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| Bush acknowledges death penalty problems |
| By Associated Press |
| Published: 02/07/2005 |
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President Bush is calling for more training for lawyers who represent accused killers, tacit recognition that not all suspects receive an adequate defense. "People on trial for their lives must have competent lawyers by their side," Bush said in his State of the Union address last Wednesday. As governor of Texas, a state that executes more inmates than any other, Bush commuted one death sentence but allowed 152 executions. Rob Warden, executive director of Northwestern University's Center on Wrongful Convictions, said the president's acknowledgment of problems was significant. "Even referring to wrongful convictions is rather amazing," Warden said. "He had every opportunity to deal with this issue as governor of Texas. He failed to do so." Bush's request for $50 million for lawyer training over three years, however, is far short of what Congress suggested in reforms passed last fall and signed by Bush. "It is scaling back," said John Terzano, head of The Justice Project's Campaign for Criminal Justice Reform, a Washington-based group that advocates fairness in death penalty cases. Terzano said the White House fought last year's legislation guaranteeing states money if they show they have an effective system to defend people facing the death penalty. Under the president's plan, $20 million would be spent in the next fiscal year training private lawyers and public defenders, state judges and prosecutors. He also called for $236 million - $1 billion over five years - for DNA testing. The law passed by Congress last fall proposed $350 million to improve legal representation in death penalty cases over the next five years. It also would make it easier for convicts, including death row prisoners, to get DNA testing. However, the law provided no funding. Concern about wrongful convictions, some revealed by DNA, led then-Illinois Gov. George Ryan to grant clemency to every inmate on that state's death row in 2003. A Bush administration official who briefed reporters on the plan last Thursday and spoke only on condition of anonymity said that although the president was recognizing concerns about capital punishment, he would not call for a moratorium on executions. More than 3,400 inmates await execution in the 38 states that allow capital punishment. The Death Penalty Information Center estimates that 117 people have been exonerated in death penalty cases since 1973. Center executive director Richard Dieter said strong training programs could lead to fewer death sentences, as well a fewer successful appeals when jurors do impose capital punishment. |
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