Alabama Reaction to UN Report

Today's Birmingham News has the editorial, "Alabama on the world stage."

If the report were aimed at some backwater on the other side of the globe, perhaps our reaction would be different.

We'd read: "Government officials seem strikingly indifferent to the risk of executing innocent people." And, surely, we'd be at least a little outraged.

But this damning assessment isn't about some place across the world. It's about Alabama.

It's included in a report made Monday to the United Nations.

Philip Alston, a law professor who reports to the U.N. on such things as arbitrary executions, looked at two of America's death penalty leaders, Texas and Alabama, and found similar problems. But at least he found "significant recognition" in Texas that changes are needed.

Not so in Alabama. Alston found our government officials were maddeningly willing to ignore weaknesses in the justice system, even those that could end with the wrong person being put to death for a crime.

And:

Alston said both states should study the issues and institute reforms. Alabama, he said, can draw on the findings of a recent review by the American Bar Association of the state's death penalty practices.

More broadly, Alston argued that Congress, rather than trying to speed executions, should pass laws giving federal courts more leeway to hear death penalty appeals.

Amen on all counts. Alston, a professor at New York University School of Law, didn't tackle this report from a perspective of doing away with the death penalty. His report was designed to see how well the world's understanding about justice and due process is reflected in two of the nation's most active death chambers.

The picture isn't pretty. Alabama, which has the highest per-capita rate of executions, desperately needs to ensure that the ultimate punishment is imposed fairly and accurately.

But that's hard to do when our leaders either won't admit there's a problem or just don't care.

Earlier coverage of the UN report is here; the ABA's Alabama assessment, here and here.

Comments

[alexjglass]

Monday, July 7, 2008
Hello,
I don't know why things are so wrong in Alabama, maybe it's just a symptom of a much broader problem. I think that the designation of *Justice system* might be a misnomer and that some thought should be given to renaming it *Law system*. When medical doctors make an error, as difficult as it is for them to admit to it, they eventually have to own up to their actions. The law system should work in the same way. There is no human being who never makes mistakes and the law system makes mistakes, just as everyone else, and should be held accountable.

Based on all evidence, Patrick R. Swiney should never have been imprisoned, yet he has been incarcerated, in Alabama, for many years now, and nobody seems to have the heart, the power or the will to do anything about this. I have talked with a number of people about this case, and the reaction here in Canada is that it's impossible, they don't seem to think that it's possible that such a miscarriage of *justice* could occur in the U.S.A. Yet it did. The ones who worked to convict Patrick R. Swiney don't want to lose face, even with the evidence before their eyes, but the issue shouldn't be losing face, it should be true justice, no?

I don't know what to think about executions, because in many cases, a summary execution is almost preferable to being innocent and locked up, denied medically necessary medications, denied decent food, denied even the small human privilege to stash some peanut butter, denied silence, denied proper rest, being assaulted or subjected to violence, denied a decent living temperature indoors, etc. It should suffice that a human being be deprived of the freedom to come and go as one pleases, without adding all that goes on in carceral institutions and which don't contribute to making someone more fit to reintegrate society, but on the contrary, further damage the body, the will to live, and even the spirit.

Before becoming aware of the Patrick R. Swiney case, in 2000, and before reading the whole binder pertaining to evidence, relation of facts, I didn't know that things were so bad in Alabama, but what is wrong is more about the people who make the decisions than about things themselves. It's the people who need a radical reeducation in humility, in admitting their mistakes, in righting a wrong. I am sure that there are many other cases where the law erred and an innocent person was convicted, mostly due to poor defense, but also due to improper crime scene preservation, but since 2000, I have not wanted to disperse my energy and have signed many petitions in favour of Patrick R. Swiney, a former police officer with a stellar record and a good human being, also.

Not being a citizen of the U.S.A., I have limited influence on events, but at least I have one voice, and wanted to add it to the debate, at this time.

God bless us all and help us get closer to His True Justice. I continue to pray for the release of Patrick R. Swiney, who never had any business being incarcerated to begin with. A few select friends, capable of compassion, are praying with me, for this.

Alex J. Glass
Catholic Writer and French Editor
MontrEal, QuEbec, Canada