Tutu visits Texas death row inmate

[dArKeR]

March 24 2004 at 07:09PM

Livingston - Nobel Peace Prize laureate Desmond Tutu visited a Texas death row inmate on Wednesday condemned for the slaying of a man more than 12 years ago during a three-day crime wave.

The archbishop, an opponent of capital punishment, wanted to talk to convicted killer Dominique Green, 29, who believes his life has been changed for the better by other inmates and a book written by Tutu.

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=3&art_id=qw1080148140429B223&set_id=1

[MrBenchley]

1. Texas justice probably seemed familiar

to somebody who'd been in a South African prison....

[Spoonman]

2. Pretty bold statement

for someone who knows nothing about the justice system in Texas.

I guess the jury should have given him 10 days house arrest with no desert?!

There is a huge difference between being imprisoned for your race, creed, color or political beliefs and being imprisoned for committing murder!

Boy what shinning example of logic that little tidbit was!

[MrBenchley]

3. Gee, spoon...

Considering Texas killed more convicts than all 49 other states put together over the last decade, I seem to know more than you do about it.

[Spoonman]

4. Wooooopppppeeeeeee

Glad your joining in the celebration!!!!!

And your point being?

All thse murdering pieces of shit that were put to death will never commit another murder. I guess you think that a bad thing?

[Romulus]

5. umm,

I don't think that any government should execute any of its citizens, for any reason.

No state should have that much power over its' subjects.

[Superfly]

6. Capital punishment is the single issue

that I really don't have a firm platform on, or, if I do, I am very willing to change. On one hand I see the benefit of removing a piece of shit murderer from our world, and on the other hand I see how flaws in the system can result in the loss of life on an innocent person.

[Spoonman]

11. First off

Were are not subjects... another topic.

The bottom line is this.
You feel it is your right to carry a firearm to protect yourself and family, correct?
That means you are willing to shoot/kill someone to protect yourself and your family.

The state is doing NOTHING different, only they are protecting a much larger "family"!

You can't act as judge and jury, without giving the government that ensures that right the same authority.

[iverglas]

18. good grief

You feel it is your right to carry a firearm to protect yourself and family, correct?
That means you are willing to shoot/kill someone to protect yourself and your family.

The state is doing NOTHING different, only they are protecting a much larger "family"!


Where do you people get your magic logic decoder rings? Off the back of a truck loaded with factory rejects? And how hard is it to make them work backwards?


Individuals are permitted to use force in self-defence, not as punishment.

They are not entitled to kill someone whom they suspect might one day do something bad to them, and they are not entitled to kill someone in retaliation for something bad done to them.

And they are not permitted to kill someone in self-defence intentionally, i.e. to kill someone in self-defence other than as the unavoidable effect of what they did to save their own lives.


Any chance you see the difference between

(a) intentionally killing someone based on a prediction that s/he might do something bad and/or to punish him/her for doing something bad (what the state in certain US jurisdictions does)

and

(b) killing him/her as the unintended outcome of using the only probably successful means available of averting an immediate and serious risk of death at his/her hands (what individuals are permitted to do)

?

No need to answer if your answer is "no"; I wouldn't believe it anyhow.

.

[Romulus]

22. disagree - sorry

Were are not subjects... another topic

When you're in the defense chair in a capital case, and the prosecutor is using circumstantial evidence (like "you were ID'd by some witness as being the last person seen in the area") to "prove" you committed some murder, despite already explaining to her what you were really doing during that that same time until you are blue in the face, get back to me about your place in society.

You feel it is your right to carry a firearm to protect yourself and family, correct?
That means you are willing to shoot/kill someone to protect yourself and your family.

The state is doing NOTHING different, only they are protecting a much larger "family"!

I can't shoot someone after they've stopped being a threat and have gone back home and are watching Mod Squad on Nick at Nite. I can't shoot someone even if I "really really believe" they killed a member of my family one hour before. The "protection" argument only works during the period of time immediate defense is needed. That's the principle of law that I live under, and the state should not operate under any different set of principles.

Capital punishment is just updated tribal retribution.

[iverglas]

23. agree -- sorry

Ha. Couldn't resist.

.

[Rainbowreflect]

7. How civilized is a country or state that executes the mentally retarded?

And are you absolutely positive not one person executed in Texas was Innocent????

