Alaska's last execution was nearly 59 years ago. Are we willing to kill again?

[struggle4progress]

By Scott Christiansen
Anchorage Press
Published/Last Modified on Wednesday, January 28, 2009 6:30 PM AKST

When Nikiski Republican Mike Chenault, the new speaker of the Alaska State House, introduced a bill last month to bring the death penalty to Alaska, pundits began predicting a noisy, emotional debate that might never result in a bill seeing the governor’s desk ...

Chenault’s bill will be a test for a group called Alaskans Against the Death Penalty. The nonprofit is about 15 years old, board member Rich Curtner says. They spend their efforts on death penalty education and pushing to keepcapital punishment—abolished here 51 years ago—from becoming instituted again. Curtner is the Federal Public Defender for the Alaska District ...

Much of the court costs take place before appeals attorneys have even looked at the case. Anchorage attorney Averil Lerman describes the costs of death penalty as “front-end loaded” with expense. “It’s expensive even before the trial begins,” she says ...

The death penalty was available to federal prosecutors in the Alaska Territory up until 1957, when the Territorial Legislature abolished the practice. There were only eight legal executions in Alaska between 1902 and 1950. Two of the men hanged were white, three were Alaska Natives, two were black and one was an immigrant from Montenegro ...

http://www.anchoragepress.com/articles/2009/01/28/news/doc498106088c10d714368988.txt

[Blue_In_AK]

1. I am so opposed to the death penalty.

This has come up periodically here over the 33 years that I've lived here, but it never goes very far. I hope this time is no different. One of the things that I love about Alaska is that we don't have the DP.

[AlaskaVet]

2. Facebook Group

There is a Facebook Group that supports the Anchorage-based
Alaskans Against the Death Penalty. Recommend all sign up.