[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----N.J., USA, CALIF., UTAH

[Rick Halperin]

Jan. 15



NEW JERSEY:

Appealed to Death


A RECENT report by the New Jersey Death Penalty Study Commission has
recommended that the state abolish the death penalty and replace it with a
life sentence in a maximum security prison, with no possibility of parole.
Although I might not agree with all of the commissions reasoning  I dont,
for example, interpret public sentiments as leaning against capital
punishment to the extent that the commission does  I concur in its
recommendation.

That was not always my view. As state attorney general, I supported the
death penalty and worked to enforce it. Later, as a member of the New
Jersey Supreme Court, I voted to affirm and overturn death sentences when
legal standards required either result.

But from a policy perspective, I now believe that the current capital
punishment system, which has spawned elaborate litigation that includes
several layers of appeal, is ineffective.

Because death is an irreversible penalty, the state Supreme Court has
construed the judicial role in capital cases as requiring heightened and
exact scrutiny. The legal process has grown into a complex, lengthy
undertaking that consumes enormous energy and resources.

For instance, each death penalty case typically entails not one but
several hearings before lower and appellate courts. And its not only state
courts; federal courts also evaluate the cases. Given that trial judges,
jurors, prosecutors and defense lawyers are, like everyone else, prone to
error, some have wondered whether any capital case ultimately can survive
such unstinting review.

But the judiciary has not been alone in its caution. 2 of the last 6
elected governors  Brendan Byrne, who is also a former prosecutor and
judge, and Jon Corzine, the current governor  have opposed the death
penalty. Moreover, while the death penalty study commission was conducting
its review, the Legislature imposed a moratorium on capital punishment
apparently because of policy concerns, including the possibility of
mistakes. Although the chance of executing an innocent person under our
judicial process is minuscule, the role of DNA in overturning convictions
has increased doubts.

The result is that New Jersey has not carried out any executions since it
reinstated capital punishment in 1982. The last execution here was in
1963. And no death sentence is likely to be carried out in the near
future.

Other states, like New York, are in a similar position. New Yorks highest
court found a constitutional defect in the states death penalty system in
2004, and legislators in Albany have so far not corrected it.

Why not fix the flaws that have prevented the use of capital punishment
rather than eliminate it altogether? Heres the problem. Narrowing the
scope of the death penalty statute or tightening its provisions, as some
have proposed, would invite a fresh wave of litigation and open new
avenues for legal challenge. In a decent society where death should be
imposed only after careful judicial examination, those appeals would
continue for years. Even renewed attempts at limiting the review process
itself would spur additional lawsuits.

For instance, when New Jersey lawmakers sought in 1992 to curb the manner
in which the judiciary conducts reviews to ensure that juries do not apply
death sentences arbitrarily, the state Supreme Court eventually decided
that it should not be so restricted.

If similar reforms were tried once more, its likely that another 2 decades
would pass with no executions, and we would be having the same debate as
we are today. Indeed, since 1985, the Legislature has amended the death
penalty statute 15 times. Tellingly, rather than expedite the process,
some of those amendments have echoed judicial or constitutional concerns
by strengthening legal safeguards, underscoring how all 3 branches have
proceeded carefully in this field.

Instead of revising the system yet again, we should accept the conclusion
that New Jersey simply lacks the collective will to carry out capital
punishment. Whether its fear of an erroneous execution, as DNA evidence
has shown is possible in other states, or a combination of other factors,
the elected branches appear ready to alter course. In that context,
substituting a sentence of life without parole for the death penalty makes
sense. In the absence of executions, such sentences essentially already
exist.

I cannot fathom the pain felt by the families of murder victims. I can
only assume that their grief and sense of loss are perpetual.
Understandably for some, a feeling of justice will result only from the
execution of the persons responsible for such unspeakable crimes.

Still, as a practical matter, New Jerseys death penalty exists merely on
paper. Despite the law on the books, this state has never really embraced
capital punishment. We should acknowledge that reality and replace the
death penalty with a punishment that is real.

(source: Op-Ed, New York Times; Peter G. Verniero, a lawyer, is a former
justice of the New Jersey Supreme Court and state attorney general)

****************

Theater group tackles death penalty


In Plainfiedl, achurch-based theater group will probe the effect of the
death penalty on those wrongly convicted in its upcoming production, "The
Exonerated."

