200 Executions and Counting: Texas Gov. Rick Perry's Cruel Death Tally

By Liliana Segura, AlterNet. Posted June 2, 2009.

"Lingering questions about the physical evidence against Newton prompted the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles to recommend, and Gov. Rick Perry to grant, a 120-day reprieve for Newton on Dec. 1, 2004 -- the day she was last scheduled for execution," Smith reported. But a mishandling of the evidence by the Harris County crime lab made it impossible to reconsider new evidence of her innocence; despite the fact that there was "even more doubt about Newton's guilt than there was when she was granted the stay."

On Sept. 1, 2005 Newton’s execution went forward, with her mother and sisters watching, as well as her parents-in-law, who on Aug. 25 wrote to the Texas Board of Pardons and Parole: "We never wanted to see Frances get executed. ... When the trial occurred, nobody from the [DA's] office ever asked ... our opinion. We were willing to testify on Frances' behalf, but Frances' defense lawyer never approached us. ... We do not wish to suffer the loss of another family member."

The Lone Star State versus International Law

More recently, last summer Perry declined to grant a stay of execution in the case of José Medellin, a Mexican national who was sent to death row when he was 18 on rape and murder charges. Medellin, who was jailed in 1993, was kept ignorant of his right to talk to a consular official at the time of his arrest -- a right bestowed on him by the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations.

According to Amnesty International, "because of this treaty violation, José Medellín was deprived of the extensive assistance that Mexico provides for the defense of its citizens facing capital charges in the USA. The Mexican Consulate did not learn about the case until nearly four years after José Medellín’s arrest, by which time his trial and the initial appeal affirming his conviction and death sentence had already concluded."

Aside from becoming a major diplomatic flap between the U.S. and Mexico, the Medellin case eventually reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled in March 2008 that the United States was obligated by international law to comply with an International Court of Justice decision that the U.S. provide judicial "review and reconsideration” of the convictions of some 50 Mexican nationals on death row in the United States. This did little to help Medellin however.

"Even President Bush, who signed scores of death warrants as Texas governor, concurred some time ago that the United States must honor its international obligations in this case," Amnesty International’s Larry Cox said in the run-up to Medellin’s execution. "There will be no clearer sign that Texas will have gone beyond the pale than if José Medellin's execution goes forward." Not surprisingly, Texas did just that, killing Medellin on Aug. 5, 2008.

"Texans are doing just fine governing Texas," Perry once said in response to pressure from the European Union to stop the execution of a man who did not commit the murder for which he was sentenced to death. (That man, Kenneth Foster, Jr., was later spared, in a historic move due entirely to an activist campaign to save his life.) That Perry would not hesitate to execute a foreign national in violation of international law should come as no surprise.

What’s the Matter With Texas?

As with George W. Bush's tenure, whole volumes could be written on Perry and the death sentences carried out in Texas under his watch; but perhaps the most salient question at the end of the day is why. Why -- especially at a time when much of the rest of the country (indeed, the world) is turning its back on the death penalty -- does Texas continue to carry out executions at such a disturbingly frantic pace?

What is it about Texas that it breeds such figures as Judge Sharon Keller, who, on the day the Supreme Court decided to hear a landmark case on the constitutionality of lethal injection, refused to allow a last-minute appeal filed by attorneys trying to save the life of a client scheduled to die that night because, in her words, "We close at 5"?

"Executions in the U.S. have become largely a Southern practice," says Scott Cobb. "Last year, 95 percent of all executions were in the South. It is the legacy of the Old South and its history of slavery, lynchings and segregation that is the reason why the South executes so many people compared to other parts of the U.S.

See more stories tagged with: texas, death penalty, george w. bush, rick perry, capital punishment, timothy cole, terry lee hankins, napolean beazely, frances newton, cameron todd willingham, ronald mock, texas board of pardons

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