Clipmarks | Death penalty Clips

Hanged for being a Christian in Iran

Mon, 13 Oct 2008 14:29:10 GMT

clipped by: sunstreak509

A month ago, the Iranian parliament voted in favour of a draft bill, entitled "Islamic Penal Code", which would codify the death penalty for any male Iranian who leaves his Islamic faith. Women would get life imprisonment. The majority in favour of the new law was overwhelming: 196 votes for, with just seven against.

Imposing the death penalty for changing religion blatantly violates one of the most fundamental of all human rights. The right to freedom of religion is enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and in the European Convention of Human Rights. It is even enshrined as Article 23 of Iran's own constitution, which states that no one may be molested simply for his beliefs.

Tags: religious, christianity, iram, islam

Texas Final Step - 12 Executions Scheduled

Mon, 13 Oct 2008 13:06:18 GMT

clipped by: nedhamson1

Clip Source: www.itemonline.com

Executions near for 12 on death row

Associated Press

The crowd on A-Wing A-Section at the Texas Department of Criminal Justice Polunsky Unit at Livingston is about to get thinned.

A dozen condemned inmates in the so-called “death watch” cells on Texas death row are set for lethal injection over the next six weeks.

Two are scheduled for this week. Two next week. And two more the week after that. Then six more in November, adding to Texas’ standing as the nation’s most active death penalty state.

“It’s just the way of Texas,” Alvin Kelly, who on Tuesday is the first of the 12 set to die, said last week from a tiny visiting cage at the prison.

Tags: human rights, death penalty, texas two-step, inhumanity

Nuns, Congressional candidate, Declared to be Terrorist.

Sun, 12 Oct 2008 04:23:57 GMT

clipped by: citizenbfk
clipper's remarks: This is what happens when you begin spying on all citizens without need for warrants or any controls at all, which has been typical of the Bush White House.

Things like approving torture, holding prisoners in jail for years and years -- indefinite detention -- deprived of all legal rights, not allowed to communicate with their families who might not even know where they went, deprived of visits even from the Red Cross.

It's one step at a time. It's doing things like this we've never done before -- war crimes. First to foreigners, then it seeps into doing it to your own.

Easily done, next, one candidate for Congress arranges to get another candidate for Congress put on the list. Someone in office doesn't like someone: Put him on the list, etc.

Spy on nun's because they're against the death penality. Spy on other political views you don't like - even though the people involved Have Absolutely Nothing To Do With Violence or Terrorism.

Step by step into real fascism.

Vote

Clip Source: www.washingtonpost.com

Spying on Activists Discussed at Forum

The 53 men and women wrongly classified by the Maryland State Police as terrorists include two Catholic nuns, a Democratic candidate for Congress, a man who campaigns against military recruiting at high schools and one person who has never set foot in the state

14-month surveillance operation in 2005 and 2006 targeted not just local opponents of the death penalty and Iraq war, as police claim, but a broader group.

"I am not a fringe person, and none of us are fringe people," said David Zirin, a sportswriter and death penalty opponent from Silver Spring, referring to a characterization by former state police superintendent Thomas E. Hutchins at a legislative hearing last week.

Tags: spying

End Death Penalty Worldwide

Fri, 10 Oct 2008 14:40:06 GMT

clipped by: nedhamson1

Clip Source: www.worldcoalition.org

On 10 October 2008, World Day Against the Death Penalty, the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty calls on all citizens around the world to take action to end executions in Asia.(2008/8/4)

Tags: death penalty, human rights

Death Penalty Dying Worldwide?

