If you write off Rick Perry as a political prettyboy you do him a disservice and you fall into a trap that his critics seem to never quite overcome. Goodhair is a posturing, preening, parasite who has found the good life by using his political office to grow prosperous. He serves the usual set of Republican suspects - corporations, the affluent, fundamentalists, etc. All this is well known. What is not appreciated is his absolute mastery of hiding this servitude under the bushel basket of bureaucratic detail and obfuscation.
The short sloganized version of this tale has to be: "Rick Perry is too busy polishing his image to worry about innocent inmates facing the death penalty."
Perry's contributing culpability in everything from the TYC scandal to the torching of the govenor's mansion has never been the stuff of headlines, or at least, of enduring cycles of news coverage. Why? I answer because the decisions and inept governance that these sordid events highlight are spin by Perry as bureaucratic foul-ups which makes him the victim of everyone's favorite bete noir - The Big Bad Unelected Bureaucrat! Don't blame me Perry says, blame that little gray guy or gal over there in the cubicle.
So, when last year the Innocence Project raised the all too real specter that Mr. Death Penalty had refused to stay an execution even though there was credible expert testimony indicating that the convicted was NOT guilty Perry pulled a Perry, he used the arcana of the Texas bureaucratic process to stall the investigation. Rick Casey explains:
Dousing a troublesome arson probe Last fall, two days before one of the nation's top arson scientists was about to appear before the commission to explain his harsh criticism of evidence used to help convict Corsicana man Cameron Todd Willingham of deliberately setting the fire that killed his young children, Gov. Rick Perry abruptly named Bradley, district attorney of Williamson County, to replace the commission's founding chairman, Austin defense attorney Sam Bassett
The chairman of the Texas Forensic Science Commission, citing a scheduling conflict, has declined an invitation to appear before a legislative oversight hearing today, angering two lawmakers and prompting one of them to suggest that he should be subpoenaed to appear.
The nine-member commission has been at the center of a months-long controversy over its investigation into whether a flawed arson investigation resulted in the 2004 execution of Cameron Todd Willingham. The panel is expected to reopen discussion of the stalled inquiry when it meets this month in North Texas.
Gee, what a shame. I am sure that that conflict is pretty damn important if you are going to stiff a legislative investigatory commitee. (snark)
I am sure you remember the incident referenced.
Texas Forensic Science Commission chairman won't appear at oversight hearing The commission has received national attention for its inquiry into the arson investigation that led to Willingham's capital murder conviction for the house fire that killed his three daughters in 1991. Willingham, an unemployed Corsicana mechanic, maintained his innocence.
Fire expert Craig Beyler of Baltimore, hired by the commission to look into the case, said in a 2009 report that the investigation was based on outmoded techniques and did not sustain a finding of arson. Beyler was scheduled to discuss his report with the commission in September 2009, but the inquiry was disrupted after Gov. Rick Perry named three new members to the panel.
Goodhair wants the fact he may have signed off thoughtlessly on the execution of an innocent man to just go away, especially in this election year. The purpose of his recently appointed stooge, I mean chairman , over at the Forensic Science Commission is make the issue go away.
A Democratic Houston judge who last week ruled that the procedures used to convict and sentence someone to death in Texas are unconstitutional has put his ruling in abeyance and scheduled a hearing on April 27 to hear evidence on the issue (Read more here). State District Judge Kevin Fine said he wants more information before making a final decision about whether the state's death penalty statute protects innocent people from execution. Judge Fine has asked Harris County prosecutors and defense attorneys to submit motions on the due process issue by April 12. Fine will then have an evidentiary hearing April 27 when testimony on whether innocent people have been executed in Texas is set to be presented. The defense attorneys are still determining whom they might call to testify at the April 27 hearing, but they said it might include officials connected to the case of Cameron Todd Willingham, whose 2004 execution for the deaths of his three daughters in a 1991 house fire near Corsicana is now being questioned.
With the hearing in Judge Fine's court looming on April 27, a group of people, students and non-students alike, are planning to spend their spring break next week learning about the problems in the Texas death penalty system and training on how to organize to change Texas public policy. Everyone is welcome to attend.
Guest speakers include six innocent, exonerated people who together spent 65 years on death row, Curtis McCarty, Shujaa Graham, Ron Keine, Derrick Jamison, Perry Cobb and Juan Melendez. (Speaker bios)
Last fall, the American Law Institute, which created the intellectual framework for the modern capital justice system almost 50 years ago, pronounced its project a failure and walked away from....
The institute's recent decision to abandon the field was a compromise. Some members had asked the institute to take a stand against the death penalty as such. That effort failed.
Instead, the institute voted in October to disavow the structure it had created "in light of the current intractable institutional and structural obstacles to ensuring a minimally adequate system for administering capital punishment."
That last sentence contains some pretty dense lawyer talk, but it can be untangled. What the institute was saying is that the capital justice system in the United States is irretrievably broken.
