On The Front Lines
John W. Whitehead Joins Distinguished National Committee to Release Updated Guiding Principles for Reform of Death Penalty Systems
WASHINGTON -- On Wednesday, February 1, 2006, John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute, and other members of a bipartisan, blue-ribbon Death Penalty Initiative released an updated set of guiding principles for reform of death penalty systems in the United States. Timed to correspond with an important death penalty hearing in the Senate Judiciary Constitution, Civil Rights and Property Rights Subcommittee, Mandatory Justice: The Death Penalty Revisited, which was issued by the Constitution Project, examines problems and solutions relevant to all capital punishment systems in the United States. A copy of the complete report and a shorter summary version are available.
The death penalty has received significant attention in recent months and years as problems with accuracy and fairness have surfaced repeatedly. New biological testing methods have exonerated many people previously convicted of capital crimes; serious mistakes and even misconduct in crime labs have called trial results into question; and continued problems with the quality of and resources for defense services plague many state systems. In Mandatory Justice: The Death Penalty Revisited, the Death Penalty Initiative committee, of which John W. Whitehead is a member, moves beyond philosophical differences about the death penalty itself, instead identifying specific improvements that can address some of these problems and ultimately serve all stakeholders in the system. The Constitution Project, renowned for its ability to move beyond politics and find broad political consensus on some of the most complicated constitutional and policy questions facing our nation today, once again provides a common-sense road map for reform. Established in 2000, the Constitution Project's Death Penalty Initiative was motivated by a "profound concern that, in recent years and around the country, procedural safeguards and other assurances of fundamental fairness in the administration of capital punishment have been revealed to be deeply flawed." The Death Penalty Initiative committee is co-chaired by the Honorable Charles F. Baird, the Honorable Gerald Kogan, and Beth A. Wilkinson, Esq. Judge Baird is a former judge on the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals; Justice Kogan is a former Chief Justice of the Florida Supreme Court and the former Chief Prosecutor, Homicide and Capital Crimes Division, of Dade County, Florida; and Ms. Wilkinson was a prosecutor in the Oklahoma City bombing case. The Initiative is guided by a professionally and ideologically diverse committee of experts and leaders that is comprised of current and former FBI officials, state attorneys general, religious leaders, victims of crime, and academics in addition to other experts and community leaders. Information about the Constitution Project is available at www. constitutionproject.org.
