The NCADP Execution Board

NCADP “lives” in a row house on Pennsylvania Avenue Southeast. We’re in sight of the U.S. Capitol, but our locale is quite the opposite of Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest, which is where the high-powered lobbyists live and where the real estate value represents quite a hefty chunk of change.

Our little row house is two stories, plus a basement that we’ve converted into a conference room and intern area. A split staircase divides the main floor from the top floor.

In the middle of this split staircase, on the wall, is the NCADP Execution Board.

At the beginning of each month, NCADP’s Jesuit Volunteer, Sarah Wisely, writes down the name of each person scheduled for execution that month. The board is a calendar of that month, so depending on how many executions we have scheduled, it might have a lot of writing on it or it might just have a little.

This month, the NCADP Execution Board has a lot of writing on it.

Sarah notes the day and time of the scheduled execution, the state where it is occurring and the number of executions for the year as well as since 1976, when executions were allowed to resume. (Right now, the count is six for the year and 950 since 1976.)

As the month progresses, Sarah puts a green line through the names of the people who receive stays (we try not to use the words “inmate” or “death row inmates” at NCADP, but rather prefer the phrasing, “people on death row” or “men and women on death row.”) If a person is executed, a red mark is put over their name. And in the rare event of a commutation, they get a blue mark.

Why is this board important?

Many things that we do as part of working at a nonprofit don’t seem immediately connected to the human aspect of the death penalty. You may be the executive director and you’re finalizing a grant report. You may be the office manager and you’re processing check requests, making sure vendors get paid or trying to get someone who can fix the heater in the basement. You may be the lowly communications guy (ha! That’s me!) and you find yourself spending a day working to build a media list, arranging a conference call or doing a radio interview with a community radio station in Los Angeles.

All of these things are important in their own way and are integral to the running of a nonprofit. But the Execution Board serves a daily reminder of the importance and human aspect of the work that we do.

A time for remembrance

While we continue to rejoice the Supreme Court ruling that juvenile offenders should not be executed, it is perhaps important to remember that this ruling came to late to save some. Twenty-two juvenile offenders have been executed in the United States since 1985. Of these, 13 were executed by the state of Texas.

One of these was Napolean Beazley, executed May 28, 2002. Here is Napolean's final statement:

The act I committed to put me here was not just heinous, it was senseless. But the person that committed that act is no longer here -- I am.

I'm not going to struggle physically against any restraints. I'm not going to shout, use profanity or make idle threats. Understand though that I'm not only upset, but I'm saddened by what is happening here tonight. I'm not only saddened, but disappointed that a system that is supposed to protect and uphold what is just and right can be so much like me when I made the same shameful mistake.

If someone tried to dispose of everyone here for participating in this killing, I'd scream a resounding, 'No.' I'd tell them to give them all the gift that they would not give me ... and that's to give them all a second chance.

I'm sorry that I am here. I'm sorry that you're all here. I'm sorry that John Luttig died. And I'm sorry that it was something in me that caused all of this to happen to begin with.

Tonight we tell the world that there are no second chances in the eyes of justice. ... Tonight, we tell our children that in some instances, in some cases, killing is right.

This conflict hurts us all. There are no sides. The people who support this proceeding think this is justice. The people that think that I should live think that is justice. As difficult as it may seem, this is a clash of ideals, with both parties committed to what they feel is right. But who's wrong if in the end we're all victims?

In my heart, I have to believe that there is a peaceful compromise to our ideals. I don't mind if there are none for me, as long as there are for those who are yet to come. There are a lot of men like me on Death Row -- good men -- who fell to the same misguided emotions, but may not have recovered as I have.

Give those men a chance to do what's right. Give them a chance to undo their wrongs. A lot of them want to fix the mess they started, but don't know how. The problem is not in that people aren't willing to help them find out, but in the system telling them it won't matter anyway. No one wins tonight. No one gets closure. No one walks away victorious.

Must update more often. Must update more often. Must update...

Yesterday, in the wake of the exciting news about the abolition of the juvenile death penalty, NCADP's web site had more traffic than ever before -- more than 1,500 individual users in one day. And this little ol' web site had 150 visitors. Daily Kos is't not (or even grits for breakfast) but for a single issue web site that doesn't get marketed very much, it's not bad.

But it makes me feel guilty that sometimes I can't update as much as I would like...when things get busy, getting the press release out and taking and returning the media calls takes precedence. One doesn't get paid to blog!

Today's ruling

The fast pace of business has prevented me from being able to update today. Most people visiting here probably know that this morning, the U.S. Supreme Court abolished the juvenile death penalty. This means that 72 people now on death row for crimes committed when they were 16 or 17 years old will now be spared.

It was two years and one month ago that I stood in front of a gaggle of reporters at the National Press Club and introduced Ken McGill, head of our Mississippi affiliate and Steven Hawkins, then executive director of NCADP. We were at the Press Club to unveil NCADP's Campaign to End Juvenile Executions, which has been ably led by my wonderful colleague, Sapna Mirchandani.

It's been a long two years. But today, finally, we won. We won. We won.

Just do the test

Gov. Mark Warner of Virginia is still dragging his feet on whether to order DNA testing for Roger Coleman, who was executed years ago despite doubts of his guilt.

One wonders what death penalty proponents are afraid of. If they are so certain that we are getting it right 100 percent of the time in terms of the guilt of people we're executing, then what's the harm in testing to make sure? Oh, wait: Maybe they realize, deep down, that the death penalty is a government program -- and government programs aren't perfect.

Here's a story from the Roanoke Times on the continuing saga of Roger Coleman:

Coleman case still unsettled in many minds----Gov. Warner still has not decided whether to order a DNA test that might prove Coleman's innocence.

Jack Payden-Travers didn't have to say what he was calling about. All he had to say was, "This is Jack."

"I can tell you what Jack's question is going to be," Gov. Mark Warner said last Tuesday during a call-in show on WVTF public radio.

Sure enough, the head of Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty was calling - again - to ask the governor to order DNA testing that could determine whether the state executed an innocent man.

For the past 2 years, Warner has been considering the request from Centurion Ministries, a group that believes Roger Keith Coleman was executed in 1992 for a rape and murder he did not commit.

Warner promised last week that he will make a decision "very soon."

Although DNA has been used to exonerate 13 people on death row since 1993 nationwide, there has never been a case in which posthumous testing proved the innocence of an executed man, according to the Death Penalty Information Center in Washington D.C.

With public support for capital punishment weakening, scientific proof that the system is not fail-safe "would be more than just a blip" in the process, said Richard Dieter, executive director of the group.

"Those who don't want to see an innocent person executed would realize this is a distinct possibility," Dieter said. "It's not just a theoretical problem."

To read the whole story go here.

Who reads this blog?

One stat counter I use allows me to see where people who read this blog live (no, don't worry -- not your exact address, but rather your home town).

In some cases (involving governments and universities) I can tell a person's ISP. (For instance, I have noticed that people who work for either attorney general's offices or the courts in the states of Ohio, North Carolina and Virginia read this blog from time to time.)

But other than these patterns, the only thing I can tell about people who visit is that they come from all over. For instance, the last 20 people to come here live in the following places: Sarasota Springs, NY; Reston, VA; The Netherlands; Allentown, PA; Herndon, VA; Cleveland; Brookline, Mass; Great Britain; Madison, N.J.; Owensboro, KY; Elyria, Ohio; Richmond Heights, MO; New Market, MD; Auburn, Alabama; Chattanooga, Tenn; Englewood, CO; Virginia Beach, VA; Trenton, NJ; Abington, NC; and Raleigh, NC.

Thanks for visiting, everyone!

$50 million could buy a lot of hamburgers

The Associated Press bureau in Kentucky has a story on the wires today suggesting that Kentucky has spent $50 million per execution in the modern era. The state has executed two people. Here's the first part of the story:

Death penalty cost study sought----OFFICIAL GUESSES PRICE OF LAST 2 EXECUTIONS AT $50 MILLION EACH

Since Kentucky reinstated capital punishment in 1976, 2 men have been executed, 36 people are now on Death Row and numerous others once under death sentences have had their convictions or sentences overturned.

Ernie Lewis, director of the Department of Public Advocacy and charged with providing legal defense for the condemned, guesses it has cost taxpayers perhaps $50 million for each of the state's 2 executions. Death sentences have been overturned more than half the time, he added.

"We're not doing it very well," Lewis said.

Another innocence case surfaces

This one wasn't on my radar screen at all. Wow.

Pennsylvania death row inmate Ernest Simmons, who was once four days from execution for the grisly murder of an 80-year-old Johnstown woman, has been granted a new trial because of prosecutorial misconduct.

In a 52-page opinion issued Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Sean J. McLaughlin ordered Simmons, 47, to be retried within 120 days or released because police and prosecutors "withheld favorable evidence that could have been used to substantially impeach the testimony of the most pivotal prosecution witness."

"When you take a look at what happened in this case, you have to be shocked," said Robert Dunham, an assistant federal defender with the Defender Association of Philadelphia, Simmons' appellate attorneys.

The ruling said Simmons' rights were violated by police and prosecutors who hid secretly recorded tapes and hair evidence that supported Simmons' innocence.

To read the whole story go here.

Legislative activity breaking out all over!