Real-life situations are the basis for the play, involving individuals
kept on death row for years or decades. Authors Jessica Blank and Erik
Jensen interviewed 40 former inmates by phone and 20 in person. The play
focuses mainly on six people who lost years of their lives before having
their convictions reversed.

The play is especially timely in light of the recent report by the New
Jersey Death Penalty Study Commission, recommending that the death penalty
be abolished. The 13-member commission concluded that "There is no
compelling evidence that the New Jersey death penalty rationally serves a
legitimate penological intent."

"The Exonerated" will be presented as a reading in February by Act IV
Productions the Parish Theater in First Unitarian Society of Plainfield,
724 Park Ave., Plainfield. Cast members and their hometowns are Harry
Ailster, Linda Morton and Alfred Nims, all of Plainfield; John Boucher,
Somerset; Larry D. Fowler, New Brunswick; Frank Higbie, Bound Brook; Art
Lieberman, Scotch Plains; Milt Rowan, Dunellen; Alexandra Rush, Metuchen
and Gail Sweeney, Clark. Barbara VanSavage of Fanwood is the director and
Katherine Watt of North Plainfield is the producer.

Performances are 8 p.m. on Friday, Feb. 9 and Saturday, Feb. 10 and 3 p.m.
on Sunday, Feb. 11. Tickets at $15 per person may be reserved now by
calling (908) 756-0750 and leaving ones name, phone number, performance
date and number of tickets requested. A discussion will follow each
performance.

The production grew out of the churchs "Take a Stand" project on the death
penalty, which began in September as a Social Justice Committee service.
It will continue through March, when the congregation will vote on a
resolution regarding the death penalty. See www.fusp.org for more
information on this project.


(source: Courier News)






USA:

Civil Disobedience Planned to Mark 30th Anniversary of Executions At U.S.
Supreme Court in Washington, DC


30 years after the first execution under contemporary laws of Gary
Gilmore, members of the Abolitionist Action Committee will stage a highly
visual demonstration at the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday, January 17.
Wednesday also marks the day that the U.S. Supreme Court will hear 3 Texas
death penalty appeals and when the 1,060th prisoner since 1977 is
scheduled for execution. Participants will peacefully and visibly call for
an immediate cessation of all executions in the United States through
civil disobedience and the risk of arrest. On the 20th and 25th
anniversaries of that first state-sponsored killing, a total of 25 arrests
were made of death penalty abolitionists for unfurling a banner that read
"STOP EXECUTIONS!" at the top of the stairs leading to the front doors of
the U.S. Supreme Court.

Activists, media and other concerned citizens are invited to join the
Abolitionist Action Committee for a peaceful and nonviolent demonstration
of resistance to the death penalty and to decry this shameful anniversary.

A legal vigil outside the Court will coincide with the action and all are
invited to attend.

January 17

10:00 am - Briefing at the United Methodist Building, Room #3

Location: 100 Maryland Avenue, NE (next to U.S. Supreme Court)

For directions, call the Methodist building at 202-488-5600

For more info about the action, call Scott Langley at 214-226-0503

See http://www.abolition.org for more information on past actions and for
a report on the 2007 action later this week.

(source: Abolitionist Action Committee)

********************

Washington Post Writer Sneers At Injustice of Death Penalty


The front of Sunday's Style section in the Washington Post carried an
article titled "Dead End," wishing for an end to capital punishment, or at
least the odd pursuit of painless execution. Post staff writer Neely
Tucker clearly implies America is barbaric for keeping it. No one in the
piece really argues for it. Tucker even reports with dismay that 67 % of
Americans support capital punishment, "though their betters -- newspaper
editorial writers, the French -- tell them they shouldn't."

Tucker's essay began by joking about killer Gary Gilmore, executed in Utah
in 1977 for killing a motel manager the year before:

Gary Gilmore, patron saint of the modern American execution, hear our
plea.

Give us potassium chloride, give us death, but give us two good grams of
sodium thiopental first.

Give us the long drop, the 2,000-volt surge, the Cor-Bon 185-grain
jacketed hollow-point .45, but let the country give up this quest for a
painless execution. Is it even possible? It has been the holy grail of
executioners for more than a century, and we are still plodding along the
capital punishment road, vast horizons ahead.

Later in the piece, Tucker starts taunting the majority of Americans:

And Americans (including the president) do support the death penalty.

