by Joseph C. Hinson
Sunday June 10, 2001

I have to say that Tim McVeigh as the poster child for the anti-death penalty forces is not as easy thing to stomach. McVeigh is a vile, loathsome creature who murdered in cold blood 168 people for his own beliefs, such as they were. He then gloated about it and showed no remorse for it in several phone interviews as well as a recently published book. If ever there was someone who should be put to death for their crimes, McVeigh would certainly fit the bill.

But, alas, as the title of this rant says, Timothy McVeigh should not be put to death for his crimes. No one, in fact, should presume such authority as to dictate when another person should die.

The McVeigh execution has certainly been front and center lately. Some people want to broadcast it live over the net. I say broadcast it over network television. Sell ads to sponsors. Have another Britney Spears/Aerosmith type Super Bowl half time show. Get the host of "Survivor" to emcee the event. Hell, get Richard Hatch to be honorary host. Interview the key people in the case. Show all the footage you can from the aftermath of the bombing to stir up the anger and sadness.

And then interview the people who have been found innocent of the crime they were to die for, some just hours before there execution was to take place. Might throw a damper on the festive spirit of the occasion, eh? And then interview the family of those who have been put to death. See the hurt they feel knowing that their loved one, no matter what they did, was taken away from them too soon.

A word must be said about the family and friends of the victims. No one can imagine the hell that they have gone through. None of us should want to know. But the death of the guilty party (whether it be Timothy McVeigh or anyone else) will make the pain go away. At the same time, I feel that their feelings should not be taken into account when sentencing a person to death. That may be an unpopular opinion, but it is one I stand by.

Of course, one of the things I was going to say in this rant was this: One of the things wrong with the judicial system in this country is that emotions get involved in cases where emotion should be the last thing considered. People are up in arms about McVeigh. And they should be. But there should also be a stopping point. This case, at it's rawest, is nothing more than another capital punishment case. As harsh as that may sound, it should be the truth.

Likewise the deaths of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman should have been just another murder case. But that's not how things are in this country sadly. Instead, we get O.J. Simpson lurking at golf courses around the country and we get the three ring circus that is the McVeigh execution.

But back to the death penalty. Here are some facts:

• It has been abolished de jure or de facto by 106 nations; 30 countries have abolished it since 1990.
• China, the Democratic Republic of Congo, the United States and Iran are the most prolific executioners in the world. Indeed, the US is one of six countries (including also Iran, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Yemen) which executes people who were under 18 years old at the time they committed their crimes.
• Between 1973 and 1993, at least 48 people on death row were released  after they were found to be innocent, according to a Congressional subcommittee on civil and constitutional rights.
• A black man who kills a white person is 11 times more likely to receive the death penalty than a white man who kills a black person.
• Eighty-five percent or 17 out of 20 of those on federal death row are people of color. In 548 of 684 of the cases submitted to the Attorney General as a possible federal death penalty case, the defendant was not white.
• There are currently more than 3,500 people on death row -- more than at any time in U.S. history.
• Since 1976, more than 580 people have been executed in the United States. Over 50% of those have been killed since 1992.
• More than three-quarters of all executions since 1976 took place in Southern states. The reality is that lynching still exists -- it's just legal now.
• When governor of Texas, George W. Bush personally signed death warrants for more than  one hundred executions.
• President Clinton's 1994 crime bill added 58 more crimes that are punishable by death. And his "Anti-Terrorism" bill limits the number of federal appeals for death row prisoners to just one within one year of conviction.
• In 1996 Clinton cut federal funding to 20 legal resource centers which provided counsel to poor defendants. Now, all of the centers that received this funding have shut down.
• Over 90 percent of defendants charged with capital crimes are indigent and cannot afford to hire an experienced criminal defense attorney to represent them. They are forced to use inexperienced, underpaid court-appointed attorneys.
• Many capital trials last less than a week -- hardly enough time to present a good defense.
• The book, In Spite of Innocence, notes that between 1900 and 1992 there were 416 documented cases of innocent persons who have been convicted and given a death sentence. The authors discovered that in 23 of these cases, the person was executed.

How many innocent men and women have been put to death in America by capital punishment? How many is too many? One? Ten? Twenty? Fifty?

to my next rant (when posted)
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Much of the information from this site was gleamed from:
http://www.derechos.org/dp/v
http://www.theelectricchair.com/stats.htm
http://www.aclu.org/death-penalty/