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National News Archive from 2005
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of National News
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- CA:
Williams' Death Doesn't End Debate on
Life
The argument over whether convicted
killer Stanley Tookie Williams was a
man of peace or a death-row con artist
raged on after his execution Tuesday,
with supporters announcing they would
give him a funeral "befitting a
statesman." The 51-year-old founder
of the bloody Crips gang died by injection
at San Quentin Prison just after midnight
for the murders of four people in two
1979 holdups, professing his innocence
to the very end, even when an admission
of guilt might have helped save his life.
His last, best hope was an act of mercy
by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. But the
governor was unconvinced by Williams'
supporters several Hollywood stars among
them who argued that he had redeemed
himself behind bars with memoirs, children's
books and lectures against the dangers
of gang life. (12/13/05, ABC.com)
- CA:
Pending Execution has Reignited Debate
LOS
ANGELES -- Day and night, a cadre of
the condemned -- 3,500 men and 54 women
-- await their fate in U.S. prisons on
death row. But the life of a single convict
scheduled to die by lethal injection
at California's San Quentin prison Dec.
13 -- Stanley "Tookie" Williams
-- has reignited a passionate debate
among people of faith over accountability
and punishment, forgiveness and redemption.
... Jewish, Christian, Muslim and Buddhist
clerics and scholars said this week that
the Williams case is fraught with ethical
and moral implications. ... after
nearly 25 years behind bars, Williams
has become for many people an icon of
redemption. He has written 10 children's
books imploring youths to stay out of
gangs. He helped mediate gang treaties.
His life became the subject of a made-for-television
movie, "Redemption," starring
actor Jamie Fox. Williams continues to
profess his innocence. (11/20/05, The
Daily Camera)
- CT:
First New England Execution in 45 Years
Serial killer Michael Ross was put
to death early today in Somers, Conn.
It was the first execution in New England
in almost 50 years. ... Some relatives
of Ross' victims said they gained no
comfort from witnessing his death. "I thought I would feel closure,
but I felt anger, just watching him lay
there," said Debbie Dupuis. Her
sister, Robin Stavinsky, was 19 when
Ross killed her. The Ross case helped
reignite debate about the death penalty
in New England, where most states lack
a facility to carry out capital punishment.
(5/13/05, Los Angeles Times)
- GA:
Prosecutorial Misconduct Overturns Georgia
Death Penalty Case
A Georgia
Superior Court overturned the murder
conviction of death row inmate Willie
Palmer after finding that prosecutors
hid a $500 payoff to the state's key
trial witness, an act the judge said
was "in defiance of (the state's)
legal and ethical duties." The judge
also threw out Palmer's death sentence
on the grounds that his trial lawyer
failed to investigate and present evidence
of Palmer's mental retardation. (4/11/05, DPIC)
- KS: Lawmakers Refuse to Fix Death Penalty
Statute
Kansas lawmakers have decided not to vote
on a proposed fix to the state's death
penalty statute, a decision that could
put the future of the law in the hands
of the U.S. Supreme Court. In 2004, the
Kansas Supreme Court overturned the death
penalty because of the way jurors were
instructed in capital cases. Some legislators
are hoping that the U.S. Supreme Court
will reverse the Kansas court's decision. (2/28/05, DPIC Update)
- MO:
Some Doubt Guilt of Executed Man
ST.
LOUIS -- Many death
row inmates proclaim their innocence,
but Roy "Hog" Roberts, a big
man, loud and profane, was adamant. He
was so convinced of his innocence that
in the waning days before his 1999 execution
for the murder of a prison guard, he
demanded a polygraph test. ... He passed.
