An innocent woman will be murdered tomorrow

[ck4829]

Frances Newton was accused of killing her husband and children for the "insurance money" back in 1987. But Frances' new lawyer, David Dow, the head of the Innocence Network at the University of Houston Law Center, has discovered evidence that proves otherwise.
Frances believes her husband was killed by a drug dealer, who he owed $1,500. Frances' brother thought this as well, and told police that he could lead them to the drug dealer's home. But the police never investigated that lead. And even though Frances passed a lie detector test, even though she had no blood on her clothes or car (in what was a very bloody crime), and no gunpowder residue was found on her hands, the police arrested her. According to prosecutors, Frances was supposed to have killed her family, cleaned up all of the evidence, and then returned to the crime scene, all in 30 minutes.

She will be executed tomorrow.

http://dailykos.com/story/2005/9/13/11568/0097

I'm not opposed to the Death Penalty when the Murderer is ghoulish, but I honestly believe that this woman is innocent.

[Horse with no Name]

1. I think so too

But she is a black woman in a Republican governed Texas.
God help her, cause at this point He is the only one that can--Rick Perry sure as hell aint gonna do it.:cry:

Edited to add another link:
http://www.austinchronicle.com/issues/dispatch/2005-09-09/pols_feature3.html

[BrklynLiberal]

2. Another of of Governor Bush's victims?

[tammywammy]

3. That would be Gov. Perry n/t

[BrklynLiberal]

10. Perry was not Governor in 1987...but Perry just continues Bush's

compassionless policies.

[tammywammy]

22. Bush wasn't governor then either

I just don't understand how you're blaming this on Bush. Shouldn't you just as much blame it on Clements and Richards? They were both governors while this woman's been in prison.

Personally, I'd blame it on Perry for not giving clemency.

[SmokingJacket]

4. The problem with the death penalty is that as long as you have it,

this sort of thing will happen.

Personally, if anyone were to hurt one of my children, I'd be happy to see them gassed, shot, and fried simultaneously. In fact, I'd do it.

But I know that criminal justice in this country is NOT perfect. And once you execute someone, there's no fixing it. The death penalty is a really bad, really barbaric idea.

I also have a little problem with government killing people. I wish we could drag this damn country out of the middle ages.

[ck4829]

7. I should have said what I truly think about it

The Death Penalty is OK and only OK when:

The Murderer does not have a shred of humanity or consciousness

It can be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that this person is in fact the murderer

All of the murder trials that the accused faced must be fair

[txaslftist]

24. Unfortunately, not a single one of your premises can be met...

...in any criminal court in this country.

[jim3775]

5. This is why I am totally against the death penalty

It is impossible to guarantee someone is absolutley guilty and terrible abuses like this will alyays happen in the imperfect system we have.

[jmowreader]

12. No, it is possible to guarantee guilt

Like for instance, DU's favorite whipping boy.

I don't think there's a shadow of a doubt that Bush and his administration are responsible for more deaths by either murder or negligent homicide than any other group currently alive, including Saddam, Kim Jong Il and Osama bin Laden.

And I also don't think there's a shadow of a doubt that if these people received the death penalty, there would be an extremely long line of DUers applying for the job of Firing Squad Member.

Normally, though, it's not nearly this clear.

[ellenfl]

14. do you doubt the guilt of

john wayne gacy or jeffrey daumer? i believe that people like these are not redeemable. in rare cases, the death penalty is warranted, imo. most of the monsters like gacy and daumer started their 'careers' by killing animals . . . and frogs? yup, death penalty for them.

ellen fl

[geomon666]

15. Murder is murder.

We murder those who murder us and it never ends.

[jim3775]

16. No I don't doubt their guilt

but if there is even the slightest chance that a person that is put to death is innocent (and plenty of innocent people have been put to death before) than the death penalty cannot be administered. As a policy the death penalty can never be applied only to the truly un-redeemably guilty therefore it cannot be applied at all.

Edit: Also, I think it is morally wrong to execute somebody who is already incarcerated and not a danger to society.

[ellenfl]

20. i agree. if only one innocent person is

put to death, that is too many. i also have no doubt that people like gacy and daumer are mentally ill. unfortunately, we do not have adequate means to deal with these people. so what's to do?

one thing we should do is always err on the side of life . . . hey, isn't that a * quote?

ellen fl

[TomInTib]

6. Of course she is in Texas. Saw the story and then checked to see

where she was from and was hardly surprised. I am beginning to think that the TX governor who signs the death warrant should be personally responsible for being a one-man(woman) execution squad. Might think twice about signing on the dotted line.

