DP Awareness Week: Innocence and the DP

DEATH PENALTY AWARENESS WEEK
February 27 to March 3

To view events happening across the country and how you can
get involved, go to our website at http://www.nodeathpenalty.org

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FIVE REASONS TO OPPOSE THE DEATH PENALTY

One of the Campaign's earliest brochures highlights five reasons to oppose
the death penalty--it's racist, it targets the poor, it kills the innocent,
it is not a deterrent, and it's cruel and unusual punishment.
During this national week of action, our CEDP list serve will highlight
one reason for each day--and highlight an event held by one of the CEDP
chapters.

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INNOCENCE AND THE DEATH PENALTY

Last week, John Robert Ballard was freed from Florida's death row bringing
the total number exonerated and released from death row to 123 people since
1976 when the death penalty was re-instated. Ballard, who always maintained
his innocence, spent three years on death row for a crime he did not
commit..
The Florida Supreme Court concluded that the evidence against Ballard was so
weak that the trial judge should have dismissed the case immediately.

Despite the growing numbers of wrongful convictions, the highest court in
the United States continues to maintain that "actual innocence" doesn't
matter. In 1993, the Supreme Court ruled that Texas death row prisoner
Leonel Herrera had no constitutional right to federal relief based on newly
discovered evidence of actual innocence. Herrera was executed and the
Supreme Court decision became the law of the land.

According to Supreme Court Justice, Antonin Scalia, the execution of
innocents should simply be expected:

"Do I think the death penalty is immoral because it will ­ I have to say it
­ it will inevitably lead at some point to the condemnation of someone who
is innocent? Well, of course it willŠ.It¹s one of the risks of living in an
organized society."

Thankfully, this callous indifference reflected by Scalia and others who
hold positions of power in our criminal justice system, is not shared by
ordinary people.

According to the Death Penalty Information Center, opinion polls have shown
a very high awareness of the mistakes that have been made in capital cases
and a strong support for reform.

-- Over 90% of the public believes that innocent people have been sentenced
to death in recent years.

-- Over 70% in a recent Gallup Poll thought that innocent people have
already been executed -- most likely in Texas.

-- Over 90% support allowing those in prison to have access to DNA testing
in order to demonstrate their innocence.

All together, prisoners who have been freed spent a total of over 1000 years
on death row. Their stories put a human face on the death penalty.

Last fall, the Campaign to End the Death Penalty organized a national
speaking tour called, "Voices from Death Row." Here is an excerpt from a
speech given by exonerated Illinois death row prisoner Darby Tillis at
University of California - Berkeley:

"I'm angry that eighteen years later [after he was released from death row],
they are still doing this mess. I was on death row for nine years, one
month, and 17 days for a crime that I did not commit. I had three hung
juries, more than any person in judicial United States history. They tried
to build a case around me. The judge who presided over my trial is now
serving fifteen years in prison for taking bribes.

³The death penalty is all about hate and revenge. The death penalty business
is for politicians to build careers. I feel like a political prisoner. I was
kidnapped, used, and abused to send a message to blacks: ŒIf you come up
here and mess with these white folks, you¹re going to jail. We are going to
kill you.¹

"When you're on death row, each day you begin to die. You smell death, you
feel death, you become familiar with death. You¹re tormented by guards. I¹ve
been released from death row. Nine years of loneliness, nine years of anger
pent up, nine years of restricted movement, nine years of living hell. A
study showed that death row prisoners suffer post-traumatic stress like
Vietnam veterans...Death row is alive and raging in me right now."

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Highlighted event of the day....in New York City

"Artists Against the Death Penalty" hosted by the Campaign to End The Death
Penalty, Critical Resistance, Amnesty International, and The Welfare Poets

An exhibition showcasing the works of Texas death row activist & prisoner
Tony Egbuna Ford, other prison inmates across the country and area artists.

Wednesday, March 1
Exhibit opens 3 pm, artist reception 7-10 pm.
The Brecht Forum, 451 West Street, NY, NY, 212-242-4201
(West Side Hwy between Bank and Bethune Streets, south of 11th street, close
to A, C, E, 1, 2, and 3 trains)

Tony Ford is a prisoner on death row in Livingston, Texas, serving time for
a crime he did not commit. For the last 15 years, he has maintained his
innocence of the murder charges against him. Tony's execution date on
December 7, 2005, was stayed for 90 days for DNA testing that can establish
his innocence once and for all. For more on Tony's case, visit
http://www.tonyford.org

Welcoming remarks by former death row prisoners and a performance by The
Welfare Poets.

For more information, contact:
nyc [at] nodeathpenalty.org
the welfarepoets [at] juno.com
artfortonyford [at] yahoo.com.

For a complete listing of Death Penalty Awareness Week events, go to
http://www.nodeathpenalty.org/events.html

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