... A few days later, Roberts was put
to death. Roberts' case is back in the
spotlight amid heightened scrutiny of
the death penalty in Missouri and a new
investigation in a separate case into
whether the state executed an innocent
man. In 2000, the anti-death penalty
group Equal Justice USA released a national
report citing 16 potential cases of wrongful
executions. (8/5/05, ABC.com)
- NY:
Death Penalty's History Housed at UAlbany
Library
ALBANY -- During a taxi ride in 1983
in Washington, D.C., two men actively involved
in the national debate over the death penalty
discussed strategy. Except for a single private
letter on the matter, the meeting between
Hugo Bedau, a scholar at Tufts University,
and Ira Glasser, head of the American Civil
Liberties Union, there would be no record
of the event. That letter, part of the papers
of Professor Bedau, is now in the collection
of the National Death Penalty Archive at
the University at Albany Libraries. The archive
is the only repository in the nation devoted
solely to the death penalty. ... UAlbany
Prof. James Acker said the official opening
of the archive is especially timely. "This
seems to be potentially a very interesting
time of change in this country," Acker
said of the intensified debate over the death
penalty. The U.S. leads the world in state-sanctioned
deaths, Acker said: more than 20,000 since
colonial times and 1,000 since 1977. (8/10/05,
Troy Record) - NY: Poll Shows More Support for Prison
than Death
A recent New York Times poll found that
56% of surveyed New York voters prefer
a sentence of life in prison (either without
parole or with the possibility of parole)
over the death penalty for people convicted
of murder. Only 34% said they supported
the death penalty, a significant drop from
the 48% who supported it in 1994. (2/28/05, DPIC Update)
- PA:
Man Becomes 122nd Inmate Freed From Death
Row
More than 16 years after a Pennsylvania jury
returned three death sentences against Harold
Wilson, new DNA evidence has helped
lead to his acquittal. Yesterday, Wilson
became the nation’s 122nd person freed
from death row. (11/21/05, DPIC Update)
- TX:
Did Texas Execute an Innocent Man?
Four days after a Bexar County jury delivered
its verdict, Cantu wrote this letter to
the residents of San Antonio: "My
name is Ruben M. Cantu and I am only 18
years old. I got to the 9th grade and I
have been framed in a capital murder case." (11/19/05,
Houston Chronicle)
- TX:
Executed Texas Woman Had Notorious Lawyer
Frances Newton was denied a basic requirement
for a fair trial - a competent lawyer.
Her attorney at trial was the notorious
Ron Mock, whose shoddy work in capital
murder trials is well known in legal
circles. He has been repeatedly disciplined
by the State Bar of Texas, and has since
been disqualified from handling capital
cases. No less than 16 people whom Mock
represented were sent to death row. Mock
apparently did no investigation of Newton's
claims of innocence. When asked by a
trial judge, he could not name a single
witness he had interviewed on Newton's
behalf. (Editorial by the Austin American-Statesman,
reprinted in 9/19/05 DPIC Update)
- TX:
Woman Faces Execution Despite Questions
of Guilt
As Texas prepares to execute Frances
Newton on September 14, her attorneys
have raised questions in a clemency petition
about her guilt based on new evidence,
including conflicting accounts of whether
investigators recovered a second gun
at the crime scene. Newton, who would
be the first black woman executed in
the state since the Civil War, was sentenced
to death for the 1987 killings of her
husband and her two children. (8/29/05,
DPIC Update)
- TX:
New Law May Lower Texas Executions
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) -- Gov. Rick Perry
signed a law Friday to give juries the
option of sentencing murderers to life
without parole -- a measure some foes
of capital punishment believe will lead
to fewer executions in the No. 1 death
penalty state. ... Death penalty opponents
backed the change, saying prosecutors
use the prospect that a killer will someday
be back out on the streets to scare juries
into issuing more death sentences. ...
Texas leads the nation in executions,
with nine this year and 345 since the
state resumed the practice in 1982. Of
the 38 states with executions, Texas
and New Mexico were the only ones that
lacked the life-without-parole option.
