[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, N.C., ARK., ARIZ., GA.

[Rick Halperin]

Oct. 3


TEXAS:

Texas Ruling Signals Halt to Executions Indefinitely


Signaling an indefinite halt to executions in Texas, the state's highest
criminal appeals court late Tuesday stayed the lethal injection of a
28-year-old Honduran man who was scheduled to be put to death Wednesday.

The reprieve by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals was granted a week
after the United States Supreme Court agreed to consider whether a form of
lethal injection constituted cruel and unusual punishment barred under the
Eighth Amendment. On Thursday, the Supreme Court stepped in to halt a
planned execution in Texas at the last minute, and though many legal
experts interpreted that as a signal for all states to wait for a final
ruling on lethal injection before any further executions, Texas officials
said they planned to move ahead with more.

As a result, Tuesday's ruling by the Texas court was seen as a sign that
judges in the nation's leading death penalty state were taking guidance
from the Supreme Court and putting off imminent executions.

The Texas court order gave state authorities up to 30 days to explain in
legal papers why the execution of the inmate, Heliberto Chi, should
proceed. With responses then certain from defense lawyers, the effect of
the order was to put off the execution for months, lawyers said.

Mr. Chi was convicted of killing the manager of a men's store in Arlington
in 2001.

Other executions, including 4 more scheduled in the next 5 months, were
also likely to be stayed, said David R. Dow of the Texas Defender Service,
a nonprofit law clinic that worked on Mr. Chi's appeal.

"Until the Court of Criminal Appeals addresses the questions raised in
this case there will be no more executions in Texas," predicted Mr. Dow, a
law professor at the University of Houston.

Acting less than a week after it rejected another inmate's appeal 5 to 4,
the appeals court justices provided no breakdown of the vote and did not
give any reasoning for their decision. But they directed the state's
director of criminal justice, Nathaniel Quarterman, not to execute Mr. Chi
and gave Mr. Quarterman and Tim Curry, the district attorney of Tarrant
County, where the crime had been committed, up to 30 days to respond to
claims by Mr. Chi's lawyers that the formulation and administration of
chemicals used for lethal injections did not quickly and painlessly kill
but paralyzed the condemned inmates while they painfully suffocated.

Earlier Tuesday, the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles voted 4 to 3
against recommending a stay for Mr. Chi. A request for a 30-day reprieve
was also pending with Gov. Rick Perry.

Had the appeals court not halted the execution, Mr. Chi's lawyers would
have taken the case to the United States Supreme Court, which last
Thursday stayed the execution for another Texas inmate, Carlton Turner Jr.

Bryan Stevenson, director of the Equal Justice Initiative in Montgomery,
Ala., and a law professor at New York University, said the Supreme Court's
ruling was a sign that while it was reviewing the legality of lethal
injection in a Kentucky case, "it was at least unseemly for states to be
carrying out executions."

Deborah Denno, a professor at Fordham Law School, called the latest stay
in Texas significant. "I do think Texas is reaching a turning point," Ms.
Denno said. "It's not unusual throughout the country, but it is unusual in
Texas. And not uncommonly when people are talking about the death penalty,
there's Texas and everywhere else, because Texas seems to be in its own
death penalty world."

But Diane Clements, president of Justice For All, a victims' advocacy
group in Texas, said the Supreme Court and the Texas appeals court gave no
reasons for their rulings, "so we're left here with no direction."

The delays spelled more suffering for victims' families, Ms. Clements
said. "I'm sure family of that stayed-execution victim is on a roller
coaster ride," she said. "If there's anything certain about the death
penalty for families, it's that it is very uncertain."

(source: New York Times)

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

Future of lethal injection uncertain


A state appeals court decision Tuesday to stay the execution of a
convicted killer could have massive implications for the nation's busiest
death penalty state.

Attorneys for death row inmates scramble to file similar appeals and
prosecutors await a decision from the U.S. Supreme Court.

Heliberto Chi, 28, was set to die this evening for the 2001 murder of a
clerk at a clothing store in Arlington.

Chi's lawyers filed appeals, urging the courts to stay his execution until
after the Supreme Court decides on a case from Kentucky that claims lethal
injection "cruel and unusual" punishment and seeking protection under the
eighth amendment of the constitution.

His execution was stopped by the Texas Court of Criminal Apppeals on
Tuesday.

