[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, PENN., GA., ARK.

[Rick Halperin]

March 2



TEXAS:

Higgins case follows recent trend ---- DA: Naylor's widow calls for life 
sentence



In recent decades, sharp trends have illustrated the nation's changing opinions 
regarding the use of capital punishment.

An increasing number of district attorneys across the nation are opting for 
alternatives to the death penalty, and in the case of Dan Higgins -- who shot 
and killed a Midland County deputy last fall -- Midland County District 
Attorney Teresa Clingman falls right in with this trend.

Giving convicted killers a life sentence rather than the death penalty has 
become a popular option among district attorneys, according to Keith Price, an 
associate professor of criminology at West Texas A&M.

In 1996, 315 convicts were sentenced to death nationwide, and as of 2013, that 
number dropped to 83 capital death sentences, according to data from the Bureau 
of Justice Statistics.

"Capital death has so many requirements -- it's so expensive. Capital death: 
the convicted dies in prison by lethal injection. Capital life: the convicted 
dies in prison whenever his natural life is over," Price said. "From an 
incapacitation standpoint, the DA has accomplished the same thing. That 
particular person will never see the Texas public again."

Pursuing capital litigation in Texas can cost an estimated $3 million more than 
non-capital cases and can be drawn out much longer, Price said. These costs can 
be onerous to counties with smaller budgets and emotionally burdensome for 
those involved.

However, in the case of Higgins, the victim's widow, Denise Naylor, requested 
that the prosecution not seek the death penalty avoid costly protracted 
litigation and personal strain, Clingman said at a press conference Friday.

"She also took into consideration that Mr. Higgins will now spend his time in 
general population rather than on death row in a single cell by himself for the 
rest of his life," Clingman said. "He was given a gift."

Had Denise Naylor desired that the District Attorney's Office pursue capital 
punishment, Clingman believes a Midland jury would have sentenced him to death.

"Had it not been for Denise's request, we would have sought death. I think that 
Mr. Higgins is death-worthy, and by that I mean I believe that a Midland jury, 
or any jury in the state of Texas, once they heard of his background -- the 
heinousness of the capital case, the continuous sexual abuse of a child case 
and his other criminal history -- would have sentenced him to death," Clingman 
said.

Naylor and other officers were trying to serve Higgins with a warrant for 
continuous sexual assault of a minor on Oct. 9 at his home in the 3800 block of 
North County Road 1247. Naylor was shot in the head when he approached his home 
to talk with Higgins. Deputies then engaged in a 3-hour standoff with Higgins, 
and Naylor was declared dead later that day.

Higgins pleaded guilty to the offense of capital murder of a peace officer and 
to aggravated assault on a peace officer with a deadly weapon. Higgins received 
a sentence of life without parole and a sentence of life, respectively, for the 
2 charges. The state filed a motion to stack the sentences to ensure Higgins' 
capital incarceration.

"Right now, we have life without parole as a sentence available in a capital 
murder case, but we cannot predict in the future what might happen in the 
Supreme Court of the United States or the state of Texas with regard to that 
law or what the Legislature might do. So we wanted extra insurance by filing 
that charge of aggravated assault," Clingman said. "To make sure that Dan 
Higgins will never set foot on a street in Texas or any other state again."

During his capital murder plea, Higgins also signed a judicial confession of 
his guilt to the sexual assault of a minor charge, though the case has been 
dismissed and Higgins will not be sentenced for that case.

"The reasoning is because we can't punish him any more than we're already 
punishing him," said Clingman. "It saves the victim in that case from having to 
go through a trial."

"I think saving the county money, saving the heartache for the families 
involved is the best solution for this particular case," Sheriff Gary Painter 
said at the press conference. "The Midland County's Sheriff's Office not only 
lost a brother and a friend, this county lost a great employee. Only time right 
now can help settle the feelings right now."

When asked if Higgins had expressed any remorse over his crime, Clingman said, 
"When he was arrested he made the comment to one of the Texas Rangers, I 
believe, to the effect of 'sorry fella, killed one of your own,'" Clingman 
said. "If you want to call that an expression of remorse, you can. I don't."

Price believes that expressing remorse not only helps the victim's loved ones, 
but it also can help soothe the conscience of the convicted.

"He's going to have to start dealing with this, and he's going to have to deal 
with the fact that the rest of his life and the end of his life is all going to 
happen in a Texas prison," Price said.

