Amnesty4Humans

The Death Penalty in the USA

Amnesty campaigns tirelessly for the abolition of the Death Penalty, which denies those most basic of Human Rights : the right to life, and not to be tortured or suffer degrading treatment. But in the US, alone among the democratic countries of the free West, several states continue to apply the Death Penalty, and it is increasingly apparent that an unacceptable degree of racial discrimination is at work here.

This issue hit the international headlines in September 2011, when Death Row veteran Troy Davis, who had for over twenty years protested his innocence, was executed by lethal injection, despite a million petitioners world-wide urging clemency from the Georgia authorities.

Many studies have shown that the US Death Penalty discriminates against black people. Black defendants are less likely to be well represented by competent lawyers, evidence is sometimes mislaid, and so on. While blacks and whites are murdered in roughly equal numbers, the killers of white people are six times more likely to be executed, with 77% being put to death for killing a white, but only 15% for killing blacks (http://www.amnestyusa.org/our-work/issues/death-penalty/us-death-penalty-facts/death-penalty-and-race).

The most recent case Amnesty has campaigned for was that of Linda Carty, a UK citizen by virtue of her birth in St Kitts. She was accused of murder in Texas – and defended by a lawyer who had already seen twenty of his clients doomed to Death Row. Her trial was seriously flawed, and she still faces execution despite this inadequate legal representation. There are now many campaigns for her reprieve, led strongly by Amnesty International.

This is just one case among many that AI urges you to support. Later this year the Zurich Amnesty group hopes to stage an anti-Death Penalty Action.We’ll let you know. Meanwhile there are petitions on the Amnesty website that would welcome your response (http://takeaction.amnestyusa.org/siteapps/advocacy/ActionItem.aspx?c=6oJCLQPAJiJUG&b=6645049&aid=14230)

The Death Penalty has no place in any civilised society. The contribution of your signature will make a real difference.

Janice Davis, Vilters.