The Supreme Court last week agreed to hear a case raised by two death row
inmates in Kentucky that claimed there were inconsistencies in federal
court decisions throughout the nation on how  and why  condemned inmates
could raise appeals based on the question that lethal injection was cruel
and unusual.

The suit claims that the procedure  used in 37 other states, including
Texas  could inflict unnecessary pain and suffering upon inmates who,
because of the drugs used, would have no way to say so.

Every state that uses lethal injection, except New Jersey, uses the same
three-drug cocktail and in roughly the same amounts.

The state adopted the method as its preferred method for executing
condemned inmates in 1977.

Since then, it has executed 405, the most by far in the nation. Virginia
has executed 98, and Oklahoma rounds out the top three with 86 executions.

According to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, the process uses 3
drugs: 1 to sedate the inmate, another to collapse the lungs and a final,
3rd drug to stop the heart.

Sodium Thiopental, a short-acting barbituate, is "many times greater than
the amount given a surgical patient and far exceeds what is necessary to
render the person unconcious," according to information released from
TDCJ.

The agency said the dose of 3 grams of this single drug alone is enough to
be conisdered lethal.

Next, pancuronium bromide is adminstered to collapse the lungs. Finally,
potassium chloride, a salt used to melt snow on streets, is given to stop
the heart.

The administration of the drugs takes anywhere between 2 to 3 minutes, and
the offender is pronounced dead usually 8 to 10 minutes after the drugs
begin.

At least 10 states have placed a temporary halt to executions, including
Alabama.

Gov. Bob Riley issued a statement this week saying his state would revise
its protocol, presumably as a preemptive strike against opponents who say
the current protocol could impose excruciating pain on inmates.

The stay was imposed just before Alabama was slated to execute convicted
murderer Tommy Arthur. That same day Texas was set to execute Carlton
Turner, but the Supreme Court  who only 2 days before turned down an
appeal nearly identical to Turner's from Michael Richard  decided to stay
his execution.

Richard was executed Sept. 25.

While Chi's execution has been stayed indefinitely, it does not mean a
commutation is his future, his lawyers told the Associated Press.

The Texas Board of Pardon and Paroles voted 7-0 Tuesday against a request
for commutation, but a request to recommend a 180-day reprieve was much
closer, failing by a 4-3 vote.

Since Sept. 25 when the Supreme Court turned down an appeal from a
condemned man and two days later upheld an appeal on the same grounds, it
is unclear about the future of executions in Texas.

Chi would have been the 27th man to die inside the death house at the
Huntsville Walls Unit this year, and the 929th execution to take place by
lethal injection since Texas executed the first man by the method in 1982.

While Texas was not the first state to adopt the method as the preferred
method of execution, it was the first to execute an inmate with the
procedure in 1982.

Charlie Brooks became the 1st on Dec. 7, 1982.

North Carolina followed suit 2 years later, executing its 1st inmate with
the method in 1984.

(source: Huntsville Item)






NORTH CAROLINA:

State officials reject judge's ruling on N.C. execution policy


Gov. Mike Easley said that the Council of State's vote was not about
whether North Carolina should or shouldn't have the death penalty.

Top state officials declined yesterday to revisit a dispute over the role
of doctors in executions, a clash that has thrown North Carolinas death
penalty into legal limbo for nearly a year.

Since January, the N.C. Medical Board has barred doctors from assisting in
putting inmates to death. That is at odds with state policy, which
requires that a doctor monitor a condemned inmate's vital signs while an
execution is being carried out.

Gov. Mike Easley and nine other elected officials voted yesterday not to
reconsider the state policy, despite a judges ruling that the policy was
improperly adopted. They said that the judge who issued the ruling has no
jurisdiction in the matter.

The group of 10 elected state officials, collectively known as the Council
of State, wanted to avoid a substantive debate about capital punishment.
Instead, they limited themselves to the narrow question of whether they
were legally required to reconsider a lethal-injection procedure that they
first approved in February.

"A lot of people mistakenly think that the Council of State is voting on
whether the state should or should not have the death penalty," said
Easley, a Democrat who has supported capital punishment in the past.

For now, Easley said, what is in effect a moratorium on the death penalty
will continue while various legal issues surrounding the role of doctors
are resolved in the courts. Ultimately, that could mean a decision by the
U.S. Supreme Court, which recently agreed to hear a challenge to the
method of lethal injection in Kentucky.