[Spoonman]

9. Your right,

There has probably been an innocent person executed.
That argument does not hold up.
There are thousands of innocent people serving LIFE w/o parole. I guess spending the rest of your life involuntarily getting your ass cheeks spread is better than death could be made though.

However, the death penalty is only handed down in the most horrific and blatant cases.

Mentally retarded?

I guess anyone who commits murder in the State of Texas would have to be retarded knowing this state executes murderers!

[iverglas]

16. oh, you're right all right

Not.

However, the death penalty is only handed down in the most horrific and blatant cases.

Try asking google for "stanley faulder".

Although now that I think about it ... yeah, that surely was one of the most horrific and blatant cases.

One of the most horrific and blatant cases of

- the purchasing of a court by the highest bidder (the super-rich son of the victim) to do what he wanted done;

- the corruption of the justice system by the rich and powerful (who paid a key witness, who may have been the real murderer, essentially to disappear);

- the violation of international law and the rights of accused persons.

And it all happened right there in Texas, while George W. Bush reigned and Democrats like Madeleine Albright ... and democrats like Desmond Tutu ... tried in vain to get justice done.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

International Outrage Over Texas' Decision To Execute Canadian Stan Faulder

Toronto, Canada, March 2, 1999—Canadians, along with other members of the international community are expressing their outrage over the decision of Texas officials to go ahead with a new execution date of June 17th for Canadian Stan Faulder. Both Texas and US Government officials have failed to address or even acknowledge the fact that Faulder's arrest, without the right of consular assistance was a direct violation of international treaty under the Vienna convention, despite of recent pleas for clemency by Canadian officials, Madeline Albright and South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu. This serious oversight may jeopardize the future safety of Americans imprisoned in foreign countries, in light of rumors about Governor Bush as a potential presidential candidate, as Texas has set a new precedent for the treatment of foreign nationals who are arrested or in custody abroad.

Calls for an international tourist boycott of Texas have gone out worldwide world due to the fact that if you're a foreigner arrested or detained by police rightfully or wrongfully in Texas, you may not be granted your rights under international law, and could with lack of proper legal representation potentially end up imprisoned for years, even decades under penalty of death, without your family or government even knowing where you were!

In light of recent rumors about Texas Governor Bush's potential presidential aspirations the boycott is rapidly gaining worldwide support from Student organizing groups, political parties, human rights watchers, travel agencies, along with many other concerned individuals from Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, the Netherlands, Slovenia, South Africa, Switzerland, the UK as well as US citizens from various states.

If Governor Bush cannot abide by international law and treaty as a State Governor and completely ignores the international outcry, as president he would surely be unable to maintain any degree of international credibility concerning the protection of Americans abroad, or any other matters regarding human rights.

For more information on Faulder and the Boycott see the CCADP <Canadian Coalition Against the Death Penalty> webpage at: www.ccadp.org

Such prescience.

.

[MrBenchley]

17. Fascinating to watch some folks here

defending Chimpy McDipstick's disgraceful record, isn't it?

[Spoonman]

19. Seeing as this is a reply to a person

on ignore (for extremely rude and ignorant comments) and I will not read it, I'll have to ask what the hell are you talking about?

The death penalty was in place long before numnuts, or numnuts sr. was in office.

How on earth can anyone derive this as "defending Chimpy McDipstick's disgraceful record".

Attack the issue and not the person is something you might want to work on.

[MrBenchley]

20. Gee, spoon...

Ask me next if I care what you want....

[iverglas]

21. this is quite entertaining

Watching someone talking without having a clue what he's talking about ... or at least watching him denying that he knows what he's talking about and trying to make it look like he doesn't know what he's talking about. And doing an excellent job, if that's the case!

The person in question had said that the death penalty was used only in the most horrific and something-or-other cases.

The info that the person in question doesn't have is that (and that everybody knows that) his statement is a long way from accurate.

Oh, I get it -- when he says

The death penalty was in place long before numnuts, or numnuts sr. was in office.

... he thinks that somebody was talking about the numnuts' records as President of the US (given that numnuts sr. was never Governor of Texas and so has no record of any relevance here).