Higgins, 37, likely will never be transferred to a low-security facility 
because of the severity of his crime, Price said. However, the likelihood of 
being moved to a medium-security facility depends on his behavior after a 
couple of decades of incarceration.

"It was always surprising to me that you could settle into a place like a Texas 
prison and decide, 'This is OK, this is where I'm going to spend the rest of my 
life.' Will he have days of dark depression? Oh, there's no doubt about that, 
particularly early on; it'll weigh heavy on him. Think of how many years he's 
got, though. He's got decades and decades,??? Price said, reflecting on his 
time as a prison warden. "30 years from now or 25 years from now, will it be as 
heavy a burden on him, as it will be next month when he gets to the prison? 
Probably not."

(source: Midland Reporter-Telegram)








PENNSYLVANIA:

For Wolf, Legal Fights Result From Murky Law



Governor Tom Wolf is facing another legal challenge to his gubernatorial 
authority, less than a month into his term.

The Philadelphia district attorney's petition to stop Wolf's effective 
moratorium on the death penalty comes weeks after state Senate Republicans 
hauled the new administration to court for firing the Open Records director 
appointed by Wolf's predecessor, Tom Corbett.

Each case has brought indignant legal filings accusing Wolf of gubernatorial 
overreach, but legal experts say the disputes wade into unsettled questions.

"Issues of gubernatorial discretion are really uncharted water in 
Pennsylvania," said Bruce Ledewitz, a professor at Duquesne University School 
of Law.

Philadelphia's top prosecutor, Seth Williams, has asked the state Supreme Court 
to reject Wolf's death penalty moratorium. Wolf announced the effective 
moratorium last week, saying he would grant reprieves in each death penalty 
case at least until a task force studying capital sentencing in Pennsylvania 
had finished its work.

Law enforcement groups take issue with the method of Wolf's effective 
moratorium. They say reprieves are must be time - and case-specific, and can't 
be used as a blanket refusal to carry out the death penalty.

"If this were at the federal level, there were a lot of ways the president 
could do this, but the governor in Pennsylvania doesn't have the kind of 
authority that the president of the United States has," said Ledewitz. "We just 
haven't structured our executive power the same way under our state 
constitution. We have fractured the executive power and we have limited it in 
lots of ways."

Bruce Antkowiak, a law professor at St. Vincent College, said it shouldn't 
surprise anyone that a Pennsylvania governor is sparring with the courts and 
the district attorneys over carrying out the death penalty. He doubts this case 
will go to "knock-down, drag-out litigation."

"I think this is something where both parties need to express their views and 
then try to come to some reasoned accommodation on the matter," said Antkowiak.

Cumberland County District Attorney Dave Freed said the state district 
attorneys association is still mulling its own challenge of the governor's 
moratorium-by-reprieve method.

"He does not have the power under the constitution or any statute to simply 
wade in and say 'I'm granting a moratorium to everybody that's facing 
execution,'" said Freed. "So in each and every case, he'll have to grant a 
reprieve. And I would anticipate that there will be a challenge of this nature 
in each and every one of those cases when he grants the reprieve."

Philadelphia DA Seth Williams is asking the state Supreme Court to decide 
whether Wolf has the authority to impose a death penalty moratorium by issuing 
reprieves. The court does not have to accept jurisdiction over the case.

The legal challenge over Wolf's removal of the Office of Open Records director 
will go before a panel of Commonwealth Court judges in March.

(source: WESA news)

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

Carolyn King to be resentenced to life for 1993 murder



Carolyn A. King, convicted of murdering a 74-year-old Palmyra man more than 20 
years ago and sentenced to die, will be resentenced Tuesday to life 
imprisonment, District Attorney David Arnold said Sunday.

Senior Judge David Grine from Centre County signed an order Feb. 12 scheduling 
King's resentencing hearing.

King and Bradley Martin were convicted Oct. 14, 1994, of 1st-degree murder and 
other offenses and sentenced to die for killing Guy Goodman in his Palmyra 
townhouse.

Both were granted new sentencing hearings by the state Supreme Court but were 
denied new trials.

Martin was resentenced on Jan. 26 to life in prison without parole.

