The death penalty is always inhumane, and the past few days in Texas have brought to light some of its most worrisome aspects.

On Wednesday, The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles recommended that Robert Thompson’s death sentence for his role in a 1996 robbery and shooting be commuted to life imprisonment. The shooter, Sammy Butler, was convicted and received life in prison, which raises serious questions about the arbitrary nature of how the death penalty works in real life. Why wait until the last minute to discuss the disproportionality of sentencing the accomplice to death while the man who pulled the trigger is sentenced to life in prison?

Earlier this week a federal judge in Houston granted a last-minute stay to Gerald Eldridge, allowing 90 days for a review of his mental state and capacity. Executing the mentally ill is extremely problematic, and the time to deal with such a serious issue is not during a prisoner’s last meal. Such jarring, nerve-wracking changes at the last second are traumatic for everyone involved, including the victims’ families.

Also this week, Danielle Simpson requested that his sentence be commuted to life in prison or that he be given a  180-day reprieve to appeal his case. Frustrated with life behind bars, Simpson had previously stated that he did not want to wait around to be executed, and so was considered a “volunteer.” Despite the alarming injustice of denying someone who has given up on appealing a death sentence a chance to reconsider, and despite claims that he suffered from “debilitating mental illness,” his requests were denied and Simpson was executed Wednesday evening. He thus became the 29th “volunteer” Texas has executed (around 6 and a half percent of all Texas executions), and the 134th “volunteer” executed in the US since the resumption of executions in 1977 (representing over 11 % of all executions).

As the week draws to a close, all eyes will be on Texas Governor Rick Perry as he decides the fate of Robert Thompson. Please contact Governor Perry and urge him to follow the advice of Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles by commuting Thompson’s sentence to life in prison.

UPDATE:  Governor Perry rejected the recommendation of the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles, and the execution of Robert Thompson was carried out as scheduled.

AIUSA activists in Chicago demand the release of Internally Displaced People in Sri Lanka. November 2009. (c) AI

Across the U.S., from Boston to Chicago to San Francisco, Amnesty International activists are demanding:  “Unlock the camps in Sri Lanka!”

As the 26-year-old war between the Sri Lankan government and the opposition Tamil Tigers ended this past May, about 280,000 Tamil civilians fleeing the fighting were put in overcrowded, military-run camps which they were not allowed to leave.  The Sri Lankan government said that the civilians first had to be screened to determine if any of them were Tiger fighters.  Amnesty International has pointed out that this constitutes arbitrary detention and violates the civilians’ right to freedom of movement.

Although some civilians have been released from the camps, around 150,000 still remain and camp shelters have deteriorated as Sri Lanka has entered the rainy season.

Amnesty’s “Unlock the Camps” campaign calls on the Sri Lankan government to let civilians leave the camps if they wish, to put the camps under civilian (not military) management, and to allow aid agencies full access to the camps.

Earlier this month, AIUSA members gathered in Boston and San Franscisco signed petitions and postcards demanding that the Sri Lankan government “Unlock the Camps!”

Activists in San Francisco sign petitions to urge the Sri Lankan government to release IDPs. November 2009. (c) AI

Today, it was Chicago’s turn.  I joined activists from the AIUSA Chicago office and demonstrated in downtown Chicago.  Despite the rain and wind, we made our voices heard.  One man signing the petition told us that he had just returned from Sri Lanka and didn’t think anyone in the U.S. cared about what was going on there.  We were happy to show him that he was wrong.

Also today, AIUSA sent a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asking  the U.S. government to publicly express concern about the treatment of the displaced civilians.  The campaign was also publicized in a college paper today.

We’ll keep campaigning for the displaced civilians until their rights are restored.  Please join our campaign and add your voice.

Caught between a legal requirement to avoid cruelty, and its desire to kill prisoners, the state of Ohio is struggling to find an acceptable method of execution following the botched, and failed, attempt to put Romell Broom to death on September 15.  As reported in today’s New York Times, the method the state has chosen is injection into the vein of a single, lethal dose of anesthetic.  This seems peculiar, since it was failure to find a suitable vein that led to the botched executions of Joseph Clark and Christopher Newton, as well as the recent Broom fiasco.

In the new Ohio protocol, another alternative, intramuscular injection, is available as a backup.  This method has not been used before, but was given the thumbs up by Massachusetts anesthesiologist Dr. Mark Dershwitz, the one doctor in America who seems willing to help states kill prisoners.  A local Ohio doctor, Jonathan Groner, seems to disagree, suggesting that legal challenges are far from over.  “In the end this is still about killing people.”