A study commissioned by the institute said that decades of experience had proved that the system could not reconcile the twin goals of individualized decisions about who should be executed and systemic fairness. It added that capital punishment was plagued by racial disparities; was enormously expensive even as many defense lawyers were underpaid and some were incompetent; risked executing innocent people; and was undermined by the politics that come with judicial elections.
Any questions?
Now, I will wait for you and your party to lead us out of the Dark Ages on this issue and turn all death penalties into appropriate forms of life in prison.
What's that you say, I should not depend on miracles? Probably not. I guess that kicking you guys out of power is the only hope for getting this done. So be it.......
Eugenia Willingham, mother of Cameron Todd Willingham, an innocent person executed by Texas, will lead the "10th Annual March to Abolish the Death Penalty" in Austin on October 24, 2009. The march and rally will include the delivery of a petition with thousands of signatures urging Governor Rick Perry and the State of Texas to acknowledge that the fire in the Cameron Todd Willingham case was not arson, therefore no crime was committed and on February 17, 2004 Texas executed an innocent man. The petition also urges Perry to suspend executions and appoint a balanced and independent commission to examine all aspects of the Texas death penalty system to determine what went wrong in the Willingham case and how to prevent the execution of innocent people. People can sign the petition at www.camerontoddwillingham.com.
The last request of Todd Willingham to his parents was "please don't ever stop fighting to vindicate me." U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia wrote in 2006 that in the modern judicial system there has not been "a single case-not one-in which it is clear that a person was executed for a crime he did not commit. If such an event had occurred in recent years, we would not have to hunt for it; the innocent's name would be shouted from the rooftops."
On Saturday Oct 24 in Austin, people from across Texas will gather and shout out that Todd Willingham was innocent to show the world and Rick Perry that there are people in Texas who are convinced that Todd was innocent and that executions in Texas should be stopped before another innocent person is executed.
The Houston Chronicle reported Sunday that former Texas Governor Mark White has said Texas needs to take a serious look at replacing the death penalty with life without parole. "There is a very strong case to be made for a review of our death penalty statutes and even look at the possibility of having life without parole so we don't look up one day and determined that we as the state of Texas have executed someone who is in fact innocent," said White.
Speakers and other confirmed attendees at the 10th Annual March to Abolish the Death Penalty will include two innocent, now-exonerated death row prisoners (Shujaa Graham and Curtis McCarty), Jeff Blackburn (Chief Counsel of the Innocence Project of Texas), Eugenia Willingham (mother of Todd Willingham), Jeanette Popp (a mother whose daughter was murdered but who asked the DA not to seek the death penalty), Elizabeth Gilbert (the penpal of Todd Willingham who first investigated and then advocated for his innocence), Walter Reaves (the last attorney for Todd Willingham, who fought for him through his execution and continues to fight to exonerate him), Terri Been whose brother Jeff Wood is on death row convicted under the Law of Parties even though he did not kill anyone, and Anna Terrell the mother of Reginald Blanton who is scheduled for execution in Texas on Oct 27 three days after the march, plus others to be announced.
Panel Discussion: Friday, October 23, the night before the march, there will be a panel discussion on the campus of the University of Texas at Austin at 7 PM with Elizabeth Gilbert (the penpal of Todd Willingham who first investigated and then advocated for his innocence), Shujaa Graham and Curtis McCarty, who will both speak about what it is like to be innocent and sentenced to death as they were. The panel is in the Sinclair Suite (room 3.128) of the Texas Student Union on Guadalupe Street.
Elizabeth Gilbert, Shujaa Graham and Curtis McCarty will be available for media interviews earlier in the day on Friday, Oct 23. Call Scott Cobb at 512-552-4743 to arrange an interview.
Schedule for the 10th Annual March to Abolish the Death Penalty, Saturday Oct 24 in Austin
1 PM - 2 PM Members of the press are invited to attend a press availability in a room inside the Capitol building. The room number will be announced. The purpose is to allow the media to ask questions and conduct interviews with the speakers listed below. (For the room number in the Capitol, call Scott Cobb at 512 552 4743 or check in the Speaker's Committee Room 2W.6)
2 PM Marchers start to gather at the Texas Capitol on the sidewalk by the South gate of the Capitol entrance on Congress Avenue at 11th Street
2:30 or 2:45 Start to march down Congress Ave to 6th Street and back to Capitol
3:00 or 3:15 Rally on the South Steps of the Texas Capitol with speakers mentioned above
The march is sponsored by many organizations, including Texas Moratorium Network, the Austin chapter of the Campaign to End the Death Penalty, the Texas Death Penalty Abolition Movement, Texas Students Against the Death Penalty, Texas Death Penalty Education and Resource Center, Kids Against the Death Penalty, Sister Helen Prejean, Journey of Hope ... From Violence to Healing, the Texas Civil Rights Project, Reprieve, Iranians for Peace and Justice, UT Campus Progress, Democrats for Life of Texas, S.H.A.P.E Community Center in Houston, the Dallas Peace Center, ALIVE Against the Death Penalty (Germany), Ensemble Contre la Peine de Mort (France) and many others.
