By Father John Flynn, LC
ROME, APRIL 3, 2011 (Zenit.org).- The use of the death penalty continued on a downward trend in 2010, according to a report published March 28 by Amnesty International.
The report, “Death Sentences and Executions in 2010,” hailed the progress achieved in the last decade, saying that in this period no less than 31 countries abolished the death penalty either in law or in practice.
Amnesty International put at 527 the number of executions last year, down from 714 in 2009. The figures in the report don’t include China, which keeps the numbers a secret. Amnesty International estimated that last year there were thousands of executions in China, but could not give a precise figure.
Apart from China the countries with the highest number of executions included the following: Iran, 252; North Korea, 60; Yemen, 53; United States, 46; and Saudi Arabia, 27.
Amnesty International admitted that its figures are provisional, due to the lack of official data in most countries. Belarus, China and Mongolia classify information on the death penalty as a state secret. Vietnam prohibits by law publishing data on the death penalty.
The report added that little information was available for Malaysia, North Korea and Singapore. Moreover, in some countries, including Belarus, Botswana, Egypt and Japan, those on death row are not forewarned about their execution, and neither are their families or lawyers.
The report observed that the number of new death sentences far outstripped the executions, with a minimum of 2,024 new death sentences imposed in 67 countries.
Pakistan topped the list of sentences at 365. This was followed by Iraq, 279; Egypt, 185; and Nigeria, 151. In the United States another 110 were sentenced to death, while Afghanistan imposed around 100 sentences.
Amnesty International put a minimum worldwide figure of at least 17,833 persons who are now under sentence of death at the end of 2010.
Fewer countries
Although the practice of the death penalty declined last year the number of countries where it was practiced increased by four to a total of 23.
Last year’s reversal contrasts with the decline in preceding years, the report pointed out. In the mid-1990s 40 countries on average carried out executions every year. At the start of the new millennium executions were reported in 30 countries on average.
By 2008 the number went down to 25 countries and 2009 saw a record low, at 19 countries.
The number of countries that have formally abolished in law the death penalty, or who in practice have done so, has risen substantially, going from 108 in 2001 to 139 in recent years.
In 2010 Gabon amended its laws to end the death penalty. And by the end of the year bills proposing an abolition were pending in the parliaments of Lebanon, Mali, Mongolia and South Korea.
As well, the report observed that there was progress in some countries where the death penalty continues to be used. For example, the mandatory imposition of the death penalty, with no consideration of the circumstances of the offense or those of the defendant, was ruled unconstitutional in Bangladesh in March last year.
In Kenya the Court of Appeal of Kenya ruled in July that the mandatory death penalty for murder was inconsistent with the constitution. Finally, in October, the parliament of Guyana adopted a new law abolishing the mandatory imposition of the death penalty for murder.
United States
A more detailed look at how the death penalty is faring in the United States came with the publication just prior to the end of the year of the report titled “The Death Penalty in 2010: Year End Report.”
Published by the group the Death Penalty Information Center, the report said that last year saw a great deal of conflict over such issues as the high cost of capital punishment and controversy over the use of lethal injections.
In fact, executions dropped by 12% compared to 2009 and are now down by more than 50% since 1999. In addition, the number of new death sentences — 114 — was about the same as the previous year, which was the lowest number in 34 years. Numbers peaked in 1996, at 315.
At the time of publication there was a total of 3,261 prisoners on death row, compared to 3,297 at the same time the previous year.
While 35 states retain the death penalty only 12 carried out executions in 2010, mostly in the South, according to the report.
A big drop in executions took place in Texas, the leader in the use of the death penalty, with 29% fewer sentences being carried out.
The decline came in a year which saw concern over mistakes made in executions. Former death row inmate Anthony Graves was freed from prison in Texas when all charges against him were dropped after 16 years.
Another case involved a man executed in 2004. A court of inquiry set up to investigate the matter found that the evidence used to convict him was highly unreliable. According to the report, nationally there have been 138 exonerations from death row since 1973.
These were far from being the only cases that cast doubt on the use of the death penalty. The report noted a number of controversial executions, such as the one in Virginia of Teresa Lewis, a grandmother with an IQ of 72. She did not physically participate in the murders that led to her death sentence and the two co-defendants who actually shot the victims received life sentences.
Meanwhile, Alabama executed a prisoner, Holly Wood, who had an IQ recorded at below 70, the level at which intellectual disability is presumed to exist.
The report contrasted this with the case of New York’s, Salvatore Vitale, a crime boss who confessed to 11 murders, but who was only sentenced to time served, and was released after seven years in prison because he cooperated with the government.
Another factor leading to a re-consideration of the death penalty is cost. Legislative commissions compared the cost of capital punishment to other ways of addressing violent crime in Illinois, New Hampshire and Pennsylvania.
In Illinois, the commission found that $100 million had been spent on assisting counties with death penalty prosecutions over the past seven years, at a time when the state’s deficit has grown to one of the largest in the country.
Culture of life
More recently, Illinois decided to abolish the death penalty, after having had a moratorium on its use for over a decade, the Associated Press reported Mar. 9.
Announcing the decision, Governor Pat Quinn said he would commute the sentences of the 15 death row inmates to life in prison, without parole.
In January the state legislature voted to abolish the death penalty and Quinn reflected for a couple of months on whether to sign the bill.
The state’s Catholic bishops welcomed the decision. “The end of the use of the death penalty advances the development of a culture of life in our state,” they said in their Mar. 9 statement.
“Furthermore, society will continue to be protected and those who commit crimes will still be held accountable through alternatives to the death penalty, including life without parole,” they observed.
Executions continue, such as that of Eric John King, in the state of Arizona on March 29, but opponents of the death penalty will continue their pressure for its abolition.
The use of the death penalty when there are other means available to keep society safe, “is an act of eye-for-an-eye vengeance that contradicts the values of our nation and that denies the dignity and sanctity of human life,” declared Arizona’s Catholic bishops the day before the execution. A point of view that is shared by more and more people.
