[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----ARK., OKLA., ARIZ., USA

[Rick Halperin]

Oct. 30




ARKANSAS:

Broken System: Inside Arkansas's Death Row


Right now, 34 people on Arkansas's death row are waiting to die. Meanwhile, 
their victims' families are waiting for justice.

Earlier this year, Governor Asa Hutchinson scheduled the executions of 8 men 
after 10 years with no Arkansas executions. This month, the Arkansas Supreme 
Court stayed those executions.

Amid all the controversy, the one thing that both opponents and proponents of 
Arkansas's death penalty agree on is that this system of justice is a broken 
system.

(source: nwahomepage.com)






OKLAHOMA:

Oklahoma prison warden retiring amid execution probe.


The Oklahoma prison warden who oversaw a botched execution in 2014 and a 2nd 
lethal injection this year in which an inmate was given the wrong drugs is 
retiring, prison officials announced Thursday.

Oklahoma State Penitentiary Warden Anita Trammell will no longer report to work 
and will use accrued leave until her retirement date of March 1, the Department 
of Corrections said in a statement.

"Beginning her career as a case manager and working all the way up to warden of 
the state's largest maximum security facility is a true testament to her 
leadership ability and dedication to the state of Oklahoma," Department of 
Corrections Director Robert Patton said in a statement.

Corrections spokeswoman Terri Watkins said Trammell was not asked to step down 
and that her retirement was not connected to Attorney General Scott Pruitt's 
ongoing investigation into how the wrong drugs were delivered to the prison for 
the last 2 scheduled executions.

A telephone message left at a listing for Trammell in McAlester wasn't 
immediately returned.

Trammell was inside the execution chamber in April 2014 when a botched lethal 
injection left inmate Clayton Lockett writhing on the gurney and mumbling in an 
execution that lasted for 43 minutes. Prison officials lowered the blinds 
during that execution after a physician member of the execution team noticed 
problems with the injection site in Lockett's groin. Trammell later described 
the scene as a "bloody mess" to investigators, who faulted her for ordering 
that the insertion point be covered up.

Both Patton and Trammell appeared last week before a multicounty grand jury 
that is investigating how the wrong drug was delivered to the penitentiary for 
the last 2 scheduled lethal injections.

Richard Glossip was just hours away from his scheduled execution last month 
when prison officials realized they received potassium acetate, not potassium 
chloride, which is the 3rd of 3 drugs the state uses to execute people. After 
Glossip's execution was put on hold, an autopsy report from Charles Warner's 
January execution revealed he was administered potassium acetate instead of 
potassium chloride.

That prompted Pruitt to ask the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals to issue an 
indefinite stay of all scheduled executions "until my office knows more about 
these circumstances and gains confidence that (the Department of Corrections) 
can carry out executions in accordance with the execution protocol."

Pruitt said he won't request any execution dates until at least 150 days after 
his investigation is complete, the results are made public and his office 
receives notice that the prisons agency can comply with the state's execution 
protocol.

A 33-year veteran of the Corrections Department, Trammell was appointed warden 
of the State Penitentiary in February 2013, becoming the 1st female warden in 
Oklahoma to oversee a men's maximum-security prison.

Deputy Warden Maurice Warrior will oversee the prison's day-to-day operations 
until Patton appoints an interim warden.

(source: Associated Press)






ARIZONA:

Face the splatter; execute by firing squad


We need to stop pretending the state can kill someone in a nice way.

There is no such thing as a 'humane execution.'

The only reason Arizona uses drugs to execute convicted murderers is because we 
don't want any mess. We pretend that for the bad guy it's just like going to 
sleep.

No. It's killing someone.

If the news reporting on this subject by The Arizona Republic's Michael Kiefer 
teaches us anything, it's that the time has come to quit the long legal song 
and dance going on between the Department of Corrections, public defenders, the 
media and federal courts.

On Wednesday federal Judge Neil Wake ordered DOC to tell him exactly what 
execution drugs the state possesses and how it plans to use them to execute the 
condemned.

Why all the cloak and dagger? Why would DOC actually try to purchase illegal 
drugs from overseas, as it has, to carry out executions?

Basically, it's because without the drugs killing someone might be messy.

The truth is, killing someone SHOULD be messy.

A while back Chief Judge Alex Kozinski of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of 
Appeals suggested that states implement the firing squad.

He wrote, "Using drugs meant for individuals with medical needs to carry out 
executions is a misguided effort to mask the brutality of executions by making 
them look serene and peaceful - like something any one of us might experience 
in our final moments ... The firing squad strikes me as the most promising 
(method). 8 or 10 large-caliber rifle bullets fired at close range can inflict 
massive damage, causing instant death every time. There are plenty of people 
employed by the state who can pull the trigger and have the training to aim 
true."