For more information and the complete list of sponsors, visit www.MarchforAbolition.org or call Scott Cobb at 512-552-4743.
Those who support Progressive causes are in an odd position these days: we're often in the majority on issues that matter; and we're seriously talking about how to turn what, just a few years ago, was a wish list...into a "reality list".
Staying in the majority, however, requires the assistance of centrist voters--and that means, from time to time, finding philosophical compromise with voters we'd like to keep "in the fold".
In years past, the issue of the death penalty has created a considerable chasm between Progressives and centrists; with the one side concerned about the misapplication of capital punishment, and the other convinced that, for the most heinous of crimes, the only way to achieve a truly just outcome is for the guilty party to face the most severe of punishments.
What if we could bridge that gap?
In today's discussion we propose to do exactly that: to create a death penalty process that only executes those who are truly guilty and excludes those who might not deserve to be put to death...in fact, those who might not be guilty of any crime at all.
Please come to the opening day reception for the exhibit of John Holbrook's death row photographs in the Texas Capitol at 6 PM on Monday and the artist's talk at 7 PM.
"Images from Texas Death Row" to be Exhibited in the Ground Floor Rotunda of the Texas Capitol
Monday, May 18 - Friday May 22
Event: Images from Texas Death Row "The Photography of John Holbrook"
Sponsor: Texas Friends and Allies Against the Death Penalty
Dates: May 18 - May 22
Where: The Texas State Capitol Building in the 'Ground Floor Rotunda' (Take elevator down to G)
Reception May 18 at 6 PM in the Texas Capitol Members Lounge - Extension, Room E2.1002 (Take elevator down to E2)
Artist's Talk May 18 at 7:00 p.m. in the Ground Floor Rotunda
Photographer John Holbrook
johnholbrook@sbcglobal.net
Artist's Statement
These images are of current Texas death row inmates. The photographs were taken in 2008 at the Polunsky and Gatesville units. Ultimately, the message I wish to convey through my art, is simple. The only way we can truly stop suffering is to love and forgive those who have caused that suffering. I have chosen to photograph both those who are clearly guilty of the crimes for which they have been condemned as well as some who have claims of innocence. Guilt or innocence is irrelevant to the point I wish to make with these photographs. My photography is intended to communicate the idea of forgiveness. I want to share this liberating truth that I have learned.
As a private investigator for 17 years, I work capital murder cases. In 1995 I was assigned to a case involving the double homicide of a North Texas teenage couple. The victims were tortured and murdered. I worked on the defense team for one of the defendants. While working the case, I spent hours examining the crime scene evidence, including graphic photographs. Some years later, I started to experience anxiety when I saw anything remotely similar to the injuries done to the victims.
I sought help from a psychologist regarding this anxiety. I was told I likely had Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The doctor determined that my photography at that time, pictures of homeless and social outcasts shown in a spiritual light, was a subconscious attempt to correct the 'bad pictures' I saw while working the capital murder case .
Ultimately, I learned that I could overcome PTSD by loving and forgiving those who had caused it.
Some family members of murder victims choose to honor their loved ones by asking prosecutors not to seek the death penalty. However, in other cases in order to get a death sentence, prosecutors sometimes argue that the victim's loved ones endorse the death of the accused. It is said that the surviving loved ones, "Need closure". Through my pictures, I argue that this disables the survivors' ability to forgive and accept reconciliation with the person in the future. To me, execution is a grave injustice. Execution virtually denies us the ability to forgive and reconcile with the convicted in the future ... ultimately denying everyone involved the ability to stop suffering.
I maintain that it takes a work of art to ultimately address the collective consciousness. Art is a wonderful medium to encourage and enhance civic engagement and dialogue. It was Uncle Tom's Cabin that spoke and turned the tide against slavery in America. I hope that my images will modestly follow in its footsteps. I aspire to help turn the tide against the death penalty.
New Mexico abolished the death penalty in 2009. New York and New Jersey have also abolished the death penalty in recent years. Last week, the House of Representatives in Connecticut voted to abolish the death penalty. In 2009, there were two bills filed in the Texas House of Representatives to abolish the death penalty.
(The House did the right thing. Now, it's the Senate's turn. - promoted by boadicea)
The Texas House of Representatives Friday passed House Bill 2267, "The Kenneth Foster, Jr Act". Sponsored by Rep. Terri Hodge (D - Dallas), the bill would eliminate the death penalty as a sentencing option under the controversial Texas Law of Parties. It would also require separate trials of co-defendants in capital cases. The bill now goes to the Senate for consideration.
The Texas Law of Parties gained national prominence in 2007 during the high profile case of Kenneth Foster, Jr., whose death sentence was commuted by Governor Rick Perry following a national grassroots movement to halt his execution.
