Current mood:

distressed

Election Day and Capital Punishment
I don't post a lot of political content, but it's election day tomorrow, with a photo-finish gubernatorial race expected here in Virginia (though it's an off-year for Congress, I live in one of the two states that thinks its governors shouldn't have coattails).

Naturally we have been inundated with tedious ads. Most of them are of the he-said, no-I-didn't variety, but I found one exchange deeply disturbing, and it continues to haunt me even though I've not seen the offending ads for at least a week.the ones descibed here really did make me ill. Basically, the Republican candidate Kilgore has dredged up relatives of executed criminals to appear in TV ads to proclaim that they don't trust the Democratic candidate to execute those convicted of the killing. Yes, that's right. They don't "trust" (their word) Kaine to kill people. I didn't like Kilgore before, but now I can't separate him from the message of retribution in these ads.

The Democratic candidate Yorrick Tim Kaine (yes, Ffordefans, that's right) is opposed to the death penalty. He is a Catholic, and his position avowedly reflects his faith. Yet he has had to produce response ads assuring that he will uphold the law regarding the death penalty in Virginia. ("Don't worry, good Republicans! I'm going to kill people because it's the law!")

The whole episode is especially troubling because of the history of the death penalty here. Virginia has executed more criminals than any other state (even Texas). Since reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976, Virginia has had the highest per capita rate of executions of any state in the U.S. By that measure, it is far ahead of Texas, which is cited frequently for having the most executions.

Virginia death-row convicts -- many of whom are poor and do not have access to legal counsel of their choice -- also have suffered from the most restrictive post-trial criminal procedure in the country. One of the reasons for this is that under Virginia criminal procedure, defendants have only 21 days after judgment to introduce new evidence. Evidence discovered later may not be considered, even if it proves the defendant's innocence. It's the shortest time limit in the country (and even though it has been mitigated somewhat recently, it still exists), and it has resulted in the killing of innocent people.

In Virginia the death penalty may be considered whenever "special circumstances" are present -- which are very broad. Also, Virginia was happy to use it to execute people who were minors when the crime was committed (that's why sniper suspects John Muhammed and Lee Malvo were tried first in Virginia, not in Maryland where most of the sniper killings occurred) and the mentally retarded, until the Supreme Court said NO. (In the retardation case, using arcane determination rules, Virginia recently ruled that Atkins was not, in fact, mentally retarded. The ruling has been appealed.)

In short, the system was designed to produce convictions, not justice. (I won't even get into the rules for retaining and turning over potentially exculpatory evidence, which is a trap for the unwary defendant.)

I'm hoping that Kilgore's strategy will backfire. Kilgore's ads have been widely denounced as inaccurate in the press; Kaine's responses have been deemed to be factually correct. Moreover, it's a strategy that seems to be aimed at conservative, traditional Virginians, but the polls indicate that the race will be won or lost here in Northern Virginia, which is wealthier, more liberal, and more likely from someplace else where different rules apply.

Rant over.