[Deathpenalty] death penalty news-----TEXAS, ALA., USA

[Rick Halperin]

Sept. 5



TEXAS----execution

Drifter executed for '98 strangling of Amarillo woman


A repentant South Carolina drifter was executed this evening for
strangling, robbing and raping an Amarillo woman a few months after he had
been paroled from prison.

Tony Roach spoke for several minutes, his voice cracking at times and a
tear at the corner of his eye. He repeatedly sought forgiveness from the
fiance and the daughter of his victim, who stood a few feet away looking
through a window.>{? "So much hurt I've caused you all," Roach said. "I
can only imagine how you feel. I pray the Lord Jesus Christ touches your
heart the way he's touched mine.">{>? Saying that he was to blame for the
killing, Roach said he knew the victim was "in a good place."

"I can't agree with this justice the state is carrying out but I accept it
and I'm sorry," he said. "I have no ill will toward anyone carrying out
this so-called justice. I leave y'all in God's care."

He was pronounced dead at 6:22 p.m.,

Roach, 30, was the 24th condemned inmate put to death this year in the
nation's most active capital punishment state. The total equals the number
of capital punishment carried out in Texas all of last year. 4 other
inmates are set to die this month. Roach becomes the 403rd condemned
inmate to be put to death in Texas since the state resumed executions on
December 7, 1982. He becomes the 164th condemned inmate to be put to death
in Texas since Rick Perry became Governor in 2001.

Roach becomes the 39th condemned inmate to be put to death this year in
the USA and the 1096th overall since the nation resumed executions on
January 17, 1977. There are 9 other executions scheduled this month in 5
different states acrosee the USA.

(sources: Associated Press & Rick Halperin)





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Inmate helps woman find voice


You could hear the urgency in Christy Armell's voice, and if you didn't
catch it then it would become abundantly clear with her hailstorm of phone
calls and e-mails.

Not just to you but to everybody she could reach.

This was a matter of life and death, she said.

Really.

Armell, 33, is something of a devotee of lost souls and lost causes, a
once-quiet idealist of the underdog, especially those on the other side of
the law.

She was calling last week on behalf of her latest cause, Kenneth Foster
Jr., who until 6 days ago had a date with the executioner.

He was to be No. 24 this year on the Texas death penalty conveyer belt. By
contrast, the last execution in New Mexico was in 2001; only 2 men sit on
death row.

Armell, a criminal justice major at the University of Phoenix in
Albuquerque, stumbled onto Foster's story while researching the death
penalty for a class.

Foster, she learned, was a 19-year-old social work major and budding
recording entrepreneur who in August 1996 made the unfortunate decision to
drive three of his buddies around San Antonio, Texas, for an evening of
booze and a little armed robbery.

No one was supposed to get hurt.

But by night's end, Michael LaHood Jr., 25, lay dead in the street, shot
in the head by Foster's cohort Mauriceo Brown.

Foster and Brown went on trial together, despite defense attorneys'
attempts to sever the cases (the other 2 took plea deals).

Although Foster never held the gun, never conspired to kill anyone, he was
convicted of murder and sentenced to die along with Brown under an arcane
Texas rule known as the law of parties.

The law condemns anyone connected with the murder regardless of intent.
New Mexico has no such law, though conspirators can be convicted of murder
if intent is proved.

Foster's case eventually inspired an international campaign to save him
from the Texas executioner.

Armell joined in.

"I wrote Kenneth in prison and the letter he wrote back was so inspiring,"
she said. "He had this strength, this positive attitude. It just motivated
me so much."

She began writing him regularly, reaching out to his family, other
campaign members. Anyone.

"I wanted to help in any way in his struggle," she said. "He was convicted
unfairly. And here he was showing us that together our voices would be
heard."

Perhaps it helped her as much as it helped Foster. Armell's husband is in
prison on battery charges.

As Aug. 30 - the date set for Foster's execution - neared, her calls and
e-mails increased. Even her 13-year-old daughter wrote letters and fasted
in protest.

Hours before Foster was to die by lethal injection, Texas Gov. Rick Perry
commuted Foster's sentence.

"It was almost miraculous," Armell said. "This was Texas."

