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News Commentary Archive from 2002
- Archive of News Commentary
See all CADP News Commentary links and excerpts from the years 2000 | 2001.
- About Broken Links
- Ashcroft Rigs Sniper Death Penalties
Seeing Mr. Ashcroft involve himself in determining who would get the privilege of trying John Muhammad and Lee Malvo, the boy and man accused of being the snipers who terrorized the Washington, D.C. area for most of October. His involvement was not precipitated by his eagerness to make sure that they would have the best chance of receiving a fair trial, about which he cares little, but to make sure they would have the best chance of receiving the services of death penalty, about which he cares a great deal. ... (Death Penalty counts Mr. Ashcroft as one of its closest friends even though Mr. Ashcroft professes to be a very devout Christian. To the non-Christian, it is an unending puzzle as to why certain Christians have such enthusiasm for putting others to death.) (11/9/02, The Daily Camera. News commentary by Christopher Brauchli.)
- Death and Elections
COLUMBIA, S.C. -- Bad behavior is what gets most people consigned to death row, but bad luck gets them on the execution calendar during an election year. Meet Richard Charles Johnson, the most recent addition to the opinion-poll execution roster. Johnson was executed in South Carolina last week amid a firestorm of controversy, and, you guessed it, a gubernatorial race. (5/9/02, The Daily Camera. News commentary by Kathleen Parker.)
- Death Penalty Bill Scrambles Assembly's Good Eggs
I wanted to track House Bill 1024, which simply has to be the dumbest and least-constitutional piece of proposed kill-'em-all legislation they've dreamed up in this week's special session. It would allow the state to execute murderers not by a unanimous jury vote, but by a minimum 10-2 majority. (7/10/02, Rocky Mountain News. News commentary by Bill Johnson.)
- Dickering on Death
This may sound impatient, but when is America going to stop fiddling at the margins of the death penalty debate and do the right thing -- abolish it? ... All this dickering about judges and tinkering with an immorally flawed system is fine, as far as it goes. But we could end all the wrangling and nit-picking if we'd just do what every other civilized nation has done: ban capital punishment altogether. (4/25/02, Editorial by The Daily Camera)
- For Legal Safety, Stick With Juries
Why try another experiment when the original system - jury determination of the death penalty - is already fully constitutional? The system may have flaws, but it's legally safe. (6/29/02, Editorial by the Rocky Mountain News)
- It's Time to Review the Death Penalty
As of now, it's unclear what the death penalty law is in Colorado, where two people are left on death row. As of now, it's a good time to look at the death penalty again. You know about the flaws. ... I'm against the death penalty not only because it's unfairly administered, but because it suggests we believe killing is an acceptable way to resolve a problem. You can see the logic problem: that we show killing is wrong by killing the killers. My opposition to the death penalty doesn't say I have any sympathy for someone like Francisco Martinez. What it says is, I don't want to be anything like him. (6/25/02, Rocky Mountain News. News commentary by Mike Littwin.)
- Lawmakers Got It Done
Although we long have opposed capital punishment, The Denver Post believes that if the extreme sanction is to be imposed, that decision properly belongs in the hands of 12 jurors, traditionally the conscience of the community. Mercifully, a House-passed proposal for a so-called "supermajority" that would have allowed a death sentence if 10 of 12 jurors approved died in the Senate -- and it should never be revived. (7/13/02, Editorial by The Denver Post)
- Nigeria: Intervention Needed to Prevent Execution for Sex
Nigeria should intervene, by force if necessary, to stop an "Islamic court" from proceeding with a travesty of a trial that could result in a woman being stoned to death. ... An Islamic court in the town of Fantua found Amina Lawal, 30, guilty of having sex out of wedlock, the penalty for which is to be half buried in the ground and then stoned to death. (8/26/02, Editorial by the Rocky Mountain News)
- No Need to Kill for Justice
On Tuesday, Texas executed the 800th death-row inmate since capital punishment was reinstated in 1976. Hours earlier, a federal judge in Vermont ruled that the federal death penalty is unconstitutional because it denies due process. What's wrong with this picture? What manner of schizophrenia makes America an international champion for humanitarian efforts and human rights, yet justifies state executions? Even as public opinion, courts, politicians and states challenge and turn against death-as-punishment, electric chairs and gas chambers keep churning out gallows justice. (9/28/02, Editorial by the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune, reprinted by The Daily Camera)
- Reforms Won't Make the Death Penalty Acceptable
No human institution is infallible, certainly not an emotionally charged criminal justice system, and we can never be sure we are executing rightly. There is no margin for error -- death is not reversible -- and error is inevitable. (6/29/01, Cox News Service. News commentary by Tom Teepen.)