(6/18/05, CNN.com) - TX: Senate Refuses to Give Jurors the
Sentencing Option of Life Without Parole
Legislation that would allow those convicted
of capital murder to be sentenced to life
in prison without parole recently failed
to win a key procedural vote in the Texas
Senate, largely because of opposition from
prosecutors and pro-death penalty organizations
who said it would result in fewer death
sentences. Although supported by a strong
majority of the senators and the people
of Texas, the bill needed a 2/3 majority
in order to be debated. The Senate's failure
to pass the bill means that Texas and New
Mexico remain the only two death penalty
states in the nation to not offer life
without parole as an alternative sentencing
option. (4/11/05, DPIC)
- TX:
Newspaper Reviews Gonzalez Clemency Memos
The Washington Post has conducted further
research into the clemency memos prepared
by U.S. Attorney General nominee Alberto
R. Gonzales, who served as lead counsel to
then-Governor George W. Bush in Texas. Gonzales
crafted 62 memos regarding clemency requests
from Texas death row inmates, and several
Texas attorneys have voiced their criticisms
that the clemency memos contained incomplete
and unfair summaries of evidence and mitigating
circumstances. (1/10/05, DPIC Update)
- USA:
Growing
Concern Among Jurors in Death Penalty
Cases
A recent Newsweek article
notes that a growing number of jurors
in capital murder cases are voicing
their concerns about the accuracy and
fairness of the justice system. Some
of these jurors have petitioned the
legal authorities to correct injustices
regarding possibly innocent or incorrectly
sentenced inmates. "I
felt like I was pushed into making the
decision of the 10 other jurors. I didn't
feel comfortable with it, but I didn't
know my rights as a juror," said
Sylvia Coeburn. (12/20/05, DPIC Update)
- U.S.
Executes 1,000th Person Since 1977
"The execution of Kenneth Boyd
has not made this a better or safer world," his
attorney, Thomas Maher, said. "If
this 1,000th execution is a milestone,
it's a milestone we should all be ashamed
of." (12/2/05, CNN.com)
- USA: Nears
1,000th Execution Since 1977
In the last
28 years, the U.S. has executed on average
one person every 10 days. The focus of the
debate on capital punishment was once the
question of whether it served as a deterrent
to crime. Today, the argument is more on
whether the government can be trusted not
to execute an innocent person. (11/24/05,
Rocky Mountain News)
- USA:
Patriot Act Reauthorization Could Impact
Federal Death Penalty Several provisions
contained within the U.S. House of
Representatives version of legislation
to reauthorize the USA Patriot Act
anti-terrorism law aim to dramatically
transform the federal death penalty
system by allowing smaller juries to
decide on executions and giving prosecutors
the ability to try again if the jury
deadlocks on sentencing. The legislative
changes, sponsored by Texas Congressman
John Carter, would also triple the number
of terrorism-related crimes eligible
for the death penalty. Carter's amendment,
called the Terrorist Death Penalty
Enhancement Act, would add 41 crimes
to the 20 terrorism-related offenses
currently eligible for capital punishment.
It would also make it easier for prosecutors
to seek a capital conviction in cases
where the defendant did not have the
intent to kill. (10/31/05, DPIC Update)
- USA:
Murder Rate Declined in 2004, Even As
Death Penalty Use Dropped
Even as the use of the death penalty
continued to decline in the United States,
the number of murders and the national
murder rate dropped in 2004. According
to the recently released FBI Uniform
Crime Report for 2004, the nation's murder
rate fell by 3.3%, declining to 5.5 murders
per 100,000 people in 2004. By region,
the Northeast, which accounts for less
than 1% of all U.S. executions, continued
to have the nation's lowest murder rate,
4.2. The Midwest had a murder rate of
4.7, and the murder rate in the West
was 5.7. The South, which has carried
out more than 80% of all U.S. executions,
again had the nation's highest murder
rate, 6.6. (FBI Uniform Crime Report
2004, released October 2005). In 2004,
the number of executions, the number
of death sentences, and the size of death
row all declined compared to 2003. (10/24/05, DPIC Update) - USA:
Federal Judge Says Death Penalty Is "Beyond
Repair"
In a dissenting opinion
filed in the capital case of Moore
v. Parker, Judge Boyce Martin of the
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth
Circuit wrote that "the
death penalty in this country is arbitrary,
biased, and so fundamentally flawed at
its very core that it is beyond repair." Among
his many criticisms of the way capital
punishment is applied in the U.S., Martin
specifically noted his concerns about
the issues of innocence, inadequate defense
counsel, and the overall arbitrariness
of the system. (10/10/05, DPIC Update) - USA:
Judicial Conference Opposes Bill Cutting
Appeals
The Judicial Conference of
the United States, the policy making
body of the nation's federal judges,
wrote a strong letter to members of the
Senate Judiciary Committee opposing parts
of the Streamlined Procedures Act (S.1088)
that would curtail death penalty appeals.
