[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----LA., ARK., NEB., ARIZ., CALIF., WASH., USA

[Rick Halperin]

Feb. 6




LOUISIANA:

Evidence of prior abuse against 8-year-old boy, killed in 2012, can be 
presented to jury at trial of accused killer, Supreme Court rules


A jury can hear about all of the prior physical abuse a Baton Rouge man 
allegedly inflicted on his 8-year-old son - including breaking the child's leg, 
shoving his head into a toilet and hitting, choking and punching him - leading 
up to the boy's beating death in 2012, the Louisiana Supreme Court ruled 
Friday.

Michael Robertson, 50, is charged with 1st-degree murder in Xzayvion Riley's 
death on June 12, 2012. There is no trial date, and prosecutors have not said 
if they will seek the death penalty.

Xzayvion's mother, Lavaughn Riley, 35, also faces a 1st-degree murder count. 
She will be tried separately. Robertson was her boyfriend at the time of the 
boy's death.

Prosecutors contend Xzayvion's death was the culmination of an escalating 
pattern of alleged abuse that included Robertson injuring the boy's mouth with 
a belt in November 2008; choking him and shoving his head into a toilet in 
August 2010; breaking his leg in February 2012 and neglecting to seek medical 
treatment; and, according to his sister, hitting and punching the boy "a lot" 
in the years leading up to his death and forcing him to run for unspecified 
amounts of time.

"Each of the acts at issue involves the battering and/or abuse of the victim by 
the defendant over the course of several years in his short life, and have 
independent and relevant bases for admissibility," the Supreme Court wrote 
Friday.

East Baton Rouge Parish District Attorney Hillar Moore III hailed the ruling as 
a victory for Xzayvion.

"This defendant prevented this child from his ability to speak to this jury as 
to his past abuse. Through the court's ruling today, we are now able to have 
this defendant's prior acts of abuse presented to the jury," Moore said. "This 
child will be able to tell the jury the entire truth through the presentation 
of the prior abuse evidence."

Jim Craig, who is Robertson's lead attorney and co-director of the Roderick & 
Solange MacArthur Justice Center in New Orleans, noted that the East Baton 
Rouge Parish Sheriff's Office investigated several of the alleged prior 
incidents of abuse and cleared Robertson of any wrongdoing.

"Criminal trials about the death of a child are always emotional, and there is 
a recognized danger that a jury may be unfairly influenced by allegations of 
other acts, even when the proof of these allegations is weak, as it is here," 
Craig said. "But assuming the Supreme Court does not reconsider this ruling, we 
will prepare to show the jury that these alleged incidents do not prove that 
Michael Robertson abused his son Xzayvion."

State District Judge Don Johnson ruled last year that the 2008 incident was too 
remote from the charged crime to be admissible at trial, but the high court 
disagreed Friday.

"The victim was only 8 years old at the time of his murder, and acts of abuse 
perpetrated against him in the years before his death are not so remote as to 
negate their probative value," the justices wrote.

They also reversed Johnson's decision to bar prosecutors from using the 
observations of Xzayvion's sister. The justices said the evidence she will 
testify about has independent relevance.

The 2010 incident, which left the boy with an injured neck and bruising to his 
upper and lower body and groin area, and the 2012 broken leg incident both are 
admissible as well, the high court said.

Johnson had determined that the neck injuries in the 2010 incident were more 
prejudicial than probative, and he allowed the introduction of the broken leg 
and lacerations and bruises from the February 2012 incident for the purpose of 
showing Robertson's identity only.

"We find that the trial court abused its discretion in excluding these 4 
incidents or permitting the state to introduce them only for a limited 
purpose," the Supreme Court stated.

Following the alleged 2010 incident, the state Department of Children and 
Family Services put a safety plan in place to limit Robertson's involvement 
with his son, prosecutors have said. The plan was in place until April 2011.

Xzayvion's death was classified as a homicide. Coroner's officials found he 
died of overwhelming infection caused by a ruptured bowel from blunt-force 
trauma to his abdomen. An autopsy revealed 60 external signs of recent and past 
trauma, including a human bite mark.

