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To: Bill who wrote (4024)	3/21/2002 2:51:21 PM
From: J. C. Dithers	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 21057

Some posters here use SI as a bulletin board, posting everything a Google search turns up on a subject like the death penalty. They don't care whether these cases of "innocent people executed" are true or not. They just want to bury the discussion under an avalanche of unsupported claims and bogus statistics. This carpet bombing tactic is the cyberspace equivalent of shouting people down in an intelligent discussion. If you respond to them, you only get more of the same junk in return. It's not worth it. Sometimes you can spot a familiar case in the pile, such as the Roger Coleman one or the Tafero case. Then you can quickly expose how ridiculous these claims of "proven innocence" are. What you have really proved, though, is what a waste of time effort it would be to pick through the growing junk pile of false and misleading so-called examples. You are totally correct that (1) there has not been a single credible, documented case of an innocent person being executed in the last half-century, and (2) the only valid examples are those where the system has worked as intended in squeezing out any mistakes in the lower courts. JC Edit: Before long, the tally of "innocent people executed" will be well in the thousands!

To: Bill who wrote (4024)	3/21/2002 4:12:32 PM
From: Solon	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 21057

"The cases Solon's anti-death-penalty site cite are those where the capital punishment appeals process works to virtually guarantee no innocent person gets executed." I am not surprised you did not read the link, but instead commented on the link and accused it of stating the exact opposite of what it actually said! Your silliness is becoming predictable and boring. If you are not interested in the issue and in honestly trying to learn anything about it, then why on earth do you waste your time throwing out flippant and erroneous statements on links you have not read, or on cases with which you have no familiarity? I wonder what the dog mauling verdict will be... "But there is another sense in which these cases illustrate the inadequacies of the system. These men were found innocent despite the system and only as a result of extraordinary efforts not generally available to death row defendants. Indeed, in some cases, these men were found innocent as a result of sheer luck. In the case of Walter McMillian, his volunteer outside counsel had obtained from the prosecutors an audio tape of one of the key witnesses' statements incriminating Mr. McMillian. After listening to the statement, the attorney flipped the tape over to see if anything was on the other side. It was only then that he heard the same witness complaining that he was being pressured to frame Mr. McMillian. [17] With that fortuitous break, the whole case against Johnny D. began to fall apart. Similarly, proving the innocence of Kirk Bloodsworth was more a matter of chance than the orderly working of the appeals' process. Only a scientific breakthrough, and an appellate lawyer's initiative in trying it, after years of failed appeals, allowed Bloodsworth to prove his innocence. And even then, the prosecutor was not bound under Maryland law to admit this new evidence. [18] Furthermore, not every death row inmate is afforded, after conviction, the quality of counsel and resources which Walter McMillian and Federico Macias were fortunate to have during their post-conviction proceedings. Many of those on death row go for years without any attorney at all. Most of the releases from death row over the past twenty yhears came only after many years and many failed appeals. The average length of time between conviction and release was almost 7 years for the 48 death row inmates released since 1970. Innocence Is Not Generally Reviewed Too often, the reviews afforded death row inmates on appeal and habeas corpus simply do not offer a meaningful opportunity to present claims of innocence. As will be discussed more fully below, in many states there simply is no formal procedure for hearing new evidence of a defendant's innocence prior to his execution. After trial, the legal system becomes locked in a battle over procedural issues rather than a reexamination of guilt or innocence. search for truth. The all-night struggle to stay the execution of Leonel Herrera in 1992, even after the U.S. Supreme Court had agreed to hear his constitutional challenge, is an example of how much pressure is exerted to proceed with executions. [19] Accounts which report that a particular case has been appealed numerous times before many judges may be misleading. In fact, most often, procedural issues, rather than the defendant's innocence are being argued and reviewed in these appeals. For example, when Roger Keith Coleman was executed in Virginia last year, it was reported that his last appeal to the Supreme Court "was Coleman's 16th round in court." [20] However, the Supreme Court had earlier declared that Coleman's constitutional claims were barred from any review in federal court because his prior attorneys had filed an appeal too late in 1986. [21] His evidence was similarly excluded from review in state court as well. Instead, Coleman's innocence was debated only in the news media and considerable doubt concerning his guilt went with him to his execution." [22]