Senior Lebanon County Judge Robert J. Eby ruled in December that he was 
precluding the prosecution from seeking the death penalty against Martin, 
because Martin had been offered a plea agreement as part of a package deal with 
King before their trial.

King refused to plead guilty; the 2 went to trial and were convicted of 
1st-degree murder for killing Goodman on Sept. 15, 1993.

Arnold said Sunday that he did not appeal Eby's December ruling.

After the Martin ruling, Arnold said he decided not to pursue the death penalty 
against King. He said that seemed like the appropriate path to take.

The district attorney at the time of the 1992 trial, Bradford Charles, required 
Martin and King to both plead guilty in order to receive a life sentence.

A package plea offer was made to Martin and King on Feb. 7, 1994, and was 
available to them when their trial began on Sept. 30, 1994.

Eby, in his December ruling, said King had a pen to sign the agreement but 
changed her mind at the last minute, and the case was heard by a jury, which 
convicted both of them of 1st-degree murder and recommended both receive the 
death penalty.

Martin was 22 at the time of the murder; King was 28. Martin, who had been 
incarcerated on a parole violation, was free on a 2-hour pass from the Lebanon 
County prison when he and King traveled to Goodman's home on Sept. 15, 1993. 
Goodman had visited Martin and written to him while Martin was in prison.

Martin struck Goodman over the head with a vase, and the couple duct-taped a 
plastic bag over his head. Goodman's body was found by police 10 days later.

Martin and King stole Goodman's car, credit card and checkbook and drove to 
Bismarck, N.D., where they abducted a 59-year-old woman, Donna Martz, later 
killing her in the Nevada desert. They were arrested in Arizona after a police 
chase on Oct. 5, 1993.

Martin and King pleaded guilty to 1st-degree murder in the death of Martz and 
were sentenced to life in prison in Nevada. The Nevada sentence is consecutive 
to Martin's sentence for the Goodman murder.

(source: Lebanon Daily News)








GEORGIA----impending female execution

Clemency Urged on Eve of Execution of Georgia Woman Kelly Gissendaner



Hundreds of clergy urged courts Sunday to spare the life of Kelly Renee 
Gissendaner, the only woman on Georgia's death row, whose plea for clemency has 
been rejected even though she earned a theology degree and transformed her life 
while in prison.

Gissendaner, 47, is scheduled to die Monday night for her involvement in the 
1997 stabbing death of her husband, Douglas Gissendaner.

Gissendaner had been scheduled to be executed last Wednesday, but the execution 
was postponed because of bad weather. A vigil was planned for Sunday night in 
Atlanta. Gissendaner's lawyers have argued that it's unfair to execute her when 
it was her lover who actually stabbed her husband - and he got only life in 
prison.

Other advocates - including the almost 400 clergy who signed Sunday's open 
letter to state and federal judges and elected officials - point to her 
acceptance of full responsibility and her graduation from the program for 
incarcerated women at the Candler School of Theology at Emory University, in 
which she became a teacher.

"Her journey is vividly demonstrated in her support of other inmates and her 
witness to young people in prison-prevention programs," they wrote. "On more 
than one occasion, Kelly has prevented another inmate from taking their own 
life."

"I feel for the family of her husband, but this will not ease their pain," the 
Rev. Cathy Zappa, director of the prison theology program, told NBC station 
WXIA of Atlanta. "She cannot undo what she's done, but she's living her life in 
a way that shows she takes what she's done very seriously, She is trying to 
turn her life to good."

(source: NBC news)

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

Killing Kelly: An open letter to Georgia's Christian citizens----An open letter 
to Georgia's Christian citizens on the eve of a controversial scheduled 
execution.



Dear Georgia's Christian Citizens:

Unless something dramatic changes, tonight, March 2, your employees in the 
Georgia prison system, enforcing your laws, paid by your tax dollars, will take 
a Christian woman named Kelly Gissendaner from her cell and calmly kill her.

This means, in a very real sense, you will kill her. That's because someone 
whose salary you pay will be the one to strap her to the gurney, and someone 
else you are paying will run the lethal chemicals into her body, and someone 
you elected made the laws that these prison officials are enforcing. So you are 
responsible.

Actually, my fellow Georgians and fellow Christians, we are responsible. We 
will kill Kelly Gissendaner.

We will kill her not because she poses any kind of threat to society, as she is 
disarmed and rehabilitated, and has been incarcerated peacefully - indeed, as a 
model prisoner and a real force for good in her prison - for years.