They do so at 67 %, though their betters -- newspaper editorial writers,
the French -- tell them they shouldn't. The United States is one of four
countries that account for about 95 % of the world's executions (the
others being China, Saudi Arabia and Iran). Americans support it 3 decades
after all of Western Europe stopped, calling it outdated, unfair and
barbaric. Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch -- oh, you know.

Tucker approvingly quotes liberal Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun:
"The system is filled with what Supreme Court Justice Harry A. Blackmun
once called 'arbitrariness, discrimination, caprice and mistake.'" He then
laments the failures of lethal injection, starting with the death of
gangster Stanley "Tookie" Williams in California, a murderer celebrities
turned out in droves to spare him from what he dished out:

Nobody really knows if Williams died in pain, but the process didn't look
good. When a federal judge questioned the executioners about the errors,
one team member said the crew wasn't exactly broken up about it:

"[Expletive] does happen," the witness said.

It turned out the executioners had no training in mixing the lethal drugs.
Also, one member had been disciplined for smuggling illegal drugs into
prison. Also, the team leader had received a diagnosis of post-traumatic
stress disorder. Also, a bunch of sodium thiopental -- an addictive
controlled substance -- was taken from the prison pharmacy by execution
team members and, um, not used or returned. (At least somebody out at San
Quentin was feeling no pain.)

400 years of execution in this country (the 1st one was at Jamestown,
1607, firing squad), and this is where we are.

Tucker then noted that the same imperfections happened with child
molester/murderer John Wayne Gacy. After noting the 33 deaths he caused,
Tucker still felt Gacy's botched-then-concluded execution was an
appropriate juncture for humor:

Nobody really cried, because nobody really liked John Wayne Gacy, anyway,
though he could paint a nice clown picture.

Tucker thinks we should all remain uneasy with the death penalty, but
there's too much sneering in this article to qualify as sensitive. But as
with many liberals, Tucker seems more upset about the deaths of the
killers than about the death of their innocent victims.

(source: Tim Graham's blog -- Washington Post)

******************

The Mentally Ill, Behind Bars----Forum: Mental Health and Treatment


LAST August, a prison inmate in Jackson, Mich.  someone the authorities
described as "floridly psychotic"  died in his segregation cell, naked,
shackled to a concrete slab, lying in his own urine, scheduled for a
mental health transfer that never happened. Last month in Florida, the
head of the states social services department resigned abruptly after
having been fined $80,000 and is facing criminal contempt charges for
failing to transfer severely mentally ill jail inmates to state hospitals.

10 days ago, the Supreme Court agreed to determine when mentally ill death
row inmates should be considered so deranged that their execution would be
constitutionally impermissible. The case involves a 48-year-old Navy
veteran who is a diagnosed schizophrenic. In the decade leading up to the
crime he was hospitalized 14 times for severe mental illness.

According to a study released by the Justice Department in September, 56 %
of jail inmates in state prisons and 64 % of inmates across the country
reported mental health problems within the past year.

Though troubling, none of this should come as a surprise. Over the past 40
years, the United States dismantled a colossal mental health complex and
rebuilt  bed by bed  an enormous prison. During the 20th century we
exhibited a schizophrenic relationship to deviance.

After more than 50 years of stability, federal and state prison
populations skyrocketed from under 200,000 persons in 1970 to more than
1.3 million in 2002. That year, our imprisonment rate rose above 600
inmates per 100,000 adults. With the inclusion of an additional 700,000
inmates in jail, we now incarcerate more than 2 million people  resulting
in the highest incarceration number and rate in the world, five times that
of Britain and 12 times that of Japan.

What few people realize, though, is that in the 1940s and '50s we
institutionalized people at even higher rates  only it was in mental
hospitals and asylums. Simply put, when the data on state and county
mental hospitalization rates are combined with the data on prison rates
for 1928 through 2000, the imprisonment revolution of the late 20th
century barely reaches the level we experienced at mid-century. Our
current culture of control is by no means new.

The graph on the left  based on statistics from the federal Census Bureau,
Department of Health and Human Services and Bureau of Justice Statistics
shows the aggregate rate of institutionalization per 100,000 adults in the
United States from 1928 to 2000, as well as the disaggregated trend lines
for mental hospitalization on the one hand and state and federal prisons
on the other.

