The first step in a climb to higher political office is often the office of District Attorney. It casts the politician in the role of protecting the community, and few things are more effective in that regard than the successful prosecution of high profile crimes. At the same time, leaving such a crime unprosecuted, or failing to get a conviction is almost guaranteed to snuff out a budding political career in it’s infancy. This gives prosecutors a built in incentive to push on to get convictions against people they know are innocent, using whatever means it takes to do it. Therefore it should come as no surprise that there are so many innocents on death row.
However much Americans may disagree about the morality of capital punishment, no one wants to see an innocent person executed.
And yet, far too often, people end up on death row after being convicted of horrific crimes they did not commit. The lucky ones are exonerated while they are still alive — a macabre club that has grown to include 152 members since 1973.
The rest remain locked up for life in closet-size cells. Some die there of natural causes; in at least two documented cases, inmates who were almost certainly innocent were put to death.
How many more innocent people have met the same fate, or are awaiting it? That may never be known. But over the past 42 years, someone on death row has been exonerated, on average, every three months. According to one study, at least 4 percent of all death-row inmates in the United States have been wrongfully convicted. That is far more than often enough to conclude that the death penalty — besides being cruel, immoral, and ineffective at reducing crime — is so riddled with error that no civilized nation should tolerate its use.
Innocent people get convicted for many reasons, including bad lawyering, mistaken identifications and false confessions made under duress. But as advances in DNA analysis have accelerated the pace of exonerations, it has also become clear that prosecutorial misconduct is at the heart of an alarming number of these cases.
In the past year alone, nine people who had been sentenced to death were released — and in all but one case, prosecutors’ wrongdoing played a key role…
Inserted from <NY Times>
There are actually two problems that need to be addressed here. We must eliminate the incentive for prosecutorial misconduct. I would like to see it made a felony, with at least a five year prison term and automatic disbarment. More important, lets gat civilized! State sponsored murder costs tax payers far more than natural life. State sponsored murder does nothing to prevent other murders. State sponsored murder prevents its victims from reforming and leading productive, socially useful lives behind bars. I know it happens. A couple of the guys who assist me in my volunteer used to be on death row and are now serving natural life.
17 Responses to “Lets Get Civilized!”
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Getting rid of capital punishment will be a walk in the park compared to reforming district attornies. I don't think anyone wants to go back to the days when criminal cases were treated more like civil suits – that is, for example in a case of morder, it was the survivors who pressed the case throughthe courts. What if there were no survivors? Then the murderer walked free. No one had standing to prosecute, so there was no prosecution. Sorry I don't now remember who, but one ancient Greek writer discussed sich a case – a woman who had been a slave was emancipated and then married. Her hisband died. She was murdered. Thr former owner had no standing because of the emancipation, and the husband was dead – no one could prosecute – no one was orisecuted. Compared to that, district atttorneys are a huge advance. But not good enough. How is it done in England? I have it in my head the UK has barristers who can be assigned to a particular prosection but are not permanently assigned just to prosecute, like our DA's? Is that actually so? If so, how does it impact potential future political careers?
I thought I knew the answer to your query Joanne, but just for you I looked up the Crown Prosecution Service who decide who in England and Wales will be prosecuted after the police in various areas decide that they have got someone who committed a crime… https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crown_Prosecution_Service People who work for the CPS do so as a career, unless they leave and join a law firm or set one up of their own.
I don't think we have a tradition over here of people trying to make their name as a prosecuting attorney and then use that publicity to go on to be elected to a political position. Having said that, it is an old saw that most MPs used to be lawyers, so I tried to find out – I saw a reference to an article in the Daily Mail saying that there were 86 (out of 650) – but I didn't want to click onto the article as the Daily Wail is not a reliable source in many people's opinions. That doesn't sound nearly as high as most people think, but sadly I can't find reliable figures – it may be around 20% lawyers and 20% were in business (probably stock broking in the Tory ranks).
Thanks very much, Pat – that does help. What I'm hearing is that being a career prosecutor doesn't itself lead to misconduct ; it's the combination of being an ELECTED (career or not) prosecutor and then using that post as a step to other elected office. Hoo boy – put this together with elected judges (who are now getting Koch Brothers attention) and you have a recipe for mass corruption.
