March 1st - International Death Penalty Abolition Day

The Tennessee Coalition to Abolish State Killing, who has a great mailing list that I highly recommend joining, sent the following press release on International Death Penalty Abolition Day:

Tennessee – In communities large and small across Tennessee opponents of executions are writing letters to elected officials to promote alternatives to capital punishment to commemorate International Death Penalty Abolition Day (IDPAD).

Organizers of these statewide events point to the state of Michigan as one example that viable alternatives to the death penalty exist.  “Michigan abolished capital punishment because they discovered 158 years ago that they could not trust the system to be fair and accurate,” said Randy Tatel, executive director of the Tennessee Coalition to Abolish State Killing.  “They learned too late that they had killed an innocent man. The first act of their new legislature when Michigan became a State was to abolish the death penalty.”

On February 28th the New Mexico House of Representatives voted 38-31 to abolish the death penalty.

Chapters in Chattanooga, Crossville, Knoxville, Memphis, Murfreesboro, Nashville, and Sewanee will hold public letter writing events that will target state elected officials.

“The trend is one of ending executions as a tool of public policy,” said Tatel. “The danger that innocent people will be executed because of errors in the criminal justice system is getting worse. The death penalty is a public policy that wastes taxpayer dollars, fails victims, the accused, and our core constitutional value of fairness.”

On January 11th 2003 Illinois Governor George Ryan stated, “Our capital system is haunted by the demon of error -- error in determining guilt, and error in determining who among the guilty deserves to die,” and then commuted 167 death sentences to life in prison clearing out that state’s death row. 

In 2004 New York State’s highest court found its death penalty statute to be unconstitutional, and in New Jersey, questions about the method of execution have put all cases on hold. In Texas, prominent leaders and editorial boards are calling for a moratorium on executions, and legislators in California, the state with the largest death row, have commissioned a study of capital punishment to uncover flaws in the system. The U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments to determine the constitutionality of executing juvenile offenders, and Congress passed the Innocence Protection Act to help prevent wrongful convictions.

The first death row exoneration of the modern era in Tennessee is long overdue.  Paul House through the use of DNA testing has been cleared of the rape of Carolyn Muncey in Union County.  In October 7 justices on the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals voted to free House. "House has shown that is highly probable that he is completely innocent of any wrongdoing whatever," Judge Gil Merritt concluded. "House should be immediately released." Yet, unbelievably, House remains in his wheelchair on death row.

“The risk of executing even one innocent person is too high a price for a democratic society to risk,” said Tatel.  “That’s the lesson of Michigan in 1847, the lesson of Illinois in 2003, and a lesson we will push this state’s elected officials to learn sooner rather than later.”

Posted by beth at 03:46 PM