[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----OKLA., NEB., MONT., ORE., USA

[Rick Halperin]

Oct. 9



OKLAHOMA:

Oklahoma governor says future of death penalty uncertain after 
mix-ups----Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin said Thursday it's hard to say if the 
death penalty will continue in the state.

There have been so many problems in carrying out executions in Oklahoma that 
it's hard to say whether the death penalty can continue in this state, Gov. 
Mary Fallin said Thursday.

"Can't answer that question yet," she said, "but it certainly is not helpful to 
us having the death penalty in Oklahoma."

An improperly set intravenous line slowed the death of one man, the wrong drug 
was given to another and a third execution was called off at the last minute 
because of the same drug mistake.

"Sure I'm frustrated, absolutely," Fallin said.

The latest error was revealed Wednesday with documents showing Oklahoma used 
the wrong drug to execute a man in January.

"We cannot trust Oklahoma to get it right or to tell the truth," said Dale 
Baich, an attorney for convicted murderer Richard Glossip.

Minutes away

Glossip was in his boxer shorts and within minutes of going to the nearby death 
chamber at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary on Sept. 30 when Gov. Mary Fallin 
granted him a stay of execution.

She did so because 1 of the 3 drugs prepared for him was potassium acetate, 
when the proper drug in the state protocol is potassium chloride.

Both drugs will stop the heart.

Potassium acetate was used in the Jan. 15 execution of baby killer Charles 
Frederick Warner, according to records obtained by The Oklahoman.

"The state's disclosure that it used potassium acetate instead of potassium 
chloride during the execution of Charles Warner yet again raises serious 
questions about the ability of the Oklahoma Department of Corrections to carry 
out executions," Baich said.

"The execution logs for Charles Warner say that he was administered potassium 
chloride, but now the state says potassium acetate was used."

The logs indicate Warner was administered drugs from syringes labeled as 
potassium chloride at 7:20 p.m. and 7:22 p.m.

However, an autopsy report indicated these syringes were actually drawn from 
vials of potassium acetate.

Gov. Mary Fallin said an investigation will get to the bottom of the problems.

(source: The Oklahoman)

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

A timeline of key events involving Oklahoma executions


Oklahoma has one of the busiest death chambers in the country - its 112 
executions trail only Texas' 529 since the U.S. Supreme Court reauthorized the 
death penalty in 1976, according to data from the Death Penalty Information 
Center, which opposes executions. But mishaps have caused the state to put all 
executions on hold as the state investigates its protocols and procedures.

Here are some notable events in Oklahoma's executions:

Aug. 11, 1995: Hours before Robert Brecheen's execution, he attempted to 
overdose on sedatives and anti-anxiety pills that he had hoarded in his cell. 
He was rushed to a hospital, had his stomach pumped and was returned to the 
death chamber, where he was executed hours later.

Nov. 6, 2012: Garry Allen was executed on the day of the 2012 general election 
despite his attorneys' claims that their client was insane. Allen spent his 
final moments rambling about the presidential election and appeared startled 
when a prison official announced the start of his execution. Allen, who had 
suffered a brain injury after being shot in the head during his arrest, was 
executed even though the state's parole board recommended clemency. Among his 
last words were "What? Huh?"

Jan. 9, 2014: Oklahoma used pentobarbital, vecuronium bromide and potassium 
chloride in its lethal injection of Michael Lee Wilson, whose last words were 
"I feel my whole body burning."

April 29, 2014: The state's prison director halted Clayton Lockett's execution 
after Lockett writhed and groaned on the gurney, but the inmate died anyway 43 
minutes after the drugs began to flow. Oklahoma was using a new sedative, 
midazolam, as part of its three-drug lethal injection procedure. The state had 
planned to execute Charles Frederick Warner on the same night, but his 
execution was stayed after Lockett's went awry.

June 25, 2014: A group of inmates filed a federal lawsuit alleging Oklahoma 
unconstitutionally allows an "ever-changing array of untried drugs" during 
executions. The state later argued that an improperly placed intravenous line - 
not its new mix of drugs - was what disrupted Lockett's execution.

Dec. 22, 2014: A federal judge declared Oklahoma's lethal injection protocol 
constitutional. But 3 weeks later, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to consider 
whether Oklahoma can use midazolam during executions.

