Quick Facts and Information

“Perhaps the bleakest fact of all is that the death penalty is imposed not only in a freakish and discriminatory manner, but also in some cases upon defendants who are actually innocent.”

–  Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan Jr. 1994

261 exonerated by DNA testing 1989 – 2010 (Innocence Project).  19% were convicted with false “snitch” testimony.

135 people released from Death Row since 1974, after having spent an average of 13 years as condemned prisoners.  

The State continues to kill legally by the following methods;

Lethal injection,

Electrocution,

Gas chamber,

Hanging,

and firing squad (Utah shot a man to death in 2010).

District Attorneys cannot be prosecuted civilly for falsifying evidence, destruction of evidence, or perjury.

DNA testing cost $8,500.

The death penalty has become a political issue that is popularly used in campaigns for judges and district attorneys elected to their positions. Sentences won on death penalty gives them a mistaken reputation for being tough on crime.

During the jury selection process, any person opposed to capital punishment is dismissed by the prosecutors. Not only do these “death-qualified” juries exclude an extremely large proportion of the population, but they are also more likely to convict during the guilt/innocence phase of the trial. (S. Gross, “The Risks of Death: Why Erroneous Convictions are Common in Capital Cases,” 1996)

Death penalty does not deter murder or affect the crime rate;

 FBI Uniform Crime Report 2009; Southern states, where highest execution rate occurs (over 80%) south also has the highest murder rate.  States with lowest number of executions have lowest murder rates (northeast and west).

88% of experts reject the notion the death penalty deters murder; according to a survey of present & past presidents of the country’s top academic criminological societies. (Radelet & Lacock, 2009)

More than 128 nations have abandoned capital punishment. The United States is only outdone in executions by three countries – China, Iran, and Saudi Arabia.

Money can be better spent;  Funds being used for the process leading to executions could be used instead to help families who have lost loved ones to murder put their lives back together through counseling, restitution, and other services addressing their needs. 

Wrongful convictions;

Kenneth Waters; Proven innocent after 18 years serving for 1^st degree murder & special circumstances.

 It took 15 yrs to get DNA testing (help from the Innocence Project whom his sister involved in the case after working to free her brother – even going to the extent to get her law degree just for his case) which proved blood at the scene was not Waters’; it was not enough to motivate the D.A. to drop the charge. It took three more years to free Waters, when an informant officially recanted their testimony; they had perjured themselves by telling a jury Waters’ had confessed to the murder. It turned out the lead investigator coerced her into the perjury. The investigator was prosecuted – but statute limitations were past, she was not held accountable.   Kenneth Waters lost 18 years of his life and when he was finally freed to reclaim his life, tragically an accidental fall lead to his death just 6 months later, at the age of 47.

Cameron Todd Willingham; convicted and executed for killing his three daughters in a house fire. Willingham maintained his innocence. He was convicted based on poor forensic science and a jailhouse informant who claimed he confessed. Updated forensic investigation proved Willingham did not set the fire. Innocence Project for more info.

According to the NCADP, evidence has been uncovered in past two years that four executed men may have been innocent.

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Serial killer is a term describing a type of killer who murders a number of people over a long period of time. Who has over 3,000 people caged, waiting to be killed, eventually calls them up to their death? Who schedules it, organizes viewing the event, and pays to have it carried out? Sounds like a serial killer?  It’s 38 of the U.S. states.

“Compassion is not religious business, it is human business, it is not luxury, it is essential for our own peace and mental stability, it is essential for human survival.” Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso

What Martin Luther King Jr spoke on the travesty of the Vietnam war can easily be applied to the subject of our turning our blind eye to the forgotten souls locked away in our prisons, particularly those waiting on death rows; this kind of behavior “cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice and love.”

Links;

http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/

http://www.innocenceproject.org/

http://www.ncadp.org/