But this was only the beginning for Armell, who said she now writes
letters daily to 5 other inmates across the country, including Rudy
Medrano, another Texas death row inmate charged with murder under the law
of parties.

"That's where all this has led," she said. "I can say Kenny has definitely
been the push for me to find my voice."

Armell, not surprisingly, is against the death penalty. Period.

"It doesn't really stop crime," she said. "It doesn't end the suffering of
the victim's family. Killing, whether legal or on the streets, is not the
way to make things better."

She agrees convicts must be punished, but argues that rehabilitation is
possible "until you take your last breath."

Of course, their victims don't get more than a last breath.

Armell said she realizes that most think her fervor for felons is odd,
even disturbing.

"I get criticized all the time," she said. "But everyone is human.
Everyone makes mistakes. Some mistakes are bigger than others."

So she writes, reminding the inmates of their humanity - and others of
theirs.

"If I had time, I would probably write every single inmate," she said.
Would that there weren't so many.

(source: The Albuquerque Tribune)






ALABAMA:

$400-an-hour contract sought for drug analysis----AG's office wants doctor
to assist in state executions


Attorney General Troy King's office is proposing a $400-an-hour contract
with a Massachusetts physician who will analyze the chemical composition
of the lethal drugs that Alabama uses in its executions.

The contract with Dr. Mark Dershwitz of Sherborn, Mass., will run from
Oct. 1, 2007, through Sept. 30, 2009. In addition to reviewing the
chemical substances, Dershwitz would also be available as an expert
witness for the state, if necessary.

Dershwitz's contract would not exceed $3,000 over the 2-year period, but
it could be renewed.

The contract was requested by Assistant Attorney General Clay Crenshaw,
who is head of the Capital Litigation Division, King spokesman Chris Bence
said Tuesday.

The proposed contract with Dershwitz will be reviewed today by the
Legislature's Permanent Joint Contract Review Oversight Committee.

Dershwitz is a University of Massachusetts professor of anesthesiology who
has been an expert witness on behalf of several states, defending their
lethal injection methods against constitutional challenges.

Lawsuits challenging lethal injection as cruel and unusual have blocked
executions in some states and may prompt others to abandon them. A U.S.
Supreme Court ruling in 2006 made it easier for death row inmates to file
such suits.

(source: The Huntsville Times)






USA:

Mayo doctors: Physicians shouldn't be involved in executions


2 Mayo Clinic physicians have landed smack dab in the middle of an
argument over lethal injections for condemned prisoners, saying physicians
shouldn't be involved in executions.

"In the case of capital punishment, we believe that whatever theoretical
good might emerge from a successful and well-executed judicial killing,
there is certainly harm in causing the death of a person under a
physician's care," the two Mayo physicians say in the September issue of
the medical journal Mayo Clinic Proceedings.

After Supreme Court decisions related to cruel and unusual punishment, a
medical model of lethal injection has evolved using high doses of
prescription drugs to kill condemned prisoners.

Because of "botched" executions that have sometimes resulted in
convulsions and apparent pain awareness, physician management of lethal
injections has been required.

Both the American Medical Association and the American Society of
Anesthesiologists have banned members from participating in executions.

A commentary submitted to Proceedings by Dr. David Waisel of Children's
Hospital in Boston caused the Mayo physicians to join the debate. Their
editorial in the medical journal preceeds his argument.

"I think we all feel quite uncomfortable discussing these issues," Dr.
William Lanier, editor-in-chief of Proceedings, said in an interview. "But
we feel that the times demand that we speak up, and, if anything, I have
some concern that physicians have often harmed our own causes by not
speaking up when it's appropriate."

Mayo anesthesiologist Dr. Keith Berge has taught ethics at Mayo Medical
School and also served several years as co-chair of Mayo's Hospital Ethics
Committee.

He disagrees with the Waisel commentary, which argued "a person who is
wholly competent at managing intravenous infusions and assessing for
anesthetic depth is needed for humane lethal injection."

Anesthesiologists are suggested as the "most technically adept at this
process because these are drugs that we use daily," Berge said.

"But our parent society, the American Society of Anesthesiologists, has
taken an unambiguous stand against any involvement," he said.