We will kill her not because she is unrepentant for her crime, but even though 
she is deeply repentant.

We will kill her not because Georgia kills all people convicted of murder, 
because no state, including Georgia, executes all people convicted of murder, 
but instead executes a tiny minority of murderers, mainly those characterized 
by socioeconomic powerlessness or bad legal decisions.

We will kill her not because the death penalty functions as any kind of 
deterrent, because there is no evidence that such a sparse and randomly used 
penalty functions anywhere as a deterrent in the United States today.

We will kill her not because executing someone can heal the wounds of grieving 
family members, because the long death penalty process and finally an execution 
more often worsens and inflames grief and unforgiveness.

We will kill her not because Georgia's citizens are united in their support for 
the death penalty, because many Georgians, including many protesting today, are 
vehemently opposed to this penalty.

We will kill her not because Georgia is participating in a surging national 
trend toward support for and use of the death penalty, but instead contrary to 
a strong national trend away from support for and use of this penalty.

We will kill her not because Georgia benefits from national attention to our 
highly questionable implementation of the death penalty in high-profile cases, 
but despite the fact that it is not what Georgia's businesses and tourist sites 
and citizens want to be known for.

We will kill her not because Georgia's largely conservative citizenry generally 
express support for strongly centralized state power, but despite the fact that 
Georgians generally distrust an overly powerful government. And there is no 
greater governmental power than the power to kill its own citizens.

And, sadly, we will kill her not despite but because of the way many Georgians 
think about our dominant Christian faith.

Here I part ways with my fellow Georgians who do support the death penalty, for 
I most certainly do not. But I think I understand the version of Christian 
faith that undergirds that support. I wish to reason with you as a fellow 
Christian and ask you to reconsider this position on principled grounds.

Knowingly or not, many Georgia Christians support the death penalty because 
there is a strong tradition of Christian support for the death penalty in the 
United States. This is true especially in the South, which executes far more 
people than any other region. The letter I write today could just as easily be 
directed to nearly any state in the South and a few elsewhere.

I urge my fellow Georgia (and Southern) Christians to pay attention to the 
sharply declining support for the death penalty among Christians in the rest of 
the United States and in the global Christian family - including the Roman 
Catholic Church, most mainline denominations, and a very large number of 
evangelical Protestants. Principled opposition to the death penalty is not an 
outlier position but instead widely held in the broader Christian world.

Many Georgia Christian citizens support the death penalty because they take the 
laws of the Hebrew Bible (our Old Testament) seriously. But I urge my fellow 
Georgia Christians to pay attention to how most Jewish rabbis and scholars also 
take these laws seriously but for centuries have not supported the use of the 
death penalty. This is reflected in the fact that the modern state of Israel 
does not practice the death penalty, and has only executed 1 person, major Nazi 
war criminal Adolf Eichmann.

I urge my fellow Georgia Christians to think about how little the death penalty 
is actually implemented even in the Old Testament itself, which offers several 
key accounts of murderers who are spared death for their crimes. Consider Cain, 
Moses and David. Perhaps this could lead my fellow Christians to the conclusion 
that the Old Testament death penalty statutes signal the extreme seriousness of 
murder and other crimes, and demand a proportionate punishment, but one short 
of death and tinged with some measure of mercy.

I urge my fellow Christians to contemplate the unjust use of the death penalty 
to kill the great majority of the leading figures we meet in the New Testament, 
including John the Baptist, Paul, Peter, Stephen and, yes, Jesus himself. 
Closely studying these abuses of state power recorded in the New Testament 
might incline my fellow Christians to be much more suspicious of state claims 
that it is time, once again, for the state to kill one of its own.

Some Georgia Christians support the death penalty because Genesis 9:5-6 seems 
to demand blood in retribution for blood. But I urge you to consider that this 
text does not envision a modern society with prisons where criminals can pay 
with their lives in a proportionate but very different way than execution - and 
urge you to again consider the clemency shown to major figures in the Old 
Testament itself, after Genesis 9.

Some Georgia Christians support the death penalty because Romans 13:1-7 says we 
should respect government, which executes divine wrath on wrongdoers, making 
them pay for their crimes. But I urge you to think about the flaws of all 
existing human governments, their manifest errors and injustices, perhaps 
especially in the criminal justice system, and the need to limit rather than 
expand state power.

