Hire a Lawyer, Avoid the Death Penalty
Published November 10, 2009 @ 03:56PM PT
If you hire a lawyer, the chances are you won't be sentenced to death in Houston.
University of Denver Criminologist Scott Phillips reviewed 504 capital indictments over three decades in Harris County, Texas, and found that defendants who hired lawyers for the entire trial were never sentenced to death -- and were more likely to be acquitted.
The results of his study, published over the summer in the Journal of Criminal Law & Criminology, are truly stunning. Since nearly all defendants facing the death penalty in Harris County were poor, Phillips argues that his results further demonstrate the arbitrariness of capital punishment. If a defendant's family and community is able to pool resources to hire an attorney, the paid attorney might be better equipped to investigate a case or to bring bargaining power to the table against a district attorney.
He makes clear that his findings aren't an indictment of appointed attorneys, but of the system that straddles those attorneys with thin resources in a death penalty case. Something clearly went wrong for results this drastic.
Phillips also came up with some significant findings on race and capital punishment, which he published in the American Constitution Society's journal, Advance.
Phillips found that the race of a defendant played a significant role in whether he or she was charged with death. This is no surprise to people following capital punishment issues, of course, but Phillips makes some interesting recommendations for prosecutors' offices to avoid this disparity. He praises the Harris DA's office for eliminating the race of a defendant from the memo used to determine whether to seek the death penalty. Other markers, however, still indicate race and play a role in the decision, he says.
Phillips suggests that prosecutors' offices go further than just removing race -- they need to "be vigilant" and remove victim informaiton, neighborhoods, school names and other possible identifiers. This is a commendable -- but unrealistic -- idea.
Phillips' research is important, but I believe it further proves that the death penalty is cruel and unusual. I don't think it's possible to remove the arbitrariness of race, socioeconomic background or myriad other factors that lead the most vulnerable to our death row. Abolishing capital punishment is the only way to address the inherent injustice in the system.
Via ACSblog and Dallas Morning News Crime Blog.
Photo via bmxchuck
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Comments (13)
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Matt has worked and volunteered in various capacities in criminal justice reform for several years. When he's not blogging, he works as the Online Communications Manager at the Innocence Project. Views expressed here are Matt's, and don't represent the positions of the Innocence Project.
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I like the fact that they remove the defendant's race. Now, if we could only get our Government to follow suit, when they address the poverty in this country.
Posted by L.S. hope on 11/10/2009 @ 11:18PM PT
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Removing the race of the defendant is one thing but to remove identifiers from the victim is absurd and wrong. Are we to dehumanize the victim even more by making them a simple statistic..."John Doe was stabbed to death somewhere in Houston, sometime yesterday"? Far from commendable it would be deplorable. To remove the details of the victim and scene of the crime would make any thoughtful determination for prosecution impossible.
It sounds to me like Mr. Phillips study tends to prove that innocent people hire lawyers and get aquitted while the guilty do not.
Posted by James Thompson on 11/15/2009 @ 10:16AM PT
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One of the worst things about the criminal justice system in the U.S. is that people get (or don't get) the best legal representation that money can buy. Too many people are dead, or serving "life without", merely because they were poor. This makes "Equal Justice Under Law" completely meaningless.
Posted by Pastor Tim Redfern on 11/16/2009 @ 10:16AM PT
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Nice idea man.
John Buchanan - an experienced Canadian Criminal lawyer, practicing in criminal law for over 25 years, We based in Vancouver, BC, Canada.
for more visit:
www.johnbuchananlaw.com
Posted by Criminal Lawyer Vancouver on 11/12/2009 @ 04:43AM PT
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...Phillips found that the race of a defendant played a significant role in whether he or she was charged with death. This is no surprise to people following capital punishment issues, of course...
African Americans make up:
* 48% of those charged with homicide.
* 41% of the death row population.
* 34% of those actually executed since 1976.
Tell me again that the death penalty is biased against African Americans?