Although, given the ease that the former Governer of Texas has with sending people to their deaths, that particular "death penalty" might not prove to be much of a deterrent.

[NNadir]

8. I have informed my children and my wife, that if I am ever murdered they

are to insist that the death penalty NOT be pursued.

It is simply wrong, 100% of the time, and I say that in 100% of cases, including one which resulted in my death.

[faithnotgreed]

19. very much agreed nnadir - it is barbaric and motivated by the same

things we have throughout our culture

race and money/power among others dictate who lives and who dies
let alone that governments should never be in the business of killing

[Maru Kitteh]

9. Just one more reason to oppose the death penalty

1st one for me? A state should not have the power to kill it's citizens.

Every chamber is covered with innocent blood, and one is one too many.

[cureautismnow]

11. Executioners are Murderers.

May they squander their blood money and their own freedom in this life.

[GreenArrow]

13. even worse are those who give them orders

and are too cowardly to do the work themselves.

[Just Me]

17. The "horns" state.

Of course.

[FreedomAngel82]

18. Oh my gosh

:cry: An innocent woman will go to her death but a man we know who has killed thousands based on lies will stay at his job. I hate this!

[kitkat65]

21. A must read: "Shot in the Heart" by Mikal Gilmore, brother of Gary

From a made for tv moview review. The book is MUCH better.

Snip

Based on his own book, "Shot in the Heart" is Mikal Gilmore's story of a harrowing family fate, of how his brother, Gary, who murdered two men just after the Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty, rose to notoriety for being the first person executed in the United States in nearly a decade. And how he, as the youngest and most distant from the family, comes back to Gary in his last days with the power to stop the execution -- which Gary not only has welcomed but also has helped turn into a sad carnival.

. . .

The Gilmore family was about as dysfunctional as they come. Frank Gilmore Sr. . . . was a low-level criminal given to startling cruelty. He beat his kids, abandoned his wife and left Gary on a park bench at one point. Mother Bessie . . . was a devout Mormon haunted by visions. Living through this was Frank Jr. (Lee Tergesen, who captures the son's shell-shocked, lost life), Gary, who seemed to suffer the most, brother Gaylen (shown only in flashbacks, who would later die) and young Mikal.

Gary Gilmore's infamy is partly due to his being the first person executed (January 1977) after the lifting of the ban and partly because his story was told by Norman Mailer in "The Executioner's Song." But as Mikal Gilmore writes in his book, Mailer never captured the real story. "What is less generally known, and what has never been much documented, is the story of the origins of Gary's violence -- the true history of my family and how its webwork of dark secrets and failed hopes helped create the legacy that, in part, became my brother's impetus to murder."

"Shot in the Heart" tells that true history, and you're a hard, hard person if, at the end of it, you're not moved to say some kind of grace that your own family, no matter how dysfunctional, never got as dark as this one.

end

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2001/10/12/DD159756.DTL&type=printable

In the book Gilmore also explains the concept of blood atonement which is basically execution without the benefit of trial and rumoured to be secretly practiced by some Mormons. (Gilmore's mother was a devout Mormon and they lived in Utah.) There's a mystical belief that by having the accused's blood spilled on the ground, it somehow makes everything right again - like a cleansing or a sacrifice. That is the reason that Utah still has/had shooting squads as an option because, compared to other execution methods, it spills blood.

Another thing I found interesting is that the executioner's who are involved in the shooting squad get one bullet each, and one of those bullets is a blank. No one knows who has the blank. Apparently, this gives the executioners some relief to think they may not have been the one that was not responsible for the executed's death.

I wrote my letter pleading for clemency and a fair hearing for Frances. I hope a lot of people here have. I don't know if she innocent or guilty. I just think that when a society gives the state the right to end the life of a convicted murderer, that society has cheapened the lives of everyone in that society, not just the convicted's.

[txaslftist]

23. Don't know the case, but I do know...

...that the innocence project cleared nearly half of the people on Illinois' death row. Some 13 out of 27.

If half of the people on liberal Illinois' death row were innocent, I shudder to think how many innocent folks my state (TX) has killed.

I'm against the death penalty. Too discriminatory, too innaccurate, and too easy to avoid for the REALLY guilty (who plead out to life in prison).

Oh, and it doesn't deter crime according to most credible analysis.

And did I mention that it discriminates against the poor?

"I'd have my supreme court down in Texas.
Then we wouldn't have no killers gettin off free.
If they was proved guilty,
then they would swing quickly,
'stead a writin books and smilin' on TV...."
-some fucked up freeper singing "If the South would a won (we'd a had it made)"...