"It is my hope that in the future no other families have to deal with the emotional, psychological and financial hell associated with having a loved one on death row for a murder they factually did not commit, like my family has had to deal with for the last 13 years," said Terri Been, sister of Texas death row inmate Jeff Wood. Wood was sentenced to death under the Law of Parties.
"This bill, when passed, will make me even prouder to be a resident of Texas," said Kenneth Foster, Sr., father of Kenneth Foster, Jr. "Our family knows first hand the injustices of the Law of Parties, and Rep. Hodge's bill is a step in the right direction."
Although Hodge's bill is not retroactive, and therefore would not affect any current cases like Jeff Wood's, several families of death row inmates convicted under the Law of Parties have lobbied in favor of the legislation.
"This is a major victory for the families impacted by this unfair law," said Bryan McCann of the Campaign to End the Death Penalty. "We are told the death penalty is reserved for the worst of the worst, but its application under the Law of Parties affords prosecutors far too much discretion in pursuing the most severe form of punishment."
Executions under the Law of Parties are very rare. Three people have been executed in Texas under the Law of Parties, which amounts to 0.6 percent of the 437 total executions in Texas. The last such execution in Texas was in 1993.
The Kenneth Foster, Jr Act is a much-needed reform. The current law allowing accomplices who have not killed anyone to pay the ultimate penalty for a murder committed by another person is fundamentally unjust.
HB 2267 by Rep Terri Hodge (the Law of Parties bill) passed the full House on second reading tonight. It must pass again on 3rd reading Friday, then it heads to the senate.
HB 2267 would require separate trials for co-defendants in capital trials in which the death penalty is sought and would prohibit the state from seeking the death penalty for people who do not kill anyone but are convicted under the Law of Parties. It is fundamentally unfair to sentence someone to death, like Kenneth Foster was, if they did not kill anyone. The death penalty is intended to be reserved for the worst of the worst killers. People who do not themselves kill anyone are not only not the worst of the worst, they are not even killers.
The Law of Parties allows people who "should have anticipated" a murder to receive the death penalty for the actions of another person who killed someone. A person sentenced to death under the Law of Parties has not killed anyone. They are accomplices or co-conspirators of one felony, such as robbery, during which another person killed someone. However, in some cases a person can end up on death row under the law of parties even though they did not even know their co-defendant had any intention to hurt or even rob the victim, which is what happened to Kenneth Foster. A person who did not kill anyone, or intend anyone to be killed, should not be executed for the actions of another person.
Executions under the Law of Parties are very rare. Three people have been executed in Texas under the Law of Parties, which amounts to 0.6 percent of the 437 total executions in Texas. The last such execution was in 1993. Kenneth Foster would have been executed under the Law of Parties, but his sentence was commuted to life by Governor Perry in 2007.
The Texas Legislature is currently considering HB 2267 and HB 304, which would both prohibit the state from imposing the death penalty on people convicted under the Law of Parties.
The Law of Parties allows people who "should have anticipated" a murder to receive the death penalty for the actions of another person. A person sentenced to death under the Law of Parties has not killed anyone.
Under the Law of Parties, a person can be held criminally responsible for an offense committed by the conduct of another if, "in the attempt to carry out a conspiracy to commit one felony, another felony is committed by one of the conspirators, all conspirators are guilty of the felony actually committed, though having no intent to commit it, if the offense was committed in furtherance of the unlawful purpose and was one that should have been anticipated as a result of the carrying out of the conspiracy."
On February 24, we held a press conference at the Texas capitol with members of the families of Kenneth Foster and Jeff Wood (video on YouTube), both of whom were convicted and sentenced to death under the Law of Parties, even though neither of them ever killed anyone. Foster's death sentence was commuted to life in prison on August 30, 2007. Wood remains on death row.
On March 24, several organizations held a Death Penalty Reform Lobby Day. The main focus of the Lobby Day was to advocate for an end to the death penalty under Law of Parties cases.
Everyone who has been executed in the United States since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976 participated in a crime in which at least one victim died. In most cases, the person executed directly killed the victim. In a small minority of cases, the person executed ordered or contracted with another person to carry out the murder.
In another group of cases, the person executed participated in a felony during which a victim died at the hands of another participant in the felony. The defendant in such cases was typically found guilty of "felony murder"or under the "law of parties," and in some states can receive the death penalty, despite not having killed or directed the killing of the victim.
Texas has executed three people under the Law of Parties out of the 435 total executions Texas has conducted since 1982.
No one should be put to death for a murder committed by someone else. The death penalty should certainly not be used for people who do not actually kill anyone. While most people in Texas may still support the death penalty, I am quite sure that even most people who support the death penalty only want it used for the worst of the worst murderers and not for people who do not actually kill anyone. Dutton's bill would eliminate the death penalty sentencing option for people convicted under the Law of Parties, but it would still allow people who play lesser roles in a case to be convicted and sentenced to prison under the Law of Parties.