Perhaps you could agree that life in prison without release is a mighty 
terrible penalty but one that sets at least that one crucial limit on the power 
of the state - the power over life and death. And you might dare to wonder how 
Paul himself would have interpreted Romans 13 a few years later when he was 
getting ready to be murdered unjustly by Nero.

Above all, I urge you, my fellow Georgia Christians, to linger around our 
Savior Jesus. Jesus who was coldly executed by Roman power. Jesus who stood 
with those on the margins and the bottom of society. Jesus who forgave and 
forgave and taught us to forgive and forgive. Jesus who said that only those of 
us without sin are free to cast the first stone.

My fellow Georgia Christians, I urge you to join those of us asking for mercy 
in this case - which means life in prison, not release, but also not execution. 
The case for that kind of mercy here is extraordinarily compelling. But 
ultimately, it's not about one particular individual and the details of one 
particular case.

The issue is really that Georgia needs to join many other states and end the 
use of the death penalty once and for all. We don't need it. It isn't 
rationally or fairly applied. It's marked by race and class bias. It's more 
expensive than imprisoning someone for life. It doesn't make us safer. It 
doesn't deter murder. It doesn't heal our wounds. It doesn't make us proud. And 
Christians, when all is said and done, it doesn't fit with the Jesus whose 
forgiveness and mercy are the very ground of our lives.

Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles, you could stop this particular killing - 
before night falls.

In the name of Jesus, many of us are pleading with you to do just that.

No more killings in our name, Georgia Christians. Not one more.

(source: David Gushee, Baptist News)

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

Witness to an execution



On Monday, I will watch the state of Georgia kill a woman. In 23 years as a 
broadcast journalist, I've covered executions but never been witness to one. 
Going into this event, I wanted to write down my thoughts and see if they 
change once the execution of Kelly Gissendaner is over. By now, you've probably 
heard her story. She masterminded the plot to have her lover kill her husband, 
Doug, in 1997. For me, I keep thinking about the Gissendaner children. There 
are 3. 2 of the 3 have forged new relationships with their mother since she's 
been in prison. And by many, many accounts, Kelly has been a model prisoner 
who's continued her education and become a Christian behind bars. But she 
killed her husband. She's the one who put her children, her family, Doug's 
family and many friends in this situation to begin with.

I'm also thinking about my own feelings on capital punishment. Is the death 
penalty a deterrent to crime? Most criminologists say no. I see the practical 
side to the argument that it doesn't 'work' as a law enforcement tool. But if 
someone hurt my family, my wife or my kids, I'd get medieval real quick. People 
scoff at Utah trying to reinstate firing squad executions but again if the 
crime involved my family, give me the gun. No need for a squad. Let me also be 
clear in that I admire, respect and truly marvel at people who can forgive a 
killer. Their hearts are bigger than mine and I readily admit it. I wish I had 
their capacity to forgive.

Which brings me back to the Gissendaner children who are grown now. What in the 
hell are they going through right now? They had to deal with the crushing blow 
of their father's death in '97. Then learn their mother orchestrated the whole 
thing and was sent to death row. Now they're reliving this nightmare knowing 
their mother's last breath is coming Monday night. I simply can't fathom. I'm 
going to write down some thoughts after the execution and I promise to be just 
as open and honest. It's true that journalists become desensitized to crime 
over the years but there's a reason. We have to. It's the only way we don't 
break down and lose it. Like many journalists before me, I've covered fatal 
traffic accidents where even hardened police officers wince when putting a 
sheet over a body. Or a house fire where you know it'll take dental records to 
identify the family. Those scenes are horrific enough but it's different when 
killing isn't accidental. When another human being chooses to kill it exposes a 
vulnerability and powerlessness in me that I simply have to file away and 
ignore. If kids are involved, I still physically shudder sometimes when 
reporting their death. So, now, just a few hours before witnessing a planned 
execution, please forgive me when I say I'm thankful to witness it through my 
profession and not as father or husband. If that were the case, I have no idea 
what I'd think - or do.

(source: Editorial, Scott Light, CBS news)

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

In the past, Georgia would have let Kelly Renee Gissendaner live ---- Georgia 
temporarily abandoned capital punishment in 1976 over evident gender biases, 
among other reasons. Why has it forgotten these past lessons?



