Tales From The Road: Deadline at the American Bar Association's Annual Meeting

First up, The American Bar Association (ABA)'s Death Penalty Moratorium Implementation Project sponsored a screening of the film at the ABA's annual meeting. Atlanta was taken over by thousands and thousands of lawyers with symposiums happening every minute. Our film had a lot of competition.

We screened the film and then there was a panel of myself, Katy, Steve Bright (from The Southern Center for Human Rights, who is also in the film), David Bradford, a lawyer in Illinois and James E. Coleman Jr. of Duke University’s School of Law.

Katy typically talks about how the film came about, why we moved the focus from Furman v. Georgia to the contemporary story of Ryan and I then talk a bit about outreach both before the broadcast and after. It was kind of nerve wrecking to do a presentation in front of lawyers. It is very different than your typical Q and A crowd but I was surprised by how easy it was and excited about what a great dialogue that resulted. The great thing about being in a crowd like this one is that you get the inside scoop on some big issues.

Steve Bright was eloquent as usual! He said some things that blew me away. For example:
1) There are 30 people on death row in Alabama with no lawyers.
2) The criminal justice system is the least affected by the civil rights movement.
3) Ashcroft uses the death penalty more than any other Attorney General. He even seeks the death penalty in states that do no have the death penalty. (Typically the death penalty is supposed to be a state issue but he pushes for it federally.)

We had a long conversation about prosecutorial misconduct. It is something that is talked of quite a bit but one person asked if people are actually tried for it. The short answer is typically no but one man brought up the economics of prosecutorial issues and how misconduct can be costly when death penalty cases typically are around 17 years between appeals and what not and cost about five million dollars each.

I also connected with some great organizations that have resources that once they come out, will have to be featured on the site. The Constitution Project will have eighteen recommendations for death penalty reform that will be released this fall. The ABA’s Death Penalty Moratorium Implementation Project will study six states’ use of the death penalty starting in September.

Many people contacted me about wanting to do screenings in their area, which is great. I am most interested in trying to put together screenings in our target states (NY, NJ, NM, MD, IL, TN and NC). Each of these states are working towards a moratorium referenda, repeal movements and/or significant reform movements.

Posted by Angela at 03:50 PM

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