In North Carolina, 5 executions have been suspended because of the fallout
from the medical board's declaration that taking an active role in an
execution is a violation of medical ethics. The board, which licenses
doctors, has threatened to punish any doctor who participates in an
execution.

But a federal judge has ruled that executions must be carried out under a
doctor's supervision, and North Carolina's lethal-injection procedure
requires that a doctor monitor the condemned inmate's "essential body
functions" and check for signs of undue pain and suffering.

The Council of State approved that procedure in February. But in August,
an administrative-law judge in Raleigh ruled that the Council of State's
approval was inappropriate. The judge, Fred Morrison, said that the
council should have heard from representatives of death-row inmates before
voting on the lethal-injection procedure.

Yesterday, rather than reconsider the lethal-injection policy or deal with
the substance of Morrison's ruling, the council approved a resolution
stating simply that Morrison had no jurisdiction to rule as he did.

Jurisdiction over death-penalty cases falls under a different judge -
Donald Stephens of Wake County Superior Court. In this instance, however,
Stephens agreed to allow Morrison to consider whether the councils
approval of the lethal-injection procedure was appropriate.

Stephens recently issued a separate ruling of his own. He ruled last month
that the medical board overstepped its authority when it threatened to
punish doctors for participating in executions. The medical board will
discuss whether to appeal that ruling at its meeting later this month, a
spokesman for the board said.

Since the debate over doctors and the death penalty began, the Council of
State has been reluctant to get involved. In addition to the governor and
lieutenant governor, the council is made up of department heads such as
the commissioner of agriculture, the state treasurer and the
superintendent of public instruction, who generally feel that they have
little expertise on the death penalty and that it should not be their role
to make such policy decisions.

The state legislature has also remained on the sidelines.

The last inmate to be executed in North Carolina was Samuel Flippen, a
former Clemmons resident who was convicted of killing his 2-year-old
stepdaughter.

He was put to death on Aug. 18, 2006.

Attorneys in North Carolina and around the country have for years
challenged the constitutionality of lethal injection, and last week, the
U.S. Supreme Court decided for the 1st time to hear arguments on the
issue. In January, it will hear a challenge from 2 death-row inmates in
Kentucky, who say that the method of lethal injection constitutes cruel
and unusual punishment.

The case could have implications for North Carolina, which uses the same
3-drug cocktail in its lethal injections as Kentucky and many other
states.

"We're probably just spinning our wheels," said Jim Long, the commissioner
of insurance, during yesterday's Council of State meeting.

"The final decision is probably going to come from the U.S. Supreme
Court."

Long was the only member of the council who voted against the resolution
asserting that Morrisons ruling was not within his jurisdiction.

(source: Winston-Salem Journal)






ARKANSAS:

Beebe may set execution date as Supreme Court debates


Gov. Mike Beebe remains open to setting an execution date for a death-row
inmate, though the U.S. Supreme Court will weigh a case on whether lethal
injection - the execution method used by Arkansas - is cruel and unusual
punishment.

Speaking to reporters Tuesday, Beebe said he'd let courts "take their
normal route" in deciding whether to issue a stay for an inmate with a
scheduled execution this month. However, Beebe left open the possibility
of scheduling an execution for another inmate, Don Davis, while the high
court deliberates.

"The normal procedure I think is, we do that and that obviously, you wait
the stays that inevitably come from the judicial proceeding," Beebe said.
"That's the normal course. We haven't done anything yet."

At least a dozen states using lethal injections put their executions on
hold because legal challenges to the procedure similar to Supreme Court's
case brought by two death-row inmates in Kentucky. They claim the mix of
drugs used in Arkansas and many of the 36 other states performing lethal
injections violates the ban on cruel and unusual punishment in the Eighth
Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

In Arkansas, only inmate Jack Harold Jones faces a set execution date,
scheduled for Oct. 16. Jones told the state Parole Board in September he
did "own" responsibility for the 1991 rape and slaying of Bald Knob
bookkeeper Mary Phillips and an attack on her 11-year-old daughter.

Beebe acknowledged that his office received a letter from the state
attorney general saying there was no legal hurdle to setting an execution
date for Davis. Sentenced to death for the 1990 killing of Jane Daniels of
Rogers, Davis faced a scheduled 2006 execution date, but later received a
stay from a federal judge.

