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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Ish who wrote (85796)	11/12/2004 4:24:10 PM
From: Bill	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 793888

Lethal injection. They'll get around to Scotty in about 20 years.

To: Ish who wrote (85796)	11/12/2004 5:07:16 PM
From: Original Mad Dog	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 793888

California has the death penalty but doesn't actually execute people. Currently (as of July 2004) California has 635 people on death row. This is more than the entire country had as recently as 1980. deathpenaltyinfo.org Nationwide, 58 people have been executed this year; none were in California. deathpenaltyinfo.org None of the 65 executions nationwide in 2003 were in California. In fact, California has executed only ten people since 1976, a tiny fraction of the 635 people on "death" row. deathpenaltyinfo.org In California, the voters approved a death penalty law in 1978. Despite this, no one was executed until 1992. As for the method: Method of Execution: California authorizes lethal injection and lethal gas. Lethal Injection will be used if the inmate fails to choose a method. When lethal gas was challenged in Fierro v. Gomez, 77 F. 3d 301 (1996), the Ninth Circuit held this method of execution unconstitutional. Subsequently, the U.S. Supreme Court remanded the case for reconsideration in light of California changing its statute to provide that lethal injection be administered unless the inmate requests lethal gas. The Ninth Circuit, on remand, held that since Fierro had not chosen lethal gas, his claim was moot. However, the court held left open the reinstatement of the issue for an inmate actually facing the gas chamber. deathpenaltyinfo.org Why is this happening? Initially it was judicial intransigence: California Chief Justice Rose Bird and two of her liberal colleagues overturned 64 death sentences while allowing four death sentences to stand (although those prisoners were not executed either). The voters, who had passed the DP to begin with, responded by voting Bird and her colleagues out of office in the mid-1980's. The federal courts have stepped into the void left by Bird, overturning death sentences in the majority of California cases they hear, often for incompetent representation: deathpenaltyinfo.org Based on the statistics so far in California, if you are sentenced to death you have less than a two percent chance of actually being executed. In 2001, the only prisoner executed in California had dropped his appeals. Peterson's trial, from what little I have heard, leaves open many areas for attack on appeal (I didn't watch it so I don't have an opinion one way or the other). I don't think he need fear for his life anytime soon.