More than 200 Rally Against Lethal Injection
at State Capitol
photos by Alex Madorik
 Rally against the Death Penalty at State Capitol, June 30, 2009. Photos below: Mike Farrell, President of Death Penalty Focus, who called for an end to executions at the hearing on Lethal Injection Procedures. Beth Weinberger and Sara Bolder demonstrate on behalf of the Progressive Jewish Alliance. |
Over 200 people attended a public hearing sponsored by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation regarding the proposed procedures for carrying out executions by lethal injection. The hearings were held at the Department of Health Services in Sacramento on June 30th. Members of California People of Faith were well represented at the hearings. Over 100 spoke in opposition to the proposed lethal injection protocols.
Barbara Becnel, who witnessed the last execution, of Tookie Williams, said that it took over half an hour to carry out the execution. She said that the execution was botched and that he went into convulsions.
Kent Peters speaking as the director of the Office for Social Ministry of the Catholic Diocese of San Diego and as a board member of California People of Faith Working Against the Death Penalty.
Kent spoke of the effect that imposing the death penalty has on those who are asked to carry out this onerous and gruesome task. This observation springs from two separate sources: the first is from the proposed regulations themselves, and the second is from personal conversations I and other CPF members have had with two wardens who have presided over multiple executions.
He noted that direct participation in the intentional destruction of a human life, especially where that life that does not pose an immediate threat, impacts the human psyche of the life-taker in destructive ways that are almost impossible to calculate. This not-so-simple act of homicide, as it is actually recorded on the death certificate, has the potential to haunt an individual for a lifetime.
Kent said that he had learned from conversations with Don Cabana, a former Warden in Mississippi, and Jeanne Woodford, former Warden of San Quentin, both who presided over multiple executions, that following a Governor’s order to kill an inmate wreaks havoc on the human psyche. It would be accurate to say that both wardens are haunted to this day by their participation in the killing of inmates.
Catherine Huston, works for the Archdiocese of San Francisco as the Coordinator of the Catholic Campaign to End the Use of the Death Penalty. She is the Archdiocesan liaison to the California People of Faith Working Against the Death Penalty. She sits on the CPF State Board. Catherine noted that the Catholic Church has taken a firm position against the death penalty, the only exception being where the state has no other means of protecting society. Today, in these United States, our religious leaders recognize that society can be protected without resorting to state sanctioned homicide, by imprisonment through natural life. Both our spiritual leaders and the laity are working diligently to educate all faithful Catholics on this important life issue.
Catherine voiced her religious reasons for opposing the proposed lethal injection procedures.
Firstly she objected to section 3349.3.4(e) which limits spiritual advisors and some confessors, not designated by the state, to visiting in the common visiting area, where confessions could hardly be deemed private. This would place both parties out in the open, for others within earshot to hear, and would clearly violate the privacy of confession.
Secondly, there is the danger of the State Chaplain being required to Disclose Private Communications. The proposed regulations require the State Chaplain to report to the Warden the contents of private conversations with the person about to be executed (sections 3349.2.2(b), (3349.3.1(e), and 3349.3.3(f)). The Catechism of the Catholic Church under Chapter Two, The Sacrament of Healing, teaches: “[T]he Church declares that every priest who hears confessions is bound under very severe penalties to keep absolute secrecy regarding the sins that his penitents have confessed to him. He can make no use of knowledge that confession gives him about penitents’ lives. This secret, which admits of no exceptions, is called the ‘sacramental seal’ because what the penitent has made known to the priest remains sealed by the sacrament.
If the Chaplain were to be required to report back to the Warden, all semblance of trust with the penitent would be broken, and the nature of the sacrament, itself, would be violated. It is commonly understood that confessions are private, and are never recorded or written down in any way. Historically, the state has recognized this clergy-penitent relationship. Under the law, a priest cannot be compelled to testify about matters he might know from confession. Thus the collaboration between warden and confessor, proposed under the new lethal injection procedures, would not only be contrary to the ethical obligations of clergy, within the context of the sacrament, it may, in fact, violate state law as well.
The religious reasons for opposing the proposed lethal injection procedures issues were echoed by Rev. Dorothy Streutker, Board Member of California People of Faith Working Against the Death Penalty, r voiced her concerns about restrictions on access to the condemned by his or her spiritual advisor, the lack of standards whereby a spiritual advisor might be disallowed by the warden and the absence of any limitations on when a spiritual advisor might be disallowed.
Dorothy concluded by saying “The God I believe in and for whom I minister seeks healing and reconciliation. Capital Punishment is the exact opposite.”