Both Jones, 43, and Davis, 44, have signed on to a lawsuit by Arkansas
death-row inmate Terrick Nooner similar to the one before the U.S. Supreme
Court.

Their suit involves the 3 drugs used in Arkansas to executed inmates - an
anesthetic, a muscle paralyzer and a substance to stop the heart. The suit
claims that, if a condemned prisoner is not given enough anesthetic, he
can suffer "excruciating pain" without being able to cry out.

Beebe, a Democrat and former state attorney general, issued a temporary
reprieve on the day of Nooner's scheduled September execution because of
federal stays. However, the state attorney general's office had petitioned
the Supreme Court to lift 2 stays.

"Obviously, we complied with the previous stay order on Mr. Nooner and
await any information on Mr. Jones," Beebe said. "Obviously, Mr. Davis
would fall into the same category if we set an execution date."

(source: Associated Press)






ARIZONA:

State Opposes Bid to Delay Ariz. Execution during U.S. Review


State prosecutors are fighting an attempt by Jeffrey Landrigan's lawyers
to put the convicted killer's scheduled execution on hold while the U.S.
Supreme Court considers the legality of lethal injection.

Attorney General Terry Goddard said Tuesday the state Supreme Court should
not delay the Nov. 1 execution date it set Sept. 25 for Landrigan, who
faces a death sentence for murdering a man in Phoenix in 1989.

Landrigan's' lawyers said in a motion filed Friday that the legality of
legal injection is in question after the U.S. Supreme Court agreed Sept.
25 to consider the legality of Kentucky procedures reportedly similar to
those used by Arizona. 2 days later, the court blocked the scheduled
execution of a Texas inmate without explanation.

Lawyers in the Kentucky case contend the three-drug method of lethal
injection violates the Constitution's ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

If the U.S. Supreme Court finds the Kentucky procedure unconstitutional,
Arizona "would be required to revise its method of execution,'' the
Landrigan lawyers' motion said.

"It would be unconscionable for the state to execute Landrigan knowing
that lethal injection has been deemed cruel and unusual punishment by
other courts and may be deemed so in a few months by the United States
Supreme Court,'' the defense lawyers said.

The Arizona Supreme Court has previously upheld the constitutionality of
lethal injection so the U.S. Supreme Court is the only court that should
determine whether a stay for Landrigan is appropriate because of its
pending review of the Kentucky case, argued Goddard and his top death
penalty lawyer, Kent Cattani.

It isn't clear what issues raised in the Kentucky case will ultimately be
addressed by the U.S. Supreme Court or even why the justices agreed to
review that case, Goddard and Cattani wrote. "This court should not
speculate regarding what the law may or may not be when and if an opinion
is issued.''

Landrigan escaped from an Oklahoma prison in 1989, where he was serving
prison terms for a 1982 murder and a 1986 prison stabbing. After a night
of drinking beer in Phoenix a month later, Landrigan killed Chester Dyer
by stabbing him and strangling him with an electrical cord.

Robert Charles Comer's execution on May 23 was the last in Arizona and the
1st in the state since Donald Miller was executed on Nov. 8, 2000.

(source: Associated Press)






GEORGIA:

Life without parole good alternative to death penalty


Earlier this year, a group of prosecutors tried to persuade the Georgia
Legislature to pass a bill making it easier to impose the death penalty.
Inspired by a horrific murder case in Gwinnett County, the bill would have
allowed a judge to sentence a defendant to death without the unanimous
consent of 12 jurors.

The bill, fortunately, was stopped by the state Senate. But it's
astounding that it passed the House, given the mistakes juries so often
make in sending the innocent off to prison. Why would prosecutors want to
make it easier to send an innocent man to his death? (While the
Legislature was debating the easier-death-penalty bill during the last
session, its members were also trying to figure out how to compensate
Robert Clark, who had spent 24 years in prison for a rape he didn't
commit.)

When the Legislature reconvenes next year, it ought to give priority to a
set of legal changes that would address some of the unfairness endemic to
the state's criminal justice system. Of all the levers of government, none
has more direct power over individuals than the authority to send a person
to prison. While the system can never be perfect  depending as it does on
human judgments  it can certainly be improved.