For death penalty watchers, all eyes will be on Georgia today - much as they 
have been throughout the grim history of the American death penalty - as the 
state plans to execute 46-year-old Kelly Renee Gissendaner. Georgia is the 
state where the Supreme Court case Furman v. Georgia created a de facto 
moratorium to the death penalty in 1972, and also where Gregg v Georgia brought 
the death penalty back to life in 1976.

Gissendaner's clemency appeal was rejected last week, despite "detailed 
testimony from inmates and former wardens" on her behalf. Her last petition to 
the Supreme Court was denied in October. According to the NAACP, she stands to 
be the 15th woman put to death by the government since 1976.

In the same period, 1,368 men have been executed. While men commit far more 
violent crimes than women, there is a disquieting history of racial and gender 
dynamics to who is sentenced to the death penalty after being convicted for the 
same crimes. This disparate impact was at issue in Furman v. Georgia. In his 
majority opinion, Justice Thurgood Marshall made note of:

overwhelming evidence that the death penalty is employed against men and not 
women. Only 32 women have been executed since 1930, while 3,827 men have met a 
similar fate. It is difficult to understand why women have received such 
favored treatment since the purposes allegedly served by capital punishment 
seemingly are applicable to both sexes.

That purpose, ostensibly though easily refutable, is that the death penalty 
should prevent crime. But if that were the case, following the death penalty's 
lopsided application towards men, it would mean men would be deterred from 
committing about 85 % of all homicides and women would be running rampant.

The 5 member majority of Furman ruled effectively, if temporarily, to end 
capital punishment because of "the discretion of judges and juries in imposing 
the death penalty" which enable it "to be selectively applied, feeding 
prejudices against the accused if he is poor and despised, and lacking 
political clout."

Though the Furman case was argued mostly around William Henry Furman's 
inability to get a fair capital trial as a poor black man, Marshall noted the 
disparate impact of the death penalty on men, and the court ruled that "In a 
Nation committed to equal protection of the laws there is no permissible 
'caste' aspect of law enforcement."

The disparate impact of the Furman case did not only stop executions of blacks 
and the poor in Georgia; it ended them for all Americans.

That was, until Utah upstaged Georgia with the 1st post-Gregg execution in 
1977, of Gary Gilmore by firing squad. Indeed, Utah may again upstage Georgia's 
execution news, as its house of representatives just voted to resurrect firing 
squads.

Much has been made of Gissendaner's conversion to Christianity and her 
relationship with prominent German theologian Jurgen Moltmann. But it's worth 
noting Gissendaner's rare execution as a woman. That women are far less likely 
to face execution than men does not demonstrate a "men's rights" defense of 
male murders; but the aberration does highlight an unjustly applied law which 
should be tossed out for everyone.

We know that men, the mentally ill, and the poor are more likely to wind up on 
death row. A 2011 Stanford Law School report found that, "Minority defendants 
who murder white victims are 3 times as likely to receive a death sentence as 
white defendants who murder white victims." For the state and its agents who 
literally execute its death penalty, the convicted must be considered a 
monster. It is arguably harder to flip the switch on the electric chair when 
that "monster" is gendered female. And, though it's hard to say with such a 
small sample, it seems harder to see a woman enough as a monster to actually 
kill her - that is, unless she is lesbian, black, poor or all 3.

The answer, of course, is not to execute more people. The answer is that the 
state of Georgia - and all states, and the federal US government - should stop 
executing everyone, for it is a legal, financial and moral failure that does 
not deter the crimes it professes to. While not technically a crime in America, 
the death penalty is a mortal injustice - and one that must be stopped.

(source: Column, Steven Thrasher, The Guardian)








ARKANSAS:

A death penalty alternative



This past week, retired Circuit Judge David Burnett, now state Senator David 
Burnett, D-Osceola, let his temper get the best of him. He openly castigated a 
remark made by 1 of the 3 elected Prosecuting Attorneys, who was apparently 
trying to play that old, shop-worn card about how "they do it down in Texas."

Burnett, whose red hair is growing grayer these days, wasn't buying that old 
Legislative trick of comparison of Arkansas to the Lone Star State.

"I don't give a damn about the whole state of Texas," Burnett shot back to 
the testimony about a lower murder rate in Texas.