Posted by Kevin Burns on 11/15/2009 @ 07:51AM PT
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In a pamphlet entitled The Death Penalty: Cruel & Inhuman Punishment, Amnesty International USA reports that "the United States is the only western industrial nation which still practices capital punishment."
Moreover, the death penalty does not deter violent crime:
"Most people who murder do not see beyond their action; they kill quickly in moments of great fear or emotional stress and under the influence of drugs or alcohol. When the crime is premeditated, the individual rarely believes he or she will be apprehended or executed…in 1976, the United States Supreme Court found no conclusive evidence that the death penalty deters violent crime. The United Nations came to similar conclusions."
According to Amnesty International USA, capital punishment tends to discriminate against minorities and the poor. In the United States since 1972, over 65 percent of the people on death row have been unskilled, service, or domestic workers, while 60 percent were unemployed at the time of their crimes.
"In the United States," reports Amnesty International USA, "blacks and other minorities face a much greater likelihood of execution than whites similarly charged...The victim’s race still factors heavily in determining the offender’s punishment. In Texas, blacks who kill whites are six times more likely to receive the death sentence than those with black victims. In Florida, black offenders who murder whites are forty times more likely than whites who kill blacks to end up on death row."
Responding to the concept of "an eye for an eye," Amnesty International USA asks, "If capital punishment is appropriate because it takes a life for a life, why doesn’t the government also burn the arsonist’s home and rape the rapist? Because justice does not mean punishment that imitates the crime." Amnesty International USA states further that the death penalty costs more than life imprisonment.
United States Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall once observed: "The death penalty is no more effective a deterrent than life imprisonment… While police and law enforcement officials are the strongest advocates of capital punishment, the evidence is overwhelming that police are no safer in communities that retain the sanction than in those that have abolished it. It also is evident that the burden of capital punishment falls upon the poor, the ignorant, and the underprivileged members of society."
United States Supreme Court Justice William Brennan once argued against capital punishment, saying, "The calculated killing of a human being involves, by its very nature, an absolute denial of the executed person's humanity."
Justice Brennan claimed the 8th Amendment bans "cruel and unusual punishment." Yet the 5th Amendment refers to "capital or otherwise infamous crime" and says no person "shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law."
This clearly implies that persons can be deprived of their right to life, but only under due process of law. Capital punishment, therefore, is constitutional, and, ultimately, the only way death penalty opponents can correct this apparent injustice is through a Constitutional Amendment.
Attacking capital punishment, the early church father Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, wrote: "Christians are not allowed to kill, it is not permitted for the guiltless to put even the guilty to death."
Religious leaders throughout the world have taken a stand against capital punishment. Leading Jewish organizations, Protestant denominations, and the United States Catholic Bishops Conference all oppose the death penalty.
Posted by Vasu Murti on 11/15/2009 @ 12:56PM PT
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The concept of circumstances that make use of violence acceptable is taught.
From "Behind Closed Doors: Violence Against the American Family" by Dr. Murray Straus, page 74:
"Researchers who have studied child abuse continue to find that children who were abused often grow up to be abusing parents (Bakan, 1971; Kempe, et. al., 1962; Gil, 1970; Steele and Pollock, 1974). Research on murderers finds that killers experienced more frequent and severe violence as children than their brothers who did not go on to commit a homicide (Palmer, 1962; Gillen, 1946). Examinations of presidential assassins or would-be assassins also find these individuals share common histories of violent upbringing. In his diary, Arthur Bremer, Governor George Wallace's would-be assassin, wrote, "My mother must have thought I was a canoe, she paddled me so much." Lee Harvey Oswald, Sirhan Sirhan, and Charles Manson all experienced violent childhoods (Button, 1973).
"A study of violent inmates in San Quentin prison found that 100 per cent of them experienced extreme violence between the ages of one and ten (Maurer, 1976). Psychologist Ralph Welsh (1976) claims that he has never examined or talked with a violent juvenile delinquent who did not come from an extremely violent background. Moreover, Welsh claims that even if the extreme violence ceases before the child is four years old, the child is still likely to exhibit violent tendencies as a juvenile.