Although much of it is under the radar screen, there's lot of stuff happening on the legislative front in terms of the death penalty. Here's a quick rundown -- I know I'm leaving important stuff out, so please accept my apologies in advance:

In Arkansas, the Senate has passed a bill abolishing the juvenile death penalty. Similar bills are under consideration in Florida, New Hampshire, Texas and, perhaps, Nevada. Another juvenile death penalty bill died (for this session) in Virginia.

In Georgia and Oklahoma, legislators are being asked to approve moratorium legislation.

In Texas, a slew of death penalty-related bills have been filed. Perhaps the most likely to pass is a measure giving juries the alternative of life without parole. Another bill that could stand a chance of passage would require the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles to actually meet in person (gasp!) to consider clemency requests.

In both Kansas and New York, efforts to reinstate the death penalty have failed. This is a major coup for our side and speaks to the strength of our local organizers.

That's it for now but I'm sure I'll be back with more updates.

To be decided....

The Supreme Court returns on Tuesday, following its traditional winter recess.

This cryptic passage just moved on the Associated Press wire:

To be decided by the Supreme Court in the 2nd half of the term:
DEATH PENALTY: Is it unconstitutionally cruel to execute juvenile killers?
(Roper v. Simmons, 03-633.) Argument heard Oct. 13. And may the United
States try and sentence to death foreign nationals without notifying their
government, in violation of international law? (Medellin v. Dretke,
04-5928.) Argument set for March 28.

A couple of notes:

First, Roper v. Simmons, the juvenile death penalty case, is the only case that was argued in the month of October that has not been released yet. Suffice it to say, we are on the edge of our chairs waiting for this one.

We are also waiting for a ruling in the case of Thomas Miller-El. He was the person convicted out of Dallas County, Texas, and has a meritous claim of racial discrimination during jury selection. We think Miller-El will prevail.

There are actually a number of other death penalty cases that have either been heard or are going to be heard during this term of the Supreme Court. For a complete rundown, go here.

Opening the floodgates

After a few "slow" months on the execution front, we are looking at a disastrous March. Already, 11 serious execution dates are pending. For a good list of pending executions, go here. (As of this writing, this web site does not include a date that was just set in Missouri, but I imagine it will shortly.)

St. Valentine: Innocent person executed?

Well, maybe not "innocent," in the modern-day sense of the word. But today is Valentine's Day, so maybe it is worth a reminder that when we celebrate Valentine's Day, we are commemorating an execution:

Go here for more information.

Death row syndrome

There are a lot of misconceptions out there about what life is like on death rows. Some people think you get cable television. The truth is, many people on death row have no access to any TV, much less cable.

Some people think you get to lift weights every day. I don't know about most death rows, but in Texas, there is no such program. Think about it: weights in a maximum security environment? I don't think so.

Some people think prison cells are air conditioned in the summer and heated in the winter. States vary, but in Florida, people on death row have suffered heart attacks after temperatures rose to 110 to 120 degrees.

In short: People, this is no picnic. But don't take my word for it. Read the latest from Lonely Abolitionist.

Philip Workman

This blog has developed a particular interest in innocence cases. Not that anyone should be executed, mind you, but innocence cases illustrate most vividly one reason why the death penalty is simply flawed public policy.

Philip Workman's case is not an innocence case, per se. He was there when the murder happened. He was robbing a fast-food restaurant. His actions that night undoubtedly contributed to the death of a police office.

But did Workman shoot the police officer, as the state alleged during trial? No, he did not, according to reports that continue to trickle out. And that is why his case falls under the category of wrongful conviction and sentencing. The jury, simply put, did not hear the truth. Here's the latest:

Former officer, now an inmate, alleges cover-up in Workman case

Associated Press

A retired Memphis police officer now in federal prison claims her former colleagues covered up details of the fatal shooting for which Philip Workman faces execution.

Charlotte Creasy claims a police officer actually killed Lt. Ronald Oliver in 1981, not Workman, who was convicted of the crime.

She quotes a hysterical woman at the shooting scene with her family as saying she saw ''a white officer shoot the policeman.''

Workman has been on death row since 1982 for the slaying of Oliver after a robbery at a fast-food restaurant in Memphis. Workman has long claimed that another officer killed Oliver by friendly fire.

Workman has twice been within hours of execution. His execution is currently on hold pending the resolution of federal appeals of a separate Tennessee case. He has exhausted his appeals in state court.

Mox Soffar arraignment set for today

Max Soffar, who has an unusually strong claim of innocence and whose death sentence AND conviction were thrown out by the federal courts, is in a Harris County courtroom today. The Harris County District Attorney's office apparently really is going to retry him for capital murder. We will continue to follow this case closely.

In the interim, here are excerpts from an article that just popped up in, of all places, the Jerusalem Post. The article is written by Kinky Friedman, the author/musician and, more recently, the quixotic independent candidate for Texas governor. This is weird, even by Texas standards:

Max Soffar: A Jew on death row


...Max doesn't have a lot of time and neither do I, so I'll try to keep it
brief and to the point.

"I'm not a murderer," he told me. "I want people to know that I'm not a murderer. That means more to me than anything. It means more to me than freedom."

...Somewhere along the line, Max's life fell between the cracks. A sixth-grade dropout whose IQ tests peg him as borderline mentally retarded, he grew up in Houston, where he was a petty burglar, an idiot-savant car thief and a low-level if highly imaginative police snitch.

...For the past 23 years, since confessing to that triple homicide, Max has been at his final station on the way: the Polunsky Unit, in Livingston, Texas. But he long ago recanted the confession, and many people, including a number of Houston-area law enforcement officers, think he didn't commit the crime. They say he told the cops what they wanted to hear after three days of interrogation without a lawyer present. At the very least, they say, Max's case is an example of everything that's wrong with the system.

...Another observer troubled by Max's case is Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals judge Harold R. DeMoss Jr., who wrote in 2002, after hearing Max's last appeal, "I have lain awake nights agonizing over the enigmas, contradictions and ambiguities" in the record.

Chief among these Kafka-esque elements is the fact that Max's state-appointed attorney was the late Joe Cannon, who was infamous for sometimes sleeping through his clients' capital murder trials. Cannon managed to stay awake for Max's, but he did not bother to interview the one witness who might have cleared him. There are, incidentally, 10 men on death row who were clients of Cannon's.

...[T]here was no physical evidence linking Max to the crime. No eyewitnesses who placed him at the scene or saw him do it. Two police lineups in which Max was not fingered. Missing polygraphs. If the facts had been before them, Schropp says, no jurors would have believed that the prosecution's case had eliminated all reasonable doubt.

"When you peel away the layers of the onion," he says, "you find a rotten core."

To read the entire article, go here.

Hurray for the death penalty!

Here is a piece from Counterpunch that -- while perhaps more strongly phrased than I would have made it -- nonetheless raises a valid issue:

You really know the state killers have lost it when they call for the death penalty for someone who was just trying to kill himself in the 1st place.

That's what prosecutors are doing in the case of Juan Manuel Alvarez, the 25-year-old Californian who apparently parked his SUV on the tracks of a Los Angeles commuter train line in order to commit suicide.

Alvarez, according to news reports, lost his nerve and left the vehicle as the train approached, and escaped injury, but the resulting crash, which derailed the train, ended up killing 11 riders and injuring many others.

Death penalty aficionados, including L.A. County's vote-hungry District Attorney, see killing Alvarez as the logical punishment for his horrible misdeed. Under the Old Testament eye-for-an-eye logic of state killers in this great Christian Nation, it's kill and be killed.

But what exactly is the punishment when you kill someone who was trying to do that to himself anyway? If anything, after causing so much suffering and pain and loss of life, Alvarez probably wants to die more than he did before the tragedy. In any event, he certainly wanted to die badly enough to try to do himself in. All the state will accomplish by injecting him with their deadly cocktail of toxins at the end of a high-profile legal process and millions of dollars in legal costs will be helping him to do what he didn't have the courage to do himself.

To read the entire article, go here.

The death penalty is a deterrent.

Texas has executed more people since 1976 than the next five states combined. So it should come as no surprise that between 2002 and 2003, Texas' murder rate increased 8.6 percent. After all, the death penalty is a deterrent.

Ooops....wait, we got that backwards. The death penalty obviously is not a deterrent. But if you are a supporter of the death penalty and you just googled the words, "The death penalty is a deterrent," then we got you, didn't we? :)

Thanks to Grits For Breakfast for pointing out this statistic to us.

Max Soffar, Chapter 975

Those who have followed this little blog know that one of the innocence cases we've been tracking is that of Max Soffar, who has spent years on Texas death row. Let's stop and acknowledge something: It's hard to follow all of the innocence cases that are in the works right now. We have multiple cases in Florida, Ohio and Texas. We have at least one case in Arizona, North Carolina and Tennessee. This could be a big year for innocence.

I mention this because we just received the following message from Nancy Bailey, who is active in the Texas abolition movement:

Max Soffar's arraignment for a new trial is scheduled for this coming
Wednesday, February 2 at 9 AM here in Houston at the Harris County
Criminal Court House, 232nd District court. Judge Mary Lou Keel is the
presiding judge That is on the 16th floor. It would be very good if
lots of people could attend. This is a very important case. In view
of the very strong evidence of Max's innocence and the decisive overturn
by the 5th Circuit and their refusal to look at an appeal by the state,
it is appalling that the Harris County DA is planning to try this case
again.