The bill is scheduled to be marked up
by the Committee on Thursday, September
29. The judges said the bill could "create unreasonable obstacles
to resolution" of death penalty
cases, and that it could "undermine
the traditional role of the federal courts
to hear and decide the merits of claims
arising under the Constitution." The
bill has also been opposed by the American
Bar Association, the Conference of (State)
Chief Justices, and many former prosecutors.
(10/3/05, DPIC Update)
- USA:
Amnesty International Examines Execution
of the Mentally Ill
An article in the
Fall 2005 edition of the magazine Amnesty
International examines whether mentally
ill defendants should be exempted from
the death penalty, especially in light
of the Supreme Court's rulings exempting
juvenile and mentally retarded offenders.
The article quotes Ohio Northern University
law professor Victor Streib: "The general public
too often assumes that only the seriousness
of the crime is relevant to the punishment,
but the (Supreme) Court has repeatedly
held that both the serious(ness) of the
crime and the character and background
of the defendant must be considered in
the sentencing decision. If certain mentally
ill defendants think and act like juveniles
or the mentally retarded, then they should
be excluded from death row." (9/12/05, DPIC Update)
- USA:
Two Cases Added to DPIC Innocence List,
Bringing Total to 121
The Death
Penalty Information Center recently
became aware of two older capital cases
in which the defendants had been sentenced
to death but were later acquitted at
re-trial. We have added Christopher
McCrimmon of Arizona and Larry Fisher
of Mississippi to our innocence list,
bringing the total number of people released
from death row on the basis of innocence
to 121 since 1973. McCrimmon is the eighth
person to be exonerated from Arizona’s
death row, and Fisher is the second death
row exoneree from Mississippi. A brief
description of the cases follows. (8/22/05, DPIC Update)
- USA: Majority
of States Do Not Actively Use Death Penalty
Most U.S. states either do not have a death penalty at all or almost never
use it. Twenty-nine states have carried out three or fewer executions in the
past 30 years or have a moratorium on executions. Almost all of these states
carried out no more than one execution in 30 years. Only 9 states have averaged
at least one execution per year since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976,
and only 4 of those states (Texas, Virginia, Oklahoma, and Missouri) have averaged
two or more executions per year during that time. (6/20/05, DPIC Update)
- USA:
Murders Decline Even as Number of Executions
Drop
Preliminary data from the FBI's Uniform Crime Report for 2004 found that murders
in the U. S. dropped last year by 3.6%. The number of executions also declined
in 2004. In 2003, the South had the highest murder rate in the country, and
that appeared to continue in 2004 even as the South carried out 85% of the
nation's executions. The Northeast, which had no executions in 2004, had the
lowest murder rate in 2003 and that position appeared to remain the same in
2004. (6/13/05, DPIC Update)
- USA:
Soldier Sentenced to Death for Iraq War
Murder
A 15-member military jury sentenced Sgt. Hasan Akbar to death for killing 2 U.S.
military officers in Kuwait in 2003 during the opening days of the Iraq invasion.