Riley has acknowledged that she held her son down in 2010 while Robertson hit 
him with an open hand on the stomach.

Craig also noted that Riley has said some of Xzayvion's injuries occurred 
accidentally during what she described as horseplay between Robertson and the 
boy.

(source: The Advocate)






ARKANSAS:

State asks justices to hear challenge to execution law


State attorneys are seeking an opportunity before the state's highest court to 
defend the constitutionality of the state's execution law and to conceal the 
source of the state's execution drugs.

Late Thursday, the Arkansas attorney general's office filed a brief challenging 
a trial judge's order to share the source of its supply of lethal drugs, and it 
also asked the Arkansas Supreme Court to hold oral arguments over a legal fight 
that began nearly 10 months ago with the passage of an execution law that 
shielded the source of execution drugs from public disclosure.

In its filing, Solicitor General Lee Rudofsky and Assistant Attorney General 
Jennifer Merritt argued that attorneys representing a group of death-row 
inmates failed to state the proper facts and claims that would show Act 1096 to 
be unconstitutional.

They asked the Supreme Court to void a bench order that prison officials must 
share the source of the drugs, and asked the court to either dismiss the 
prisoners' suit or return the case to the trial court with instructions 
favorable to the state.

An attorney representing the inmates, Jeff Rosenzweig, declined to comment on 
the filing but said he was not surprised by the request for oral arguments.

"We're not going to contest [the request]. It certainly seems appropriate for 
oral arguments," he said. "We anticipate the Supreme Court will grant it."

Arkansas has not executed a prisoner since 2005. And for years, the death 
penalty process has been frozen by a series of lawsuits as well as difficulty 
in finding drug manufacturers willing to sell to the state for the purpose of 
execution.

The statute being challenged, Act 1096 of 2015, set down rules for prison 
officials to follow in obtaining and using a 3-drug execution cocktail. The act 
ensured that suppliers of the drug would remain confidential so they would not 
be subjected to harassment from anti-death penalty activists.

Rosenzweig filed suit the day the law was passed in April 2015, arguing that 
the constitutional rights of his 9 death-row clients were being violated.

Rosenzweig has argued that the new state law violates the agreement made 
between his clients and the state in a 2013 settlement that required the state 
to disclose the identity of any drug manufacturers.

Attorneys for the inmates argue that one of the drugs involved, midazolam, has 
resulted in botched executions elsewhere, which violates a condemned prisoner's 
constitutional protection against cruel or unusual punishment.

The prisoners, their attorneys argued, have a right to know where the drugs 
came from and to inspect them.

In September, Gov. Asa Hutchinson set execution dates for 8 of Rosenzweig's 
clients. The executions were stayed by the Supreme Court in late October.

In early December, Pulaski County Circuit Judge Wendell Griffen refused to 
grant state attorneys' request for a summary judgment and a dismissal of the 
prisoners' suit.

Instead, he ruled that part of Act 1096 protecting the identity of drug 
suppliers was unconstitutional. The high court stayed Griffen's order pending 
the current appeal.

In Thursday's brief, state attorneys argued that past court rulings, including 
a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling involving midazolam, showed the drug was not 
likely to cause cruel or unusual punishment and its use was thus 
constitutional.

They also argued that the state has a compelling interest to protect the 
identities of drug suppliers and that such a protection does not violate the 
prisoners' rights to due process.

(source: arkansasonline.com)






NEBRASKA:

Let death penalty die


I am writing in support of the Editorial Board's opinion that defending our 
state legislature's abolition of the death penalty should be our number one 
priority for 2016 ("Editorial board agenda for 2016," Jan. 16). It's been 
almost a year since our legislature made the historic vote to repeal the death 
penalty and override the governor's spiteful veto. In a blatant and desperate 
attempt to sway the voting, Governor Ricketts spent $54,400 of state funds in 
an illegal attempt to purchase enough lethal injection drugs to kill 300 people 
from an overseas supplier. After his veto was overridden, Ricketts spent 
$200,000 of his personal funds and $100,000 from his wealthy father to mount a 
crooked campaign to bring the death penalty back.