Appalling, indeed. We'll keep you posted regarding further developments.

Media bias and the death penalty

In a case that has been very closely monitored by the abolition movement for many years now, a panel of the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals has voted 2-1 that Kenny Richey is entitled to a new trial. This is an innocence case.

Unfortunately, after the ruling came down, the Associated Press moved a story on the national AP wire (meaning millions of newspaper readers in the U.S. will end up seeing it) with the headline, "Child Killer's Death Penalty Overturned."

Of course....the whole point of the court's ruling is that Richey might be innocent, in which case he is not a "child killer."

It should seem patently obvious...to anyone except some of the folks in the media who report on the death penalty.

Lest anyone out there think that I immediately jump up and down and yell "media bias, media bias!" please keep in mind that I am a former, longtime newspaper reporter with some 3,000 bylines under my belt.

It should further be noted that much media bias is not ideological in nature but institutional. To the copy editor on the AP copy desk who wrote this headline, it was probably one of 50 headlines he or she was writing that day. He or she probably didn't stop and think about the subjectivity of the chosen headline.

The following email message was sent last night to an abolition email listserv that I subscribe to:

There has been some buzz on the Ohioans to Stop Executions list about the coverage of today's decision overturning Kenny Richey's conviction and death sentence in Ohio. Specifically, a number of newspapers are running the story with the headline "Child Killer's Death Penalty Overturned". Since the whole story is about a finding that the trial which convicted Richey does not meet legal standards, he ought to be described as an "alleged killer" or an "accused killer".

These newspapers all seem to be running the AP story, although the AP disclaims any responsibility for the headline.

I'm pretty sure letters from many OTSE members and others who have been following this case closely will be coming, but newspapers with a local clientele are much more likely to publish letters from people within their distribution area. I would therefore urge everyone on this list, if any paper in your general area publishes this biased headline, please write a letter to the editor taking them to task. I'm worried that coverage like this reinforces the popular right-wing fallacy about justly deserved death sentences being overturned on technicalities. Many of the technicalities, including this one, cast serious doubt on the correctness of the conviction.

Visiting death row in Georgia

Martina Correia, a longtime NCADP member whose brother is on Georgia's death row (despite having a strong innocence claim), writes the following. She is referring to Tim Carr, who is scheduled for execution this week:

On Sunday January 23, 2005, I went to visit my brother on Death Row in Georgia, it was about 17 degrees with the wind chill making it a lot colder. As my family entered the visitation room my 10 year old son De'Jaun noticed one of his friends sitting in a cage with a video camera recording him and his family. It was Tim Carr a 34 year old man with a beautiful 4 year old red headed nephew named "Scooter". De'Jaun and Scooter are also good friends meeting while both children visit their uncles on Death Row in Georgia. Little Scooter wasn't smiling and De'Jaun simply said to me, "Moma why is Tim in a cage and why does he look like he's seen a ghost?"

De'Jaun is 10 now and understands very well, so I simply said, "De'Jaun, Tim is afraid, they plan to kill him on Tuesday, De'Jaun said well Moma can I say hello and maybe we can pray, because Tim is a good person. He then said to Tim, my mom and her friends are faxing the governor and other people so don't worry." Then a guard told us to come away from the cage. My son woke up this morning telling me he had a nightmare that Tim was dead and nobody tried to help him. I can't spare my son from this and that is so sad to me. Pray for Tim Carr and his family.

Talking to the other side

We got a lot of hate mail recently around the Beardslee execution in California. Which is fine -- this is a democracy and people have the right to express themselves. And, certainly, the death penalty is one of the most emotional issues out there.

But I always like to see efforts made by both sides of this issue to at least talk to the other side, even when agreement is not possible. That's why I was encouraged by this article in the San Francisco Chronicle:

Grieving brother's pain gives protester pause


It was a chance meeting outside the gates of San Quentin prison late
Tuesday as hundreds of anti-death-penalty protesters milled about, waiting
for the midnight execution of Donald Beardslee.

A college student carrying a candle walked past Ernest Montano, whose
grief has consumed him ever since Beardslee killed his sister, Patty
Geddling, nearly 24 years ago.

"Why don't you light a candle for my sister?" Montano said to the student,
Neil Ferron, a 20-year-old senior at Santa Clara University.

Given the tension of the moment, it might have been the overture to a
slugging. But on Tuesday night, it turned out to be the opening of a
conversation between the protester and the victim's brother, a dialogue
that drifted in and out for nearly 2 hours.

To read the entire article, go here.

Martin Soto-Fong

Those who follow this blog know that we've written about several pending innocence cases out of Texas. Names like Anthony Graves, Frances Newton, Nanon Williams and Max Soffar may well ring a bell.

But Texas, of course, is not the only state that has arguably innocent people on death row (although history may prove it to be the worst offender).

Today, courtesy of investigative journalist Jeffrey Toobin and the New Yorker magazine, we have a case out of Arizona that should command everyone's attention.

The inmate's name is Martin Soto-Fong. The prosecutor who helped put him on death row is Kenneth Peasley. Peasley has since been disbarred by the Arizona Supreme Court for falsifying evidence in this triple murder, but Soto-Fong remains on death row (and running out of appeals).

In disbarring Peasley, Arizona Supreme Court Justice Michael D. Ryan (writing for a unanimous court) had this to say:

"A prosecutor who deliberately presents false testimony, especially in a capital case, has caused incalculable injury to the integrity of the legal profession and the justice system."

Hear that, Charles Sebasta? Hear that, Chuck Rosenthal? How about you, Johnny Holmes?

To read the entire article, go here.

Here's a novel idea

This editorial appeared in the Houston Chronicle today:

Say why
Prosecutors who seek the death penalty should willingly explain their reasons to the public.

U.S. District Judge Vanessa Gilmore is guilty of unorthodox methods, but it was not unreasonable of her to ask prosecutors why they are seeking the death penalty against the one black defendant among 14 indicted in a smuggling case that ended with the death of 19 illegal immigrants.

Last week a three-judge panel of the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals slapped down Gilmore's threat to tell jurors that prosecutors had refused her order to say why they were seeking the death penalty against Tyrone Williams, the driver of the truck that pulled the sweltering trailer in which the immigrants perished May 14, 2003. Williams is the lone African-American defendant to be tried in the case.

Prosecutors said they were under no legal obligation to give a reason for singling out Williams among his co-defendants for the death penalty. They stated that Williams, as the truck's driver, was the sole defendant with "the power to release the aliens and possibly save their lives." This reasoning is akin to the uncommon notion that the triggerman is guiltier than the person who hires him — a notion not recognized by law or custom.

Gilmore then asked for a letter of explanation from U.S. Attorney John Ashcroft, who ignored the request.

Gilmore could have dismissed the death penalty as a sanction against the government for not obeying her order. Perhaps she was more interested in bringing attention to the controversial racial disparities in the application of the death penalty.

In 2001, Attorney General Ashcroft released a report showing "no evidence"
of racial bias in the federal death penalty system. But the original study, released the previous year by then-Attorney General Janet Reno, showed minorities accounted for 80.4 percent of the 682 federal criminal defendants accused of capital crimes between 1995 and 2000.

Instead of setting aside the possibility of the death penalty, Gilmore decided she would announce to jurors during the punishment portion of Williams' trial — if he were convicted — that prosecutors had not abided by her order to provide a rationale for seeking the death penalty. The judge said she further would allow the defense team to say the prosecution's refusal showed Williams' race had been a motivating factor in the government's decision.

Gilmore can be accused of jumping to a conclusion there. But in the absence of a real reason for seeking the death penalty, prosecutors left the door open for the public to jump to its own conclusions.

The New Orleans-based three-judge panel threw out Gilmore's entire plan. But if the judge accomplished anything, she got the public to think about why prosecutors are so secretive about providing information concerning how and why they choose to subject accused criminals to the ultimate punishment. A competent prosecutor eventually presents that information to the jury, so there is little reason why the public should not know from the start.

Graner guilty!

Charles Graner, the former Pennsylvania death row prison guard, was found guilty this evening of a number of counts involving abusing Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib.

Will Rehnquist be able to swear Bush in?

Chief Justice William Rehnquist is scheduled to swear in President Bush for Bush's second term this Thursday. However, will Rehnquist be able to do it?

From death row to Abu Ghraib

No one seems to be focusing on the fact that Charles Graner Jr. served as a guard on death row in Pennsylvania before his assignment to the notorious Abu Ghraib jail in Iraq. Graner Jr., in fact, was accused of cruelty and brutality toward people on death row.

Now the defense has rested in Graner's court martial and closing arguments are beginning about now.

Anthony Graves

If you've followed this blog, then you've read about Anthony Graves before.

It's always dangerous to proclaim that a person on death row is innocent. For how does one go about proving innocence, anyway? DNA evidence, for instance, rarely proves it innocence. At most, it tends to disprove a prosecutor's theory of how a crime occurred.

But this case speaks to innocence.

Remember Anthony Graves' name. And while you are at it, remember the name of Charles Sebasta, who put him on death row.

The blog is back!

Thanks for bearing with the blog as it took a little vacation! A lot happened while we were gone, so there is a lot to catch up on. Among the developments:

The governor of Indiana commuted a death sentence.

The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to review two new death penalty cases this term, making it a very busy season for death penalty-related matters.