Jan. 15, 2015: Oklahoma executed Warner for the 1997 killing of his roommate's 
infant daughter. He said "My body is on fire," after receiving midazolam but 
showed no other signs of distress. He died 18 minutes after the start of the 
execution.

June 29, 2015: A sharply divided U.S. Supreme Court upheld Oklahoma's use of 
midazolam during state executions.

Sept. 16, 2015: Oklahoma prepared to hold its 1st execution since the high 
court's ruling but a state appeals court issued a rare, last-minute stay for 
inmate Richard Glossip, who argued that he is innocent.

Sept. 30, 2015: The state again prepared to execute Glossip but Gov. Mary 
Fallin issues a 37-day stay, saying the Corrections Department received the 
wrong drug, potassium acetate (rather than the potassium chloride listed in the 
state protocols) and that the state needed to investigate whether it could 
legally use potassium acetate in its lethal injection protocol.

Oct. 2, 2015: The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals indefinitely stays all 
pending executions at the request of Attorney General Scott Pruitt, who calls 
for an inquiry into the execution procedures.

Oct. 8, 2015: Citing an autopsy report, The Oklahoman newspaper reported that 
the state used potassium acetate in Warner's execution in January.

(source: Associated Press)

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


Oklahoma delays further executions----Department of Corrections possibly used 
potassium acetate instead of potassium chloride


Oklahoma will delay any further executions as officials investigate how the 
wrong drug may have been used in the execution of Charles Warner back in 
January.

Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin issued a 37-day stay of Richard Glossip's execution 
Wednesday to allow the state time to address questions about chemicals and 
protocol.

The new execution date is set for November 6.

Neither of the convicted murderers physically killed anyone, but both were 
sentenced to death.

In a statement Thursday, Gov. Mary Fallin said the mix-up came to light after 
state officials stopped the execution of Richard Glossip last week because the 
state supplier had sent the Department of Corrections potassium acetate instead 
of potassium chloride (the drug approved as a part of the state's 3-drug 
protocol).

"During the discussion of the delay of the execution it became apparent that 
DOC may have used potassium acetate in the execution of Charles Warner in 
January of this year," Fallin said. "I was not aware nor was anyone in my 
office aware of the possibility until the day of Richard Glossip's scheduled 
execution."

The governor said the state attorney general is now conducting an inquiry into 
the Warner execution.

She added: "Until we have complete confidence in the system, we will delay any 
further executions."

Fallin said that the pharmacist who provided the drug had assured the DOC that 
the drugs are medically interchangeable. But her critics note that potassium 
acetate is not officially part of the state's protocol.

"We cannot trust Oklahoma to get it right or to tell the truth," said Dale 
Baich, a lawyer for Glossip. "The execution logs for Charles Warner say that he 
was administered potassium chloride, but now the state says potassium acetate 
was used. We will explore this in detail through the discovery process in the 
federal litigation."

Oklahoma's difficulties began in April 2014, when Clayton Lockett died gasping 
for air, writhing on the table. After the botched execution, Fallin ordered a 
full review of the state's procedures, which took five months to complete. The 
state adopted a new protocol in September 2014.

In January 2015, Warner's execution took place and Fallin released a statement 
praising the "professionalism" shown by the Department of Corrections.

The Associated Press reported that Warner "showed no physical signs of 
distress" after the drugs were administered although he did say, "My body is on 
fire."

The new revelation has implications for the Supreme Court's recent opinion 
allowing the use of midazolam, the first drug in Oklahoma's protocol.

In a majority opinion authored by Justice Samuel Alito last June allowing the 
use of midazolam, the court referenced Lockett's botched execution but said 
Oklahoma had made changes and there were now "safeguards" in place with regard 
to the "training and preparation of the execution team."

Alito wrote: "In January of this year, Oklahoma executed Warner using these 
revised procedures and the combination of midazolam, a paralytic agent, and 
potassium chloride."

Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote a biting dissent and Justices Stephen Breyer and 
Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote separately to say for the first time that they 
thought the court should revisit whether the death penalty is unconstitutional.

(source: KCCI news)






NEBRASKA:

In 16-page poem, Ernie Chambers calls prisons chief Frakes a 'minion of death'


Nebraska's prison chief "became a minion of death" on behalf of Gov. Pete 
Ricketts by helping his administration's attempts to acquire lethal injection 
drugs, state Sen. Ernie Chambers says in 16-page poem he distributed Thursday.