Recently, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution published an exhaustive series
on the death penalty, showing that it remains as arbitrary a punishment in
this state as it was 35 years ago, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled it
unconstitutional for that very reason. Some of the most heinous murderers
escape death, while less horrific offenders go to death row. And, over the
past decade, Georgia prosecutors have been more than twice as likely to
seek the death penalty when the victim was white than when the victim was
black, according to the series, "A Matter of Life or Death."

"It's like there's a race-specific definition for how serious or horrible
a homicide is, " University of Maryland criminologist Ray Paternoster told
the AJC. "Black victims have to be really, really brutalized before
they're treated the same as a white-victim case."

That caprice is reason enough to do away with capital punishment. But
Georgia is immersed in a rigid Old Testament mentality that makes the
abolition of the death sentence unlikely in this lifetime. But the
Legislature can, at the very least, pass a law making it easier for
prosecutors to seek a sentence of life without parole. Currently, it's
only an option if a prosecutor seeks the death penalty or the defendant
was previously convicted of a serious felony.

Some prosecutors  and many jurors  would accept life without parole as a
more just sentence. It also provides a safety valve if the defendant is
later exonerated. Since 1973, more than 120 people in 25 states, including
Georgia, have been exonerated and released after they were sentenced to
die.

False convictions might be curbed if the Legislature passed a law
requiring police agencies to change the way in which they allow witnesses
to identify suspects. Of the 208 people exonerated by DNA evidence after
false convictions, most were imprisoned because of mistaken eyewitness
identification, according to the Innocence Project.

In the last session, state Rep. Stephanie Stuckey Benfield (D-Atlanta)
proposed legislation that would have mandated higher standards in
eyewitness IDs. Among other things, it would have required police to show
photos to witnesses one at a time, rather than all together in a file.
Experts say witnesses tend to make subtle comparisons when they view
photos together, rather than sifting their memories for details of the
face of the actual suspect.

Benfield also suggested that the police officers conducting the witness
interviews not know the ID of the suspect themselves, so they can't give
off subtle clues. Benfield's modifications should pass.

It's not in anyone's best interest to put an innocent person in prison.
Not only has the state unjustly imprisoned a citizen, but it has also left
the actual perpetrator on the streets, free to commit other crimes. Even
the harshest prosecutor should want to get the right guy.

(source: Opinion, Cynthia Tucker, Atlanta Journal-Constitution)

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

Death penalty is fair; Georgians support it----If there is a problem with
Georgia's death penalty, it is that it is not carried out soon enough.


Some murderers receive the death penalty. Some don't. That's a fact. It's
also constitutional, fair and reflective of the will of the people.
Period.

As a society, we have long supported the death penalty. The United States
Constitution, the very foundation of our republic, contemplates the use of
the death penalty. The Fifth Amendment provides that no person shall be
deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law. The
Eighth Amendment prohibits the infliction of cruel and unusual punishment.
Every murderer on Georgia's death row received due process and will be
executed humanely. Ironically, none of them gave their victims the same
consideration.

While all murders are obviously bad, some are worse than others. The death
penalty should be reserved only for the worst murder cases, and it is.

In 1973, the U.S. Supreme Court declared Georgia's death penalty statutes
unconstitutional because they did not provide appropriate guidance to
prosecutors or juries in deciding which murder cases were eligible for the
ultimate punishment. Prior to 1973, a defendant who shot and killed his
victim in a bar room fight was eligible to receive the death penalty as
was a serial child killer who tortured and murdered his victims in the
most heinous fashion imaginable. In Furman v. Georgia, five justices of
the U.S. Supreme Court held that allowing the death penalty in such a
broad range of cases was unconstitutional. Four justices disagreed with
their decision.

What was needed was a way to narrow the class of murders that would
qualify for the death penalty. In other words, the death penalty would be
reserved only for the worst of the worst murderers. So Georgia and at
least 34 other states responded with revised death penalty statutes.
Georgia's statues now allow a district attorney to seek the death penalty
only in cases in which at least one of 10 aggravating circumstances is
present. For example, if the murder was committed during another capital
felony (such as armed robbery or the murder of a 2nd victim), or where the
defendant had a prior conviction for murder, or where the murder was
committed during a burglary, or where the murder involved torture, then
the murder could qualify for the death penalty.

