Female journalist told skirt too short when reporting on Alabama execution

[BoSoxGal]

Here’s the article https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... -execution

It took them three hours to find a vein into which to pump the lethal drug cocktail.

But hot damn we can’t have any knees showing in the gallery while we’re torturing and murdering in the name of the state.


USA is warped. Honestly the more I think the more I just cannot deny we are a profoundly sick and violent society with seriously messed up values.

[Burning Petard]

Nina Simone was an expert on the Southland. Her song is called Mississippi god dam, but in the lyrics she includes Alabama.

snailgate

[Joe Guy]

Any dress code rules for watching someone get killed should be pointed out prior the actual day. This journalist's experience almost makes the prison officials look stupid, misogynistic and unprofessional.

I say "almost" because they may have previously been declared to be stupid, misogynistic and unprofessional. In that case, their behavior would already be a matter of record and need not be reaffirmed.

[Bicycle Bill]

But hot damn we can’t have any knees showing in the gallery while we’re torturing and murdering in the name of the state.

This was not "torture and murder".  It was the long-delayed levying of a sentence imposed after Mr. James had been found guilty by a jury of his peers in a court of law.  The sentence was handed down in accordance to the laws of the land, laws that are passed by representatives of the people (which means if you don't like 'em, elect representatives who will change them).  And undoubtedly the condemned man filed numerous appeals, all of which were apparently denied for cause.

Remember too that Mr. James was being executed almost thirty years after the 1994 killing — and here's where the word 'murder' is appropriate — of a twenty-six year old woman who 'rejected' him.  My sentiment is, good riddance to bad rubbish.  It's just too bad that it took this long to get rid of the trash.

-"BB"-

[Big RR]

And undoubtedly the condemned man filed numerous appeals, all of which were apparently denied for cause.

If he did, those appeals are also done in accordance with the same "laws of the land" that outlawed his conduct that he was convicted of and his ultimate execution, so? That's the way the system works (and IMHO this se especially important when the state is to take a life, whatever he did).

And FWIW, I imagine 30 years on death row is probably much worse torture than 3 hours of trying to find a usable vein; I imagine they could have done some sort of cut down to expose a deeper vein, but then that might require medical personnel (likely doctors) who would not want to participate in th ending of a life. But these are the things we must deal with when we decide to give the state the absolute right to end a life.

[MGMcAnick]

My guess is that the woman he killed didn't enjoy being killed either.

If we went back to good old fashioned hangings, there would no problem finding necks with nooses.

[Jarlaxle]

How many innocent people are you willing to kill to sate your blood lust?

[Bicycle Bill]

How many innocent people are you willing to kill to sate your blood lust?

Oh, probably the same number of innocent schoolkids, churchgoers, night-clubbers, and concert patrons the NRA and the ammosexuals ask us to accept as collateral damage — if it means they don't gotta give up their AR-15s and other implements of death, devastation, and destruction.

-"BB"-

[Jarlaxle]

Deflection. How many people are you willing to wrongly execute to sate your bloodlust?

[Bicycle Bill]

Deflection. How many people are you willing to wrongly execute to sate your bloodlust?

Sorry ... I inadvertently omitted two little words, and your reading comprehension skills aren't good enough to have figured it out.
Take two:   "... probably the same as the number of innocent schoolkids, churchgoers, night-clubbers, and concert patrons ..."

Now do you understand?

-"BB"-

[Econoline]

Okay then, Bill. So...killing innocent people is fine, as long as it's done by the government. Right. Got it.

And the reason why it's sometimes bad and sometimes fine...?

[MajGenl.Meade]

that might require medical personnel (likely doctors) who would not want to participate in th(e) ending of a life

[Bicycle Bill]

Okay then, Bill. So...killing innocent people is fine, as long as it's done by the government. Right. Got it.

And the reason why it's sometimes bad and sometimes fine...?

Hey... accidents and mistakes happen all the time.