The numbers include only state and county mental hospitals. There were
many more kinds of mental institutions at mid-century, ones for "mental
defectives and epileptics" and the mentally retarded, psychiatric wards in
veterans hospitals, as well as "psychopathic" and private mental
hospitals. If we include residents of those facilities, from 1935 to 1963
the United States consistently institutionalized at rates well above 700
per 100,000 adults  with highs of 778 in 1939 and 786 in 1955. It should
be clear why there is such a large proportion of mentally ill persons in
our prisons: individuals who used to be tracked for mental health
treatment are now getting a 1-way ticket to jail.

Of course, there are important demographic differences between the 2
populations. In 1937, women represented 48 % of residents in state mental
hospitals. In contrast, new prison admissions have consistently been 95 %
male. Also, the mental health patients from the 1930s to the 1960s were
older and whiter than prison inmates of the 1990s.

But the graph poses a number of troubling questions: Why did we diagnose
deviance in such radically different ways over the course of the 20th
century? Do we need to be imprisoning at such high rates, or were we
right, 50 years ago, to hospitalize instead? Why were so many women
hospitalized? Why have they been replaced by young black men? Have both
prisons and mental hospitals included large numbers of unnecessarily
incarcerated individuals?

Whatever the answers, the pendulum has swung too far  possibly off its
hinges.

It would be nave, today, to address any of these questions without also
considering the impact of imprisonment on crime. One of the most reliable
studies estimates that the increased prison population over the 1990s
accounted for about a third of the overall drop in crime that decade.

However, prisons are not the only institutions that seem to have this
effect. In a recent study, I demonstrated that the rate of
institutionalization  including mental hospitals  was a far better
predictor of serious violent crime from 1926 to 2000 than just prison
populations. The data reveal a robust negative relationship between
overall institutionalization (prisons and asylums) and homicide.
Preliminary findings based on state-level panel data confirm these
results.

The effect on crime may not depend on whether the institution is a mental
hospital or a prison. Even from a crime-fighting perspective, then, it is
time to rethink our prison and mental health policies. A lot more work
must be done before proposing answers to those troubling questions. But
the 1st step is to realize that we have been wildly erratic in our
approach to deviance, mental health and the prison.

(source: Bernard E. Harcourt, a professor of law and criminology at the
University of Chicago, is the author of "Against Prediction: Profiling,
Policing and Punishing in an Actuarial Age."----Op-Ed; New York Times)






CALIFORNIA:

Barbara Becnel: Why I joined the Green Party


In 2006, Barbara Becnel was the 1st black female Democrat to have ever run
for Governor of California. Now she is a member of the Green Party. In
Oakland this evening, Barbara joined area Greens to describe the events
that led to her conversion.

As guest of the Alameda Greens in Oakland this evening, Barbara Becnel
described how the execution of Stanley "Tookie" Williams led her to
embrace the Green Party.

Her political conversion began on the last day of Williams' life. She
described how she was with friends and supporters in the visiting room at
San Quentin. Jesse Jackson was present. William's attorneys brought in a
5-6 page message explaining why Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger had turned
down their clemency request. A councilwoman from Oakland, Desley Brooks,
had brought in 500 petitions to no avail. Barbara's initial shock turned
to outrage. She decided then and there that she could no longer support
any politician or political party that was in favor of the Death Penalty.

With the help of Todd Chretien and Williams' assent, she set up a meeting
with Peter Camejo to tell him that she wanted to run for Governor-- as a
Green. "I'll give Peter his 'props'. He was willing to step aside," she
said referring to how Peter had been planning his own candidacy.
Unfortunately because of the "way the two parties [Republicans and
Democrats] have created the rules," she and Camejo soon discovered that it
would be virtually impossible for her to run as a Green. Barbara decided
she would make her "last hurrah" as a Democrat: by running as an
"anti-Democrat Democrat!"

"It was the most horrific experience of my life," Becnel said, her
thoughts returning to the day when Williams was killed. "It took 35
minutes to kill Stanley," she said. "It was horrific torture... what
happened at San Quentin rises to the level of unconstitutionality."