We need to send a message that Nebraska values cannot be bought and sold, 
despite what our governor may be used to. The system of capital punishment is 
barbaric and broken beyond repair. It does not deter crime. Most violent crimes 
aren't committed by people carefully considering the consequences of their 
actions. It does not provide closure to victims families. The long, drawn out 
process of appeals can be even more traumatizing to endure than the initial 
impact of the crime, not to mention extremely expensive for all parties 
involved, including the state.

It isn't even reliable. Since 1973, 144 innocent people sentenced to death have 
since been exonerated by new evidence. It isn't justified. An eye for an eye 
makes the whole world blind, not morally superior. So, when we the people vote 
on November 8 this year, which I know you all who love this great democracy 
will do, let the death penalty stay dead. Let's move forward to putting our 
time and money towards more productive pursuits for the betterment of our 
state.

Audrey Nance, Lincoln

(source: Letter to the Editor, Lincoln Journal Star)






ARIZONA----death sentence overturned

Death Penalty Vacated for Ariz. Rape & Murder


A man who once scored 62 on an intelligence test - where an IQ of 65 or below 
qualifies as mental retardation - cannot be executed for a 1980 rape and 
murder, the Ninth Circuit ruled Thursday, converting the sentence to life in 
prison.

"There can be no doubt that the crime in this case was truly horrific," Judge 
Stephen Reinhardt wrote a divided 3-judge panel. "The Constitution, however, 
regards intellectually disabled defendants as less morally culpable for their 
crimes, and for this reason, prohibits their execution."

Robert Douglas Smith was sentenced to death in 1982 for the rape and murder of 
Sandy Owen in Tucson.

At the time of Owen's abduction in 1980, Smith had 5 failed marriages under his 
belt. He had been on a cross-country road trip with a couple, and was 
frustrated that they had intercourse in front of him, while he had no one with 
whom to be intimate.

The ruling describes in horrific detail Owen's rape and murder, in which both 
he and his friends on the road trip participated, saying the trio celebrated 
the killing afterward by playing "We Are the Champions" as they drove off.

In earlier years, Smith had been held back in every grade and sent to a special 
school for children for children unable to learn. He was only in the 8th grade 
when he turned 16 and dropped out.

Arizona did not outlaw the execution of people with intellectual disabilities 
until 2001, however, and Smith's trial occurred more than 20 years after the 
state created a framework to evaluate capital defendants for intellectual 
disability.

State courts that eventually evaluated whether Smith was intellectually 
disabled at the time of the crime concluded he was not, denying Smith's claim 
in 2012 under a landmark precedent. In the 2002 decision Atkins v. Virginia, 
the U.S. Supreme Court found that the execution of intellectually disabled 
criminals amounts to cruel and unusual punishment, in violation of the Eighth 
Amendment.

The Ninth Circuit converted Smith's sentence 2-1 Thursday to life in prison, 
saying Smith's IQ may have improved while in prison, but that he was clearly 
intellectually disabled at the time in 1980.

"Considering Smith's intellectual functioning test scores and his history of 
significantly impaired adaptive behavior," Reinhardt said Smith "demonstrated 
by clear and convincing evidence significantly subaverage general intellectual 
functioning."

The dissent by Judge Consuelo Callahan meanwhile blasts the majority for 
"expressing supreme confidence in its own ability to detect past intellectual 
disability despite substantial conflicting evidence and the fact that Smith is 
not now intellectually disabled."

Callahan said Smith's testing in 2005, which revealed an IQ between 87 and 93, 
is "undeniable" evidence that Smith failed to meet his burden.

The dissent also emphasizes Smith's ability to live independently and support 
himself for 15 years after dropping out of school, before the murder.

The doctors who examined Smith in 1980 also "determine his competency to be 
tried found no signs of intellectual disability," according to the dissent.

Reinhardt, who authored the lead opinion, included a specially concurring 
opinion as well.

This lengthy addition complains about how Atkins has been applied in Arizona, 
which has 124 inmates on death row, the 8th highest number of any state, with 
15 executions since Atkins.

