Everything new, it used to be said, comes from California. Perhaps not everything, but a federal district court has just ruled that the death penalty as practiced in the Golden State is unconstitutional in light of the long, dreadful wait between sentencing and executions. Judges have hinted around this theme for years, but this is the first time I’ve heard an American judge actually grant such a claim. In the legal literature this is known as the death row phenomenon, or how extended stays on death row causes severe mental illness, debilitating physical impairments, and for some, the desire to commit suicide to end such horrible conditions. I, like very few reporters today, know a little something about death row. I spent almost 30 years on it.
Certainly, under international law, this symptom is recognized and has, for decades, been the basis of relief and the removal of the death sentence. Now, an American judge has decided that such extended delays on death row constitutes a violation of the Eighth Amendment: forbidding cruel and unusual punishments. Soon it will make its way to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, and thereafter we shall see what we shall see. From imprisoned nation, this is Mumia Abu Jamal.
These commentaries are recorded by Noel Hanrahan of Prison Radio.