And while there may have been exceptions in the past, of course, I feel it's safe to say that everyone who has been legally put to death by the government since Gary Gilmore said, "Let's do it" in Utah in 1976 has had more than ample opportunity to initially plead their case, appeal their conviction and sentence post trial, or otherwise try to prove that the police, prosecutor, and the prisons had the wrong person.  Not to mention that in this day of security and surveillance cameras just about everywhere — not to mention the ubiquitous video-capable smartphones, graphic and incontrovertible proof is becoming more and more common.

-"BB"-

[Jarlaxle]

Going to answer the question now?

[MajGenl.Meade]

more than ample opportunity to initially plead their case, appeal their conviction and sentence post trial, or otherwise try to prove that the police, prosecutor, and the prisons had the wrong person.

Remedial law reminder: the accused has no need to prove anything. The burden is on the prosecution to prove guilt.

Now when the prosecution cheats, lies, hides evidence, manufactures evidence and persuades even a reasonable person such as me that BB "did it", then it doesn't matter that 10 years after BB was executed it turns out that he was, after all, innocent.

You'd be quite content that these executed people turned out to be innocent? And what about all those sentenced to life or long prison terms (because the death penalty was no longer legal) who have been exonerated and set free years and years later. You would prefer they were found innocent years after they were executed?

1989 The Wrong Carlos: Anatomy of a Wrongful Execution, describes the faulty eyewitness testimony, the police’s failure to investigate Carlos Hernandez, and the misrepresentations by the prosecution that “the other Carlos” DeLuna claimed committed the killing was “a phantom,” while one of the prosecutors knew of Hernandez’s existence and his criminal history. Hernandez and DeLuna looked so similar that their own families mistook photos of the men for each other.

2020 Nathaniel Woods was sentenced in 2005 to death after a non-unanimous jury sentencing recommendation in August 2005 for the killings of three Alabama police officers. His case featured several hallmarks of wrongful conviction: official misconduct, coerced informant testimony, and racial discrimination.

Prosecutors acknowledged that Woods’ co-defendant, Kerry Spencer, shot the officers in an incident in a drug house. Spenser, who received a life sentence in his trial, has consistently maintained that he shot the officers in self-defense, after they had beaten Woods during a shakedown and then pointed a gun at Spenser. Knowing he was not the shooter, prosecutors offered Woods a plea deal for 20-25 years, but Woods’ lawyer advised him not to take it, misinforming him that he could not be convicted of capital murder as an accomplice. After Woods, who is Black, turned down the plea deal, prosecutors for the first time claimed that he had been the mastermind of a plan to kill the three white officers because he supposedly hated police. In support of that new theory, they presented testimony from Woods’ girlfriend that he purportedly had made comments about his hatred of police. But even before the trial, she recanted that statement, saying police had threatened to charge her with parole violations if she did not testify. At trial, the court refused to allow the defense to present evidence of police misconduct.

Spencer called Woods “100 percent innocent.” “Nate ain’t done nothing,” he said. “All he did that day was get beat up and he ran.”

Missouri prosecutors tried Walter Barton (executed 2020) five times for the brutal 1991 stabbing death of 81-year-old Gladys Kuehler. Twice, Barton’s convictions and death sentences were overturned because of prosecutorial misconduct. Two other times, the trials ended in mistrials.

Barton was one of three people, along with a neighbor and Kuehler’s granddaughter, Debbie Selvidge, who discovered her body. He consistently maintained that he pulled Selvidge away from Kuehler’s body, getting droplets of Kuehler’s blood on his clothes. His conviction rested on junk science testimony that small blood stains on his clothes had been “impact stains” from “high velocity” blood spatter, which the prosecution argued occurred while Barton was purportedly stabbing Kuehler. However, a 2015 analysis by crime scene analyst Lawrence Renner concluded that the bloodstains on Barton’s clothes were actually “transfer stains,” likely caused by contact with other bloodstains. Kuehler had been stabbed 50 times, and Renner said that the perpetrator of such a grizzly murder would have been covered in the victim’s blood. Prior to his execution, three jurors who had voted to convict Barton signed affidavits saying that the new analysis of evidence from the case would have affected their guilt-stage deliberations.