"The constitutional infirmity of Arizona's statute creates a recurring problem 
with potentially far-reaching consequences," Reinhardt wrote, saying the court 
should have held that both aspects of Arizona's intellectual-disability statute 
"violate the Eighth Amendment because they permit the execution of individuals 
whom Atkins deems categorically ineligible for capital punishment."

Judge Mary Schroeder concurred in all but one 11-page section of the 55-page 
lead opinion.

(source: Courthouse News)

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

Death Row Diaries: The 1st inmate in the state to be executed by lethal 
injection


ABC15's "Death Row Diaries" takes a look at Arizona???s most notorious death 
row inmates past and present.

JOHN GEORGE BREWER

Date of Birth: November 8, 1965

Executed: March 3, 1993

John George Brewer was the 1st Arizona inmate executed by lethal injection.

Brewer had repeatedly declared that he deserved the death penalty, and he never 
pleaded for his life, criticizing "'civil libertarians who seek to forward 
their own agenda on the back of my case."

He never pleaded for his life

In 1987, Brewer and his girlfriend, Rita Brier, were living together in a 
Flagstaff apartment. In the early morning hours of November 11, they argued 
about Brewer's excessive dependence on Brier.

Later that day, Brier told her 22-year-old boyfriend she was leaving him to 
help him learn to live on his own. Brewer locked the bedroom door and began to 
beat and strangle Brier. Brier fought for her life in a long struggle as Brewer 
bit her, tried to gouge her eyes out and choked her with his hands.

Brewer eventually used a tie to strangle his girlfriend to death. She was 22 
weeks pregnant.

After taking some time to rest from the attack, Brewer took a shower. He then 
had sexual intercourse with the corpse, walked to a nearby bowling alley, 
called police, and turned himself in.

Brewer pled guilty to 1st-degree murder and was convicted in Coconino County 
Court. His automatic appeal to the Arizona Supreme Court was upheld.

In February 1993, Brewer's case entered the federal court system where Brewer's 
mother filed a petition challenging Brewer's competency.

She offered new evidence, specifically 2 letters written by Brewer from death 
row where he talked about his belief in the god "Dantain" who ruled the planet 
"Terracia." He also described "Fro," who he believed was the child of his god 
who lived in his girlfriend, writing, "I am the one who killed Fro, the savior 
of Terracia."

Despite this evidence, the Federal District Court ruled against Mrs. Brewer and 
her son was put to death on March 3, 1993.

(source: ABC news)






CALIFORNIA:

Death penalty for Northridge killer of 4; 'Thug' has 'resume of violence'


A 34-year-old man who killed four people outside a Northridge boarding home in 
2012 was sentenced to death Friday.

Ka Pasasouk was convicted in November of 4 counts of 1st-degree murder for the 
Dec. 2, 2012, shooting deaths of Teofilo Navales, 49, of Castaic; Robert 
Calabia, 34, of Los Angeles; Amanda Ghossein, 24, of Monterey Park; and 
Jennifer Kim, 26, of Montebello.

The same jury recommended a month later that he be sent to death row.

In court Friday, Superior Court Judge Larry Paul Fidler rejected an automatic 
motion to reduce the jury's recommendation of a death sentence to life in 
prison without the possibility of parole, along with a defense motion for a new 
trial.

In addition to the murder counts, he was also convicted of one count each of 
attempted murder and possession of a firearm by a felon, along with assault 
with a semiautomatic firearm, for confronting other people nearby shortly 
before the killings.

Jurors found true the special circumstance allegation of multiple murders, 
triggering the penalty trial in which they were tasked with determining whether 
to recommend death or life imprisonment without parole.

During the guilt phase of the trial, Deputy District Attorney Dan Akemon told 
the jury that Pasasouk was "fueled by drugs and alcohol" and had the "perfect 
opportunity for vengeance," along with the perfect opportunity for a robbery, 
when he came across Navales - with whom he had an altercation months earlier - 
in a dark and confined area and shot him twice.