The Harris County District Attorney, proving again that he has all the intelligence of a pet rock, said it will retry Max Soffar on capital murder charges.

2005 is going to be quite a year, folks.

Blog break!

The blog is taking a much-needed vacation!

We will return on Monday, Jan. 10th.

Year in review

As we wrap up 2004, let's look at where we're at:

Executions at a five-year low (59, compared with 65 last year and compared with 98 in 1999).

Death row population down slightly.

Death sentences dramatically down (an estimated 130 in 2004, compared with 144 in 2003 and 282 in 1999).

Courts in Kansas and New York struck down the death penalty.

California created a death penalty study commission.

New Jersey could be on the verge of abolition (and, perhaps, Connecticut too).

North Carolina may pass a moratorium this next year.

The U.S. Supreme Court may soon strike down the juvenile death penalty.

Texas may be headed for a court-enforced moratorium, unless and until the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals and U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals agree to start obeying the law and providing the comprehensive review of death sentences that the U.S. Supreme Court (and the U.S. Constitution) demand.

All in all, not a bad year for the abolition movement.

Champagne, anyone?

6,000 visitors and counting!

Earlier today, we had our 6,000th visitor to this blog.

That's not a lot compared with some huge blogs out there like daily kos or talking points memo or talk left.

But it's quite more than I imagined when we launched this blog as an experiment last summer!

I'd like to thank not only all of the progressive blogsters out there who have linked to us (and thus provided most of our traffic) but also my brother and sister blogs at grits for breakfast and lonelyabolitionist for their often and kind mentions.

Mr. Warner dithers

The Washington Post ran yet another editorial today calling for DNA testing for Roger Coleman, executed more than a decade ago by Virginia. The editorial begins:

Dithering on DNA

WHEN MARK R. WARNER became Virginia's governor three years ago, we greeted him with the friendly suggestion that he order new DNA testing in the case of Roger Keith Coleman. The commonwealth executed Mr. Coleman back in 1992, but both before and since the execution, his guilt has been heatedly disputed. An early form of DNA testing before his death suggested that he did commit the rape and murder for which he was condemned, but its methodology was controversial, and more modern testing might finally put the matter to rest. Ordering the testing should not be a tough call. New tests might -- by proving Mr. Coleman's guilt once and for all -- remove a cloud that has hung over Virginia's criminal justice system since the execution.

It continues:

This is getting ridiculous. It should take no great political courage for Mr. Warner to order the testing. It's hardly as though Mr. Coleman -- who is dead, after all -- will walk free if the testing exonerates him. The only questions the case still raises are of historical accuracy and retroactive accountability for the state's criminal justice system.

And it concludes:

Mr. Coleman, after all, insisted upon his innocence from the day of his arrest to his haunting last words: "An innocent man is going to be murdered tonight." If he was telling the truth -- however improbable that might seem -- respecting the "finality" of his conviction means never prosecuting the person who actually committed the murder. Every day that Mr. Warner dithers, he tacitly betrays an anxiety that the justice system over which he presides cannot withstand daylight.

To read the entire piece go here.

What would your last meal be?

Go here to see an interesting flash animation. (If you have a slow browser, it may take a while to load...it's worth it!)

'Foolproof death penalty?'

The New York Times is spoofing attempts by Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney to create a "foolproof death penalty" in his state.

I think the operative word here is "fool!"

This is kind of like the annual Darwin awards, if you follow those (or, for those of you in my home state of Texas, the "Bum Steer Awards" given out each year by Texas Monthly).

To read all about it, go here.

Death in Texas

There's an amazing essay that just hit the newstands, written by Sister Helen Prejean and published in the January issue of the New York Times Review of Books.

It's about George W. Bush and executive clemency. Here's part of the article:

Here was Karla Faye, a woman who had transformed her life and would have been a source of healing love to guards and prisoners for as long as she lived, yet the iron protocol of retributive justice demanded that she be put to death. It was as if Bush and Albert Gonzales and the pardons board had freeze-framed Karla Faye Tucker in the worst act of her life, then freeze-framed themselves into killing her. That's the way a machine works, relentless and preordained, with no room for the personal transcendence that conscience gives. It was all so mechanical, so unthinking, so political. That's why on the night of Karla Faye's killing, my anger at George W. Bush turned to outrage when Larry King aired Bush's press statement and I heard the way Bush invoked God to bless his denial of clemency. I already knew the substance of Bush's position toward Karla Faye, but I had never heard the last sentence of his press statement: "May God bless Karla Faye Tucker and may God bless her victims and their families."

Immediately after the statement, King turned to me for a response. When I heard Bush say, "God bless Karla Faye Tucker," I had to struggle to keep a vow I made to reverence every person, even those with whom I disagree most vehemently. Inside my soul I raged at Bush's hypocrisy, but the broadcast was live and global. With not much time to rein myself in, I took a quick breath, said a fierce prayer, looked into the camera, and said, "It's interesting to see that Governor Bush is now invoking God, asking God to bless Karla Faye Tucker, when he certainly didn't use the power in his own hands to bless her. He just had her killed."

As governor, Bush certainly did not stand apart in his routine refusal to deny clemency to death row petitioners, but what does set him apart is the sheer number of executions over which he has presided. Callous indifference to human suffering may also set Bush apart. He may be the only government official to mock a condemned person's plea for mercy, then lie about it afterward, claiming humane feelings he never felt. On the contrary, it seems that Bush is comfortable with using violent solutions to solve troublesome social and political realities.

The aphorism "A hammer, when presented with a nail, knows to do only one thing" applies, par excellence, to George W. Bush. As governor of Texas, Bush tackled the social problem of street crime by presiding over the busiest execution chamber in the country. At the time of the thirteen death row exonerations in Illinois, Bush stated publicly that although states such as Illinois might have problems with a faulty death penalty system, he was certain that in Texas no innocent person had ever been sent to death row, much less executed. That remains to be seen. What is clear is that he had, as governor, no quality of mercy.

To read the whole article, go here.

Watch Larry King Live tonight...

Ray Krone, who was sentenced to death in Arizona and later completely exonerated (can one be partially exonerated?) will be on Larry King Live at 9 p.m. Eastern tonight (unless he gets bumped by breaking news).

Ray is a really, really nice guy and has an amazing story to tell.

I don't know what Larry King is up to, but Kirk Bloodsworth is tentatively scheduled to be on his show on Dec. 29. Bloodsworth also is a really nice guy -- and, I believe, a former member of the U.S. Marines track and field team (he threw the discus). Bloodsworth is an exoneree out of the state of Maryland and was actually the first person proven to be innocent by DNA testing.

The death penalty in the year 2022

Where will the death penalty debate be in the year 2022? It's a fascinating question. For one scholarly take -- constituional law meets up with informed science fiction -- go here:

Gov. Ryan, part one

Kristen Bell is a friend, a senior at Stanford University and a former NCADP intern. In fact, the few of you who followed this blog early last summer know that she was helping out back then, when we were struggling to get five or ten readers a day!

Now Kristen returns to us as a guest blogger. She heard Gov. Ryan speak recently at Stanford University and she files this two-part report:

It was the first night of finals week at Stanford University. Like a house on the night before Christmas, the campus was silent. Students do not go to class, athletes do not attend regular practices, clubs do not meet, the campus newspaper is not even published. Needless to say, it is not a good time for speakers to come if they want a decent audience.
But students, faculty, and staff filled one of the largest lecture halls in the Law School that night to hear Gov. George Ryan speak. With standing room only, the room was abuzz.
The attendance came as a welcome surprise to me, since a death penalty speech by lawyer and author Scott Turow was very poorly attended earlier this year. And now it was finals week.
“Wow,” I thought. “Maybe people really do care about the death penalty.”
I wondered how many people in the audience were like me—decided opponents of the death penalty who had come to see a real live hero of the abolitionist movement.
I wondered how many people in the audience were like my friend sitting next to me—genuinely undecided people who had come to hear a former government official give a balanced argument against the death penalty.
“I've heard all the arguments and such, but always from advocates,” said my friend before the speech. “It'd be interesting to hear a governmental or political stance.”
We both got what we came for.
I saw the man whose face in a newspaper covers the back of my binder. Hearing him speak filled my eyes with tears and my heart with a rejuvenated sense of purpose.
My friend saw an old, card-carrying GOP-member explain how he came to reject a corrupt system of punishment. Hearing him speak prompted her to write down some facts and questions. Perhaps she did not leave with a burning desire to abolish the death penalty, but—quite in the spirit of finals week—she left with some new things to think about.

Gov. Ryan, part two

Kristen continues:

I too left with some new questions to think about.
Gov. Ryan spoke about the practical problems associated with carrying out a capital punishment system—problems like corrupt police officers forcing confessions, incompetent lawyers sleeping through trials, discrimination on the basis of skin color, mistakes in determining guilt and innocence.
These problems caught his eye in the Chicago Tribune. These problems made him examine the system. And these problems led him to commute the sentences of all 167 death row inmates in Illinois.
It seemed to me, then, that Gov. Ryan was opposed to the death penalty because of these practical problems. The issue for him was the just practice of a policy, not the moral fabric of the policy itself.
But perhaps not.
After the speech, he was asked, “What about the moral question of the death penalty?” Ryan responded that he was morally opposed to the death penalty.
I asked him if he thought retribution was a suitable justification for the death penalty (the Supreme Court does cite retribution as a justification for the death penalty). “No,” Ryan said, point-blank. “Retribution is wrong.”
I wonder how he had changed his opinion on that moral question. He used to believe that bad guys deserved to die. Now he believes not only that we cannot perfectly identify the bad guys in practice, but also that we cannot say bad guys deserve to die on moral grounds.
That’s not just a change of mind, that’s a change of heart.
How does that change of heart happen? And how can we bring it to the heart of America?

