Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, April 26, 1990 TAG: 9004260387
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Los Angeles Times
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
But, if a little-noticed measure now pending in the Senate becomes law, the practical effect may be to abolish the death penalty nationwide.
That at least is the opinion of Attorney General Dick Thornburgh and the top law enforcement officials of about two dozen states.
The measure, known as the Racial Justice Act and sponsored by Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., was approved 7-6 by the Senate Judiciary Committee in October. A close vote is expected in the full Senate, probably within weeks.
The bill forbids imposing the death penalty in states in which statistics show that a "racially discriminatory pattern" exists in capital punishment cases. And the proposal would invalidate the death penalty whether the racial pattern involved a defendant directly or some other aspect of capital cases.
The latter is significant because statistical analyses have consistently yielded the same result: Those who murder whites are more likely to get a death sentence than those who murder blacks.
Statistics indicate the race of the murderer is not as clearly significant nationwide as the race of the victim. For the nation as a whole, a General Accounting Office study said, only equivocal evidence was found that the race of the offender had a strong effect on the imposition of the death penalty. There was, however, some evidence suggesting that, in some states, blacks are more likely to receive the death penalty than whites.
Under the proposed law's terms, a death row inmate could cite racial data in death penalty cases as a reason for having his sentence invalidated. It would then be up to the state to convince a federal judge through "clear and convincing evidence [that] pertinent non-racial factors" explain the statistical disparity.
The Senate committee report gave these examples:
If death penalties were imposed on black persons convicted of capital crimes far more frequently than on whites convicted of the same crimes, a racially discriminatory pattern would be presumed and prosecutors would have to demonstrate that non-racial factors accounted for the difference.
Equally, the report said, if evidence shows that 15 percent of all defendants charged with killing white persons receive the death penalty and only 1 percent of all defendants charged with killing black persons received the death penalty, then discrimination would be presumed. It would be up to prosecutors to prove that non-racial factors were involved.
State officials contend that they cannot meet such a test. It "would have the practical effect of abolishing capital punishment," Thornburgh and 23 state attorneys general said recently in letters to members of the Senate.
In a sharply worded response, civil rights leaders said they were "outraged by the cavalier attitude" of the state attorneys general. The measure is "designed to expose and eliminate racial bias in the application of the death penalty, not to eliminate the death penalty," they said.
"I'm shocked by their willingness to tolerate discrimination in the way that our criminal justice system metes out the most severe punishment," said Julius L. Chambers, director of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund.
Among those supporting the bill are the American Bar Association and the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights.
by CNB