Calabia, Ghossein and Kim were shot to death to silence them as potential 
witnesses as Pasasouk was "trying to get away with murder," the prosecutor 
said.

One of Pasasouk's attorneys, James Goldstein, had urged jurors to consider the 
lesser charge of 2nd-degree murder, arguing that his client's judgment was 
"impaired" by being under the influence and that he could not have premeditated 
the killings.

During the penalty phase of the trial, the prosecutor told the panel that 
Pasasouk has a "resume of violence" and has spent 20 years in and out of 
juvenile and adult correctional facilities.

"He has thumbed his nose at society at every turn in favor of leading a thug 
life ... He is a hardened career criminal," Akemon said. "Tell him he deserves 
the death penalty for what he has done ... In this case, there is only 1 just 
punishment, and that is the death penalty."

The prosecutor said Pasasouk robbed the 4 victims of their futures, fled the 
crime scene and discarded the murder weapon in an effort to get away with the 
killings. He was arrested 2 days later at a hotel-casino near the Las Vegas 
Strip.

Another of Pasasouk's attorneys, Larry Sperber, countered that justice has 
already been served by the jury finding Pasasouk guilty of the crimes.

He told jurors that his client was born at a refugee camp in Thailand and "is 
not a normal, healthy person." He acknowledged that Pasasouk "did some terrible 
things" and told jurors that he was asking for justice but not mercy for his 
client.

As early as age 14, Pasasouk was described in 1 report as having a "very 
dysfunctional and chaotic early life," with parents unable to be contacted by a 
probation officer when their son was 15, Sperber said.

He said that his client has a well-documented history of having a lack of 
learning skills, suicidal tendencies, alcoholism and drug abuse, and had begged 
not to be paroled from prison in October 2011 because he knew that he needed 
help and wanted to remain behind bars.

Pasasouk's attorney said there was a "lifelong pattern of mental disease that 
he's suffering from" and contended that his client is "not a career criminal."

Jurors also heard from Pasasouk's older brother, Torasonh, who is in a 
substance abuse program and described his parents as drinking "most of the 
time" during their childhood. He said their father was often abusive.

Last year, family members of the victims filed a lawsuit against Los Angeles 
County District Attorney Jackie Lacey and Probation Chief Jerry Powers, 
alleging they didn't do enough to protect the public from Pasasouk once he was 
released from prison in January 2012.

A judge dismissed the civil rights case in August, ruling that the government 
officials were immune from liability.

(source: mynewsla.com)






WASHINGTON:

Death penalty foe returns to campus


A nun, an advocate and a writer. Sister Helen Prejean of Baton Rouge, 
Louisiana, has spent her entire life as an advocate against the death penalty 
through writing and action. And she has brought that movement to Gonzaga, 
again. Tonight in Jepson's Wolff Auditorium, Prejean is scheduled to address 
the GU community to share her lifelong work.

Prejean began her career when she was a young woman working in the poor areas 
of New Orleans. During her term working in the St. Thomas housing project, she 
became pen pals with Patrick Sonnier, a man convicted for the murder of 2 
teens, who was sentenced to die by electrocution in the Louisiana prison 
system.

Prejean repeatedly visited Sonnier in prison up until his execution in 1984. 
Prejean witnessed the execution.

She documented her experiences in her book "Dead Man Walking: An Eyewitness 
Account of the Death Penalty," which claimed a spot on the New York Times 
best-seller list for 31 weeks and was translated into 10 languages.

That same book was then turned into a major motion picture in 1996 featuring 
Susan Sarandon and Sean Penn. In addition to being nominated for four Academy 
Awards, Prejean's story gained international notoriety in literature and on the 
silver screen.

Making her 1st return to GU since 2013, Prejean will take the podium to address 
the death penalty, faith and her story.

(source: The Gonzaga Bulletin)






USA:

The problem with Hillary Clinton's stance on the death penalty


Thursday night's Democratic presidential debate included one brief exchange 
that showed some overlap but also a sharp philosophical difference between 
Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders on a persistently fractious issue: the death 
penalty.