News flash

Kansas' Supreme Court has just struck down that state's death penalty law. Here's the AP story:

TOPEKA - Kansas' death penalty law is unconstitutional because it favors the state over defendants when aggravating and mitigating circumstances are equally split, the Kansas Supreme Court ruled in a 4-3 decision today.

The decision came in the case of Michael Marsh of Wichita, who was convicted of killing Marry Ane Pusch and her 19-year-old daughter, Marry Elizabeth in 1996.

The decision was not a broad, sweeping indictment of capital punishment, but rather identified a technical error in the law the state Legislature could fix during their upcoming session.

The three justices who disagreed with the ruling, however, said it would wipe out the death penalty in other cases, including Reginald and Jonathan Carr, convicted of killing four people in Wichita in December 2000; Douglas Belt, sentenced to death last month for killing Lucille Gallegos in Wichita; and John Robinson, convicted in Johnson County of killing two women and stuffing their bodies in barrels.

The court also ordered a new trial for Marsh on capital murder and aggravated arson charges. The trial court erred by refusing to allow testimony that the victim's husband may have been involved in the murder, the Supreme Court ruled.

In a dissent, Chief Justice Kay McFarland wrote that the Supreme Court upheld the death penalty under similar circumstances in the case of Gary Kleypas, convicted in the 1996 rape and murder of Carrie Williams in Pittsburg.

"To now strike down the Kansas death penalty law is, in my opinion, wholly inappropriate and unjustified," she wrote.

Incredible developments in New York

It really is beginning to look like the death penalty is on its way out in the state of New York. You may recall that earlier this year, a New York state court struck down the existing death penalty statute.

Now the Republicans (and a few Democrats) are trying to bring it back, but the public and media backlash against the death penalty has been incredible! Yesterday, at a hearing in New York City, hundreds of people turned out in opposition to the death penalty, and only two witnesses testified in favorite of it.

NCADP's own David Kaczynski had this to say, as quoted in New York Newsday:

"It's political, it's revengeful, and it ultimately doesn't work," said
David Kaczynski, head of the advocacy group New Yorkers Against the Death
Penalty. The brother of notorious "Unabomber" serial killer Ted Kaczynski,
he's been campaigning against the death penalty ever since he turned in
his mentally ill brother to federal authorities in 1996, only to have them
try to impose the death penalty. Ted Kaczynski eventually got a plea deal
that gave him life without the possibility of parole.

Add to that this comment from Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau:

He told the Assembly members that he opposes the death penalty because it doesn't deter crime, it's expensive, its only reason is vengeance, its application "mostly closely resembles the lottery," and its main purpose is to allow public officials to prove how tough they are on crime.

New York, New York, the abolition train is a-coming.

Regarding Scott Peterson

Eric Predoehl, who operates the blog EP Rants You got a problem with that?, writes logically of the Scott Peterson dilemma:

Millions have dollars have been spent on the Scott Peterson case, and the recommendation for the death penalty will ensure that millions of more dollars will be spent by the state of California for the invariable appeals process. As the state of California struggles with massive budget problems, leading to a shut-down of various fire stations, libraries, educational programs, and other important public services, there always seems to be plenty of money to pay for the business of death. The prosecution and defense lawyers will be gainfully employed for the continuing process, while the families will endure the trauma of this hellish legal nightmare with each and every new trial.

To read the entire essay, go here.

A new day in New York City

This morning, a hearing was held in New York City on a proposed bill to reinstate the death penalty in New York. (Earlier this year, a state court struck down New York's existing death penalty statute.)

Here's what a columnist for Newsday has to say about the state of things:

At 10 o'clock this morning on West 44th Street, in a meeting hall at the Bar Association of the City of New York, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver will hold a rare public hearing on whether the state should be in the death business again.

A big crowd is expected today. But just before the hearing begins, people from 300 religious groups, unions, activist organizations and others will announce a giant coalition to keep the death penalty off the books in New York. Standing at the front of this group is Andrew Cuomo, Mario's son.

The issue is the same it has always been. But suddenly, the ground is not.

"I remember when my father first ran," said the younger Cuomo, who was federal housing secretary and made a brief run for governor two years ago.
"The only thing people knew the governor of New York did was he passed the death penalty. The only thing they knew about my father is that he was against the death penalty, and they were for it."

But something has obviously changed in the past 10 years on the politics of death.

"Crime is down," Cuomo said. "The discussion is more sober. People are in a different place. I'm not sure it was the death penalty that people really wanted before. It was their way to say, 'I'm afraid of crime. I'm afraid for my family and not enough is being done.' It is their way of saying, 'I am so scared and angry, I'll go to the extreme.

To read the entire column, go here.

One direction.

Today, the Death Penalty Information Center released its annual report, sort of a state-of-the-death-penalty if you will. DPIC Executive Director Dick Dieter had this to say:

"The events of the past year and the statistical evidence all point in one direction," said Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center.

"The public's confidence in the death penalty has seriously eroded over the past several years. Because of so many failures, the death penalty is rightly on the defensive. Life-without-parole offers the public a better alternative without all the risks and expense."

To read CNN.com's story on the DPIC report, go here.

Playing politics with the death penalty

Virginia is one of the few states (New Jersey being the only other, I think) that elects its governor during odd-numbered years. So, next November, Virginia will choose between two candidates. Frontrunners are Republican Attorney General Jerry Kilgore and Democrat Lieutenant Gov. Timothy Kaine. Kaine has a history of opposing the death penalty.

This is a nonpartisan blog, so we can't officially endorse. However, we are allowed to publish information about the race. In this vein, we offer up this editorial from today's Washington Post:

Mr. Kilgore's False Start

Jerry W. Kilgore, the Republican attorney general of Virginia, apparently needs a refresher course on the Constitution. In attacking his likely opponent in the state's 2005 gubernatorial race, Democratic Lt. Gov. Timothy M. Kaine, the attorney general said last week that Mr. Kaine "not only opposes the death penalty but actually represented death row inmates." As it happens, Mr. Kaine, a fair-housing and small-business lawyer at the time, acted as a court-appointed attorney to represent 2 Virginia death row inmates -- one in the mid-'80s, the other around 1990.
He did so, he says, after much soul-searching and in the knowledge that lawyers are bound by the ethics of their profession not to reject cases simply because they may be unpopular. As an attorney appointed by the state Supreme Court, Mr. Kaine was fulfilling a public service.

Mr. Kilgore's inane accusation is an affront to the principles of justice he is sworn to uphold. It's no great shock that he embraces the death penalty; what's surprising is that, as the state's top law enforcement official, he would imply that there is something wrong with representing defendants or convicts in capital cases. In fact, the attorney general in Virginia, whatever his stance on capital punishment, should be applauding lawyers who agree to represent inmates on death row, many of whom have no defense counsel whatever.

Mr. Kilgore was also once a lawyer in private practice. We assume that all his clients were law-abiding paragons of righteous behavior, but for the sake of argument let's say some of them were not. Should Mr. Kaine then attack him for his former clients' transgressions? Of course not.

Ronald Williamson: dead at 51

From today's New York Times:

Ronald Williamson, Freed From Death Row, Dies at 51

Ronald Keith Williamson, who left his small town in Oklahoma as a high school baseball star with hopes of a major league career but was later sent to death row and came within 5 days of execution for a murder he did not commit, died on Saturday at a nursing home near Tulsa. He was 51.

Mr. Williamson's early life appeared charmed. As a pitcher and catcher in Ada, he twice led his high school teams to the championship of a state where another native son, Mickey Mantle, enjoyed the status of near deity. The Oakland Athletics picked Mr. Williamson in the 2nd round of the 1971 amateur draft.

After 6 years in the minor leagues, Mr. Williamson saw his career end because of arm injuries. He returned to Oklahoma and worked at a sales job, but began to show signs of a mental illness that was eventually diagnosed as bipolar disorder.

In late 1982, a waitress, Debbie Sue Carter, 21, was found raped and killed in her apartment in Ada. The case remained open until 1987, when a woman who had been arrested for passing bad checks told the police that she had heard another prisoner discussing the killing. The man, she said, was Mr. Williamson, who had been in the jail for kiting checks.

Mr. Williamson was charged with the killing. So was a 2nd man, Dennis Fritz, a high school science teacher who had been one of Mr. Williamson's few friends when he returned to town after his baseball career. The evidence, the authorities said, consisted of 17 hairs that matched those of Mr. Williamson and Mr. Fritz, and the account provided by the woman who said she had heard Mr. Williamson confess. A 2nd jailhouse informer later stepped forward to buttress the case against Mr. Fritz.

Mr. Williamson and Mr. Fritz were tried separately and found guilty. Mr.
Fritz was sentenced to life in prison, and Mr. Williamson - who had not received his psychiatric medicines for months before the trial and shouted angrily at the prosecution witnesses - was sentenced to die.