"Violence in the streets, violence in the schools, assassinations, murders, assaults, wife abuse, child abuse - are they caused by violence on television, violence in the movies, permissive upbringings? These probably contribute something. But the evidence appears to support the notion that our homes and how we raise our children are the main sources of our violent society."
If you want to stop the death penalty and the crimes that would warrant it, start by stopping the root of the problem: Ban assault upon all members of society, not just the ones who are over 18.
CAPTA would be a good place to start. It sets the standard for what the 50 states' child abuse definitions must say. It serves as a minimum set of child law requirements. If we can correct the definition of child abuse in CAPTA to outlaw assault against children we can then argue that the 20 states that still allow child beatings with wooden boards on school grounds must stop; and the parents who use violence against children at home must learn about effective forms of discipline that teach without retaliation.
In other words, we can address the problem of capital punishment from both sides by stopping child assault: we can change society's view of use of capital/corporal punishment, and we can reduce the violent upbringing kids still legally receive in this country that grooms them to lash out in ways currently answered by corporal and then capital punishment.
Posted by Christine Clarke on 11/16/2009 @ 06:58AM PT
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It is interesting that the Fifth Commandment says 'Thou shalt not kill', but we do it anyway to get even with those who murder. We do this even though it is not a deterrent to most murderers and even though we do kill innocent people from time to time!!!
Sadly it is a 'feel good' thing for society as a whole
Posted by Phil Crabill on 11/15/2009 @ 02:40PM PT
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Death penalty is a shame, an open wound in our consciousness as civilized Humans.
Those fellow humans, who were unfortunate enough to commit the horrible crimes, for which they are sentenced to death, need help and direction: they are lost.
They should be isolated, banned from the societies (for a time, decided by the judicial authorities in all wisdom, neutrality and knowledge of the facts and of the human psyche), so that they could ponder on themselves, about their transgressions/crimes, understand all the magnitude of their problem/distortion of psyche and make honest amend.
They should also have the opportunity to provide for themselves through their own work.
They should be treated with all human dignity and given the chance to re-gain their place within the society, through their honest change, hard work and good will, when they have served their terms.
Regards.
Posted by Adam Izak-Sunna on 11/15/2009 @ 10:32PM PT
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To stop capital punishment our country has to outlaw legalized child assault, otherwise known as corporal punishment. Violence in childhood grooms people for violence in adulthood, and the idea of justified use of violence as a means of retaliation is a concept taught by parents who hit their children.
100 percent of studied inmates in San Quentin who were found guilty of violent crimes had violent upbringings. The idea of using violence as a reaction to displeasure starts early in a person's development.
If we can end those lessons for kids, and follow up with social health education in schools about how to manage anger, find healthy releases for stress and calm conflict, we can drastically reduce the incidence of crimes that might call the death penalty into question -- while at the same time changing people's views about the death penalty's use at all.
Posted by Christine Clarke on 11/16/2009 @ 07:02AM PT
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tried to reply to kevin's post but couldn't. african-americans make up 13.5% of the u.s. population as of 2007.
also, i think trying to eliminate as much identifying info as possible is worth the effort, even if it doesn't entirely work. abolishing the death penalty would be ideal, but people would still be serving life sentences based on prejudices.
Posted by Catherine Turley on 11/16/2009 @ 11:38PM PT
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Abolish the death penalty as all other civilised democracies have!
It is shameful that it should still exist in a country like the U.S. where there is a large Christian population.
Posted by alison Coulavin on 11/17/2009 @ 01:21AM PT
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Its all about chasing shadows.
By that I mean latching on to this or that latest, most innovative idea that some self styled money making guru has put out in the hope it'll go viral and make them a lot of money off the backs of all the headless chickens who will follow them blindly down a blind alley. Its a shame but a truism nonetheless that people will follow where someone they see as an expert leads. Even if they lead them to certain disaster, which is what most of the gurus tend to do to their flocks.
The trick is to recognize a shadow when you see it!
www.onlineuniversalwork.com
Posted by david baer on 12/14/2009 @ 02:00AM PT
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