Referring to a report issued by US District Judge Jeremy Fogel which led
to a moratorium on executions in California and even Jeb Bush's Florida by
the end of 2006, Becnel described how crude the procedures are in
administering the lethal drugs to those being executed. She described how
one guard shrugged off errors after being questioned by the judge saying,
"Shit just happens. So?" Becnel also described how some of the drugs used
for capital punishment come up missing or are mixed up by untrained
guards. Becnel also described a cruel policy used by prisons of "one dose
fits all." "Why do we bother having anesthesiologists in hospitals if one
dose fits all?"

She described Williams as being 250 pounds of muscle. She said Judge Fogel
said it was likely that Williams was not administered the "correct" amount
of drug. Barbara exclaimed, "I know it happened!" [That that was the
case.] She described how it was likely that Williams woke up from the
short-lived drug that was supposed to put him to sleep before being
killed. He was paralyzed by another drug (for the sake of the audience,
she said). "His midsection and feet [however] contorted in a horrible way
as if his body caved into his bones. Forty witnesses heaved a collective
gasp. It was the worst thing to see. Stan was used to pulling muscles and
feeling pain [he was a bodybuilder]. I hoped for a miracle... I hoped for
a phone call. My brain went: "O.K. God. Kill him now." Barbara described
her horrible anguish knowing how Williams was suffering... and her own
disgust with herself to think that she could herself wish another human
being's death even if to him out of his misery.

"Any which way," she said, "it was horrific, horrific, horrific."

Barbara described how she had been against the Death Penalty before
viewing Williams' execution, but left uncompromisingly against it. Before,
she said, she was able to rationalize it as something her political allies
regularly compromised about to win votes for the sake of promoting their
larger progressive agendas. After the execution, however, she pledged to
never again vote for any candidate who supports the Death Penalty.

Becnel described how Phil Angelides once made light of a question she put
him about whether or not he supported the Death Penalty. By later running
for Governor, she said, she hoped to get in his and Arnold
Schwarzenegger's faces about the issue.

"But it didn't happen," she said.

Blacklisted from being invited to key Democratic Party events, Barbara
said she felt like Fannie Lou Hamer. "The Dixiecrats have become the
'Richiecrats'," she said referring to the Democratic Party gatekeepers who
can bar a black woman from full participation in 2006 the same way they
did in 1964.

She said that she was happy when finally one group, The Progressive
Democratic Caucus, asked her to come speak to them on a Saturday night. On
the Friday before the event she got a phone call. The voice on the other
end of the line said: "Well um, um. We've-- um-- we've changed our rules
this time, so... um, um... you are not going to be able to speak on
Saturday.... But, um, for 30 minutes you can man the table!"

Becnel said that her habit at the end of any conversation or meeting is to
do "a reality check"-- to repeat what was said to review that everyone is
on the same page. "With all those um ums--" she explained, "I wanted to be
clear about what was actually said." She described how she repeated the
message back to the caller: "What I hear you saying is that I am
DIS-invited to speak Saturday but I can man the registration table for 3o
minutes! Is that right?"

"No! No!" said the caller. "The INFORMATION table!"

"I therefore am disinvited to speak Saturday night, but I can man the
pamphlet table for 30 minutes! No thank you!"

Becnel described how she marched with Todd Chretien, Peter Camejo, and
others to Sacramento to protest on the steps of the Democratic Party State
Convention. The man she had talked to on the telephone came outside and
asked her if she wanted to come inside and meet the candidates.

Barbara's answer: "NO!"

She described how afterwards, she joined Peter Camejo and Nativo Lopez to
celebrate her becoming a full-fledged Green. Becnel said that there is no
love lost between herself and the Democrats; she is very happy to have
left them. She admitted that the many Democrats in Richmond where she
works are "a little outdone" with her. Barbara laughed aloud though to
recall that of eight candidates in the Democratic Party primary she had
ran 3rd! Steve Westly and Phil Angelides, she said, had to spend
$60,000,000 to beat her. "And $40,000,000 between them was their own
money."

Barbara mused aloud about a fantasy of hers. "I would like to get rich,"
she said, "so I can become the George Soros to end the Death Penalty."

A person in the audience asked Barbara a question about Tookie Williams--
jarring her back to reality. She described Williams without shoes-- in his
socks... "That's how I could see his feet moving." [Meaning that he was
not completely sedated.]

Becnel described how Judge Fogel sought a moratorium on the Death Penalty
with the idea that a more "humane" execution is possible. Even a
veterinarian had told the judge that the protocol used to euthanize people
would never be employed on animals.

"Why? the judge asked him.