Mr. Williamson later said the prison guards taunted him over an intercom about Ms. Carter's murder. In September 1994, when all of his state appeals had been exhausted, he was taken to the warden's office and told that he would be executed on Sept. 24. He recalled filling out a form that directed his body to be returned to his sister for burial.

A team of appellate lawyers, however, sought a writ of habeas corpus from Judge Frank H. Seay of Federal District Court, arguing that Mr. Williamson had not been competent to stand trial and that his lawyer had not effectively challenged the hair evidence or sought other suspects. Judge Seay granted a stay 5 days before Mr. Williamson was scheduled to die.

In 1998, lawyers from the Innocence Project at the Benjamin C. Cardozo School of Law in New York arranged DNA tests for Mr. Williamson and Mr. Fritz. They showed that neither man had been the source of the semen or hair collected from the victim's body. Another man, Glen D. Gore, has since been convicted of the killing and sentenced to die for it.

Closing in on innocence

For some time now, I have felt that the whole nature of the death penalty debate will change once we can prove that an innocent person has been executed in what we call the "modern era," i.e., the era since 1976, when executions were allowed to resume in the U.S.

We're getting close to being able to prove such a thing. One case currently is perculating in Virginia, one in Oklahoma, one or two in Texas.

And now, suddenly, this story pops up in today's Chicago Tribune:

Texas man executed on disproved forensics
Fire that killed his 3 children could have been accidental

By Steve Mills and Maurice Possley
Tribune staff reporters
Published December 9, 2004

CORSICANA, Texas -- Strapped to a gurney in Texas' death chamber
earlier this year, just moments from his execution for setting a fire
that killed his three daughters, Cameron Todd Willingham declared his
innocence one last time.

"I am an innocent man, convicted of a crime I did not commit,"
Willingham said angrily. "I have been persecuted for 12 years for
something I did not do."

While Texas authorities dismissed his protests, a Tribune
investigation of his case shows that Willingham was prosecuted and
convicted based primarily on arson theories that have since been
repudiated by scientific advances. According to four fire experts
consulted by the Tribune, the original investigation was flawed and it
is even possible the fire was accidental.

Before Willingham died by lethal injection on Feb. 17, Texas judges
and Gov. Rick Perry turned aside a report from a prominent fire
scientist questioning the conviction.

The author of the report, Gerald Hurst, reviewed additional
documents, trial testimony and an hourlong videotape of the aftermath
of the fire scene at the Tribune's request last month. Three other
fire investigators--private consultants John Lentini and John DeHaan
and Louisiana fire chief Kendall Ryland--also examined the materials
for the newspaper.

"There's nothing to suggest to any reasonable arson investigator that
this was an arson fire," said Hurst, a Cambridge University-educated
chemist who has investigated scores of fires in his career. "It was
just a fire."

Ryland, chief of the Effie Fire Department and a former fire
instructor at Louisiana State University, said that, in his workshop,
he tried to re-create the conditions the original fire investigators
described.

When he could not, he said, it "made me sick to think this guy was
executed based on this investigation. ... They executed this guy and
they've just got no idea--at least not scientifically--if he set the
fire, or if the fire was even intentionally set."

To read the whole story (it's long!) go here.

Fry fish, not people

That's the slogan of Alaskans Against the Death Penalty, an affiliate of NCADP's.

This is no ordinary affiliate. Two of their members happen to be Bill Pelke and Rich Curtner, the chair and the vice chair of NCADP's Board of Directors.

This past Sunday, the Anchorage Daily News ran a great feature story about Bill and Rich:

There are a lot of numbers and percentages on the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty Web site, but meaning can also be calculated in a list of 57 names. They are the names of the Americans executed so far in 2004. They are among 944 people executed in this country since the reinstatement of capital punishment in 1976.

When Bill Pelke looks at this list, the name James Allridge III stands out. Pelke, an Alaskan and one of the most vocal opponents of the death penalty in the nation, corresponded with Allridge for several years and worked throughout August to stop his Aug. 26 execution.

"When I look at that list, his name pops right out at me," Pelke said by phone from Washington, D.C., where he was traveling over Thanksgiving to visit family and promote the cause. "It says that the death penalty is unnecessary. It's totally ridiculous."

You can read the entire story here. The blog recommends it!

More on Miller-El

One more post on Thomas Miller-El, whose case was argued -- for the second time -- before the U.S. Supreme Court yesterday.

Reading the Houston Chronicle's article summarizing the case, one can anticipate that this is not going to be a close call for the court. Here's how the article starts out:

Court majority finds discrimination

Justices say prosecutors left blacks off jury deliberately in death penalty case
By PATTY REINERT
Copyright 2004 Houston Chronicle Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON - Faced with a Dallas County prosecutor's old training manual advising against choosing jurors who are black, Jewish, Hispanic, Italian-American, bearded, fat or female, a U.S. Supreme Court majority said Monday that a black defendant clearly suffered discrimination when blacks were excluded from his 1986 jury.

Antonin Scalia was the only justice to speak in favor of the state of Texas, which executes more killers than any other and is defending the way Thomas Miller-El was sentenced to die for capital murder.

For the second time in two years, the high court heard legal arguments from the state and the convict's lawyers Monday. A decision on Miller-El's move to overturn his conviction is expected by July.

Most of the justices Monday were openly critical of the lower courts that handle Texas death penalty cases. Court-watchers predicted the court will again try to corral what is considered a rogue appeals court, the New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Perhaps the only question now involves how strong the rebuke will be.

Judicial defiance

It's not exactly former Alabama Gov. George Wallace standing defiantly in front of the schoolhouse door to keep blacks out, or former Arkansas Gov. Orval Faubus forcing LBJ to call out the national guard.

But today, in an editorial, the Washington Post pointed out the obvious: The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals and the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals are defying U.S. Supreme Court edict.

Here's the editorial:

Judicial Defiance

Tuesday, December 7, 2004; Page A24

THE SUPREME COURT should not have had to hear the case of Thomas Joe Miller-El once, let alone twice. But yesterday the court for the second time held oral arguments in a capital case that ought to embarrass even Texas, with its unrivaled enthusiasm for executions. The question is simple: How overtly discriminatory must jury selection be before it becomes unconstitutional? Nearly two years ago, the Supreme Court instructed a lower appeals court to seriously examine evidence of racial bias in the jury's selection. The high court's message should have been clear when it expressed suspicion that "the State sought to exclude African-Americans from the jury." But after that ruling, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit again averted its gaze from substantial evidence of discrimination, treating the case with what seems like willful disregard for the high court's meaning.

The backdrop of this case is Dallas's ugly history of keeping blacks out of the jury box. In 1963, a training manual for the district attorney's office stated: "Do not take Jews, Negroes, Dagos, Mexicans or a member of any minority race on a jury, no matter how rich or how well educated." By the time of Mr. Miller-El's murder trial in 1986, such formal policies no longer existed, but office insiders testified that some prosecutors still observed them. And the Dallas Morning News reported that, in 100 cases studied, prosecutors had eliminated 92 percent of African Americans using peremptory strikes, a device for removing jurors who would otherwise be qualified.

The manipulations in Mr. Miller-El's case were not subtle. Prosecutors exploited rules to move potential African American jurors out of contention; of 11 who got past that barrier and were qualified to serve on the jury, 10 were struck by peremptory challenge. The only African American not challenged was one who declared that lethal injection is "too quick. They don't feel the pain. . . . What I call punishment is back to the old Indian days. . . . Pour some honey on them and stake them out over an ant bed." Texas argues that would-be jurors' statements, not their race, explain their being barred; but as the Supreme Court noted in its last opinion, prospective black jurors were questioned differently from others.

Amazingly, both the Texas court system and the 5th Circuit judges have consistently approved the prosecutors' conduct. In the last go-round, the 5th Circuit declined even to hear the case, contending that reasonable judges could not disagree on the subject. After eight Supreme Court justices disagreed and ordered the lower court to consider the merits of Mr. Miller-El's claims, the lower court rejected them -- using passages lifted nearly verbatim from Justice Clarence Thomas's lone dissent.

This case is no longer only about how big a fig leaf Texas gets when its prosecutors keep blacks out of the jury box. It also poses the question of whether the Supreme Court will allow a lower tribunal -- keen to keep the machinery of death humming -- to all but openly defy it. The answer must be no.

Which court is worse?

Scott Henson, a criminal justice reform activist in my hometown, asks this question on his blog. Which court is worse, the federal Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, which is based in New Orleans and has jurisdiction over Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi, or the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, which is the highest court in Texas that deals with criminal matters.

It is a tough call, but a relevant one, given that the U.S. Supreme Court is hearing arguments this morning in the case of Thomas Miller-El. (Scroll down a bit to get to the appropriate entry.)

Rather than answer Scott's question directly, I want to talk about the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals a bit. The Fourth Circuit, which has jurisdiction over North Carolina, South Carolina, West Virginia, Maryland and Virginia, is extremely conservative. But judges who sit on that court really seem to base their decisions on the law, although I grant you that it is a most conservative reading of the law.

Contrast that court with the Fifth Circuit and the Texas CCA. These courts are simply pro-prosecution and anti-defendant, but they do not seem to base their hostility against the individual on any judicial philosophy. Rather, they seem to identify the result they want to reach and then fashion their opinions, however sloppily, to meet that result.

