UN Report Calls for Halt to U.S. Executions
UN Report Calls for Halt to U.S. Executions
By Vicki Linton
May 1998
Volume 35 Number 4
When the UN Human Rights Commission released its most recent highly critical report on human Rights in Iraq, it received significant coverage in the New York Times, the Washington Post, and other national media. But another UN Human Rights Commission report released a few days later was not so welcome in the media. The report, scorned as well by the U.S. government, called on the United States to “stop executions until it can ensure that death penalty cases are administered fairly and impartially, in accordance with due process.”
The report was issued by the UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, Bacre Waly Ndiaye. Ndiaye visited the U.S. last fall and extensively examined the situation faced by those charged with capital crimes. He concluded that “in the United States, guarantees and safeguards, as well as specific restrictions on capital punishment, are not fully respected.”
The Rapporteur’s report is an extensive and well-documented expose of these conclusions. According to the report, the United States is not in accord with international treaties, specifically the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), as far as its implementation of the death penalty is concerned. The U.S. ratified the ICCPR with reservations.
The UN report expresses particular concern over the expansion of the use of the death penalty in the United States which is not only contrary to trends in the rest of the world toward the elimination of capital punishment, but in direct violation of the ICCPR. The ICCPR does not allow for the expanded use of the death penalty and expressly denies the reinstatement of the death penalty after it has been abolished. The report notes that states are “widening the scope of the death penalty,” and that the Federal Death Penalty Act of 1994 “expanded the federal death penalty to more than 50 new offenses.”
Only the U.S., Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and Yemen allow the execution of juveniles. According to the report, “International law prohibits the imposition of a death sentence on juvenile offenders (those who committed the crime while under 18 years of age).” The U.S. entered a reservation regarding the execution of juveniles when it ratified the ICCPR. Since the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976, nine juvenile offenders have been put to death.
The unfairness inherent in the death penalty is illustrated by the fact that, “defendants who receive a death sentence are not necessarily those who committed the most heinous crimes.” The Rapporteur notes that “many factors...influence the imposition of a death sentence” including “class, race and economic status, both of the victim and the defendant.” Among the factors cited in the report include the composition of the judiciary (for example in Alabama, “only one of the 67 elected district attorneys is...black”), election of judges (noting that “it is very difficult for a judge who has reservations regarding the death penalty to be re-elected”), and “prosecutorial discretion” which allows prosecutors to choose in which cases to seek the death penalty, increasing “the risk of arbitrariness” and bringing “a sense of unfairness” to the death penalty.
The jury selection process is noted with particular concern. Because peremptory challenges allow prosecutors to eliminate potential jurors without giving cause, race can be used as a factor in creating juries. The report notes two cases of black defendants in which all potential black jurors were eliminated in peremptory challenges and the defendants were tried by all white juries.
Also of concern is the fact that those opposed to the death penalty are removed from juries in capital cases. The report states, “the community can hardly be represented when those opposed to the death penalty or having reservations about it seem to be systematically excluded from sitting as jurors.”
The report details the problems defendants have in receiving adequate representation in the trial process, stating that having a competent lawyer is critical in protecting the rights of those charged with capital crimes. The report cites the case of Mumia Abu-Jamal in this regard, as well as the case of a gay man sentenced to death in Texas, whose lawyer accepted three jurors onto the jury who expressed “prejudice against homosexuals,” fell asleep during the trial, and “failed to object to the statement made by the prosecutor during the sentencing phase of the trial, according to which being sent to the penitentiary was not a very bad punishment for a homosexual.”
The report criticizes the elimination of funding for post-conviction defender organizations (PCDOs) which has left those sentenced to death with little recourse in appealing their sentences. It also notes the negative effects of the 1996 Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act which “was designed to shorten the time for the appeals process for convicts on death row.”
This report from the UN Human Rights Commission is not likely to be noticed by much of the political power structure in the United States. The U.S. has a long record of recognizing those resolutions, reports and treaties of the UN that suit its political purposes and ignoring those that do not. Nevertheless, the report on the death penalty in the U.S. is a powerful document that serves to contradict the myth of the unassailable fairness of the U.S. justice system. The report shows that the death penalty is applied in arbitrary, discriminatory, and political ways. Its continued use in the United States belies that other myth of the United States as a shining beacon of enlightenment for the world.