At his sentencing, Akbar said, "I want to apologize for the attack that
occurred. I felt that my life was in jeopardy, and I had no other options. I
also want to ask you for forgiveness." He is the first American since the
Vietnam era to be prosecuted for murdering a fellow soldier in wartime. (5/2/05, DPIC Update)
- USA:
Catholic
Bishops Renew Anti-death Work
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops
announced a new campaign against the death
penalty Monday, saying they will step up
lobbying and educational efforts, and buttressing
their arguments with polls they commissioned
that find support for executions has weakened
among American parishioners. "We cannot
teach that killing is wrong by killing. We
cannot defend life by taking life," Cardinal
Theodore McCarrick told a Washington news
conference. ... The U.S. hierarchy's opposition
to capital punishment, first stated in 1974,
was reinforced in a major 1980 policy paper
and other pronouncements since then. McCarrick,
the Washington archbishop, said Catholic
tradition and teaching allow for the use
of capital punishment, but noted that Pope
John Paul II and other Catholic leaders increasingly
say the state "should forego this right
if it has other means to protect society." He
said that's the case in the United States.
(3/22/05, The Daily Camera)
- USA:
Americans Believe Innocents Executed
Three-quarters of Americans believe that
an innocent person has been executed within
the last five years and that conviction
is resulting in lower levels of support
for the death penalty, according to a study
published in the February issue of Criminology & Public
Policy. The study, conducted by researchers
James D. Unnever of Radford University
and Francis T. Cullen of the University
of Cincinnati, found that support for capital
punishment was significantly lower among
both blacks and whites who believe the
death penalty is applied unfairly. (2/28/05, DPIC Update)
- USA:
ABA Study Faults Inadequate Legal Defense
A
new American Bar Association study
has found that thousands of suspects,
including some who are later given death
sentences, risk wrongful conviction because
they are pressured to accept guilty pleas
or have incompetent attorneys. After
surveying 22 states, the ABA committee
leading the study stated that legal representation
for indigent defendants is in "a
state of crisis." (2/28/05, DPIC Update)
- USA:
Growing Elderly Population on Death Row
A record 110 persons aged 60 and older
were on death rows across the United States
at the end of 2003, a number that is nearly
triple the 39 death row seniors counted nine
years ago by the Bureau of Justice Statistics,
according to an article in USA Today. In
many states, elderly prisoners who are not
on death row are housed in geriatric facilities
within prisons or they are placed in "end
of life" programs, but these programs
are not offered to seniors facing the death
penalty. (2/21/05, DPIC Update) - VA:
Execution Stayed by Supreme Court
RICHMOND,
Va. -- The
U.S. Supreme Court granted a last-minute
stay of execution Monday. ... Robin Lovitt,
41, had been scheduled for execution at
9 p.m. Monday. ... The stay will remain
in place until the full court resumes in
October. The court will then either hear
Lovitt's appeal or allow Virginia to execute
him. (7/11/05, ABCnews.com)
- VA:
Execution Set for Slow Learner
YORKTOWN, Va. -- A death row inmate whose
case led to the Supreme Court's ban on
executing the mentally retarded was found
mentally competent by a Virginia jury Friday.
A judge immediately scheduled his execution
for December. Daryl Atkins, 27, flashed
a peace sign to his family and blew a kiss
as he was led from the courtroom after
the verdict was read. Three years ago,
Atkins' case had led to the landmark U.S. Supreme
Court ruling that declared executing the mentally
retarded to be unconstitutional. The court,
however, left it up to states to determine
whether inmates are retarded. The Virginia
jury deliberated for 13 hours over two days
before determining Atkins was not retarded.
(8/6/05, The Buffalo News)
- VA:
Execution Set Despite Destroyed Evidence
Authorities prepared Monday for the first
execution in Virginia in 2005, as lawyers
sought last-minute court intervention
in Robin Lovitt's case where the murder weapon
and other evidence was destroyed after
the trial. ... Among those fighting the
execution are Kenneth Starr, the former
independent counsel in the Clinton Whitewater
investigation, who argued the case before
the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals
in February. Jack Payden-Travers, executive
director of Virginians for Alternatives to
the Death Penalty, said "it boggles
that mind that Virginia is even proceeding
with this and that the governor hasn't intervened
before now to stop it. (7/11/05, ABCnews.com)
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