The Lone Star state leads the nation and the world in the number of executions 
since 1976, when the death penalty was reinstated by the U.S. Supreme Court. 
Texas has executed 521 individuals in the 39 years since the ban was lifted on 
executions. Arkansas has executed 27 inmates since 1976, but none since 2005.

Not very senatorial in his remarks about Texas, but the message was succinct 
enough to end that discussion of what Texans "do and don't do." Still, 
Burnett's bill survived and passed out of committee.

The bill Burnett champions, Senate Bill 298, which would abolish the state's 
death penalty, may face a tough challenge in the Republican controlled Senate 
and House of Representatives. And that may be despite the piety of many 
Republicans who lean heavily upon their religious beliefs. At a recent 
Legislative Forum in Fayetteville, the abolishment of the death penalty split 
right about party lines. Democrats saying they would abolish the death penalty 
and Republicans saying no.

Arkansas has not conducted a state execution of a death row prisoner since 
2005, under former Gov. Mike Huckabee, a Republican. Outgoing Democratic Gov. 
Mike Beebe on several occasions said he would sign a bill abolishing the death 
penalty if one reached his desk. No bill ever reached his desk, and no bill has 
gotten as far as Burnett's bill in modern times.

Burnett told the senate committee the "...death penalty doesn't do anything to 
prevent murder of capital crime(s). I think the time has come for us to 
reconsider the death penalty as a form of punishment."

This sponsor of this controversial legislation is no stranger to the death 
penalty in the circuit courts of Arkansas. Burnett was the sitting judge in the 
trial of the "West Memphis 3" - that trio of boys charged with the death of 3 
younger boys in West Memphis. But let's set aside that tragically flawed case 
that was finally settled with all 3 defendants admitting guilt, but released by 
the courts as future trials and evidence caused their guilt to be in question.

Burnett, a former prosecuting attorney, has tried 5 death cases as a 
prosecutor. As a retired Circuit Judge, he conducted trials of 5 more death 
cases. That's a record few others can break in modern day Arkansas judicial 
circles. And when Burnett speaks on the status of the death penalty in 
Arkansas, maybe we all should listen.

"It's broken," Burnett told the committee. "It doesn't work because you do have 
not certainty."

Veteran death row attorney Jeff Rosenzweig, who has defended many of Arkansas 
death row inmates who were executed and many more awaiting the lethal dose of 
state prescribed drugs, concurred with Burnett's remarks about the system being 
broken.

"The courts are a human system where people make mistakes. It is a broken 
system and there's no way to fix it that is fair."

Others disagree. 3 elected Prosecuting Attorneys, Cody Hiland of Conway; Tom 
Tatum of Danville and Dan Shue of Fort Smith, all spoke against the bill. All 3 
said the death penalty was a deterrent to crime. Also the threat of the death 
penalty often helps prosecuting attorneys as a bargaining tool to elicit guilty 
pleas from those charged in these heinous crimes.

In 2014, Texas and Missouri tied for the most executions in the United States 
with 10 each. Already in 2015, Texas has executed 3 inmates with 7 others set 
to die from lethal injection between March 11 and May 12, 2015, if court 
challenges do not set aside the death sentences.

Since 1976, it should be pointed out the United States Government has conducted 
3 executions. Oklahoma has put 112 individuals to death since 1976, Missouri 
81; Alabama 56; Louisiana 28; Mississippi 21 and Tennessee just 6.

Burnett's bill should be weighed also by the cost of maintaining and operating 
a "death row" in our prison system. The bill does not do away with a life 
sentence without out a chance of parole.

But it does assure everyone of 1 thing - no innocent person will be put to 
death by the state, if no one is put to death by the state. Even those 
undeterred by all the Scripture, morals and laws telling humans not to kill 
other humans may need to stop and consider Burnett's bill as a message from a 
man who has seen killings and killers tried in our judicial system. Some of 
those outcomes came with mixed results.

People do, sadly, kill other people for a myriad of reasons, none of which we 
fully understand. But Arkansas does not have to as a mechanism of justice put 
people to death under this new twist to the death penalty law. Maybe it is time 
to consider an alternative to the lethal injection to elicit justice.

And yes, I, too, agree with Burnett. I don't give a damn about the whole state 
of Texas and what they are doing with respect to making law in Arkansas.

(source: Opinion; Maylon Rice, thecitywire.com)