Are you on Facebook? If you add our Abolish the Death Penalty Project on Amazee to your Facebook profile by Sunday afternoon, you could help us Win $1,000 to Use in the campaign against the Law of Parties.
Amazee.com is having a contest and we could win $1,000 to use to advocate for passage of the bill to end the death penalty in Law of Parties cases.
You have to have a profile on Facebook in order to add the project to your Facebook profile. If you do not have a profile on Facebook, you can create one and then add the Amazee project to it.
This contest ends on Sunday, April 5, in the afternoon.
At last count, we were in second plase, 23 people behind first place. The project that has the most people who add the project to their facebook profile wins $1,000, which we will use towards the campaign to pass the bill to end the death penalty under the Law of Parties.
We want to organize Law of Parties forums in Houston, San Antonio, and other cities while the Legislature is in session, so if we win the $1,000, we will use the money to do that. We are also planning a phone bank to make calls into key legislative districts asking people in those districts to contact their state representatives and urge them to vote for the Law of Parties bills (HB 2267 and HB 304).
The Law of Parties allows people to be sentenced to death even though they did not kill anyone. Kenneth Foster, Jeff Wood and others were sentenced to death under the Law of Parties.
Conventional wisdom suggests that the death penalty is reserved for the worst of the worst criminals - those who commit the most heinous murders.
But in Texas, we sometimes execute accomplices, people who never pulled the trigger and who might have been only peripherally involved in a crime. The law of parties permits the court to hold someone criminally responsible for the acts of another.
Incredibly, an accomplice can be put to death for the triggerman's crime. That accomplice might not even get his own trial, as Texas allows joint trials in capital cases.
But proposed legislation would change that.
Several lawmakers are pushing for needed reforms that would guarantee a defendant's right to his own trial in a death penalty case. Other bills would rule out sentencing an accomplice to death using the law of parties.
This common-sense legislation, which got a hearing Thursday (March 19) in a House subcommittee, would ensure that defendants in capital cases have their own day in court and are not punished for another's actions. Even death penalty proponents should welcome these safeguards.
Gov. Rick Perry, who has shown little hesitancy about the death penalty, expressed concerns about simultaneous trials in 2007 when he blocked Kenneth Foster's execution and reduced his sentence to life in prison. The governor urged the Legislature to look at the issue.
People from across Texas are coming to Austin on Tuesday, March 24, for a Death Penalty Reform Lobby Day to speak with legislators about the injustice of the Texas death penalty system. Issues to be discussed include the risk of executing an innocent person (HB788), the need for a moratorium on executions (HB 913, HJR 24), abolition of the death penalty (HB 297, HB 682), the Law of Parties (HB 304, HB 2267), and impeaching Sharon Keller (HR 480).
The Lobby Day will include a press conference at 1 PM and a rally on the South Steps of the Capitol at 5:30. Many family members of people currently and formerly on death row plan to participate in Lobby Day events.
Advocating an end to death sentences under the Law of Parties is the primary focus of the Lobby Day. In 2007, the death sentence of Kenneth Foster was commuted to life by Governor Perry. Foster had been sentenced to death under the Law of Parties even though he never killed anyone. Family members of Kenneth Foster, Jeff Wood and others convicted under the Law of Parties will meet with members of the House Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence and other legislators to urge them to approve HB 2267 and HB 304, both of which would end the death penalty under the Law of Parties.
A group of citizen lobbyists will also meet with members of the House Committee on Judiciary and Civil Jurisprudence to urge them to approve HR 480, which would create a House select committee to determine if Sharon Keller should be impeached. Keller, presiding judge of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, has until March 24 to send her response to the State Commission on Judicial Conduct regarding charges that she violated her judicial duties by declining to accept an after-hours appeal from a death row inmate in 2007.
Jeanette Popp, whose daughter was murdered in Austin in 1988, will participate in Lobby Day. Two innocent men were convicted of the murder of Ms. Popp's daughter. Ms Popp's new book, entitled "Mortal Justice", was published on March 1, 2009. Her book tells the story of her daughter's murder, the wrongful convictions of two innocent men, their exonerations, and the eventual trial and conviction of the real killer. Ms Popp visited the real killer in jail prior to his trial and told him that she did not want him to receive a death sentence. He was sentenced to life.
The death penalty was abolished by New Mexico just last week.
Lobby Day Schedule
10 AM - Noon: Lobbying Training Workshop Location: University of Texas at Austin Sanchez Building (College of Education) in the Cissy McDaniel Parker Dean's Conference Room.
1 PM: Press Conference in the House Speaker's Committee Room 2W.6 in the Capitol
2 - 5 PM: Group lobbying visits to at least 90 legislative offices
5:30 PM: Rally on the South Steps of the Capitol
Sponsored by:
Sponsored by Texas Moratorium Network, Texas Death Penalty Abolition Movement, Campaign to End the Death Penalty - Austin Chapter, Texas Students Against the Death Penalty, Texas CURE, the Student Prison Caucus, the Eye & Tooth Project: Forum Theatre on the Death Penalty, Kids Against the Death Penalty, People Organized in Defense of Earth and Her Resources (PODER) and the Friends Meeting of Austin.