Chambers, who represents northeast Omaha, is a longtime opponent of capital 
punishment and sponsored the legislative bill that abolished the state's death 
penalty this spring.

The poem is titled "The Elevation and Devaluation of Scott Frakes by His Boss, 
Governor Pete Ricketts."

Neither Frakes nor the governor responded to requests for comment Thursday, but 
Ricketts has said Nebraskans overwhelmingly favor reinstating the death penalty 
and that Frakes is making "great progress" at the Nebraska Department of 
Correctional Services.

Chambers' poem describes the hiring and - in the senator's words - "fall" of 
Frakes, whom Ricketts appointed in January. Chambers accuses Frakes of selling 
his soul to the governor, comparing the Corrections director with literary 
figures including Dorian Gray, Faustus and Lucifer.

"Into a cesspool, Scott Frakes has been hurled, a shadowy, lawless, gross 
drug-underworld," the poem reads. "Skulking and slithering as do loathesome 
bugs, trying to garner illegal Death-Drugs.

"When one spins into moral decline, the honorable thing to do is: RESIGN."

Chambers regularly distributes typewritten letters and hand-drawn sketches to 
reporters and fellow senators, and the Frakes poem is his fifth in an ongoing 
series about the death penalty. Other installments have targeted the governor 
and Attorney General Doug Peterson.

The latest poem took Chambers "maybe about 4 days" to write, he said. "Once I 
got started, it flowed like water."

Chambers initially supported Frakes' confirmation as Corrections director after 
consulting with Harold Clarke, a former Nebraska prisons chief who later 
supervised Frakes in Washington State. The poem says Frakes appeared to be an 
"honorable man."

Under his leadership, Washington prisons cut back on their use of solitary 
confinement and placed more emphasis on community supervision, education, 
counseling and rehabilitation of inmates.

But in Nebraska, Chambers says, Frakes has collaborated with Ricketts and 
Peterson to "circumvent federal law" by attempting to import sodium thiopental 
and pancuronium bromide, two of the three drugs required for Nebraska's lethal 
injection cocktail. The drugs are not approved for import by the U.S. Food and 
Drug Administration, which has said sodium thiopental is not an approved drug 
in the United States except for very limited purposes such as research.

Frakes has been working with an India-based distributor, HarrisPharma, to 
acquire the drugs - so far without success. In August, FedEx returned three 
packages of sodium thiopental to the distributor, apparently because of 
incorrect information on forms provided by the state.

"I made a WHOPPER endorsing Scott Frakes," Chambers says in his poem.

He accuses Frakes of assisting what he calls the governor's "obsession" with 
carrying out the death penalty.

After the Legislature repealed capital punishment over Ricketts' veto in May, 
supporters of the death penalty - with significant financial backing from 
Ricketts - mounted a petition drive to put the issue to a public vote and 
resume executions in the meantime. The Secretary of State's office has said it 
appears the effort has enough votes to get the issue on the November 2016 
ballot; it is still verifying signatures to see if it has enough to prevent the 
law from taking effect before the vote.

Ricketts accuses lawmakers of losing touch with Nebraskans and eliminating a 
"prosecutorial tool" for dealing with the state's worst criminal cases.

Chambers says state executions "degrade our humanity" and that death sentences 
aren't issued in a uniform way.

"All of these facts are familiar to Frakes. Nevertheless, he has thrown in his 
lot with (Ricketts), and this thickens the plot," his poem says.

When Ricketts agreed to pay Frakes a salary of $180,000, more than his 
predecessors made, Chambers speculates the governor's "true goal was not buying 
competence but, rather, a soul."

"Just as the Honeybee risks all for honey, some men there be who will sell soul 
for money," Chambers writes.

"The choice is yours, to cease or continue. Is the will to regain your 'soul' 
in you?"

(source: Freemont Tribune)






MONTANA:

Death Penalty Stalemate in Montana


he death penalty is at a stalemate in Montana, after a judge blocked the use of 
a particular lethal injection drug on Tuesday.

Capital punishment remains legal, and while efforts to abolish it have failed, 
so have efforts to revive it. The judge ruled that pentobarbital cannot be used 
because it is not "ultra-fast acting" as required by state law.