In 2015, the Justice Department and the FBI formally acknowledged that nearly every examiner in an FBI forensic squad overstated forensic hair matches for two decades before the year 2000. Of the 28 forensic examiners testifying to hair matches in a total of 268 trials reviewed, 26 overstated the evidence of forensic hair matches and 95% of the overstatements favored the prosecution. Defendants were sentenced to death in 32 of those 268 cases.

[BoSoxGal]

A decade or so ago Frontline/Pro Publica did a special on forensic science in the USA. I was literally sick to my stomach after I watched it. It played a large part in shifting my thinking toward exiting the criminal justice system - it was simply devastating. Since watching it I’ve read volumes on the subjects covered and looked at dozens of cases of wrongful convictions.

They have since done a similar expose on the so-called science behind shaken baby syndrome, a methodology still being taught to prosecutors nationally but which has been largely discredited now by science - despite there being a cohort of physicians and pathologists so invested in it (their careers having been made on it) that it continues to put innocent parents and caregivers behind bars unjustly, for deaths that are more often than not simply the result of illness or accident.

The foundations of criminal investigations for decades which have now been discredited either fully or significantly:

Fingerprint evidence
Hair follicle comparison evidence
Bite mark comparison evidence
Fiber comparison evidence
Blood spatter analysis evidence
Arson analysis evidence

and the least reliable of all yet most trusted by jurors,
Eyewitness testimony evidence

There are many shocking cases of egregious wrongful convictions that we could discuss concerning this issue, but the case of Cameron Todd Willingham is proof positive that we have executed innocent people for deaths that weren’t even crimes, just horrible accidents.

Anyone who supports the death penalty in the face of modern understanding of broken policing, broken prosecuting and the faulty truth of the body of forensic ‘science’ employed by state investigators has either a deep streak of cruelty or a deep vein of profound stupidity.

[BoSoxGal]

https://youtu.be/91GbKc0ijHU

The Child Cases covers the faulty science of shaken baby syndrome and is accessible via PBS website for free. Death by Fire covers the case of wrongfully convicted and executed Cameron Todd Willingham for the deaths of his children who perished when a likely small appliance (portable heater) fire started in their bedroom - this episode also available via PBS website for free.

I really feel like anybody who isn’t willing to watch those programs and consider the plethora of publications from law journals to medical journals to science journals that address the serious issues with the competency of so called forensic experts whose testimony has convicted thousands of people many tens of thousands of people just doesn’t have a foot to stand on stating an opinion on whether we should put people to death in our criminal injustice system.

[BoSoxGal]

And by the way, DNA evidence isn’t 100% reliable, either - though many jurors think it is.

https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/arti ... testing-2/

[Big RR]

And by the way, DNA evidence isn’t 100% reliable, either - though many jurors think it is.

https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/arti ... testing-2/

Well, OJ showed that; there are a lot of ways, fair and unfair, to attack it. But in the end, even if it were 100% reliable (which it is not) its reliability is still based on how the evidence is collected and handled.

[ex-khobar Andy]

DNA evidence can be close to 100% - and bear in mind that the number usually quoted for 'beyond a reasonable doubt' is 95% - if properly carried out, if the sample is protected from contamination, and if the sample integrity is maintained. And most cops do not have the understanding of the procedures necessary to protect the samples from all sources of contamination. You might recall a little case from 27 years ago - I was pretty sure the guy was guilty but the handing of the DNA samples was downright shoddy and if I had been on the jury and based on what I read, I would have voted 'not guilty' because the prosecution did not prove their case.

Sorry I started writing this a couple of hours ago and got sidetracked and only just now posted it, I see that BigRR has posted substantially the same comment.