Mary Kay Raftery a member of California People of Faith Working Against the Death Penalty since 2002 spoke of her attitude to the death penalty as the mother of a victim. “I became an unofficial member of Murder Victims Families for Reconciliation. Our oldest son, Paul Raftery was murdered on Dec. 8, 2006 by two young men looking for drug money. He had NO money. I remember asking myself how I felt about the Death Penalty now. This awful deed didn’t change my mind, and I was relieved that the Death Penalty was never an option. I was having conversations with Paul about my activities with California People of Faith, when he quietly told me he also opposed the Death Penalty. This occurred during his many years as a law enforcement officer. I was surprised, but very gratified by his response. The family also opposes the Death Penalty. I don’t understand the concept of “closure”. After all—putting another person, or in my case 2 people, to death will NEVER bring my sorely missed son back. The two murderers received sentences of Life with a possibility of parole after 55 years-essentially a life sentence. The family felt justice had been served.”
Mary Kay said that she has a huge argument concerning the cost of the Death Penalty. California is currently in the midst of a severe financial crisis. On October 2, 2006, the Los Angeles Times published an article by Jeanne Woodford, the former director of the CA Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation and the former warden at San Quentin, titled, “Death Row Realism”. In it she said “I wish the public knew how much the Death Penalty affects their wallets.” She stated that California spends an additional 117 million dollars each year pursuing executions of the inmates on death row, plus an additional 90,000 dollars per prisoner per year above the cost of housing them with the general population. Additionally, the bipartisan Commission for the Fair Administration of Justice concluded that the state must spend 100 million dollars each year to fix the many problems with capitol punishment. She concluded by saying that she strongly believes that these funds could be better spent for the least among us—the children, the elderly, the mentally ill and all those families suffering from loss of jobs, food and homes.
Alex Madonik, spoke as a member of California People of Faith Working Against the Death Penalty and as a member of Kehilla Community Synagogue.
He said that the lethal injection procedure was based on the pretense that it is not a violent act. He said that this pretense was a disgrace. He continued, our district attorneys should be ashamed to seek the death penalty. He said that our officials should be ashamed to offer this penalty as a consolation to the families and friends of murder victims. Our juries should not be forced to choose between life and death. He said that we should be ashamed to ask our correctional officers to participate in this procedure and we should be ashamed that it is carried out in our name.
He asked the question if anyone present is not affected by violence in our communities. And is there anyone who thinks that lethal injection is not a violent act or who think that it will make our communities safer? He urged that the lethal injection procedure be rejected and the pretense that it is not a violent act.
Sara Bolder, spoke on behalf of the Progressive Jewish Alliance, which has 5000 members in California. The Progressive Jewish Alliance is a member of 3 criminal justice coalitions, California People of Faith Working Against the Death Penalty, the Alameda County Coalition for Alternatives to the Death Penalty and the Los Angeles County Coalition for Alternatives to the Death Penalty.
Sara said that she has a personal reason to want to end the death penalty. Her paternal grandfather died in prison in Pennsylvania the year she was born. He was serving a life sentence that was the result of a plea bargain that he accepted when threatened with the death penalty. Her father, her aunts and her grandmother never quite recovered from feeling that they let him down. Why? Because he had an overworked and under prepared public defender. Her father was 18 years old during the trial and wished to the day he died that he had been able to afford better legal representation for his father.
The 5000 members of Progressive Jewish Alliance are opposed to the death penalty for many of the reasons already mentioned today:
- Racial, economic & geographic disparities in the application of the death penalty;
- Wrongful convictions, over 130 innocent people having been exonerated from death rows across the US, including California and many more cases of wrongful conviction are in the pipeline;
- public safety;
- the cost of the death penalty;
- taking of critical resources that could be used for public safety which are going toward a broken death penalty system.
As a Jewish organization, the proposed lethal injection procedures are particularly troubling to us. If the state is going to kill in our name we must guarantee that religious concerns are respected at the end of life. These proposed regulations profoundly fail to do that.
Terry McCaffrey, representing Amnesty International and California People of Faith, spoke against the regulations. Specifically, he noted that California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) has not issued the proposed regulations on lethal injection in Spanish. He said that this needs to be corrected.
The CDCR has declared that the proposed regulations have no fiscal impact. Mr. McCaffrey said that this is incorrect. He said that the proposed regulations require hundreds, possibly thousands of hours of staff time. He said that the public has a right to know exactly how much it will cost taxpayers to carry out executions using lethal injection at San Quentin prison as proposed in the regulations.
Mr. McCaffrey said that Amnesty International and California People of Faith Working Against the Death Penalty take exception to the lethal injection procedure. He noted that the Administration of Pancromium Bromide, which paralyses the person to be executed, masks the possibility of extreme pain that would be caused when Potassium Chloride is injected. The process is not foolproof and has the potential of torture, which is a violation of the U.S. Constitution.
In closing, he noted that from the comments aired in the hearing, it is clear that there are substantial objections to the lethal injection process. He concluded by saying that society would be better off without the death penalty.