The Department of Justice would not say whether it intends to appeal, only that 
its attorneys are looking into their options. Caitlin Borgmann, executive 
director with the American Civil Liberties Union, which sued to block the drug, 
says they'll continue to fight for complete abolition and calls this de facto 
moratorium "the next best thing."

"The only other option open to the state would be for the Legislature to amend 
the statute so that the state is not required to use an ultra-fast-acting 
barbiturate," says Borgmann. "I don't think there is the political will to do 
that in the Legislature; certainly we would fight any efforts to do that."

A move to repeal the death penalty failed on a tie vote in the Montana 
Legislature earlier this year.

State Representative Tom Berry (R-Roundup), a death penalty advocate, says he 
doubts the Legislature will move to change the law to allow for drugs that 
aren't ultra-fast acting - meaning drugs that would take a few seconds longer 
to render the condemned prisoner unconscious.

"In my opinion, with the current governor we have, he would never sign that 
type of legislation so I think it's a moot point," says Berry.

The governor's office declined to comment. This issue has been tied up in the 
courts for many years. Montana's last execution took place in 2006.

(source: publicnewsservice.org)






OREGON:

Oldest man on Oregon's death row appeals to governor for release to hospice


Mark Pinnell, the oldest inmate on Oregon's death row, is making a last-ditch 
appeal to spend his final days outside of prison in hospice as he dies from 
severe chronic pulmonary disease.

Pinnell, 67, was among the first to seek clemency after former Gov. Kitzhaber 
declared a moratorium on executions in November 2011. His co-defendant is a 
free man, having left prison in 2011 after serving nearly 26 years behind bars.

On Thursday, Pinnell's federal public defender sent a letter to Gov. Kate 
Brown's office by email, asking for her urgent review. Pinnell Thursday was 
moved off death row to the Oregon State Penitentiary's infirmary, the letter 
said. He has been on death row since 1988.

Kitzhaber in February denied Pinnell's request, saying he was unable to review 
his application before the end of his term. Pinnell renewed a clemency request 
to Brown in August, and her office responded that a review could take up to 6 
months.

"Mark does not have 6 months. His disease will kill him long before his federal 
litigation is concluded; long before focus groups, constituency round tables or 
social science research can be initiated, much less completed, on the efficacy 
or failure of the death penalty in Oregon. His disease will kill him long 
before the next election,'' lawyer Teresa A. Hampton wrote.

"A decision is necessary today. Mark has secured palliative care housing in the 
community. He is in the end-stages of life and poses no threat to the 
community. He asks simply, 'Please, let me die on the outside, with my friends 
and family near me when I pass.'"

Pinnell's August request for clemency, titled "Mercy for a dying man,'' noted 
that he was rushed to Salem General Hospital twice in July for extended stays. 
His lawyer provided the governor's office with medical records that reflect his 
dire prognosis and argued that the prison is incapable of providing the 
"escalating care and equipment'' that Pinnell's condition requires.

"In short, he is dying,'' Hampton wrote in August to Brown. "The only question 
left to be answered is where Mark will die.''

"Please, let me die on the outside, with my friends and family near me when I 
pass." - Oregon death row inmate Mark Pinnell, 67.

In his own letter to the governor on Aug. 5, Pinnell wrote, "I am a weak, old 
man. I pose no threat to society. I am very ashamed and sorry for what I did. 
I'm asking for mercy. Please release me from prison so that I can spend my last 
days near my family rather than at the Oregon State Penitentiary.''

Pinnell and co-defendant Donald E. Cornell both robbed and killed 65-year-old 
John Wallace Ruffner in his Tualatin apartment in 1985. A jury convicted 
Pinnell of multiple aggravated murder counts, including aggravated murder by 
torture, and he was sentenced to death. Cornell was tried later and acquitted 
of all aggravated murder charges by another jury.

Pinnell was appointed an attorney with no capital punishment experience, while 
Cornell was represented by a seasoned capital punishment attorney, Pinnell's 
current lawyer has argued.

Cornell was found guilty of felony murder, a less serious charge, after his 
attorney successfully argued that the killing was unintentional. The attorney 
also argued at trial that the victim's death wasn't prolonged but happened 
quickly, thus not rising to torture. Cornell was released from prison on Sept. 
23, 2011, after serving a life sentence with the possibility of parole after 25 
years. He served 25 years and 11 months. He was released from parole a year 
later.

In Thursday's appeal to Brown, Pinnell's lawyer requested a response from the 
governor while Pinnell is still alive.