The exchange came in response to a question by co-moderator Rachel Maddow, who 
asked Clinton whether she still stood by an earlier statement in which she 
"reluctantly" endorsed capital punishment.

"Yes, I do. And - you know, what I hope the Supreme Court will do is make it 
absolutely clear that any state that continues capital punishment either must 
meet the highest standards of evidentiary proof of effective assistance of 
counsel or they cannot continue it because that, to me, is the real dividing 
line.

"I have much more confidence in the federal system, and I do reserve it for 
particularly heinous crimes in the federal system, like terrorism. I have 
strong feelings about that. I thought it was appropriate after a very thorough 
trial that Timothy McVeigh received the death penalty for blowing up the 
Federal Building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people, including 19 children in 
a day-care center.

"I do for very limited, particularly heinous crimes believe it is an 
appropriate punishment, but I deeply disagree with the way that too many states 
are still implementing it. If it were possible to separate the federal from the 
state system by the Supreme Court, that would, I think, be an appropriate 
outcome."

Sanders staked out the opposite turf from Clinton, arguing that the death 
penalty is too prone to error to be trusted but also said more broadly that "of 
course there are barbaric acts out there. But in a world of so much violence 
and killing, I just don't believe that government itself should be part of the 
killing."

To her credit, Clinton has said she "would breathe a sigh of relief" if the 
Supreme Court were to ban the practice. But there are 2 underlying problems 
with her position as staked out Thursday night. First is the implication that 
effective counsel is all it takes to guarantee a fair trial, when many of the 
death penalty exonerations we've seen in recent years have hinged on 
prosecutorial or investigative misconduct (including hiding potentially 
exculpatory evidence from the defense) and lying witnesses. Even the best 
defense lawyers will have trouble overcoming such practices.

2nd is Clinton's suggestion that somehow the federal system has got it right on 
how to get a clean conviction and a method of execution that is not 
unconstitutionally cruel and unusual. She cited the case of McVeigh, whose 
atrocious act of anti-government terrorism killed 168 people, including 
children at a day-care center, in the federal Alfred P. Murrah Building in 
Oklahoma City in 1995. That was a heinous act of terrorism, and she called his 
execution "appropriate."

But it's only appropriate if you view vengeance as the purview of the state. 
McVeigh was irredeemable and caused unimaginable pain and loss, but that 
doesn't mean it was just for the government to kill him in return. If killing 
is wrong, then it's inconsistent to vest that power in the state. That's the 
moral argument against the death penalty. The pragmatic one - expensive, 
indiscriminate, prone to manipulation - doesn't inherently give the federal 
system a pass. In an adversarial judicial system, the goal is to win as much as 
it is to reach truth and justice.

Since McVeigh's execution, the federal government has put to death 2 more men: 
Juan Raul Garza just 8 days after McVeigh in 2001, and Louis Jones Jr. in 2003. 
Neither involved terrorism.

In the 1st case, the government executed Garza despite international protests 
that the courts had allowed the prosecutor to tell the jury that Garza, a major 
drug-trafficker convicted of ordering the murders of 2 people and killing a 3rd 
himself, was a suspect in more murders in Mexico - crimes for which he had 
never been charged and for which he could not mount a defense during the 
sentencing hearing. Would the jury have voted for death without that 
information? Who knows, but insinuation should not be evidence in determining 
whether someone lives or dies.

The execution of Jones was even more problematic. A highly decorated Gulf War 
vet with diagnosed psychiatric problems from his service, Jones' life fell 
apart after the war, propelled largely by his exposure to chemical agents. He 
was convicted of the 1995 rape and murder of a 19-year-old female Army recruit 
on a military base. A horrific crime, yes, but it seems to fall outside 
Clinton's endorsement of capital punishment "for particularly heinous crimes in 
the federal system, like terrorism."

And there's nothing to suggest that the federal system can't fall victim to the 
same sorts of manipulations that dog the state courts. And the federal death 
row includes people convicted of the same kinds of murders for which state 
courts invoke the death penalty. In fact, the only person on federal death row 
convicted of terrorism killings is Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the surviving Boston 
bomber.

