Can there be a compromise on the death penalty?

irishrose

On Tuesday evening, I had meant to post with regard to the SCOTUS’s last minute stay of execution in Berry v. Epps, pending decision on Berry’s petition for writ of certiorari. This decision essentially places a moratorium on executions until the SCOTUS decides the Baze v. Reese case which argues that the specific method of lethal injection during executions, particularly the types and combination of drugs administered, constitutes suffering that amounts to cruel and unusual punishment.

Now, around the time I learned of Berry’s stay of execution, a police officer was shot responding to an execution-style shooting that took place not two blocks from Philadelphia’s City Hall (otherwise known as the nice part of town). By the time I had a chance to raise the news of Berry’s stay of execution in my office on Wednesday afternoon, another officer had been shot in the head responding to a burglary. And these two officers were shot not a day after the city’s last cop killer pled guilty.

When I mentioned SCOTUS’s order, I’m sure topmost in everyone’s mind were the two officers that had just been shot, one of whom was thought wouldn’t make it through the night. The response from the judge, though, was actually stunning to me. He said, “I give full-throated support to vastly decreasing death penalty cases. But I wonder if there aren’t some cases that warrant the pursuit of the death penalty.” My first reaction was that he is just too emotionally involved in these recent shootings. We interact with Philadelphia police, as witnesses, on a daily basis; we know some of these officers very well. The judge’s response was just a case of the old argument: the parents of a murder victim should never sit the defendant’s jury.

However, this judge, as a practicing attorney, spent most of his time working on appeals, PCRAs and certioraris for death row inmates and life termers. This is not simply a case of personalizing the lives of the victim, at least not to the exclusion of the lives of the defendants. This is a person who, as far as I’ve always assumed, was against the death penalty, and has spent countless hours trying to overturn death penalty convictions for defendants.

Which made me wonder, is there a compromise to be found, from either side, with regard to the death penalty? Or are the reasons for and/or against tied-up in arguments that require an all or nothing approach?

Frank 013 · Posted: Mon Dec 03, 2007 7:41 pm Post subject:


	FORUMS	ABOUT	BOOKS	VIDEOS	TRANSCRIPTS	LINKS	BLOGS	DONATE	CONTACT