Firing squads have been used before in states like Utah. The method is ugly but 
efficient.

It's all unnecessary.

If Arizona eliminated the death penalty it would save taxpayers millions of 
dollars (on appeals and special prisons etc.) and it might - just might -- 
save our souls.

But if we are not willing to do that we should at least be willing to face the 
bloody truth of execution.

As Judge Kozinski wrote: "Sure, firing squads can be messy, but if we are 
willing to carry out executions we should not shield ourselves from the reality 
that we are shedding human blood. If we, as a society, cannot stomach the 
splatter from an execution carried out by firing squad, then we shouldn't be 
carrying out executions at all."

Capital punishment is not about drugs or politics or even justice. It's very, 
very simple.

If we can't stomach the spatter ...

(source: EJ Montini, The Arizona Republic)






USA:

Death Penalty Could Provide Debate Fodder for Hillary Clinton and Bernie 
Sanders


Hillary Rodham Clinton, who leads most Democratic polls nationally and in Iowa, 
has for months moved to her party's left on a range of issues, from immigration 
overhaul to criminal justice reform to, more recently, opposition to the 
Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal.

Yet on Wednesday, Mrs. Clinton bluntly told attendees at a campaign event that 
she supports the death penalty - in limited use and in limited cases, but she 
still supports it. And that's a position that isn't shared by much of the 
Democratic primary base.

Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, her main opponent in the Democratic contest, 
called for the abolition of the death penalty in a speech on the Senate floor 
on Thursday, a move that highlighted the issue and the fact that he is to her 
left on it.

"We are all shocked and disgusted by some of the horrific murders that we see 
in this country, seemingly every week," Mr. Sanders said. "And that is 
precisely why we should abolish the death penalty. At a time of rampant 
violence and murder, the state should not be part of that process."

The other Democratic candidate, Martin O'Malley, also favors abolishing the 
death penalty. And Mrs. Clinton's position and her rivals' disagreement with it 
virtually guarantees it will be a topic at the next Democratic debate.

(source: New York Times)

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

PFAW Urges GOP Candidates To Drop Out of Summit With Pastor Who Defends Death 
Penalty For Gays


People For the American Way is calling on Republican presidential candidates 
Sen. Ted Cruz, Gov. Mike Huckabee and Gov. Bobby Jindal to withdraw from a 
conference in Iowa next month hosted by a far-right pastor who has defended 
capital punishment for homosexuality and who has blamed forest fires on women 
who wear pants.

People For the American Way's Right Wing Watch has documented the long history 
of extreme anti-gay, anti-women rhetoric from Kevin Swanson, the Colorado 
activist and pastor who is organizing next month's "National Religious 
Liberties Conference" in Des Moines, which event organizers say Cruz, Huckabee 
and Jindal are scheduled to attend.

"We already knew that the Republican Party opposed LGBT rights and women's 
equality, but this is taking things to a new level," said People For the 
American Way President Michael Keegan. "We can respectfully disagree on matters 
of public policy, but someone who supports gay people being put to death should 
have no place in our public discourse, much less be sharing the stage with a 
major party's presidential candidates."

"If Cruz, Huckabee and Jindal are serious about wanting to hold the nation's 
highest office," Keegan said, "they should back out of this conference and 
denounce the extremism of its organizer."

Swanson's wild extremism includes"

Defending a Ugandan measure to make homosexuality a criminal offense punishable 
by life imprisonment or the death penalty, saying he was glad the country was 
"standing strong" by adopting extreme anti-gay laws.

Explaining that "a Christian perspective ultimately brought the death penalty 
upon homosexuality."

Urging people to hold up signs telling gay couples to die on their wedding day.

Claiming that flooding and forest fires in Colorado were the result of 
"decadent homosexual activity" and women wearing pants.

Saying that Hurricanes Sandy and Katrina were divine punishments of 
"pro-homosexual" cities.

Insisting that "God's laws require that we prosecute homosexuals who are caught 
in the act of homosexuality."

Claiming that women who use birth control have "little tiny fetuses, these 
little babies ... embedded into the womb," meaning that the "wombs of women who 
have been on the birth control pill effectively have become graveyards for lots 
and lots of little babies."

Claiming that working women hate men and their children and will destroy 
America.

Saying that gonorrhea is God's punishment for single women having sex.

Warning that "Frozen" is a demonic movie meant to "indoctrinate my 5-year-old 
to be a lesbian."

Insisting that Beyonce is possessed by demons.

