalty which was 
reintroduced in 2008.


Addressing a 1-day national human rights consultation held in Monrovia on 
Wednesday, November 7, a member of the HRC, Margo Waterval said it was 
unfortunate for Liberia, as a State party to the Second Optional Protocol to 
the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to reintroduce the 
death penalty in its Penal Code.


The Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and 
Political Rights, which aims at the abolition of the death penalty, is a side 
agreement to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).


Ms. Margo noted that although no execution has taken place since 2008, the 
judiciary continues to sentence people to death.


Her statement is in line with a set of recommendations that the HRC submitted 
to the Government of Liberia at the Covenant on Civil and Political Rights 
(CCPR) meeting, which took place in Geneva in July 2018.


The 48-count recommendations, among other things, centered on the abolition of 
the death penalty, impunity and past human rights violations and the 
administration of justice and fair trial.


The committee recalled that adherence to the Second Optional Protocol requires 
that Liberia, as a state party takes all necessary measures to abolish the 
death penalty within its jurisdiction and become an abolitionist country in 
practices as well as in law.


In addition, it petitioned the government to remove any provisions in its 
legislation that provide for the death penalty and to commute all existing 
death sentences as well as refrain from carrying out any execution.


On impunity and past human rights violation, the Committee called on Liberia to 
establish a process of accountability for past gross human rights violations 
and war crimes that conform to international standards, including concerning 
independence and expertise of the judiciary, victims’ access to justice, due 
process and fair trial guarantees, and witness protection.


The committee: “Ensure that all alleged perpetrators of gross human rights 
violations and war crimes are impartially prosecuted and, if found guilty, 
convicted and punished in accordance with the gravity of the acts committed, 
regardless of their status or any domestic legislation on immunities, and 
remove any persons who have been proven to be involved in gross human rights 
violations and war crimes.”


For administration of justice and fair trial, the committee recommends that 
Liberia should pursue it effort to reform the justice system and ensure that 
all court proceedings are conducted in full observance of due process 
guarantees set forth in article 14 of the covenant.


Meanwhile, during the consultation, the civil society organizations resolved to 
engage government stakeholders to ensure the implementation of the HCR 
recommendations.


Some of the recommendations highlighted during the consultation included the 
promotion of gender equality, criminalizing all forms of ha

[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, FLA., MISS., KY., ARK., USA

2018-11-09 Thread Rick Halperin





November 9




TEXAS:

Texas AG fights Harris County prosecutors to keep Bobby Moore on death row
Prosecutors and defense lawyers agree that Bobby Moore is too 
intellectually disabled to execute - but the state of Texas wants him put to 
death anyway.



A day after Harris County prosecutors made the rare move of siding with a death 
row inmate in a Supreme Court filing, the Texas Office of the Attorney General 
took the possibly unprecedented step of asking to take on the case and keep 
pushing for the death chamber.


"The DA, who represents just 1 of Texas's 254 counties, does not represent the 
Attorney General's interest," the state's top prosecutor wrote, claiming that 
the district attorney offered "no analysis" beyond "2 conclusory sentences" in 
her filing a day earlier.


The state's 17-page brief represents yet another twist in a groundbreaking case 
that's already shaken up how Texas determines whether a prisoner is too 
intellectually disabled to be put to death.


Lawyers for Moore, an attorney general spokesperson and the district attorney's 
office all did not weigh in on Wednesday's filing. A day earlier, Harris County 
District Attorney Kim Ogg offered a short statement pointing to an earlier 
Supreme Court decision in the case.


"We agree with the Supreme Court that the intellectually disabled should not be 
executed," she said.


The convicted killer was 1 of 3 men involved in a botched robbery at the 
Birdsall Super Market, a 1980 slaying in which he fired the shot that killed 
elderly store clerk James McCarble. That same year, the former carpenter was 
sentenced to death during his 1980 trial.


For more than 3 decades, Moore fought his appeals, once coming within hours of 
execution. Then, in 2017, the Supreme Court handed down a groundbreaking 
decision, in a 5-3 ruling determining that Texas had been, for years, not 
properly measuring intellectual disability in cases like Moore's. The ruling 
booted Moore's claims back to a lower court, where prosecutors switched course 
and asked for a life sentence.


But - even though the district attorney's office agreed to the more lenient 
outcome - the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals didn't, handing down a split 
decision Moore's lawyers condemned as an "outlier" and "inconsistent" with the 
higher court.


Last month, Moore's legal team appealed that ruling up to the Supreme Court 
again, asking the justices to yet again examine the state's standards for 
intellectual disability, but also asking the high court to consider whether an 
execution should count as unconstitutional if both sides agree that it is.


"As far as counsel is aware, this Court never has permitted an execution when 
both the prosecutor and the defendant agree that the defendant is 
intellectually disabled and ineligible for execution," defense attorney Cliff 
Sloan and Pat McCann wrote in their Supreme Court filing. "For good reason."


Although the Supreme Court banned states from executing intellectually disabled 
prisoners more than a decade ago, for years Texas skirted that by relying on an 
out-dated, nonclinical test to evaluate mental capacity.


Named after plaintiff Jose Briseno, the test used seven questions to determine 
intellectual disability, as outlined in a 2004 ruling that famously referenced 
"Of Mice and Men" character Lennie as someone most Texans would agree should be 
exempt from the death penalty.


But even though he failed every single grade, did not understand the days of 
the week by age 13, and fell below the standard for being able to live 
independently as an adult, under the old standard Moore still didn't qualify as 
intellectually disabled.


The Court of Criminal Appeals twice decided that despite his apparent deficits, 
he was still fit to execute. Then last year the Supreme Court reversed the 
first of those two decisions with its groundbreaking 5-3 ruling.


The high court's 2017 ruling didn't just impact Moore's case, it also ordered 
Texas to come up with new standards - something other than the Briseno factors 
- for determining intellectual disability.


The ruling sparked a stream of requests from inmates hoping to get off death 
row, and 2 condemned killers won stays this year because of the decision.


But even the Supreme Court's decision hasn't been enough to spare Moore - at 
least not yet. After the high court's decision last year, prosecutors in 
November 2017 agreed with the defense that a life sentence was appropriate.


And still, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals said no. Even though the appeals 
court came up with a new, clinical standard for measuring intellectual 
disability, they still found that Moore didn't meet it.


So in October, Moore's lawyers filed another appeal in the Supreme Court. On 
Tuesday, the district attorney's office agreed.


"The respondent parts company with the TCCA in its determination that the 
applicant is not intellectually disabled," the district attorney's office 
wrote.