The UN report can be downloaded from the world wide web page of the UN Commission on Human Rights, http://www.unhchr.ch
By Vicki Linton
May 1998
Volume 35 Number 4
When the UN Human Rights Commission released its most recent highly critical report on human Rights in Iraq, it received significant coverage in the New York Times, the Washington Post, and other national media. But another UN Human Rights Commission report released a few days later was not so welcome in the media. The report, scorned as well by the U.S. government, called on the United States to “stop executions until it can ensure that death penalty cases are administered fairly and impartially, in accordance with due process.”
The report was issued by the UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, Bacre Waly Ndiaye. Ndiaye visited the U.S. last fall and extensively examined the situation faced by those charged with capital crimes. He concluded that “in the United States, guarantees and safeguards, as well as specific restrictions on capital punishment, are not fully respected.”
The Rapporteur’s report is an extensive and well-documented expose of these conclusions. According to the report, the United States is not in accord with international treaties, specifically the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), as far as its implementation of the death penalty is concerned. The U.S. ratified the ICCPR with reservations.
The UN report expresses particular concern over the expansion of the use of the death penalty in the United States which is not only contrary to trends in the rest of the world toward the elimination of capital punishment, but in direct violation of the ICCPR. The ICCPR does not allow for the expanded use of the death penalty and expressly denies the reinstatement of the death penalty after it has been abolished. The report notes that states are “widening the scope of the death penalty,” and that the Federal Death Penalty Act of 1994 “expanded the federal death penalty to more than 50 new offenses.”
Only the U.S., Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and Yemen allow the execution of juveniles. According to the report, “International law prohibits the imposition of a death sentence on juvenile offenders (those who committed the crime while under 18 years of age).” The U.S. entered a reservation regarding the execution of juveniles when it ratified the ICCPR. Since the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976, nine juvenile offenders have been put to death.
The unfairness inherent in the death penalty is illustrated by the fact that, “defendants who receive a death sentence are not necessarily those who committed the most heinous crimes.” The Rapporteur notes that “many factors...influence the imposition of a death sentence” including “class, race and economic status, both of the victim and the defendant.” Among the factors cited in the report include the composition of the judiciary (for example in Alabama, “only one of the 67 elected district attorneys is...black”), election of judges (noting that “it is very difficult for a judge who has reservations regarding the death penalty to be re-elected”), and “prosecutorial discretion” which allows prosecutors to choose in which cases to seek the death penalty, increasing “the risk of arbitrariness” and bringing “a sense of unfairness” to the death penalty.
The jury selection process is noted with particular concern. Because peremptory challenges allow prosecutors to eliminate potential jurors without giving cause, race can be used as a factor in creating juries. The report notes two cases of black defendants in which all potential black jurors were eliminated in peremptory challenges and the defendants were tried by all white juries.
Also of concern is the fact that those opposed to the death penalty are removed from juries in capital cases. The report states, “the community can hardly be represented when those opposed to the death penalty or having reservations about it seem to be systematically excluded from sitting as jurors.”
The report details the problems defendants have in receiving adequate representation in the trial process, stating that having a competent lawyer is critical in protecting the rights of those charged with capital crimes. The report cites the case of Mumia Abu-Jamal in this regard, as well as the case of a gay man sentenced to death in Texas, whose lawyer accepted three jurors onto the jury who expressed “prejudice against homosexuals,” fell asleep during the trial, and “failed to object to the statement made by the prosecutor during the sentencing phase of the trial, according to which being sent to the penitentiary was not a very bad punishment for a homosexual.”
The report criticizes the elimination of funding for post-conviction defender organizations (PCDOs) which has left those sentenced to death with little recourse in appealing their sentences. It also notes the negative effects of the 1996 Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act which “was designed to shorten the time for the appeals process for convicts on death row.”
This report from the UN Human Rights Commission is not likely to be noticed by much of the political power structure in the United States. The U.S. has a long record of recognizing those resolutions, reports and treaties of the UN that suit its political purposes and ignoring those that do not. Nevertheless, the report on the death penalty in the U.S. is a powerful document that serves to contradict the myth of the unassailable fairness of the U.S. justice system. The report shows that the death penalty is applied in arbitrary, discriminatory, and political ways. Its continued use in the United States belies that other myth of the United States as a shining beacon of enlightenment for the world.
The UN report can be downloaded from the world wide web page of the UN Commission on Human Rights, http://www.unhchr.ch