(source: pfaw.org)

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

Begging to Be Executed Saved His Life----A death row inmate who was exonerated 
at the 11th hour opens up about the psychological turmoil he faced, and the 
problems with capital punishment.


It could only make sense in the twisted world of American justice. A death row 
prisoner's life was saved because he wrote to a judge begging to be executed.

After decades behind bars protesting his innocence, he could no longer stand 
the failed appeals, the enforced silences, and the despair of another 
extinguished dream of freedom. He requested that his trip to the electric chair 
take place in the coming months.

"Dear Judge Giles, I ask that the one right that I have be recognized - and 
that is a condemned man's right to be executed," he explains in the documentary 
The Fear of 13. Nick believed this was the final chance to take control of his 
destiny.

"I was going to be executed but I was going to have some words for them when I 
left in eloquence, not anger," he told The Daily Beast.

Over the previous 20 years, a messed up kid, who was addicted to drugs and 
could barely read, had transformed himself into an erudite student who had 
worked his way through 10,000 books.

He would write down the new words he encountered each day - sometimes 30, 
sometimes 50 at the beginning - spelling them out over and over again, learning 
their meaning. "With every new book I found something wonderful about myself," 
he recalled.

"On the day of my execution I was going to quote something so beautiful. I 
could prove to them, I had erased and broken the person they thought me to be - 
while showing I had replaced them with someone I loved. That was my whole goal 
of educating myself."

Nick's extraordinary metamorphosis is charted in an engrossing true crime 
drama, which is playing at Doc NYC next month. With the help of well-shot 
reconstructions, most of the documentary is simply a searing and captivating 
monologue as one man recounts the jaw-dropping twists of fate that left him 
falsely imprisoned for so long.

Speaking after the premiere in London, director David Sington told The Daily 
Beast that The Fear of 13 wasn't a campaign film about capital punishment but 
Nick's story highlighted one of its greatest failings.

"I think the worst aspect of the death penalty as it exists in America is this 
very long period between conviction and execution," he said. "You're not really 
executing the person who did the crime. You're executing this different person 
who's now had a decade or 2 decades of a completely different kind of world."

Sington had been planning a more conventional documentary that charted Nick's 
false imprisonment and his eventual release, which came when Judge James T. 
Giles responded to his letter by ordering a full review of the evidence, 
including DNA tests that would prove his innocence.

After meeting the death row inmate, it became clear to Sington that allowing 
the camera to roll as Nick, now 54, let rip was the only way to go.

"I think the worst aspect of the death penalty as it exists in America is this 
very long period between conviction and execution."

"He is a master storyteller telling his own story. The story he's telling is 
how he became a storyteller. And that's very important, because he gets into 
prison because he tells a stupid story, he makes up this foolish lie to get him 
off something - ironically he was destined to get off in any case - but in the 
end, of course, he liberates himself with another story - a letter."

Nick's intensity and look are reminiscent of James Carville in full flow; the 
more time you spend with him, the more you are left in awe.

How can he possibly remain so positive, and reject any feelings of bitterness 
after spending 23 years on death row for a crime he didn't commit?

"Swear to God, the last time I let that bitterness get to me was after my 
brother died. I realized I ain't got a damn reason to be bitter because my 
brother is dead. My parents have lost him," he said. "I can steal every good 
intention of my parents and my family who prayed and prayed for me by being a 
cock. By coming out [of prison] and being a self-centered bitter bastard, I 
would rob everyone who cared about me or cried for me of the dignity they 
deserved."

He hopes this movie and his story of overcoming a terrible start in life will 
help to inspire other teenagers who feel they are in a spiral of drug-taking 
and criminality. "I don't want them to be ashamed, I want them to be empowered. 
If I can achieve that then my own embarrassment is set aside," he said. "The 
greatest quote I ever heard was Pablo Picasso. He said, 'The meaning of life is 
to find your gift. The purpose of life is to give it away.'"

Nick continues to share his "gift" by extolling the virtues of reading, and 
broadening the horizons of young people who may be on a path to imprisonment.

With inhuman levels of equanimity, Nick says he partially deserved to be in 
prison for all that time because he was not a nice person when he was jailed at 
the age of 20. That doesn't mean he can't see the errors of a system of capital 
punishment he describes as embarrassing for the United States.

"We're in an antiquated mindset," he said. "Shamefully, 140 people were 
exonerated last year, and some of them with as much as 35 years on death row. 
How is that still possible in the modern age? I got out 11 years ago and I 
expected some significant change. I was the 13th death row prisoner set free 
because of DNA in America. I can't believe those are the only mistakes they 
made in that whole time. I fail to believe that."

(source: The Daily Beast)