Post by Admin on May 21, 2007 4:58:02 GMT -5
sentencing.typepad.com/sentencing_law_and_policy/2007/05/killers_willing.html
Killers willing to be executed, raise your hand...
This coming week, Robert Comer is scheduled for execution in Arizona and Christopher Newton is scheduled for execution Ohio. Both are "volunteers": they have given up their appeals and thus it is likely that their executions will go forward.
I find the reality of, and reactions to, death row "volunteers" quite intriguing, and Amnesty International now has this new report on this underexamined aspect of the modern death penalty. Here are some highlights:
About one in 10 of the men and women put to death in the USA since judicial killing resumed there in 1977 had given up their appeals. Outside of the five main executing states of Texas, Virginia, Oklahoma, Missouri and Florida, this figure rises to one in five for the remaining 28 jurisdictions that have executed since 1977. Four of the first five executions in the USA after 1977 were of "volunteers"....
Fourteen US states, and the federal government, resumed executions after 1977 with the killing of a prisoner who had waived his appeals. Five of the states which have resumed executions, Connecticut, Idaho, New Mexico, Oregon and Pennsylvania, have yet to execute a "non-volunteer". In other words, if the eight inmates who have been put to death there had not given up their appeals, these five states would likely not yet have resumed executions. Twenty of the 27 executions so far carried out in Kentucky, Montana, Nevada, Utah and Washington have been of prisoners who waived their appeals (see table at end of report).
Race and mental health appear to be the strongest predictors of who will waive their appeals – most "volunteers" are white males (as are the five prisoners featured in the second half of this report), and many have a history of mental disorders. Nevertheless, a review of such cases suggests that any number of factors may contribute to a prisoner’s decision not to pursue appeals against their death sentence, including mental disorder, physical illness, remorse, bravado, religious belief, a quest for notoriety, the severity of conditions of confinement, including prolonged isolation and lack of physical contact visits, the bleak alternative of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole, pessimism about appeal prospects, or being worn down by the cycle of hope and despair generated by winning and then losing appeals.
Killers willing to be executed, raise your hand...
This coming week, Robert Comer is scheduled for execution in Arizona and Christopher Newton is scheduled for execution Ohio. Both are "volunteers": they have given up their appeals and thus it is likely that their executions will go forward.
I find the reality of, and reactions to, death row "volunteers" quite intriguing, and Amnesty International now has this new report on this underexamined aspect of the modern death penalty. Here are some highlights:
About one in 10 of the men and women put to death in the USA since judicial killing resumed there in 1977 had given up their appeals. Outside of the five main executing states of Texas, Virginia, Oklahoma, Missouri and Florida, this figure rises to one in five for the remaining 28 jurisdictions that have executed since 1977. Four of the first five executions in the USA after 1977 were of "volunteers"....
Fourteen US states, and the federal government, resumed executions after 1977 with the killing of a prisoner who had waived his appeals. Five of the states which have resumed executions, Connecticut, Idaho, New Mexico, Oregon and Pennsylvania, have yet to execute a "non-volunteer". In other words, if the eight inmates who have been put to death there had not given up their appeals, these five states would likely not yet have resumed executions. Twenty of the 27 executions so far carried out in Kentucky, Montana, Nevada, Utah and Washington have been of prisoners who waived their appeals (see table at end of report).
Race and mental health appear to be the strongest predictors of who will waive their appeals – most "volunteers" are white males (as are the five prisoners featured in the second half of this report), and many have a history of mental disorders. Nevertheless, a review of such cases suggests that any number of factors may contribute to a prisoner’s decision not to pursue appeals against their death sentence, including mental disorder, physical illness, remorse, bravado, religious belief, a quest for notoriety, the severity of conditions of confinement, including prolonged isolation and lack of physical contact visits, the bleak alternative of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole, pessimism about appeal prospects, or being worn down by the cycle of hope and despair generated by winning and then losing appeals.