In 1976, the U.S. Supreme Court, in a 7-2 decision, held that Georgia's
revised statutes were constitutional. The two dissenting justices thought
the death penalty should never be imposed. Over the last 31 years, both
the Georgia Supreme Court and the U.S. Supreme Court have held repeatedly
that Georgia's death penalty statutes do not offend either the state or
federal Constitution.

A recent series of articles published in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
criticized Georgia's death penalty laws as unfair because some murderers
escape the death penalty, while others do not. The fact that even some of
the most heinous murderers do not receive the death penalty, while others
do, doesn't mean the system is unfair to those sentenced to death. What it
means is that the families of the victims whose killers were sentenced to
life feel they didn't receive justice. And who can blame them? Either way
you look at it, it doesn't mean the system is unconstitutional, and it
doesn't mean those sentenced to death were treated unfairly. They received
due process  something they denied their victims. Now, they must face the
consequences for their criminal acts.

Even the vilest murderer on death row today received due process before
landing where he is. If he couldn't afford a lawyer, the taxpayers
(including the family of his victim) paid one to represent him. A grand
jury heard the case before returning an indictment against him. A lawyer
filed motions on his behalf. (In today's death penalty cases, there might
be 150 such motions, including requests so trivial as to ask the court to
order that the police not wear uniforms in court or to order that bailiffs
in court be ordinary citizens untrained in courtroom security instead of
trained and sworn peace officers.)

The prosecutor had to prove the guilt of the accused beyond a reasonable
doubt, the highest legal standard, to a jury of 12. The verdict had to be
unanimous. The jury then had to consider any additional evidence in favor
of a life sentence or a sentence of life without parole, as well as any
additional evidence that would support a death sentence. The judge
instructed the jurors that they could refuse to impose the death penalty
for whatever reason they chose. Before they could return a death sentence,
they were required to find beyond a reasonable doubt, in writing, that one
of the 10 aggravating circumstances was present in the case. The judge
told them that even if they found that one of these was present, they
could still impose a life sentence. The affirmative vote of all 12 was
required to return a death sentence. If even one had held out for a life
sentence or life without parole, the death sentence could not be imposed.

The process didn't stop there. Once the murderer was convicted, the
taxpayers (again, including his victim's family) paid for his automatic
appeal.

After the first round of appeals, attorneys usually, if not always, handle
subsequent proceedings for free. And we all know how long the appeals
last. Fifteen to 20 years is not unusual. If there is a problem with
Georgia's death penalty, it is that it is not carried out soon enough.

An editorial in this newspaper last week argued that the death penalty
should be abolished because there is too much discretion on the part of
prosecutors in seeking the death penalty, and there is too much discretion
on the part of jurors in imposing the death penalty ("Death penalty
unfair, must be abolished," @issue Sept. 27). The U.S. Supreme Court says
otherwise.

Justice Byron White, joined by two other justices writing in support of
the death penalty in Gregg v. Georgia, discounted such arguments as an
indictment of our entire system of justice. He refused to hold as a matter
of constitutional law that humans are incompetent to administer
government. In his view, it is proper for a prosecutor to use his or her
discretion not to seek the death penalty when the evidence isn't strong
enough or when there is a substantial likelihood that the jury will not
impose the death penalty. The same is true of jurors who decide the
appropriate sentence in death penalty cases.

Every state in this country is different, and every community in Georgia
is different. People move to Georgia and away from other states because of
the quality of life here. Within Georgia, differing community standards
are good because they offer citizens a choice as to what type of community
they prefer. It is true that some communities are more likely to impose
the death penalty than others, but what does this cost a capital
defendant? Nothing. What it offers those citizens, however, is a safer
community. Elected district attorneys reflect those community standards in
every prosecutorial decision they make, not just in death penalty cases.

We get the impression sometimes that justice is supposed to make us feel
good, but that is not the case. One of the hardest parts of the job for a
prosecutor is to ask a jury to sentence a defendant to death. Trust me, it
doesn't feel good, but sometimes justice demands it.

Public opinion polls reveal that support for the death penalty remains
high, and it is the law of the land in Georgia. When the law does not
reflect the values or mores of a society, government runs the risk of
creating anarchy. I don't believe that such a risk on the part of the most
heinous killers in Georgia is justified.

(source: Opinion, Ken Wynne, who is district attorney of the Alcovy
Judicial Circuit (Newton and Walton counties), and who is president of the
District Attorneys Association of Georgia; Atlanta Journal-Constitution)