The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights

The Supreme Court has recently agreed to rule on three lower court decisions, in what may prove to be to be the biggest challenge to the nation's death penalty laws in 30 years. In two of the cases the court will reconsider its own earlier rulings.

The three cases that the Supreme Court has agreed to hear concern

• racist jury selection: The Dallas County District Attorney's office who prosecuted Miller-El, used preemptory strikes to remove 10 out of the 11 prospective African-American jurors. (During jury selection, an attorney may use their power of preemptory strike to remove prospective jurors). Mr. Miller-Els clemency petition contains testimony from four former Dallas County prosecutors who said that the office had a policy to exclude blacks from juries. )
• executing the mentally ill: Atkins v. Virginia is concerned with whether it is cruel and unusual punishment to apply the death penalty to mentally retarded individuals. The National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty notes, "Generally, people suffering from mental retardation are eager to please others. This means that they will often answer yes to questions even when they don't fully understand what they are being asked." Over the past thirty years the number of mentally incompetent people being executed has increased steadily.
• the right to a jury of one's peers: Arizona v. Ring is concerned with whether a judge (instead of a jury) can decide if a convicted killer deserves the death penalty. The question addresses the sixth Amendment right to a trial by a jury of one's peers. The court will review the sentencing of Timothy Ring, the defendant in the Arizona case, who was found guilty for the 1994 killing of an armored van driver in Phoenix.

In March 2000, Governor Ryan ordered a moratorium on executions after 13 death row inmates were found to have been wrongfully convicted by the state's justice system. These inmates were exonerated either by new scientific evidence (generally DNA evidence), or set free by the revelation of mistakes made during their trials proving their innocence. After imposing the moratorium, Ryan, a death penalty supporter, established a commission to examine the way that the death penalty is carried out in Illinois and to make recommendations for its improved administration.

The Ryan Commission's final report, released on April 15, 2002, includes 85 recommendations for reform in the areas of investigations, eligibility for the death penalty, prosecutorial discretion and trial practice. Most significantly, the report calls for the videotaping of all interrogations of capital suspects, reducing the number of crimes that create death eligibility, and requiring that the trial judge concur in any death recommendation made by a sentencing jury.

In May, 2002 Maryland became the second state in the nation to declare a moratorium on the death penalty when Gov. Parris Glendening (D) issued an order halting executions until a report analyzing the fairness of capital punishment in Maryland could be completed.

As part of the national response to the grave concerns highlighted by the large numbers of death row inmates that have been exonerated in recent years, Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Rep. William Delahunt (D-MA) have introduced in Congress the Innocence Protection Act of 2001 (S.486/H.R.912). This bill provides access to DNA testing for certain state and federal prisoners to support a claim of innocence, establishes a National Commission on Capital Representation to set standards for indigent defense in capital cases, adds a certification requirement in federal death penalty prosecutions, and establishes a compensation fund for individuals unjustly sentenced to death.

Senators Russell Feingold (D-WI) and Jon Corzine (D-NJ) and Rep. Jesse Jackson (D-IL) have introduced the National Death Penalty Moratorium Act of 2001 (S. 233/H.R.1038) which would establish a national commission on the death penalty and prohibit the federal government from carrying out the death penalty until Congress considers the final findings and recommendations of this commission. Both bills are currently pending in Congress.