Just one thoguht to add to your own humane ideas.

You make reference to the notion of a DA trying to earn his hashmarks on some pour soul’s back, and it seems to me that this is one area in which more focus from the community evaluating the issue of the death penalty would be of value.

Compare and contrast the notion of the local (or, perhaps, more accurately “state”) application of death penalty statutes versus the manner in which federal cases are evaluated for death penalty prosecution.

In federal cases, while there is an argument that the system is still flawed, there is a well defined process by which US Attorney’s must evaluate all “death eligible” cases before deciding how to proceed on those cases. One flaw: It became evident under Attorney General Ashcroft that this well defined process – which was designed to facilitate consistency across the US in deciding for which cases the death penalty would be sought – was still subject to the loophole of the Attorney General overriding the local US Attorney’s recommendation on each individual case. But still, the process is in place, and can be (and hopefully is) used to insure that only the most singular of cases proceed as death penalty eligible prosecutions.

There is no such requirement as to how local jurisdictions may choose to proceed. A county DA in one state may be a steadfast believer in the import of the death penalty sanction, while a county DA in another state may be entirely against it. In those two jurisdictions, the precise same crime might well result, assuming a conviction in both cases, in entirely different sentences. One person lives, the other dies.

So while surely there is meaningful work which can be done to preserve the sanctity of any individual prosecution at each “weigh station” along the road of that prosecution, it’s my own two cents worth that there is particular importance placed in the hands of local state prosecutors in making these huge decisions. And without humane procedures being implemented (which of course would be up to each state, given that it’s not something which can easily be federally mandated, if it could be at all) to ensure the sanctity of these decisions, and that they are being made on a case by case basis for reasons associated with those individual cases, and not solely because the local DA wants more notches on his or her belt, there is a missing step along the way which could otherwise quite readily effect the result of any number of cases tried on the local level.

Will such procedures change many cases?

Perhaps not.

But even one is an improvement with life or death circumstances.

But remember a time b_j, when I saw incomprehensible outcomes where the more moneyed and the more ‘well connected’ definitely seemed to gain favored outcomes whether it be for their kid found speeding, or their kid who committed a low down crime. Outcomes in family court still seem puzzling sometimes. Too, there is no mental health court here for those who are not well and who are charged with crimes.

Have suspected that the judges and sometimes the lawyers, know one another and socialize together and that there may have been prior ‘trying of the case’ on the golf course. No proof of this directly, just noting the backslapping, joking and laughing going on in the courthouse halls afterward.

Sometimes law enforcement is guided wrongly, or rewarded wrongly, and thereby picks up and charges people for, in my opinion, doing nothing other than walking being black, walking being latino, walking being poor-white, walking being poor.

It seems that the arraigning judges are the first line of just decisions even if law enforcement has wrongly arrested for
whatever reason, even if the DA is trying to earn hash marks on some poor soul’s back. That’s after complainant and witness/eyewitness.

Then it seems like the hearing judge, if there is to be no trial by jury, is the second line of justice.

The public defender is another line that ought intervene strongly in injustice. But, though I have seen many heartfelt public defenders, I’ve also seen slothful public defenders who are bored with their jobs and want ACTION it seems, or who merely practice the law desultorily as though they are hungry for meat, but all they have to eat are stale pretzels.

The jury ought be one of the final line for justice, but also, what the judge will allow to be brought to the jury’s attention can tilt everything one way or the other. Then of course, the sentencing judge is the final line on a case, at least before appeal… if there is one… a highly expensive and long process

How many points there are in bringing a person before a court wherein proper justice can be served, but each line fails to hold properly….

Some of the factors that come into play seem not only ‘prejudice’ toard a certain kind of person or race or nationality or gender or sexuality…. the sociometric relationships of those in power seem a critical factor; who owes who, who’s going to help who ‘look good’ to the electorate… and then … us, the electorate, not asking questions, for decades, not even knowing what questions to ask, not knowing how to gain access to the persons in power, or being turned away, being patronized, oh yes, we’ll look into it right away, but then being unheard by those in power, poo-poohed, or threatened, shunned in community

there are many ways to see that ‘the people’ do not questions the system

Not an expert in the law even though I work with lawyers, but you are right b_j, the poor… the poor black, the poor caucasian, the poor latino, the poor anyone…. there’s the burn

arrested while walking poor, or funny-looking, or mentally not well, or mentally not sharp, or ‘unconnected.’

Captain’s Quarters is right about talking. I keep thinking CQ about talking across systems, belief sytems, that is. I know this sounds funny but knowing we can now work cross-platform (as I do on one cpu with both Windows and Mac,)I hope we as humans will catch up to that ability. Cross-platform to translate all kinds of ideas ( software,) as needed, than just one platform alone that can only read/ understand by half.

dr.e.

Death row, what would a brother know?

There have been many convicted killers, most of them black, proven to be innocent by DNA evidence. These cases were our justice system’s most examined, the ones we thought for sure we were getting right. Now the ABA is saying that evidence from these cases is disappearing. How do you explain this? What made these juries make such huge errors in the first place?

Even more: if there are so many innocent men on death row, how many more innocent men are there for common felonies? How can we really believe that anyone in our huge prison population is guilty? Dear God, what are we doing to our nation’s black men? It’s slavery all over again. I feel sick.

That’s the question Joan Rivers used to ask in her stand-up routines, but these days, it seems more appropriate to ask in a political context. After completing a fascinating hour with Danny Glover of Air Congress and Joe Gandelman of……