"We felt the topic kind of found the medical profession, that medical
methods had been employed in the legal execution of prisoners," Lanier
said, "and the use of medications that were taken from medical practice
had been improperly used by persons who were untrained or undertrained and
this resulted in a large number of botched executions."

Berge and Lanier said they felt compelled to take a stand when Waisel's
editorial was submitted. They didn't offer specific alternatives to lethal
injections, pointing out the experience of a doctor named Guillotine, an
anti-capital punishment physician who developed a way to decrease
suffering caused during executions.

"He was horrified that this devise went on to very common over-usage
bearing his name," Berge said.

A 2nd editorial by ethicist Arthur Caplan of the University of
Pennsylvania suggests "properly trained executioners" could become a way
to remove "physician involvement" from the equation.

Lanier didn't want to approve or disapprove of specific methods. But he
made clear that "physicians should not be involved in the taking of life
of any prisoner."

Separately, Berge said, "we don't want to provide an instruction manual
for how we think this should be done."

(source: Jeff Hansel, The (Minn) Post-Bulletin)

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

Should Doctors Participate in Capital Punishment? ---- Doctors and Medical
Ethicist Discuss


Should doctors be involved in the state-ordered administration of capital
punishment? In the September issue of Mayo Clinic Proceedings, three
anesthesiologists and a medical ethicist take an in-depth look at this
question in a commentary and 2 editorials.

None of these articles debate whether capital punishment is justifiable.
Instead, the authors explore the current position of the American Medical
Association (AMA), which prohibits physician participation in legally
authorized executions. Here are a few highlights of the arguments
presented in these articles.

In a commentary article, David Waisel, M.D., an anesthesiologist
practicing at Children's Hospital Boston, Harvard Medical School, asserts
that it is time to reassess the AMA's position on this issue and allow
doctors to participate in state-mandated executions to help provide the
condemned a more humane path to death.

Dr. Waisel cites numerous details about the technical problems associated
with lethal injection, the form of capital punishment most commonly used
in the United States today. Dr. Waisel reasons that doctors, possess the
skills to administer the medications used in lethal injections in a manner
that prevents undue suffering.

"If state administration of capital punishment is legal and ongoing,
humane methods of execution should be sought and applied. It is honorable
for physicians to minimize the harm to these condemned individuals and
organized medicine has an obligation to permit physician participation in
legal execution," he writes.

2 editorials that follow Dr. Waisel's commentary arrive at the opposite
conclusion. In one editorial, William Lanier, M.D., editor in chief, Mayo
Clinic Proceedings, and Keith Berge, M.D., who are anesthesiologists at
Mayo Clinic applaud Dr. Waisel for "bringing forward this emotional issue
so that it can be pondered and discussed by a broad audience."

But the authors oppose doctors' participation in capital punishment,
arguing that the Hippocratic oath that guides doctors prohibits medical
professionals from assisting in executions.

"In the case of capital punishment, we believe that whatever theoretical
good might emerge from a successful and well-executed judicial killing,
there is certainly harm in causing the death of a person under a
physician's care," say Drs. Lanier and Berge.

Drs. Lanier and Berge propose replacing the anesthesia-related drugs
currently used in lethal injections with personnel and tools that are
"clearly distinguished from representing medical care."

In a 2nd editorial, Arthur Caplan, Ph.D., a medical ethicist at the
University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, also argues against the
participation of doctors in execution. Dr. Caplan asserts that a doctor
does not have a duty to alleviate the suffering of a condemned person
unless that prisoner has a previous medical relationship with that doctor.

"It seems a bit late for physicians to step forward in the context of an
execution and say they are motivated by a duty of mercy given that many
prisoners suffer miserably because of the poor state of prison-based
medicine," says Dr. Caplan.

Dr. Caplan also suggests that involving doctors in capital punishment may
affect the overall moral standing accorded the practice of execution
because "physician prestige and the respect afforded medicine are in part
transferred to executions when physicians are involved."

Dr. Caplan asserts that physicians are not needed to serve as executioners
using lethal injection because "... governments and societies committed to
execution using this technique can achieve this goal by properly training
executioners."

(source: WTVH News)