The following is the third installment of a Left of College Station series: The Issues We Face, an in depth look at the issues that progressive activist will face in the coming year and the coming 111th Congress and 81st Texas Legislature.
Possibly the most difficult task for progressive activist is continuing the movement to abolish the death penalty, particularly in a state that has executed more people than any other in the United States since 1976. There is a particular urgency to this issue; every battle fought is literally a battle for life and death. Organizations such as the Innocence Project of Texas have worked to save lives; Texas has wrongfully convicted 32 people which is more than any other state in the country.
On Friday's episode of Meet the Bloggers there were several activist and progressive bloggers who discussed the death penalty including Mike Farrell, President of Death Penalty Focus, and Liliana Segura, rights and liberties blogger at AlterNet.org. This discussion ranged from the racial inequality that is present in the justice system to the inhuman and uncivilized nature of the death penalty.
The United States has prided itself on being an example for the rest of the world, yet this country is the only developed western nation that has not abolished the death penalty and finds itself in the company of nations that we often point to as the most egregious human rights offenders. There are four countries that executed more people in 2007 than the United States (42): Pakistan (135), Saudi Arabia (143), Iran (317), and China (470); the United States and those four countries represented 88% of all the executions carried out throughout the world in 2007.
(No duty taken on by government is graver than the decision to take a life. That Texas does so cavalierly is a record of shame, not law and order. - promoted by boadicea)
There were only nine states that performed executions in 2008. Executions in the U.S. did not begin in 2008 until May because of a de facto national moratorium caused by the Baze case being considered by the U.S. Supreme Court. 2008 will end with fewer executions in the U.S. than any year since 1994.
Texas performed 18 of 37 executions carried out in the U.S. in 2008, making it the number one execution state with 48.6 percent of all executions. Virginia was number two with four executions.
Nine of the eighteen people executed in Texas in 2008 were African-American.
66 percent of the people executed in Texas were Hispanic or black.
Seven people were executed from Dallas County, the most from any county in 2008.
Join the "Abolish the Death Penalty Project" on Amazee.com and help Texas anti-death penalty activists win the Amazee Bucket membership contest. We could win up to $5,000 to use against the death penalty in Texas. The project with the most members by Jan 22 wins. If we win, we plan to use one-half of any prize money we win to help needy families of people on death row travel to visit their loved ones on death row. We will use the other half of the prize money to advocate against the death penalty, including during the upcoming legislative session.
First go to the project page, then you have to click on "join project" on the right hand side, then click on "register". Then to qualify as one of the members who count towards the contest, you have to upload a picture or avatar of yourself.
We were all moved by the family members who spoke at the 9th Annual March to Stop Executions in Houston, so we were thinking of how we could help them. We all know that the death penalty is reserved for the poor. There are no rich people on death row. We will use one half of any money we win through this contest to help family members visit their loved ones on death row. Many families have a hard time making ends meet and the extra cost of traveling long distances to visit their loved ones on death row is a great financial burden. Some of the people on death row have young children who rarely get to visit them. The other half would be used for activities during the upcoming Texas legislative session from Jan to May 2009, such as a big anti-death penalty rally at the capitol.
Greg Wright was one of the 18 people executed in Texas in 2008. There are no more executions scheduled this year in Texas. So far in 2008, there have been 36 executions in the U.S., so 50 percent of them took place in Texas. There is one more scheduled in South Carolina on December 5.
This is a photo of Greg Wright 15 minutes after his execution on Oct 30, 2008 in Texas. His friend, Bente Hjortshøj, is standing on the left. She wrote this caption to the photo:
"The first time we touched you Greg...you were still warm...you looked at peace...as though you were just sleeping and would wake up soon....it was sooooo hard to see you like this though you were finally free..this is just about 15 minutes after the execution...sooo surreal....BUT dearest Greg.....Me and Connie kept our promise to you and for that we are glad...but it was tougher than we thought.... we did it out of love and respect for you!! LOVE YA LOADS!!!!".
Bente Hjortshøj has given permission for the photo to be distributed around the internet, "me and Connie decided to publish all pictures to show the world the cruel and unusual punishment and its horrible consequences".
"The truth doesn't matter," Wright said in an interview from death row a few days before his execution. He said he was stunned when his guilty verdict was announced. "I couldn't believe what was happening ... I am innocent."
