Study: Capital Punishment Mistakes Tracked
More Innocents Condemned
“These people should never have another happy moment in their lives.”
—Bob Micholas, president of Citizens for Law and Order
 Bryan A. Stevenson, director of the Alabama Equal Justice Initiative, told Nightline the death penalty punishes innocent people 325k (wav) |
 ABCNEWS' Jeff Greenfield: Is the death penalty being used fairly? 750 kb (avi) 732.kb (mov) RealVideo (download RealPlayer) |
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 (ABCNEWS.com) |
By Jackie Cooperman
ABCNEWS.com
More and more innocent people are being condemned to death, and the problem’s only getting worse, an anti-death penalty group said Tuesday.
“For every six people we have executed in the past 20 years, we discover one person on death row who is completely innocent,” said Richard Deiter, the author of the report “Innocence and the Death Penalty: The Increasing Danger of Executing the Innocent.”
Overburdened attorneys, fewer opportunities to appeal cases and fuller dockets mean criminal defendants are at greater risk for getting death sentences before cases are appealed and evidence examined, the study said.
Since 1973, 69 people in 15 states have been released from death row after evidence has led to their acquittal.
“The facts stand for themselves. The system clearly is not working well,” said Deiter, also the executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center.
Last year President Clinton signed the Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act, restricting death row appeals, and angering prisoners’ advocates.
“There has been a cutback in the appeals process. All of the resource centers have had their funding cut—the average amount of time we spend to research these cases is seven years,” Deiter said. “If the appeals are cut and it takes only four years to get someone executed, then most of the people in our report would have been dead.”
Ambivalence Over Death Penalty
The American Bar Association called for a moratorium on the death penalty in February, urging jurisdictions to “ensure that death penalty cases are administered fairly, impartially and in accordance with due process and [to] minimize the risk that innocent persons may be executed.”
But proponents of capital punishment say the report is misguided and the ABA’s moratorium ill-advised.
“The death penalty is the only guarantee that a murderer will not kill again,” said Mike Rushford, president of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation in Sacramento. “I don’t think that people want to pay for a murderer living in prison, watching TV and eating cookies.”
Rushford dismissed the report’s findings as “anecdotal” and “suspicious.”
Rep. Bill McCollum, R-Fla., admits that some innocent people will die, but says that the tradeoff is worth the security of keeping the death penalty.
“I don’t think there’s any question that someday somebody who is innocent will be executed in this country again,” McCollum told ABCNEWS’ Nightline Monday night, adding that he believed capital punishment deters crime and helps victims’ families grieve.
Capital punishment is allowed in 38 states, and states are using it more often, according to groups that monitor capital punishment.
Executions on the Rise
“This year we’re going to see more executions than any other year since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976. The largest number of executions was 56 in 1995. We’re already at 42 and the pace is quickening,” Deiter said.
The emotional issue is inspiring continuous debate, and revealing national ambivalence. Even groups opposed to the death penalty acknowledge that most Americans favor having the option in sentencing particularly violent crimes.
An ABCNEWS poll last year found that 77 percent of Americans favor the death penalty for convicted murderers, and 19 percent oppose it.
Still, the conflicting reports on whether the death penalty serves as a deterrent, and complaints that capital punishment is administered with racial bias, are forcing some groups and individuals to question their stance.
“Ten years ago it would have been unimaginable for the house of delegates of the American Bar Association to propose abolishing the death penalty,” said Hugo Bedau, a philosophy professor at Tufts University and an expert on the capital punishment, referring to the ABA moratorium.
“But I think we’re in for a grim time ahead, we don’t seem to have a national awareness of the problems of convicting innocent people.”