Minorities also make up a disproportionate number of federal sentences (44% 
black, 39% white, 13% Latino and 2% Native American). It's hard to see much 
daylight between the federal and state capital punishment systems, other than a 
matter of scale. The 60 people currently under a federal death sentence (these 
are the eligible crimes) are dwarfed by the estimated 2,950 people on state 
death rows.

The death penalty isn't likely to be a pivotal issue in the nominating contests 
for either major party, nor in the general election. That's unfortunate. It's 
among the most pressing ethical issues of the day, and challenges to it could 
well bring more cases to the Supreme Court in the relatively near future.

As it is, Florida and Delaware are struggling to reconfigure their systems 
after a recent Supreme Court decision that juries and not a judge must 
determine death sentences. And here in California, voters may have a choice of 
2 death-penalty initiatives, 1 to ban it and the other to speed up the 
execution calendar.

More candidates ought to be talking about it, and more voters should be 
bringing it up. And I hope Clinton will re-think her stance on it.

(source: Opinion, Scott Martelle----Los Angeles Times)

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

Democrats debate the death penalty


There was not much discussion of federal courts during Thursday night's 
Democratic debate, but there was an interesting exchange on capital punishment. 
(Kudos to debate moderator Rachel Maddow for asking substantive questions.) 
Here's the relevant portion of the MSNBC transcript:

MADDOW: Secretary Clinton, on the issue of the death penalty, here in New 
Hampshire, the one person who is on death row is there for killing a police 
officer. It's a crime that has caused anguish in this state, both among death 
penalty opponents and death penalty supporters.

The last time I had the chance to talk with you on this issue, on the death 
penalty, you said that capital punishment has a place in a very few federal 
cases, but you also said you would breathe a sigh of relief if the Supreme 
Court abolished the death penalty nationwide. Tonight, do you still support 
capital punishment, even if you do so reluctantly?

CLINTON: Yes, I do. And - you know, what I hope the Supreme Court will do is 
make it absolutely clear that any state that continues capital punishment 
either must meet the highest standards of evidentiary (ph) proof of effective 
assistance of counsel or they cannot continue it because that, to me, is the 
real dividing line.

I have much more confidence in the federal system, and I do reserve it for 
particularly heinous crimes in the federal system, like terrorism. I have 
strong feelings about that. I thought it was appropriate after a very thorough 
trial that Timothy McVeigh received the death penalty for blowing up the 
Federal Building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people, including 19 children in 
a daycare center.

I do for very limited, particularly heinous crimes believe it is an appropriate 
punishment, but I deeply disagree with the way that too many states are still 
implementing it. If it were possible to separate the federal from the state 
system by the Supreme Court, that would, I think, be an appropriate outcome.

MADDOW: Senator Sanders, you have singled out the death penalty, and Senator 
Clinton's support for the death penalty, as an issue that makes it hard to 
consider as progressive in your mind ...

SANDERS: ... Look, I hear what the Secretary said, and I understand, but look, 
there are - all of us know that we have seen in recent years horrible, horrible 
crimes. It's hard to imagine how people can do, bomb, and kill 168 people in 
Oklahoma City, or do the Boston Marathon bombing, but this is what I believe, 
and for a couple of reasons.

Number one, too many innocent people, including minorities, African Americans, 
have been executed when they were not guilty. That's number 1. We have to be 
very careful about making sure about that.

But, 2nd of all, and maybe, in a deeper reason, of course there are barbaric 
acts out there. But, in a world of so much violence and killing, I just don't 
believe that government itself should be part of the killing. So, when somebody 
commits ...

(APPLAUSE)

SANDERS: ... Somebody commits any of these terrible crimes that we have seen, 
you lock them up, and you toss away the key. They're never going to get out. 
But, I just don't want to see government be part of killing. That's all.

(source: Jonathan H. Adler teaches courses in constitutional, administrative, 
and environmental law at the Case Western University School of Law, where he is 
the inaugural Johan Verheij Memorial Professor of Law and Director of the 
Center for Business Law and Regulation----Washington Post)