Wright again proclaimed his innocence in his last statement at his execution, when asked if he had anything to say:
"Yes I do. There has been a lot of confusion on who done this. I know you all want closure. Donna had her Christianity in tact when she died. She never went to a drug house. John Adams lied. He went to the police and told them a story. He made deals and sold stuff to keep from going to prison. I left the house, and I left him there. My only act or involvement was not telling on him. John Adams is the one that killed Donna Vick. I took a polygraph and passed. John Adams never volunteered to take one. I have done everything in my power. Donna Vick helped me; she took me off the street. I was a truck driver; my CDL was still active. Donna gave me everything I could ask for. I helped her around the yard. I helped her around the house. She asked if there were anyone else to help. I am a Christian myself, so I told her about John Adams. We picked him up at a dope house. I did not know he was a career criminal. When we got to the house he was jonesin for drugs. He has to go to Dallas. I was in the bathroom when he attacked. I am deaf in one ear and I thought the T.V. was up too loud. I ran in to the bedroom. By the time I came in, when I tried to help her, with first aid, it was too late. The veins were cut on her throat. He stabbed her in her heart, and that's what killed her. I told John Adams, "turn yourself in or hit the high road." I owed him a favor because he pulled someone off my back. I was in a fight downtown. Two or three days later he turned on me. I have done everything to prove my innocence. Before you is an innocent man. I love my famly. I'll be waiting on ya'll. I'm finished talking."
The lethal injection was then started. He was pronounced dead at 6:20 p.m.
When you read the final statements of most executed offenders, at least those who choose to give them, they tend to express remorse, often apologizing to victim families, or else offering comfort to friends and family they're leaving behind. Wright's final statement was noteworthy because he defiantly maintained his innocence until the end, instead insisting that an informant who testified against him really did the deed.
There is absolutely no reason for you to protest the execution of this scum. The 87 year old man who he and his friend killed with a coat hanger was my Great-Grandfather. Imagine being 4 years old and having just been to his birthday party and then being picked up from school and your mother in tears because someone killed him, just so they could steal his stuff to pawn it for drugs. And then for years watching everyone in your family suffer because the courts are constantly changing their minds about the rulings of this man's fate. Tell me then that you wouldn't want the person responsible to pay for his crime, and all of the pain he caused.
-thedarkroom
Standing in opposition to the death penalty is not a position that I have come too lightly, and it is not a position that I have come to without considering the fact that in opposing the death penalty I am defending the rights worst of humanity. However, it is necessary to defend the rights of everyone, even those among us who we have little compassion or empathy for. In fact many times it is those people who need their rights defended the most.
It is not that I do not want people to pay for their crimes; I most certainly want criminals who commit heinous crimes to feel the full brunt of the law. However, I do not believe that putting someone to death is an acceptable form of punishment in a civilized society. Mohandas Gandhi said, "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind."
Today, a letter from 22 former federal and state judges and prosecutors from Texas and across the country was delivered to Governor Perry urging him to grant a 30-day reprieve to Charles Dean Hood who is scheduled for execution on Wednesday, September 10, 2008. The former judges and prosecutors are asking the governor to grant a reprieve to allow the Texas courts to conduct a meaningful review of the allegations of a secret romantic relationship between Judge Verla Sue Holland, who presided over Mr. Hood's 1990 capital murder trial, and former Collin County District Attorney Thomas O'Connell, who prosecuted the case.
The letter states: "We write because our long experience as jurists and law enforcement officials leads us to believe that justice cannot be served unless the courts are able to consider whether Mr. Hood's conviction and sentence are invalid."
Signatories to the letter include: John J. Gibbons, former Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit; W.J. Michael Cody, former Attorney General of Tennessee; J. Joseph Curran, former Attorney General of Maryland; William S. Sessions, former Chief Judge, United States District Court for the Western District of Texas and former Director of the FBI; Kenneth J. Mighell, former United States Attorney, Northern District of Texas; Jay Burnett, former Criminal District Court Judge, Texas; and Sam D. Millsap, former District Attorney, Bexar County, San Antonio, Texas.
The former judges and prosecutors say that "Mr. Hood's claim appears on its face to have substantial credibility." In June, a former assistant district attorney who worked in the office with Mr. O'Connell filed an affidavit stating that "[i]t was common knowledge in the District Attorney's Office, and the Collin County Bar, in general, that the District Attorney...and Judge Verla Sue Holland had a romantic relationship." Mr. Hood's trial attorney and a private investigator have also signed affidavits corroborating this claim.
To-date, the Texas courts have refused to consider the charges on their merits or allow an investigation before the scheduled execution. Judge Robert Dry of the 199th Judicial District Court has scheduled a hearing on Mr. Hood's request to take investigatory depositions of Judge Holland and former District Attorney Tom O'Connell on September 12, 2008 - two days after the scheduled execution.
"It is an irrevocable wrong to send a man to his death without ever hearing this critical evidence," the letter from the former judges and prosecutors states.
Earlier this summer, the nearly 500-member Association of Professional Responsibility Lawyers and three dozen of the nation's leading legal ethicists also called Mr. Hood's conviction into question (pdf). They say the affair constitutes a violation of Mr. Hood's constitutional rights and must be investigated.