It is indeed, and if this protocol proves acceptable to Ohio and federal courts, the lethal injection of Kenneth Biros and others could be back on schedule (the stay of Biros’ December 8 date is only temporary), and Ohio’s one-a-month assembly line of executions could be back in business.

This posting is part of our Write-a-Thon Cases Series. For more information visit www.amnestyusa.org/writeathon/

Mohammed Mohammed Hassan Odaini © Private

Despite having been cleared for release more than four years ago, twenty-six-year-old Mohammed Mohammed Hassan Odaini remains detained in Guántanamo. Odaini was sent to the detention center at the U.S Naval Base in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba in March 2002 along with fourteen other Yemeni nationals, all of whom were turned over by Pakistani police. In June 2005, U.S. authorities declared Odani suitable for release from Guantánamo. Yemeni authorities are prepared to take him back, however he continues to be detained without reason. He has not been interrogated for nearly two years and the reason for his continued detention is unclear.

Participate in this year’s Amnesty International annual Global Write-a-thon and help free Mohammed Mohammed Hassan Odaini by writing a letter on his behalf to the Commander of the Joint Task Force Guantánamo. Be one of the thousands of individuals asking why Odaini and fellow detainees remain detained despite being cleared for release. By putting pressure on the Commander now, we hope to help release Odaini and fellow Yemenis and enable them to go back to Yemen. Writing a letter could not only help Mr. Odaini but the other detainees currently being unlawfully held in Guantánamo.

By Morgan Brescia, AIUSA Campaign for Individuals at Risk

The Obama administration’s decision to refer a further five GTMO detainees, including self-proclaimed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, for trial federal court in New York City is a small but significant victory for the rule of law.

Carrie Lemack, whose mother was killed on board one the planes flown into the World Trade Center, welcomed the transfer telling the BBC:

“At the end of the day my mother and nearly three thousand others were murdered. And they deserve the right to have a trial of their murders and their families, me, my sister, so many other families of 9/11, deserve our day in court to hold to account those who did these terrible offenses.”

Yet this decision has predictably provoked a backlash from right-wing Republicans who can’t seem to help themselves when the opportunity for fear-mongering presents itself. Indeed, the Republican Party is proving to be one of Osama bin Laden’s most consistent boosters.

Rudy Giuliani was one of many Republican politicians to make the pilgrimage to Fox News to denounce the decision.  The former mayor said that bringing KSM to New York would be “repeating the mistake of history” and he accused the Obama administration of adopting a “pre-9/11 approach” to fighting terrorists.

Rather odd since this is the selfsame Giuliani who hailed the conviction of the aspirant 9/11 hijacker Zacarias Moussaoui in federal court in May 2006 by telling reporters: “The greater value is demonstrating what America is like. America won tonight.” Poor Rudy, he seems a bit confused.

Carrie Lemack and Rudy 2006 have a powerful point, one President Obama himself recently underscored in his eulogy to the victims of the Fort Hood shootings:

“We are a nation of laws whose commitment to justice is so enduring that we would treat a gunman and give him due process, just as surely as we will see that he pays for his crimes.”

Being a nation of laws is no small thing. The rule of law is the foundation on which our way of life is built. It commands respect. Without the rule of law the constitution would, as John J. McCloy famously remarked, be just a scrap of paper.

It is the rule of law that has made America what it is and we set it aside at our peril. That is why the transfer of five terrorist suspects to the federal courts is such a good thing.

It also why the referral of five other cases to the reconstituted Military Commissions is such a mistake. Of particular concern is the referral of Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri’s case. Al-Nashiri is alleged to have been the leader of the successful plot to bomb the USS Cole in 2000, in which 17 US sailors were killed.

The USS Cole bombing occurred prior to the apparent start of the Global War on Terror or the passage of the Congressional Authorization for the Use of Military Force, which begs the question of whether or not Military Commissions have any logical jurisdiction over the case. Furthermore, the Cole bombing was investigated by the FBI and federal prosecutors making the federal courts a practical venue as well.

The families of the USS Cole victims have been particularly outspoken in their criticism of President Obama’s national security policies and it is difficult to escape the conclusion that in this instance the administration simply decided to sacrifice principle to political expediency.

And that’s the problem. The Military Commissions are political courts. They exist to ensure convictions in cases where there is insufficient evidence to take to a real court. This is not justice and Commission judgments will lack any legitimacy. And once again we will have allowed the unscrupulous fear-mongers among us to undermine American values and hand Al Qaeda another propaganda victory.