"Because I have ethics and standards," the veterinarian replied simply. "I
would not knowingly put an animal away which would cause it pain. First,
medical professionals not guards should administer the drugs. They should
stand by the inmates' side to check to know what to do." [As it is, no one
wishes to be close to the inmate when he is killed, Barbara said, nor does
anyone want to risk being held personally culpable for the death even when
so many people are involved.]

Williams' execution was "surreal" she said, "It is Death Theater. They
even had a curtain. Macabre. Worse than anything I've seen in my whole
life. We were told that two rules would be enforced. No one was allowed to
speak above a whisper. No one was going to be allowed to 'sob loudly.'"

You disconnect and ask yourself: 'am I in a civilized society'?"

Becnel described how she was later attending a Wrongful Death Conference
at UCLA when somebody said to her, "Nobody cares about the last ten
minutes in a Death Row inmate's life."

Barbara replied that she herself did.

She said that she will never tire of speaking to people about the horrible
things she saw during Williams' execution until the Death Penalty ends
forever. She recalled to the audience the vitriolic and hateful e-mails
Williams was still getting even after he was gone. "People called him a
'Buck'," she recalled with disgust.

"Schwarzenneger, and Bush (who killed 150 people in Texas-- more now in
Iraq): these two made it 'O.K.' for these people to come out from under
the rocks." Barbara said that the e-mails came from people from all walks
of life; some had been sent from the peoples' workplaces. She said she
wonders to herself if persons she meets in the course of her day might not
be some of these creepy people. "Do these people I do not know hate me?"
she asked. She quoted one of the most common messages she had read in the
e-mails: "One nigger down, a billion to go."

She said that 80% of Williams' e-mail was positive and supportive though.

"The Green Party is right on the issues-- no ifs, ands, or buts." Becnel
concluded after looking over the small but dedicated audience that had
come to hear her speak and hung on her every word.

It still faces many hurdles to be sure, she added, particularly in its
need to attract membership and leadership from minority groups.

(source: IndyBay)






UTAH:

MEDIA ADVISORY----FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE ---- January 16th, 2007

Contact: Lydia Kalish----Telephone: (801) 393-4467----Terry
McCaffreyCellphone: 408-515-0341


AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL MARKS THE 30th ANNIVERSARY OF THE FIRST DEATH
PENALTY EXECUTION SINCE 1976 AT THE UTAH STATE PRISON

Amnesty International Utah activists will hold a vigil to mark the 30th
anniversary of the execution of Gary Gilmore. The vigil will take place at
the Utah State Prison on Saturday January 20th at 2pm.

Amnesty International, the world largest grassroots human rights
organization will hold a vigil at the Utah State Prison to mark the first
execution since the reinstatement of the death penalty in Utah. Gary
Gilmore was the first man to be executed on January 17th, 1977 by Firing
Squad for the murder of a service station attendant in Crem Utah. This was
the first execution in the United States since the death penalty was
reintroduced in 1976.

Gary Gilmore's execution opened the floodgates for executions in the
United States. Since then there have been over 1000 executions in the
United States.

Rick Halperin, Chair of Amnesty International's Board of Directors, who
will speak at the vigil on January 20th , in a statement he said: "The
death penalty remains what it has always been: the most basic of all human
rights violations. It is clear that the death penalty institution is
inherently flawed, brutally racist, and prone to terrible mistakes. It is
not now, nor ever has been or ever will be, a solution to violent crime in
America. We call upon the Utah legislature to take the courageous and
necessary steps to end the death penalty"

Prof. Alan Clarke, a noted Criminal Justice Scholar, from Utah Valley
State College will also speak.

The vigil will also feature the reading of the names of those who have
been executed and the reading of the names their victims.

About Amnesty International

Amnesty International is the largest human rights grassroots organization
in the world. Recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize of 1977, Amnesty
International is an apolitical organization and bases its work on the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Amnesty International fights to
achieve civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights for all and
fights for the abolition of the death penalty.

Address and Directions to the Utah State Prison

Address: 14012 S. Pony Express in Draper.

Directions: From Salt Lake City, take I-15 south to the Utah Correctional
Facility exit (it is the first exit after the Bangeter exit in the
southern part of the valley). After exiting from the freeway, turn right.
Turn right again. The vigil will take place at the parking lot.

(source: Amnesty International USA)