I follow the death row stuff in Texas with a bit of distance, but the finality of this inmate's quote got me thinking again about the DP and how it works versus what people THINK it does (deter crime):
"Nobody cares," he said bitterly. "It doesn't matter. Death is the best chance to get out of this place."
Watts said he'd be expecting an execution date, which would be a "real low blow."
"I don't put my trust in no judge," he said. "They make mistakes, just like we do. ... I don't believe the state of Texas has the right to murder anyone."
The other interesting one, albeit from a person weary of it all, is:
"They're all crooks," he said. "If you show me one honest one, I'll show you 10 that ain't. it's all a buddy system. And when you get hung up in it, there's not much you can do. They're hoping I'll keep my mouth shut and die, but since I'm about dead anyway, I won't shut up."
And herein is the story about something I think we all get hung up in:
Supreme Court ruling puts Texas inmates closer to execution
By MICHAEL GRACZYK Associated Press Writer
© 2008 The Associated Press
LIVINGSTON, Texas — The question for some condemned Texas inmates lately has not been if they would face execution, but how.
The U.S. Supreme Court's ruling that lethal injection is not unconstitutionally cruel answered the question of how, and it also brought execution dates considerably closer for prisoners in the nation's busiest capital punishment state.
"It's going to be real crazy," Kevin Watts, sentenced to die for the slayings of three people during a robbery at a San Antonio restaurant five years ago, said from a small visiting cage at the prison unit where the state's 360 condemned men are housed.
Watts, 26, is among dozens of inmates whose appeals have been exhausted since Sept. 25. That's when the high court decided to take up a challenge from Kentucky prisoners who contended the lethal injection procedure used in that state, similar to the one employed in Texas and other states, violated constitutional protections against cruel and unusual punishment.
The justices, in a 7-2 vote announced Wednesday, upheld the process, clearing the way for capital punishment to resume. In Texas, where 405 inmates have been put to death since 1982, that number could begin rising as early as a month from now.
Prisoners who had execution dates but whose punishments were stopped for additional reviews are eligible to die within 30 days. For inmates who will get their first dates, execution could be held in 90 days.
The Texas Attorney General's Office, which handles capital case appeals once they get into the federal courts, called the hiatus in executions since last fall "delayed justice for crime victims and their families." The office will "take the legal action necessary to bring closure to these victims," spokesman Jerry Strickland said.
"The way the courts are ruling, I lost all hope," said David Lewis, who was convicted of killing a Lufkin woman during a burglary 21 years ago.
Like Watts, Lewis in January had his case rejected by the Supreme Court, clearing the way for his likely death.
"Look at history," he said. "They'd just find something else. We all know it."
"I'm not concerned if they put a bullet between the eyes," added 70-year-old Jack Smith, the state's oldest condemned prisoner. "Dead is dead, no matter how you go about it."
Smith, on death row for some 31 years for a fatal shooting during a Houston robbery, said lethal injection would always provoke controversy and was merely the progression from other methods.
"You had the electric chair, hanging at the gallows, now this," he said. "They're always going to try to find another method."
Smith lost his appeal before the justices in February.
"I'll contest them any day of the week," said Smith, who maintains his innocence of the slaying where authorities said $90 was taken in the robbery. "The courts, the D.A., they can squash your case and sit on it hoping I'll die of old age."
That may not happen.
Harris County Assistant District Attorney Roe Wilson, who handles capital case appeals for the state's most active death penalty county, said Thursday that Smith is likely to among several Harris County inmates to get an execution date imminently.
One problem may be the volume of cases and coordinating them with the attorney general's office, she said.
"We're just going to have to get the dates and stagger them," she said.
Besides Smith, others are likely to include Derrick Sonnier, who was scheduled to die in February for the 1992 rape-slaying of an Humble woman. Sonnier won a reprieve because of the Kentucky case. Another is Jose Medellin, condemned for the rape-slayings of two Houston teenagers 15 years ago.
Medellin and Cesar Fierro were among seven Mexican-born inmates on Texas death row who last month lost their bids for appeal before the Supreme Court in a case where the justices said President Bush overstepped his authority trying to reopen their cases.
"If I die, this could be the best thing to happen to me," said Fierro, 51, convicted of the 1979 robbery-slaying of an El Paso taxi driver. He's been on death row more than 28 years but says he's innocent.
"Nobody cares," he said bitterly. "It doesn't matter. Death is the best chance to get out of this place."
Watts said he'd be expecting an execution date, which would be a "real low blow."
"I don't put my trust in no judge," he said. "They make mistakes, just like we do. ... I don't believe the state of Texas has the right to murder anyone."
Smith was equally critical of the justice system.
"They're all crooks," he said. "If you show me one honest one, I'll show you 10 that ain't. it's all a buddy system. And when you get hung up in it, there's not much you can do. They're hoping I'll keep my mouth shut and die, but since I'm about dead anyway, I won't shut up."
Smith, whose fellow inmates call him "Old Man," also said the ruling wasn't all bad news.
"I've been blessed in a way," he said, "I could have been out on the streets and been run over.
"I'm old. I'm ready."
No comments:
Post a Comment