"Time has run out for relief to come from the legal system,'' she wrote. "At 
this point, only you can answer this request. If nothing else, Mark deserves an 
answer before he dies.''

(source: The Oregonian)






USA:

Capital punishment in the U.S. - Why our country's justice system is faulty


The constitutionality of the death penalty is being brought back to light due 
to a recent case in Oklahoma, and for good reason.

If you have read the news over the past two weeks, you may have come across an 
article from Tulsa World about death row inmate, Richard Glossip. Glossip was 
sentenced to death in 2004 in Oklahoma after being accused of hiring a man 
named Justin Sneed to kill his boss.

The victim, Barry Van Treese, was beaten to death by a baseball bat. The 
murderer, Sneed, was sentenced to life in prison in exchange for his testament 
against Glossip. On the other hand, Glossip, who wasn't present at the time of 
the murder, was given the death penalty.

Recently, complications with the ingredients for the lethal injection halted 
Glossip's execution. This wasn't the 1st time Glossip's execution date has been 
postponed and was the 2nd time his case was brought to the Supreme Court.

There are many arguments made in the media about how Glossip may have been 
innocent, which Glossip upholds. The only evidence providing that Glossip was 
guilty was Sneed's testimony.

Allowing a possibly innocent man to be thrown into the gallows by the word of a 
murderer just goes to show that the American capital punishment system is 
broken.

The United States is one of the top 5 countries in the world that still 
sentences people to death, along with China, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Iraq, 
according to Pew Research Center. Most other developed countries such as 
Canada, Spain, France and the United Kingdom have abolished capital punishment, 
according to an article by Amnesty International.

Living in a country where the majority of states still uphold a law that is so 
barbaric is disappointing.

In Glossip's case, let's say that he and Sneed were both completely guilty of 
the crimes they were accused of. Lowering ourselves to their level by executing 
them doesn't justify the punishment.

It is difficult to not tie emotional arguments into this discussion, yet they 
are hard to avoid. Many death penalty advocates use the argument, "What if it 
was your family that was murdered?"

I could never understand the sorrow of a family who has dealt with the loss of 
a loved one in this way. However, I do believe that forgiveness is more 
important than revenge, especially on an institutional level.

For the families, executing the criminal won't bring the victim back. It won't 
reverse the crime and it won't make the event any less devastating. So the real 
question is whether or not the benefits of killing an inmate outweigh the 
costs, and from a logistic standpoint, they don't.

The fiscal costs of using a lethal injection outweigh that of a criminal 
spending life in prison. A university in Seattle analyzed the costs of 
executions in Washington and found that each case that sought the death penalty 
cost about $1 million more than similar cases that didn't utilize the death 
penalty. This trend is frequent throughout states that still practice capital 
punishment.

Taxpayer's dollars could be used for more positive purposes, such as investment 
in rehabilitative programs.

Perhaps if using the death penalty resulted in lives being saved or if it cost 
less financially it could be justified. But it doesn't, which leads me to 
believe that capital punishment is mostly sought after because people want 
revenge. Allowing the government to institutionalize retribution is unsettling.

In the event of murder or heinous crimes, there are no true winners.

One of my favorite quotes about the death penalty by Holly Near may be 
overused, but it is still extremely relevant and important to consider: "Why do 
we kill people who are killing people to show that killing people is wrong?"

(source: Jessica Gee, Commentary, The (Univ. Idaho) Argonaut)

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

The rise of the anti-death penalty conservative


In a recent episode of The Daily Show, new host Trever Noah asked what would 
happen if conservatives applied their enthusiasm for preserving the lives of 
the unborn to passing additional restrictions on gun ownership. Though Noah's 
exact hope is probably a pipe dream, his line of reasoning could be more 
fruitfully applied in another direction - a direction that has already been 
taken by social conservatives themselves: the consistent pro-life ethic.

Of course, to be pro-life in the sense of opposing legal abortion in most or 
all cases ranks high on the priority list of Republican orthodoxy. Low taxes, 
strong military, saving babies - these are the building blocks of a successful 
GOP candidate.

And the videos released by the Center for Medical Progress this fall, which 
allegedly depict Planned Parenthood staff discussing the profit and practice of 
harvesting fetal organs, have made abortion a topic of interest in the 2016 
election in a way we haven't seen for at least a decade.