A new report released by New York’s City Bar Justice Center opens a window not only to the problems of immigrants being held in the Varick Federal Detention Center, but also profiles the problems rampant throughout the US immigration system.  The report describes the Know Your Rights Project – a joint effort of the City Bar Justice Center, the Legal Aid Society and the American Immigration Lawyers’ Association NYC Chapter Pro Bono Committee.  158 interviews were conducted from December 2008 to July 2009, by pro bono attorneys providing legal counsel to immigrants detained at Varick Federal Detention Center.

While sometimes stark and startling, the results reported in the City Bar Justice’s publication are not an isolated circumstance, but rather a case study of an all too common phenomenon.  As Amnesty International has reported on and advocated against for several years, and even the United States Council on Foreign Relations Task Force on US Immigration Policy has admitted, the United States immigration system is not merely flawed—it is broken.

The report presents compiled findings and identifies trends among the 158 people interviewed.  Notably among the results are that 39.2% of the detainees that the Project interviewed had possible claims for relief from removal—that they could appeal their cases and be released from detention and not deported.

However, at the same time, the report states that almost none of the detained immigrants interviewed had any knowledge of the legal provisions under which they may be able to present their claims for relief from removal.  While a legal library is available at Varick, most immigrants do not have adequate access to the facility, nor are they able to adequately navigate the intricate legal web in which they are caught in order to effectively represent their case on a pro se basis  (without a lawyer).  Only 10% of the immigrants interviewed qualified for a bond under the law as it is currently written, and only 1% were able to pay their bonds.  Often immigrants are detained much longer than necessary, with detention terms stretching on for weeks, months, even years.

The New York Times article “Immigrant Jail Tests U.S. View of Legal Access,” by Nina Burnstein run on November 1, 2009, chronicling the history of and conditions in the Varick Facility.  According to the article, Varick is run by an Alaska Native Corporation, Ahtna.  It profiles individual cases of immigrants detained at Varick, and describes some of their trials and tribulations as they attempt to navigate the legal and political quagmire in which they find themselves.  It shows a personal side of the story the NYC Know Your Rights Project report.

The findings of this report and of the recent New York Times article do not represent isolated events at Varick.  Amnesty International’s 2009 report, Jailed Without Justice:  Immigration Detention in the USA  explains the widespread flaws in the US immigration detention system and calls for a number of key policy recommendations.  In February 2009, the US Council on Foreign Relations Task Force on Immigration Policy released a publication chronicling similar problems in the immigration system and made recommendations to Congress for comprehensive immigration reform, closely mirroring the Amnesty International Report regarding recommendations on immigration detention.  Among them are similar recommendations made in the NYC Know Your Rights Project report, including providing alternatives to detention, such as affordable bonds, reporting requirements, or electronic monitoring ankle bracelets; and the need to make legal council available to every immigrant in custody.

As case studies such as Varick continue to emerge they underscore the fact that the United States is in dire need for detention reform.  Legislation is beginning to hit the floor, including the Immigration Oversight and Fairness Act (HR 1215)  and Robert Menendez’s two bills in the Senate, the Protect Citizens and Residents from Unlawful Detention Act (S.1549) and the Strong STANDARDS Act (S.1550).   However, with bigger, louder debates raging around health care, the very real danger exists that issue of immigration—like many immigrants to the US—will be pushed aside, locked in a veritable political and legislative jail to be dealt with at an undetermined date in the future.

Joanna B. Hurlburt, AIUSA Refugee and Migrant Rights, contributed to this post.

UPDATE:  Virginia Governor Tim Kaine has denied John Muhammad’s request for clemency.

This evening Texas and Virginia, the two most prolific executing states in the USA, are both slated to carry out lethal injections.  Texas has scheduled an execution for Yosvanis Valle – a Cuban national – while Virginia is preparing to put to death John Allen Muhammad, known by most simply as the “DC sniper”.  The crimes for which John Muhammad is known inflicted serious trauma not just on the victims  and their families but on the entire Washington DC area.

But we at Amnesty International oppose the death penalty in all cases without exception.  Like torture, the deliberate killing of prisoners is a fundamental violation of human rights.  No human being, no matter how unsympathetic or how heinous the crimes for which he has been convicted, should ever be subjected to the kind of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment that both torture and executions represent.  There are lines that we as a society should simply not cross, or lines that we should not cede to our governments the power to cross.  And there have to be better ways to respond to traumatic crimes than with violations of basic human rights.

Beyond these human rights concerns, there are some other issues that make the execution of John Muhammad problematic.  Evidence of severe mental illness was not presented to the jury during the sentencing phase of his trial.  Virginia Governor Tim Kaine has been presented with this evidence and could still recommend clemency on that basis. 