Bingo!
You made my day, Tom, finding you in my Inbox. So glad you are feeling better. And I am glad that at my age (not saying) I no longer have file Income Tax. I make no money other than my paultry (sp) Social Security.
I'm sorry you aare so poor, except for the IRS part.
CA did fine for the decade plus we had no death penalty…it never should have been reinstated.
One way to reform DAs is to hold them accountible for withholding or falsifing evidence. Prosecutorial misconduct, because trust in our system is so important, must be held up to the highest levels of punishment. .Prosecutors, like judges, represent all that's considered balanced and just in our criminal justice system. It must be trustworthy. When one part of that system goes bad then the whole system suffers. There cannot be a death penalty when the process that defines the terms of said crimes is broken. Disbarrment is tiny compared to someone who has lost 5 or more years off their life because of proven prosecutorial misconduct. I believe a just discentive would be if years lost by the prosecutor's victim equaled the total years of imprisonment of the prosecutor. Not the 5 recommented years. Perhaps, faced with that punishment, prosecuting attorneys may be more hesitant to use their greed or personal prejudices as a weapon against innocent people…peace.
Cheryl, I have proposed that in the past as well. My suggestion of five years was intended as a minimum.
Capital punishment is state sanctioned murder. I have never agreed with it, and never will. Innocent or guilty, the state does not have the right to end a life. The innocents have been railroaded by over zealous prosecutors and I agree with your solution, make it a felony with automatic disbarment if the DA is convicted of this.
I oppose capital punishment because there is a chance that the convicted may indeed be innocent; state ordered murder is still murder and is morally reprehensible; and the death sentence has not proven to be a deterrent to others. From a point of practicality, the death sentence with its appeals etc costs more than keeping a felon incarcerated for life, not to mention the "wear and tear" on the victim`s family.
In Canada, the last executions were in December 1962, with capital punishment removed from the criminal code in 1976 and replaced by life in prison with no chance of parole until 25 years has been served. Although the Progressive Conservative government of Brian Mulroney sought to bring it back, in a free vote the matter was defeated. Even the PM, Brian Mulroney, voted against bringing back the death penalty.
Any interesting fact which highlights a significant cultural difference between Canada and the US: Canada sentenced to death 1,481 people and actually executed 710 between 1759 and 14 July 1976, all by hanging. In addition, we don`t seem to have the level of problems with prosecutorial misconduct as the US. In my estimation, prosecutorial misconduct is a blatant overzealousness to convict no matter the circumstances and as such denies the accused a fair trial. As such, those guilty of such misconduct must be meted out harsh sentences reflective of one denying another his rights.
The death penalty accomplishes nothing but increasing the monetary burden on taxpayers.
I don't believe in the death penalty. It serves no purpose but revenge, that's not the purpose of seeking justice. Fix the corrupt system instead of (what we have heard recently) finding different ways for the State to kill (firing squads, hanging, etc…..)
You state the difference between retributive and restorative systems. We agree on the latter.
It is horrifying to think that innocent people have been executed – but a couple of years ago I saw a documentary featuring a American University Professor who had a new technique of analysing evidence – and who recorded and analysed people's voices to see if they were innocent or guilty – and then if he thought they were innocent he and his law students looked at the paperwork of the trial and saw if they could help. The case that we saw was horrendous – the convicted man was convicted of murder despite the fact that he and his mates were in another town and they said so and could prove so – but his 'lawyer' at trial didn't even seem to refer to this in 'defending' his client – to cut a long story short the man who should never ever have been convicted was released after the Professor and a class of young aspiring lawyers called for his case to be reviewed. However this is not only about one miscarriage of justice per wrongly convicted person, but two – as the real murderer got away scot free to commit more crimes.
This goes to show (again) that once someone is judicially executed, it is a bit late to say sorry, we made a mistake – no-one can be un-executed.
If one coul;d be un-executed, Republicans would oppose it.
Thanks all. We agree.