But protesting abortion is not all the consistent pro-life ethic entails. As 
typically expressed, most often in Catholic circles, consistent defense of 
human life in all its forms also requires opposition to the death penalty and 
assisted suicide (as well as any involuntary form of euthanasia).

"Life is something that comes from God and shouldn't be taken away by man," 
explains Father Thomas Reese, a Jesuit priest. Those with a consistent pro-life 
ethic "are concerned about a person from womb to tomb." For all Christians, 
consistent pro-lifers argue, "Something is definitely wrong when we claim to 
follow a man who halted an execution (John 8:1-11) and then was unjustly 
executed by the state, but still prefer justice over mercy."

While assisted suicide is legal in Washington, Oregon, Vermont, and (starting 
in 2016) California, it remains relatively low-profile on the national stage. 
The death penalty, however, is a different story.

This is particularly true because of recent high-profile capital punishment 
cases, like the ongoing saga of Richard Glossip, who is on death row in 
Oklahoma. Glossip's case has attracted significant attention - and multiple 
stays of execution - thanks to the dubious evidence and circumstances 
surrounding his conviction and sentencing, as well as the state's intent to 
kill him with a lethal injection containing midazolam, which in previous 
executions has produced agonizing deaths lasting as long as 2 hours.

Of course, there are some conservatives for whom capital punishment is already 
a pressing issue. "For those of us who are pro-life and maintain the 
far-from-radical notion that our government shouldn't kill innocent Americans, 
the death penalty fails to live up to our standards," argues Marc Hyden of 
Conservatives Concerned About The Death Penalty (CCATDP), a nonprofit that 
exists to question "a system marked by inefficiency, inequity, and inaccuracy." 
And marked by these difficulties it most certainly is.

As CCATDP enumerates, the problems and perils of capital punishment in modern 
America are many. There's the risk - as in the Glossip case and too many 
others, like Marlon Howell or Cameron Todd Willingham - of accidentally killing 
an innocent person. More than 150 people sentenced to die in America have been 
exonerated in the last 4 decades, some after spending 30 years or more on death 
row.

Beyond that, the death penalty is exorbitantly expensive for taxpayers - as 
much as 10 times more expensive than a life sentence by some calculations. The 
lengthy process drags out the grief of murder victims' families, endlessly 
resuscitating it with a new appeal or evidence. And there's no evidence that 
the threat of death deters crime.

Furthermore, capital punishment is implemented in a systemically unfair manner: 
Factors like where you live, your race and the race of your alleged victim, and 
even whether your judge is elected or appointed can all influence whether 
you're sentenced to prison or death.

With inequities like these, Hyden argues, there's nothing "limited or wise 
about giving an error-prone government the power to kill its citizens, 
especially when many of us don't trust the state to even deliver mail."

In spite of the evidence that - as conservatives tend to agree in other policy 
arenas - the government is neither competent nor trustworthy, polling suggests 
that CCATDP is still in the minority on the right: Only 11 % of Americans 
oppose both abortion and the death penalty. There is "no significant 
correlation between attitudes about the legality of abortion and views on 
capital punishment," according to Robert P. Jones of OnFaith, and if we zoom in 
on Tea Partiers, support for a consistent pro-life ethic drops to just 7 %.

So in 2016, Republican debate moderators looking for a tough but thoughtful 
question to add to their list should consider question grilling presidential 
contenders on the death penalty.

Thanks to the Planned Parenthood footage - not to mention the cross-partisan 
popularity of the broader cause of criminal justice reform, as well as the 
consistently pro-life Pope Francis - the timing is good. And thanks to the 
clear discrepancies between opposition to big government handing out a license 
to kill, on the one hand, and support for the death penalty on the other, the 
chance to catch candidates in hypocrisy is pretty good, too.

(source: The Week)

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

Prison more of penalty than death


In 1846 the state of Michigan put a stop to its death penalty due to its 
execution of a man by hanging who it was found later was innocent. At that 
point, the state said never again.

Everyone will die. How then is death a "penalty" if it happens to everyone? It 
is not.A penalty is a long sentence in a prison.

Just recently a man was retried and found not guilty after 20 years in prison. 
It is possible to be found not guilty yet live. But not if you are already 
dead.

Beatrice Scalise, Yuma

(source: Letter to the Editor, Yuma Sun)