Thu, 09 Oct 2008 20:27:47 GMT

clipped by: nedhamson1

Clip Source: www.guardian.co.uk

World is moving towards banning death penalty, says Reprieve

Report says five nations responsible for almost all state executions in past year

Tags: death penalty

Unabomber Brother Speaks Out on Death Penalty

Thu, 09 Oct 2008 14:34:07 GMT

clipped by: nedhamson1

Clip Source: www.missoulian.com

Unabomber's brother, others say death penalty unfair
By TRISTAN SCOTT of the Missoulian

“If there was one thing that could have deterred me from turning in my brother, it would have been the death penalty,” says David Kaczynski, who tipped law enforcement off that he suspected the Unabomber was his brother Ted and now is executive director of New Yorkers Against the Death Penalty.
Photo by KURT WILSON/Missoulian

David Kaczynski says his efforts to abolish the death penalty were born of the same moral sense he had 12 years ago, when he first suspected his brother might be the person law enforcement called the Unabomber.

“My objective today is the same objective I had the day I turned my brother in,” Kaczynski said. “I don’t want there to be any more victims.”

Tags: death penalty

Enemies List Deja Vu!

Thu, 09 Oct 2008 14:25:25 GMT

clipped by: nedhamson1
clipper's remarks: The spirit of Spiro Agnew and Richard Nixon must both be laughing up a storm

Clip Source: blog.wired.com

Maryland State police placed the names of 53 left-leaning political activists into federal and state databases, labeling them as terrorists, the state's police chief admitted Tuesday.

Evidence that the state police had been infiltrating anti-war and anti-death penalty groups first came to light in July following a government sunshine lawsuit filed by the ACLU on behalf of a prominent peace activist named Max Obuszewski.

Tags: us storm troopers, nazification in usa, human rights?

El Paso Mayor Sings Opposition to Death Penalty

Tue, 07 Oct 2008 13:26:20 GMT

clipped by: nedhamson1

Clip Source: www.elpasotimes.com

Mayor Cook on guitar against Texas' death penalty

By Brandi Grissom / Austin Bureau

Article Launched: 10/06/2008 12:00:00 AM MDT

Mayor John Cook performed during the Music for Life Tour on Wednesday at Scholz Garten in Austin. (Brandi Grissom / El Paso Times)

AUSTIN -- In a dark blue pin-striped suit, crisp white dress shirt, snug red tie and shiny brown dress shoes, El Paso Mayor John Cook sure didn't look like any folk singer.

But he slung one knee over the other, braced his guitar and belted out a couple songs Wednesday night in Austin just as he has in five other cities across the state, playing with a variety of musicians promoting abolition of the death penalty in Texas.

Tags: death penalty, human rights, songs for life

No action on Georgia capital case - Troy Anthony Davis’

Mon, 06 Oct 2008 17:17:57 GMT

clipped by: nedhamson1

Clip Source: www.scotusblog.com

No action on Georgia capital case

Monday, October 6th, 2008 10:11 am | Lyle Denniston | Print This Post

Email this • Share on Facebook • Share on LinkedIn • Digg This!

The Supreme Court, opening a new Term Monday, took no action on an appeal testing whether it is unconstitutional to execute a death-row inmate who has a significant claim of innocence. The Court’s 82-page list of orders on pending cases contained no word on Troy Anthony Davis’ appeal, Davis v. Georgia (08-66).

Tags: death penalty

Do Executions Make US Safer?

Fri, 03 Oct 2008 13:58:24 GMT

clipped by: nedhamson1
clipper's remarks: Former Warden of San Quentin says no.

Clip Source: www.latimes.com

Death row realism

Do executions make us safer? San Quentin's former warden says no.

Tags: death penalty, human right.

Death Row Realism

Thu, 02 Oct 2008 18:45:11 GMT

clipped by: debbyski
clipper's remarks: "Why should we pay to keep him locked up for life? I hear that question constantly. Few people know the answer: It's cheaper -- much, much cheaper than execution.
If we condemn the worst offenders, like Massie, to permanent imprisonment, resources now spent on the death penalty could be used to investigate unsolved homicides, modernize crime labs and expand effective violence prevention programs, especially in at-risk communities. The money also could be used to intervene in the lives of children at risk and to invest in their education -- to stop future victimization.

To take a life in order to prove how much we value another life does not strengthen our society. It is a public policy that devalues our very being and detracts crucial resources from programs that could truly make our communities safe."