Of course, nobody was. Everybody else was, of course, still talking about Texas. Some more about the record actually in question:

http://www.progressive.org/mplvct00.htm

According to a Chicago Tribune two-part investigation, Texas under Bush has executed dozens of indigent death-row inmates whose cases "were compromised by unreliable evidence, disbarred or suspended defense attorneys, meager defense efforts during sentencing and dubious psychiatric testimony." The report also found that the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, the venue of last resort for correcting errors at trial in Texas, has continuously refused to overturn death sentences, even when defendants complained about their attorneys sleeping during trial or when a prosecution witness gave false testimony.

The New York Times followed with a report that further highlighted the rampant incompetence of court-appointed attorneys for indigent inmates in Texas. The Times reported that one attorney has been so bad at defending indigent clients facing the death penalty that a wing of a death-row prison has been named after him. Yet Texas judges continue to appoint incompetent attorneys to defend clients facing capital punishment.

... He insists that not one of the 131 people executed on his watch was innocent, even though the Chicago Tribune and the New York Times have cast doubt on several of them. He appears indifferent to the right of competent counsel. In 1999, he helped defeat legislation that would have allowed Texas counties to transfer the power to designate attorneys for poor defendants, currently reserved for judges, to a panel created by county commissioners. The bill’s intent was to create a system where appointments would be made by a panel motivated more by the quality of defense than the speed of trials or cronyism.

In Bush's defense, most of the death-sentence judgments were handed down before he became governor and the pattern of Texas' hastened executions started long before he entered politics. But Bush has a final say on whether or not a death sentence is carried out and can grant clemency upon the recommendation of an appointed board. Even then, Bush has only once granted a one-time, 30-day stay of execution.

By defending and presiding over the busiest death chamber in America, Bush has given us a glimpse of compassionate conservatism.

Amazing how little some people apparently want to question the policies and actions of the stupidest and evilest of right-wing power-wielders and their policies ... and how closely their own policy positions coincide with those of the stupidest and evilest right-wingers.

.

[MrBenchley]

24. It certainly is amazing

but I'm not really surprised, any more than I'm surprised to see some people pretend World Net Dreary has "substance" worth discussing...are you?

[MrBenchley]

8. Texas--home of the sleeping lawyer

Amazing what some people here will saddle up and defend, isn't it?

[Spoonman]

10. Even more amazing

are the uneducated comments that come from the rear of the horse.

[MrBenchley]

13. Like those pretending "Texas justice" isn't a disgrace?

[Spoonman]

14. Thank you for your

OPINION.
I guess dirty ashtrays in New York businesses are a disgrace too.

[MrBenchley]

15. You're welcome...

Now trot right back with another turd out of the World Net Daily cesspool so we can have a big laugh.

[Sugarbleus]

30. Hmmm, is this an example of "Compassionate Conservatism?"

[DonP]

25. When was Tutu imprisoned?

I was not aware that he had spent time in prison in SA?

Although I can see he would have been a target for the apartheid government before they change.

[demsrule4life]

26. You sure he was in prison?

I think you are mistaking him for Nelson Mandela.

[MrBenchley]

27. He certainly visited South Africa's prisons

Nelson Mandela wouldn't be fooled by "Texas Justice" either...

[iverglas]

28. my, my (to both of the above)

Texas justice probably seemed familiar
to somebody who'd been in a South African prison....

When was Tutu imprisoned?
You sure he was in prison?


I've been in a Canadian prison. A few times.

And yet I've never been imprisoned.

How can that be??

.

[MrBenchley]

29. Far as I know

Tutu wasn't imprisoned in Texas either....as much as that must have enraged some of the bigots down there....

[Pert_UK]

12. A strange last request but I can't see why he'd want a ballet dress...

Obvious, but had to be done.

P.

[dArKeR]

31. Tutu: He's no death no monster

Nobel Peace Prize laureate Desmond Tutu visited an inmate on Texas's death row on Wednesday, saying it would be "one of the greatest tragedies" if the man were to be executed, and describing capital punishment as an "absurdity that brutalises society".

The archbishop spent two hours with Dominique Green, sentenced to die for the slaying of a man during a robbery 12 years ago.

"I come away deeply enriched by my encounter with an extraordinary young man," Tutu said. "I have met quite a few people in my time, but I have not been as impressed by someone I've met very briefly through a glass partition. He is a remarkable young man.

"It would be one of the greatest tragedies if someone like Dominique were to be executed."

Tutu called capital punishment a perverse way to show respect for life and an "absurdity that brutalises society".

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=3&art_id=vn20040325130954205C853360&set_id=1