In my mind, both the Fifth Circuit and the Texas CCA are embarrassments, compared with the Fourth Circuit, which is merely objectionably conservative. This is why we probably will see, at some point in the next four years, a Supreme Court nomination come out of the Fourth Circuit and not the Fifth.

In any case, it's a good question that Scott asks. Drop him a line and weigh in!

Four and out

Football fans know that the term "four and out" refers to an offense that gets the ball, fails to make a first down, and has to punt.

Combined, the states of Kentucky, Texas, Pennsylvania and North Carolina went four and out this week.

That's right: We had four executions scheduled in four days and we got four stays. No additional executions are scheduled for December and -- if this holds -- this will be the first month since July 1994 that we did not have a single execution!

Folks, that's amazing.

The four scheduled executions this week were:

Thomas Bowling, Kentucky. Bowling received a stay some weeks ago.
Frances Newton, Texas. You've read all about her.
George Banks, Pennsylvania. He is severely mentally ill.
Charles Walker, North Carolina. In an unusual move, the North Carolina Supreme Court allowed a stay in his case to remain in effect.

Awwww.

Harris County District Attorney Chuck Rosenthal is quite the character. He's the guy who tried to get the death penalty for Andrea Pia Yates, the woman who was convicted in connection with the drowning deaths of her children, after suffering from post-partum psychosis.

Now Rosenthal, according to these paragraphs out of the New York Times, is disappointed that his buddy and fellow Republican, Texas Gov. Rick Perry, didn't consult with him before granting Frances Newton a 120-day reprieve so that her guilt can be ascertained:

In an effort to sway the governor, Mr. Rosenthal said, he submitted an affidavit on Wednesday from the Texas Department of Public Safety saying that the test on the skirt, which it had originally performed for the trial in 1988, could not be duplicated today.

"Rick didn't call me," he said of the governor, a fellow Republican. "I kind of thought he would."

Newton gets a stay!!!

Gov. Rick Perry has accepted the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles and granted Frances Newton a 120-day reprieve so that her lawyers can continue to investigate her case.

This is wonderful news. There will be no execution tonight.

Newton update

Late yesterday, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals declined to halt today's scheduled execution.

That means Newton has two remaining venues for relief: the U.S. Supreme Court and Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who could accept the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles' recommendation for a stay.

Perry likely will not take action until the U.S. Supreme Court acts. And the U.S. Supreme Court likely will not release its decision until late this afternoon.

This means that we probably will not know the outcome until around the time of Newton's scheduled execution -- 6 p.m. Texas time.

An African American radio network is going a show on Newton's case at noon central time, 1 p.m. east coast time. You can listen over the Internet by going here.

To Give

Our little blog is suddenly experiencing a spike in traffic. So I want to try something again that I tried, with moderate success, last Wednesday.

NCADP's activist list just surpassed 9,000 people. Our annual budget is in the six digits.

We need your help. Think about it: We're the only fully-staffed national organization in the country that is specifically devoted to abolishing the death penalty. (There are many other wonderful anti-death penalty groups, but they are either local in nature or they are not fully staffed. These groups are our friends, our allies -- and they stronger we get, the stronger they will be. A rising tide floats all boats.)

Think about other leaders in other progressive movements. The Human Rights Campaign. The NAACP. The American Federation of Teachers. The Sierra Club. And so on. All of these groups have budgets that are in the millions and activist lists that are in the hundreds of thousands. Simply put, this is where we must go.

We can't realize our dreams with our current activist list and our current budget. We need more activists to sign up to be on our e@bolition list and to give us $25 or $50 or whatever you can give.

Join if you can. Give if you can. Thank you!

Newton update

Frances Newton has been moved from Gatesville to Huntsville, where they conduct the executions. Texas prison officials proceed as if executions are going to go on as scheduled until told otherwise; that is why Frances was moved despite the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles' vote to recommend a 120-day reprieve.

Meanwhile, it turns out that I'm going to be on the radio show "Fight Back!" which I discussed earlier. (If you want to tune in, go to www.kpft.org and click on "listen." It's on from 10 p.m. to 11 p.m. Texas time, 11 p.m. to midnight east coast time.) This is good, as I will be able to say hello to the folks on death row as well as to Frances' mom (and they're trying to get Frances a radio so that she can listen to the show).

Back later.

News flash

The Texas Board of Pardons and Parole has just voted to recommend a 120-day reprieve for Frances Newton. However, this recommendation must be accepted by Gov. Rick Perry or the execution will proceed as scheduled Wednesday, barring last-minute court intervention.

Tune in tonight to KPFT!

Folks:

Frances Newton's mom, Iva Nelms, is going to be interviewed at 10 p.m. central standard time (that's 11 p.m. on the east coast, 9 p.m. Rocky Mountain time and 8 p.m. out in blue state land!)

The interview will air on KPFT, Paicifica's station in Houston, but because of the wonders of the Internet, you can listen to it from your computer. Simply go to www.kpft.org and click on "listen here" near the top of your computer screen.

The name of the show is "Fight Back!" It is co-hosted by Gloria Rubac, a leader in the trenches in the abolition movement in Harris County.

Frances Newton is scheduled to be executed shortly after 6 p.m. Texas time on Wednesday. Please stay tuned to this blog for updates and breaking news. To take action, go our web site.

After the interview, friends and relatives of people on death row in Texas will be able to call-in to say hello to their loved ones. If you have someone on death row, call 1-713-526-5738 between 10 p.m. and 11 p.m. central standard time to participate.

KPFT is listened to by people on death row in Texas; Livingston, where death row is located, is within the station's listening range. I'm told that most people on death row in Texas know about "Fight Back!"

Thank you!

Right before Thanksgiving, we offered up a modest plea for help, both in taking action against next week's three scheduled executions and in helping NCADP financially. (See the post below if you are wondering what I am talking about!)

Over the holiday weekend, seven people responded to this admittedly modest appeal, visiting NCADP's donor site and giving a total of $325. And several dozen people signed up for NCADP's e@bolition email list.

Thank you. We need your help. We need your support. You have the power to abolish the death penalty. You really do.

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.

Dec. 1, 2 and 3

Next week we have three really bad executions scheduled. (Well, you know, compared to the *nice* ones.)

On Wed., Dec. 1 Texas is scheduled to execute Frances Newton, despite a very strong innocence claim and classic ineffectiveness of counsel.

On Thursday, Dec. 2, Pennsylvania is scheduled to execute George Banks. He has no innocence claim -- he shot and killed 13 people, including five of his own children. He does have an exceptionally strong claim of severe mental illness, but that often does not stop executions.

On Friday, Dec. 3, North Carolina is scheduled to execute Charles Walker. He would be the first person executed in North Carolina (and also in the modern-day United States) where no body was ever found. He has an innocence claim as well as a mental retardation claim.

If you want to take action against these executions, go here. And if you think you might be able to donate to help NCADP with our continuing battles go here (and tell them the blog sent ya!)

Happy holidays, everyone.

What do Iraq and Afghanistan have in common?

They are the only two countries to have recently restored the death penalty.

A handful of other countries (Lebanon, Chad, Indonesia and India) have allowed executions to resume after periods of moratorium.

And four countries -- Turkey, Bhutan, Samoa and Serbia-Montenegro -- have recently abolished the death penalty.

I learned all this from reading a statement put out by the 2nd World Congress Against the Death Penalty, which convened last month in Montreal. I understand that the 3rd World Congress will be held in Turkey -- a country that now leads the U.S. in human rights, at least in one regard.

Get ready, folks.

On Wednesday, Dec. 1, the state of Texas is scheduled to execute Frances Newton.

Folks, this one is gonna be big. It's gonna get a lot of attention, a lot of press and a lot of protests.

It's not just going to get a lot of attention and a lot of press and a lot of protests because Newton is a woman. Nor is it going to get a lot of attention and lot of press and a lot of protests because she is African American. (If anything, I think race might explain why it hasnt gotten hardly any attention so far.)

Rather, it is going to get a lot of attention and a lot of press and a lot of protests for one simple reason.

Newton may well be innocent.

Go to NCADP's web site to read a press release about this case. Also, shortly (within the next hour) we're going to have the entire 39-page clemency petition she has filed up on the web.

If you think I'm going out on a limb by using the word "innocent" in connection with Newton's name, please read the entire petition. I think you'll see what I mean.

And I think you'll agree with me on one thing. It's time to get mad. It's time to take action.

The Texas smack-down continues

The state of Texas was scheduled to execute Troy Kunkle Thursday just after 6 p.m. central standard time. That would be 7 p.m. my time here in the east, about the time ABC's World News Tonight wraps up.

But it was not to be.

At 6:40 p.m., 40 minutes after the execution could have begun, the U.S. Supreme Court voted 5-4 for a stay. Why? No one can say for sure, because of the way the Court operates.

However, Kunkle's lawyers had argued that the execution should be stopped in light of Monday's Supreme Court ruling that some capital murder defendants in Texas were not given enough of an opportunity to have jurors consider mitigating evidence.

The 5-4 vote is pretty significant. It means that we got Kennedy or O'Connor to join Souter, Ginsburg, Breyer and Stevens. I think it also could mean that the rate of executions in Texas may decline next year -- despite the fact that the state already has three executions scheduled for January alone.

There's a new blog in town

Actually, when I say "new," what I really mean is that I just found out about it. Grits For Breakfast covers criminal justice reform in Texas and its owner, Scott Henson, is a name I know from my college days.