- Supreme Court Justice O'Connor's Doubts Are a Start
(7/9/01, Los Angeles Times. News commentary by Joe Davidson.)
- Swinging Back: Court Rulings May Reflect Shift on Death Penalty
Following the development of reliable DNA technology that has exonerated dozens of death-row inmates, public certainty about state-sponsored execution has wavered, if only slightly. Now it appears that the heretofore-rigidly pro-death penalty Rehnquist court is shifting, as well. ... Neither ruling questions the essential constitutionality of capital punishment, but taken together, they seem to indicate moderation from a quarter of a century of rabid, pro-death-penalty sentiment among the public, politicians and jurists alike. This is good news. We've long argued that the death penalty neither deters crime nor serves its ostensible purpose of "closure" for murder victims' families. (6/25/02, Editorial by The Daily Camera)
- There is No Such Thing as a 'Free Ride' on Death Row
William Nieves did not come as a citizen of Colorado to address the House and Senate Judiciary committees. He came as a former citizen of death row. ... OK, you've heard it before. You've heard all the arguments, but it has been a while since you've heard them when there was no death penalty in Colorado. In the wake of the Supreme Court ruling that effectively struck down Colorado's law, we should be thinking hard about this issue - instead of hardly thinking. (7/9/02, Rocky Mountain News. News commentary by Mike Littwin.)
- Time to Execute Reform
WASHINGTON -- For years now, politicians have had a rule: When you can't do anything real to stop crime, just add a slew of new offenses to the list for which juries can impose the death penalty. It's painless for politicians, and lets them sound really tough. ... But, thanks to the Ryan Commission, we might ratchet up our concern over whether a nation that proudly touts its love of justice and compassion should be at ease with having more than 3,700 people on death row. We might ask ourselves whether we want to be the democratic world's capital not only of freedom but also of executions. (4/17/02, The Daily Camera. News commentary by E.J. Dionne, Washington Post)
- Yates, Andrea: The True Insanity
But even Texas law permits the jury to show compassion in the next phase of this trial: choosing between a sentence of life in prison, meaning she must serve at least 40 years before seeking parole, and death by lethal injection. ... Andrea Yates may not be legally insane. But the system that left her burdened with life-or-death responsibilities while refusing to help a pathetic woman who had been repeatedly diagnosed with severe mental illness is insane by any definition of the word. (3/14/02, Editorial by The Denver Post)
- Young, Guilty and Mentally ill
WASHINGTON -- Georgia: Don't kill Alexander Williams. If you've already done so, you might read the remainder of this column for your amusement. But if you haven't: Don't kill him. ... Williams, prosecution and defense agree, is a mental case, a schizophrenic -- and was when he raped and killed Aleta Bunch. According to a coalition of death-penalty opponents who've come together to oppose this execution, Williams' mental illness is so severe he has to be medicated just to get him sane enough to be executed. (2/25/02, The Daily Camera. News commentary by William Raspberry.) In a followup story, it was reported that Williams death sentence was commuted to life in prison (2/25/02, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution)
- We Should Act Like We Are Better Than They
The issue is the death penalty itself, which in this case amounts to nothing more than vengeance. It cannot be a deterrent since men who are willing to die cannot, by definition, be deterred. If there are more suicide terrorists coming our way, they are not likely to pause because Moussaoui faces the death penalty or, if he is convicted, actually dies for his crime. Death is what they expect. (4/5/02, The Daily Camera. News commentary by Richard Cohen.)
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