[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide
Sept. 8 IRAN: 38 People Executed in August 2019The actual number of executions may be even higher than reported. At least 38 people were executed in August 2019 in Iran. In sum, between January 1 and August 31, 2019, at least 185 people have been executed in the country. The number shows an increase compared to the same period last year. According to the Iran Human Rights statistic department, at least 38 people were executed in August 2019 in Iran, including 2 public hangings and 36 executions inside prisons. Most of those executed (30), were sentenced to qisas (retribution in kind) for murder charges. 6 others were executed for drug-related charges and 2 for Moharebeh (waging war against God). Iranian officials or media have only announced 13 executions in August 2019. The rest were confirmed by Iran Human Rights (IHR). Only unannounced executions confirmed by two independent sources are included in our reports. Therefore, the actual number of executions may be even higher than reported. The number of executions in August 2019 shows a rise compared with the same period last year. In August 2018, at least 20 people were executed in Iran. Moreover, 185 people have been executed between January 1 and August 31, 2019. This figure also shows a rise compare to the same period last year which 165 executions were recorded. (source: Iran Human Rights) SOUTH AFRICA: The state has no business administering the death penalty Neither the death penalty, nor a state of emergency can curb the savage violence that society appears to have licensed. Only a restoration of values and an effective state can, writes Ebrahim Fakir. The past few days have seen renewed calls for the reintroduction of capital punishment and the imposition of a "state of emergency" in response to the wanton brutality, criminality and impunity of the recurrently xenophobic, but more properly, generalised criminal violence and theft. The long scourge of brutal rape of and violence against women, which culminated this past week in the rape and murder of Uyinene Mrwetyana have intensified these calls. The death penalty and a state of emergency are considered by some of its proponents locally as an antidote to the inability of authorities to effectively police recurrent outbreaks of criminal looting and xenophobic violence and the seemingly constant savage criminality that South Africans have to live with. Those who want the imposition of capital punishment or the declaration of a state of emergency believe that it will also serve to curb the scourges that society's public morality and civic ethics have failed to contain and miraculously restore them. Surprisingly, calls for both feign ignorance of South Africa's horrendous apartheid past, which eroded all sense of public ethics but worse, when these were used - not as instruments of effective policing and social control, but - as instruments of political oppression and socio-economic marginalisation and exclusion. My concern here is two-fold. Apart from being inhumane and ineffective, capital punishment is premised on a society anchored in unmediated vengeance, victimisation and retribution rather than reconciliatory rehabilitation. Apart from the moral problematic, the administration of capital punishment and its utility as a deterrent is entirely dependent on capable and effective policing and the efficient administration of justice. States of emergencies extend the power of the repressive instruments of the state in extraordinary ways, which, to be a means for the restoration of social order, requires reasonable levels of state capacity, especially in the criminal justice cluster. This can't be said of South Africa at present, which would render both these measures moot, except to entrench the well-known impunity with which an incapable, inept and corrupted security establishment behaves and further license the impudent unaccountability of the political class in charge of them. For good reason, capital punishment was scrapped in 1995. Instrumentally, the re-imposition of capital punishment will require a two-thirds majority in the National Assembly and the support of six of the nine provinces in the National Council of Provinces (NCOP). This implies that six of the nine provinces will need to resolve in favour of capital punishment at provincial level and instruct their delegations to the NCOP to support a resolution in favour of it. This is an unlikely prospect. But the elaborate and practical legislative process impediment ought to be less serious a consideration. The values of society and the use of these instruments as effective modes of deterring criminal barbarism and social control are. On this score, the evidence is that in South Africa this is unlikely to be prudent, or effective. Globally, there is no proof that capital punishment is effective as a deterrent to abhorrent violent
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, FLA., OHIO, CALIF.
Sept. 8 TEXAS: County may renew membership in death penalty defender program The Hunt County Commissioners Court is scheduled this week to renew the county’s membership in a program which helps pay for defense attorneys in death penalty capital murder cases. A vote to approve the renewal of the interlocal agreement with Lubbock County through the Regional Public Defender for Capital Cases program is included under the consent calendar for the regular session, starting at 10 a.m. Tuesday inside the Auxiliary Courtroom, 2700 Johnson Street, in Greenville. Hunt County has been a part of the program since first enrolling in August 2012. The West Texas Regional Public Defender Office was established in 2007 through interlocal agreements between the counties in the 7th and 9th judicial regions, with Lubbock County serving as the administrative county. Each participating county agrees to pay a yearly fee, based on its population and the number of capital murder cases it has filed within the last 10 years. The cost of the program to Hunt County is on a sliding scale, with the costs rising each year. There are some limitations to the program. In the event 2 people are charged with capital murder and are facing the death penalty in the same case, the office could only defend 1 of them. The office also doesn’t handle the appeals of any convictions, nor does it pay for “second chair” defense attorneys, both of which would be still be paid for through the county. The office also does not handle capital murder cases where the death penalty is not being sought. Hunt County currently has 4 potential death penalty capital murder cases pending trial, two of which at last report are being represented by the West Texas Regional Public Defender Office. (source: Greenville Herald-Banner) ** Lawyers say the Texas judge who presided over this Jewish death row inmate’s trial later called him anti-Semitic slursLawyers for Randy Halprin, a member of the "Texas Seven," are requesting a stay of his execution amid allegations that the judge who handled his case made racist and anti-Semitic comments during his time on the bench. “Lawyers say the Texas judge who presided over this Jewish death row inmate’s trial later called him anti-Semitic slurs” was first published by The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans — and engages with them — about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues. Lawyers for “Texas Seven” gang member Randy Halprin, who is Jewish, requested a stay of his execution set for Oct. 10 amid allegations that the judge who handled his case in 2003 made racist and anti-Semitic comments during his time on the bench. In a filing Thursday, Halprin’s lawyers accused former criminal court Judge Vickers Cunningham of describing Halprin using expletive-laden anti-Semitic comments after the trial ended. The Dallas Morning News also reported during Cunningham’s 2018 Republican primary race for Dallas County commissioner that each of his children could only receive an inheritance by marrying a straight, white Christian. During the election, Cunningham acknowledged putting such stipulations in his will. He lost the race by 25 votes. Halprin is on death row for capital murder in connection to a high-profile 2000 prison escape during which seven inmates went on the run. The group robbed a North Texas sporting goods store on Christmas Eve, and Irving police Officer Aubrey Hawkins was shot and killed as he responded to that crime. The escaped inmates fled to Colorado, where most of them were arrested in January 2001. Four of the gang members have already been executed, and a fifth shot himself before police could arrest him. The seventh member is also scheduled to be executed this fall. Halprin’s attorneys wrote in the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals filing that Cunningham could have biased the case in areas ranging from jury selection to evidence submission. Cunningham also prevented the jury from knowing that state officials labeled Halprin as the “weakest” of defendants, according to court documents, which his attorneys said might have caused jurors to consider alternative sentences to the death penalty. Cunningham has denied the allegations of bias in Halprin’s case, and of being racist and anti-Semitic, according to various news reports. The 69-page filing calls Cunningham a “racist and anti-Semitic bigot” in the first sentence and accuses him of believing Jews “needed to be shut down because they controlled all the money and all the power.” Halprin’s lawyers also wrote that minorities who walked into his courtroom knew they were “going to go down” regardless of the evidence or what happened at the trial. Halprin’s federal public defender, Tivon Schardl, said they began looking into Cunningham following the Morning News’ investigation last year. Prior to that,