Check it out!

Also, I would be remiss if I didn't point out that Lonely Abolitionist has totally redesigned her blog. (She also has been blogging like crazy, putting me to shame!) Lonely Abolitionist is now the most avant garde, cutting edge blog in the abolition movement! (Well, you know, among the three or four of us...)

A Texas-sized smackdown!

Some people might wonder why I write about Texas so much. It's not because Texas is my home state, although I guess that's part of the reason.

The more important reason is this: of the 943 people executed (as of this hour) since 1976 in the United States, 335 are from Texas. That's higher than the next six states combined.

Fortunately, there's some good news coming out of Texas these days. Yesterday, the U.S. Supreme Court, in a very unusual smackdown, served notice that it is going to be monitoring Texas' use of the death penalty very carefully. The Supreme Court, on a 7-2 vote (Scalia and Thomas dissenting) issued what is called a summary reversal. They outright reversed one death sentence and remanded another to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals for further consideration.

Today there is an awful lot of coverage in the media explaining the Court's actions. Here are some of my favorite quotes:

From Jordan Steiker, law professor at the University of Texas at Austin:

Steiker said the justices' willingness to slap the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals without hearing arguments in the case "reflects a growing disenchantment and impatience" with the lower court's death penalty rulings.

"This is aimed at that court's recalcitrance," he said. "The high court is sending a clear message that even if it's not willing to hear a case, it's going to supervise the Court of Criminal Appeals' application of its decisions. ... It is saying the court is not only wrong, but it is so wrong that it requires our intervention and supervision."

From Rick Broughton, law professor at Texas Wesleyan University:

"If we had any doubt that the court was serious about these issues surrounding death penalty issues, it's pretty clear now. He added that the court's ruling sends a clear signal that "the court isn't going to tolerate anything short of a total overhaul of the [Texas] death sentencing instruction scheme."

And from the Supreme Court itself:

In their opinion in Smith's case, the justices said that despite several of their previous rulings, the Texas court failed to get the message that juries in capital murder cases should fully consider mitigating evidence.

"There is no question that a jury might well have considered petitioner's IQ scores and history of participation in special-education classes as a reason to impose a sentence more lenient than death," the court said in a 12-page opinion. The justices said the state court "erroneously relied on a test we never countenanced and now have unequivocally rejected."

Oh, are they supposed to be guilty before we execute them?

Courtesy of Steve Hall, we learn that a new Texas Poll is being released over the weekend. Among the findings:

“Do you think Texas has executed an innocent person?”

Yes: 70 percent.

“Do you support the death penalty?”

Yes: 75 percent.

Sigh.

Blogging from death row

Renee checked in from Athens the other day. She's helped a person on death row in Pennsylvania start a blog, which is cool. There aren't many entrees yet, but I'm glad to see it's up and running -- I hope more people do this sort of thing!

The human touch

One of the wonderful things about working in the abolition movement is the terrific people one meets across the people. Real people, outside the Beltway, most of whom hold down real jobs and do their anti-death penalty work after hours.

One such person is Tim McDonald. I don't know much about Tim, except that he is, I believe, a university professor and he is active in Tennessee Coalition Against State Killing.

Tim has a friend on Texas' death row with whom he has been corresponding. He recently paid his friend a visit in person and dropped me this email:

Greg and I had a good visit - he is more encouraged now, although no one knows what to expect. Please keep him in mind and if you say prayers, please say one for him.

I saw the families visiting the young men who are scheduled for execution tonight and later this week in Texas - I always leave the visiting room angry over Greg and these other families - I wish the people who so easily sentence people do die could see their handiwork in the faces of these families...it would be justice for the judge and jury to see the pain they have caused these people.

No, I'm not going to Canada....Like I told the Baptist church I have belonged to for many years - one man said "if you don't like it, leave." I said, "No, those of us who know the truth and speak it will stay and cause you trouble."
Best regards,

Tim

Second innocence case: Anthony Graves

To continue the post from below:

The second person on Texas death row whose name has been in the news lately and who presents a very strong and credible case for innocence is Anthony Graves.

The Houston Chronicle reports the following:

Juror regrets role in capital conviction ---- A new trial could be ordered if judge in Galveston finds evidence hidden

One of the jurors who convicted Texas death row inmate Anthony Graves of capital murder 10 years ago says now that he made a mistake that keeps him awake at night.

"I have lost a lot of sleep over my decision to convict Mr. Graves, and if I had to do (it) over again, I wouldn't do it," Jim Hahn stated in a sworn affidavit for the Texas Innocence Network last week.

In an interview this week from his home in Manvel, south of Houston, Hahn said, "I don't think they proved the case beyond a reasonable doubt."

Graves, convicted in 1994 in the deaths of 6 family members in Somerville, is awaiting a decision by a Galveston judge on whether prosecutors hid evidence that could have persuaded jurors to acquit him. If the answer is yes, U.S. Magistrate Judge John Froeschner will order a new trial.

If the answer is no, Graves could be executed for the 1992 slaying of Bobbie Davis, 45, her 16-year-old daughter, Nicole, and Davis' four grandchildren, ages 4 to 9. They were shot and stabbed inside a house, which was burned to hide the crime.

Graves' attorneys, Jay Burnett and Roy Greenwood, said changes in the law prevent courts from considering new evidence.

At the federal level, the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of
1996 limits those sentenced to death to a single appeal, even if new evidence is later discovered.

A state law adopted in 1995 imposes the same limit.

"You only get one bite at the apple," Burnett said.

Hahn, 56, said he and a female juror held out through a day and a half of deliberations, but he finally agreed to go along with a guilty verdict after concluding that the other jurors would never change their minds. The woman also later gave in.

Hahn said he believed then that Graves would get a new trial on appeal.

Hahn said the evidence was circumstantial, no murder weapon was found and that he had little confidence in testimony by a convicted killer and a man who claimed to have overheard an incriminating comment by Graves in jail.

Hahn said the memories of that trial came back after he saw a TV news broadcast about information indicating Graves' innocence in a two-year investigation by students from the University of St. Thomas in Houston.
The students participate in the University of Houston Law Center's chapter of the Texas Innocence Network.

Hahn phoned journalism professor Nicole Casarez, adviser to the St. Thomas students, and she sent him an affidavit form that he signed Oct. 19.

Casarez said she has been looking for the other juror who Hahn said was reluctant to convict Graves.

Of the 6 women on the jury, Casarez has found 3, all of whom say they have no regrets about their verdict.

Hahn also was critical of Charles Sebesta, former district attorney for Burleson and Washington counties, who prosecuted Graves.

"I always believed that Graves was set up by (Sebesta) because the prosecutor needed someone to take a fall," Hahn wrote in his affidavit.

Sebesta told the Chronicle, "That's not unusual, to find a juror 10 years later that wants to recant for whatever reasons. That's something the courts will have to address."

Two more innocence cases

And both involve people on death row in Texas.

First we have the case of Max Soffar. The following story, reported by a Houston TV station, doesn't really do Soffar's case justice, but it does take you to the tip of the iceberg:

Max Soffar has spent the last 23 years on death row. His lawyers have spent a lot of that time in court - twice winning rulings for a new trial.

Those were both appealed - and one is still pending. Now Soffar's lawyers are telling prosecutors and the Houston Police Department there is evidence missing in his case.

Soffar told Eyewitness News, "I walked in and just confessed to a crime they no more had a suspect in than the man on the moon."

Max Soffar is a convicted killer who confessed to his crime decades ago and then days after recanted, saying the confessions were complete fabrications - that he wasn't there and neither was anyone he knew.

"C'mon, this whole thing is a lie," he said.

On July 13, 1980 4 young people were shot execution style in a robbery at the Windfern Lanes bowling alley off the Northwest Freeway. Three of them died.

Harris County Assistant District Attorney Lynn Hardaway said, "It was a horrific crime."

It captured headlines, but no suspects until League City police officers stopped Max Soffar - at that time a drug user and petty criminal - riding a stolen motorcycle. At first, Soffar tells us he thought he could trade information about the shooting - even if it was false - for leniency on the stolen motorcycle. He tells us he wanted to implicate a friend he was angry at and get reward money.

In an audio tape of the confession an officer asks, "Y'all parked at the doors?"

Soffar can be heard answering, "Yeah, and I heard them shots and I moved down. Then he came running. He came running out."

In that first confession, he told cops he was outside the bowling alley and that friend did the shooting. But after three days of interrogations without a lawyer, Max said he was coerced into saying he was inside, too, and that the friend shot 2 people, threw the gun across the room to him and Soffar shot 2 others.

Soffar's lawyer James Schropp explained, "They were all complete fiction."

For the last 12 years, Schropp has been Soffar's lawyer. Not only does he say the confessions are made up, but says Soffar didn't look like the shooter. As it was reported in 1980, the survivor couldn't positively identify Soffar in a lineup. Now Schropp says there is more - crucial evidence missing in the case.

"I think it's extremely important to the case," Schropp said.

In a letter this week to Houston Police Chief Harold Hurtt, Schropp demands a close look in the 280 boxes of recently discovered evidence for polygraph results and audiotapes of Soffar's statements. That's evidence the defense never had, that could help paint the picture of how the confession was made.

"There is no way you can tell me that a triple homicide, quadruple shooting has no evidence in those boxes," Soffar said.

For more information about Max Soffar, go here.