Clip Source: www.latimes.com

As the warden of San Quentin, I presided over four executions. After each one, someone on the staff would ask, "Is the world safer because of what we did tonight?"

We knew the answer: No.

I didn't reach that conclusion because I'm soft on crime. My No. 1 concern is public safety. I want my children and grandchildren to have the safety and freedom to pursue their dreams. I know from firsthand experience that some people are dangerous and must be removed from society forever -- people such as Robert Lee Massie.

I did my job, but I don't believe it was the right thing to have done. We should have condemned Massie to permanent imprisonment -- that would have made the world safer. But on the night we executed him, when the question was asked, "Did this make the world safer?" the answer remained no. Massie needed to be kept away from society, but we did not need to kill him.

Another Supreme Court's Embarrassing Mistakes

Thu, 02 Oct 2008 04:51:45 GMT

clipped by: merrie
clipper's remarks: There assuredly will be a motion for rehearing filed, and even if there's not, the Court could consider reconsidering the case on its own, sua sponte. But only a naive wanker would expect the Emperor of America, Mr. Justice Anthony Kennedy, or any of the other four Justices who joined his opinion for the majority, to actually change their votes. At most, those five will permit limited supplemental briefing by both sides. There won't be additional oral argument. And in short order, Justice Kennedy will write a short supplemental opinion. It will announce the denial of rehearing. It will try to explain why the laws that America, through its Congress and president, has chosen to apply to its own uniformed sons and daughters are nevertheless absolutely meaningless data points in the SCOTUS' determination of America's "evolving standards of decency."

Clip Source: hughhewitt.townhall.com

On July 6, 2008, I wrote at my usual tedious length about the Supreme Court's embarrassing mistake in the case overturning Louisiana's capital sentence for a child rapist, Louisiana v. Kennedy, in which Justice Kennedy, writing for a five-Justice majority

insisted that neither any other state nor the federal government permitted the death penalty for child rapists. That was a major premise for their holding that "evolving standards of decency" under their "living, breathing" version of the Eighth Amendment no longer permitted Louisiana's death sentence for convicted child rapist Patrick Kennedy. And that statement was absolutely wrong: Congress and the president had recently acted to amend the Uniform Code of Military Justice to permit the death penalty for exactly that crime.

Even the editorial board of the Washington Post had urged the Supreme Court to grant rehearing in the case to address this enormous blunder. Here's what I predicted, however:

Tags: supreme court overturned capital punishment, convicted child rapists, louisiana v. kennedy

There is still time to right a wrong

Wed, 01 Oct 2008 20:57:24 GMT

clipped by: jimbo1000
clipper's remarks: send an email.

Clip Source: takeaction.amnestyusa.org

Urge Clemency for Troy Anthony Davis [Urgent!]

Troy Davis was sentenced to death for the murder of Police Officer Mark MacPhail in Georgia. The case against him consisted entirely of witness testimony which contained inconsistencies even during the trial. Since then, all but two of the state's nine non-police witnesses from the trial have recanted or contradicted their testimony.

Tags: death penalty

Death Penalty Too "Expensive," Fiscally and Morally, for California?

Mon, 29 Sep 2008 13:51:28 GMT

clipped by: nedhamson1

Clip Source: www.ipsnews.net

BOSTON, Jul 30 (IPS) - A high-level California commission has sounded the death knell for the state's "dysfunctional" death penalty system, calling for an infusion of hundreds of millions of dollars or the closing down of the state's death chamber.

"The time has come to address death penalty reform in a frank and honest way," the commission said in its 145-page report at the end of a four-year-long study.

Tags: death penalty, california, human rights

Death Penalty Protest in New Hampshire

Mon, 29 Sep 2008 13:44:48 GMT

clipped by: nedhamson1

Clip Source: www.nashuatelegraph.com

Staff photo by Karen Lovett

Members of The New Hampshire Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty stand in front of the Statehouse Friday during a “silent vigil.” The Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson, New Hampshire’s Episcopal bishop, second from right, participated in the demonstration.

Tags: death penalty, humane, human rights