If both these execution do proceed as scheduled, they will be the 44th and 45th executions in the country this year.  Yet also this year, 9 men have been exonerated from US death rows.  That means that for every 5 people executed, one person has been found innocent of the crime for which he was sentenced to die.  That’s a spectacular failure rate for a system that employs an irreversible punishment.  This year also saw the revelation that in 2004 Texas executed Cameron Todd Willingham for setting a fire that, as it turns out, was probably not arson at all.  The fact is, as long as our criminal justice system is run by fallible human beings, mistakes will continue to be made, and along with punishing the guilty and the “worst of the worst”, we will also be sentencing to death, and occasionally even executing, the innocent.

Earlier today an Italian court convicted in absentia twenty-two CIA officers and a colonel in the US Air Force of charges relating to the February 2003 kidnapping of Muslim cleric Osama Moustafa Hassan Nasr aka Abu Omar.

Abu Omar was a victim of the extraordinary rendition program established by the Clinton administration and greatly expanded under President George W. Bush in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.

He was snatched off the street in Milan and flown secretly to Cairo where he was handed off to Egyptian security officials. Abu Omar was tortured extensively in Egyptian custody. He was finally released without charge in 2007.

The Italian decision is a graphic illustration of just how damaging practices such as kidnapping and torture are to America’s national security.

Armando Spataro, the deputy Milan public prosecutor, told reporters:

“This decision sends a clear message to all governments that even in the fight against terrorism you can’t forsake the basic rights of our democracies.”

Yet, the Obama administration has given no commitment to end the practice of extraordinary rendition. Indeed, the administration has asserted that this is an option that it plans to retain as part of its counterterrorism strategy.

This is a terrible mistake. Continuing these practices will inevitably have a chilling effect on other countries’ willingness to work with the United States until they can be sure that America will no longer operate as a rogue nation outside the law.

Two Italian intelligence officers were also convicted for their roles in the Abu Omar abduction and it is hard to imagine that this lesson has been lost on counterterrorism officials in other western countries.

These policies are toxic. We gain nothing but shame from them. There is no upside. Extraordinary rendition famously produced the false intelligence that linked Iraq to Al Qaeda and helped precipitate the rush to war in Iraq perhaps the biggest counterterrorism blunder of this, or any, decade.

The United States shouldn’t need a foreign court to distinguish right from wrong. The Obama administration must repudiate the unlawful practice of extraordinary rendition – and hold accountable those responsible for having put this system in place — or his administration will end up as tarnished as his predecessor’s.

Aterciopelados at UN concert ©AI

The Colombian rock group Aterciopelados performed last week at the UN Day Concert: A Tribute to Peacekeeping, as they performed their hit song ‘The Price of Silence’ at the ceremony in New York this past Friday, October 23rd. The UN Day Concert event was put together by the non-profit organization, Culture Project to commemorate the anniversary of the United Nations charter, focusing on its most crucial purpose of peacekeeping. The event featured live music performances and documentary clips, appearances by the Aterciopelados, CNN’s Isha Sesay, Roberta Flack, Lang Lang, Harry Belafonte, , Angelique Kidjo, former child soldier Emmanuel Jal, and Sister Fa. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon made an introductory statement at the event and then stayed for the show.

Aterciopelados were invited because of their contribution and participation with  Amnesty International campaigns, since late 2008. They participated in a collaborative performance with singers from all over the world for a human rights anthem ‘The price of silence’, inspired by an Aterciopelados song called “Protest Song” from their album Oye, Latin Grammy winner.

In a recent interview on NPR, former Texas Governor Mark White discussed his lack of faith in the ability of the legal system to reliably handle death penalty cases, and emphasized the seriousness of handing down an irreversible sentence to a person who may later be proven innocent. While he was Governor, he oversaw a significant number of executions, but White now believes that: ”What I see in retrospect is that our system is not as foolproof as I think it should be in order to carry out a punishment that’s irreversible.”

White also stated that he has never believed in the death penalty as a deterrent, because: “Obviously, with 400 people on death row, there’s at least 400 people up there that didn’t deter.”

As Amnesty International observed, Governor White’s evolution on this question is part of a national trend: “As advances in DNA and forensic science have revealed the extent to which our criminal justice system is prone to error, judges, jurors, the public, and even some politicians, have begun to question the wisdom of resorting to capital punishment.”

White’s statements (he’s a Democrat) also come at a particularly bad time for current Governor Rick Perry, who, in the middle of a re-election campaign, is now being scrutinized for his role in the execution of Cameron Todd Willingham, who appears to have been innocent and wrongly put to death.

In the past, you would only pay a political price if you didn’t support the death penalty strongly enough.  But in Texas, as everywhere else in the U.S., times have changed, and it would be quite something if the most prolific executing Governor in modern history wound up suffering politically because he supported the death penalty too much.