On June 3, Hood's lawyers obtained a sworn statement from a lawyer who had worked in the Collin County district attorney's office at the time of the trial in 1990. The former assistant DA, Matthew Goeller, said it was "common knowledge in the district attorney's office" that DA Tom O'Connell and Judge Verla Sue Holland were involved in a long-running affair.
The courts have clearly held that the constitutional right to due process includes a trial in which the judge is not, figuratively or literally, in bed with the prosecutor.
The ABA Code of Judicial Conduct provides that "A judge shall disqualify himself or herself in a proceeding in which the judge's impartiality might reasonably be questioned." Where there is doubt, a judge is obliged to disclose information that lawyers might consider relevant to the question of disqualification.
The judge in Hood's case did not disclose the affair with the prosecuting attorney.
Charles Hood deserves a new trial in which the judge is not having an affair with the prosecuting attorney.
You can also leave Governor Perry a phone message at: 512-463-2000, fax him at 512-463-1849 (his fax line is often busy, so just keep trying) or write him at:
Office of the Governor
P.O. Box 12428
Austin, Texas 78711-2428
Today in Huntsville, Texas Jeff Wood was going to be strapped down, and poison was going to be injected into his body. Today Jeff Wood was going to die because Daniel Reneau shot and killed Kriss Keeran. Jeff Wood's execution has been postponed, but the basic truth is that Jeff Wood is going to be executed for a murder that he did not commit a murder that was committed by a man that was executed six years ago. On that day we are all murderers.
This case enters the murky waters of the moral justifications of capital punishment, the imperfect justice system that sentences criminals to death, and the public's overriding emotions of vengeance and apathy.
Last summer, Governor Perry commuted the death sentence of Kenneth Foster only hours before he was scheduled for execution. The Board of Pardons and Paroles had voted the day before to recommend clemency for Foster, who had been convicted under the "Law of Parties" even though he did not kill anyone. Many newspapers wrote editorials urging Perry to commute Foster's death sentence, including the Dallas Morning News, which wrote in, "Not a Killer: Kenneth Foster does not deserve execution":
Ours is the only state in the country to apply the "law of parties" to capital cases, allowing accomplices to pay the ultimate penalty for a murder committed by another. Mr. Foster is a criminal. But he should not be put to death for a murder committed by someone else"
Now, Texas is set to execute another person who did not kill anyone but was sentenced to death under the Law of Parties.
Jeff Wood is waiting to die on Texas Death Row with an execution date of August 21st, 2008. Jeff was charged under the Law of Parties and was not the shooter in this crime. Jeff did not know that the other person would commit a murder. The actual shooter in this case has already been executed by the state of Texas.
Last night several different Austin Democratic clubs participated in a combined candidate forum. All four DA candidates were present for questions. Three of the candidates were asked a question related to the death penalty, with exception of Rosemary Lehmberg. So far no one has publicly supported a moratorium on seeking the death penalty in Travis County. Rick Reed seems to be the only candidate to question the death penalty and possibility of executing an innocent person. Videos are posted below.
Jeanette Popp spoke at a press conference on the plaza of the Blackwell/Thurman Criminal Justice Center in Austin on Saturday, January 12. Popp urged the candidates for Travis County District Attorney to impose a moratorium on the death penalty in Travis County by not seeking the death penalty in any capital trials and instead using life without parole as an alternative to the death penalty. The above video was recorded after the press conference.
Jeanette Popp's daughter Nancy DePriest was murdered in Austin in 1988.
March 4, 2008, the day of the primary in Travis County, would have been Nancy's 40th birthday.
Jeanette became intimately familiar with the many flaws of the Texas criminal justice system after two innocent men, Chris Ochoa and Richard Danziger, were wrongfully convicted of her daughter's murder and spent 12 years in prison. They were exonerated and released in 2001. The City of Austin settled separate lawsuits with Danziger and Ochoa for $9 million and $5.3 million respectively in 2003. Danziger also settled with Travis County for $950,000. The actual killer, Achim Marino, was convicted in October 2002.
"The death penalty system in Texas is broken. The next DA in Travis County should reflect how the Travis County community's views on the death penalty have evolved in recent years and pledge that for now the death penalty is off the table within Travis County", said Scott Cobb of Texas Moratorium Network. "If we want to slow down the number of executions in Texas and reduce the risk of executing an innocent person, we need to elect a district attorney who will pledge to impose a moratorium on seeking new death sentences and a moratorium on setting execution dates for cases with existing death sentences. Certainly a DA candidate in Travis County who makes such a pledge will find a rich reward of votes in the Democratic primary", said Cobb.
For more information visit TMNPAC.org and contribute online through ACTBLUE.
Greg Wright was one of the 18 people executed in Texas in 2008. There are no more executions scheduled this year in Texas. So far in 2008, there have been 36 executions in the U.S., so 50 percent of them took place in Texas. There is one more scheduled in South Carolina on December 5.
