Posted on 10/09/2007 9:46:25 AM PDT by uxbridge
To put it bluntly, Texas wants President Bush to get out of the way of the state's plan to execute a Mexican for the brutal killing of two teenage girls.
Bush, who presided over 152 executions as governor of Texas, wants to halt the execution of Jose Ernesto Medellin in what has become a confusing test of presidential power that the Supreme Court, which hears the case this week, ultimately will sort out.
The president wants to enforce a decision by the International Court of Justice that found the convictions of Medellin and 50 other Mexican-born prisoners violated their rights to legal help as outlined in the 1963 Vienna Convention.
That is the same court Bush has since said he plans to ignore if it makes similar decisions affecting state criminal laws.
"The president does not agree with the ICJ's interpretation of the Vienna Convention," the administration said in arguments filed with the court. This time, though, the U.S. agreed to abide by the international court's decision because ignoring it would harm American interests abroad, the government said.
Texas argues that neither the international court nor Bush has any say in Medellin's case.
Medellin was born in Mexico but spent much of his childhood in the United States. He was 18 in June 1993, when he and other members of the Black and Whites gang in Houston encountered two teenage girls on a railroad trestle.
The girls were gang-raped and strangled. Their bodies were found four days later.
Medellin was arrested a few days later. He was told he had a right to remain silent and have a lawyer present, but the police did not tell him that he could request assistance from the Mexican Consulate.
Medellin gave a written confession. He was convicted of murder in the course of a sexual assault, a capital offense in Texas. A judge sentenced him to death in October 1994.
Medellin did not raise the lack of assistance from Mexican diplomats during his trial or sentencing. When he did claim his rights had been violated, Texas and federal courts turned him down because he had not objected at his trial. Mexico later sued the United States in the International Court of Justice in The Hague on behalf of Medellin and 50 other Mexicans on death row in the U.S.
I’d vote for him.
State’s rights, Bush needs to shut up.
LOL!! Me too, come to think of it! ;o)
Our leaders won't do that. We can bitch and moan till hell freezes over but until they repeal it-it ain't gonna happen.
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The first step towards withdrawing from the United Nations would require the repeal of the UN Participation Act outright. Repeal would require the closing of the U.S. mission to the UN, and the withdrawal of all U.S. government delegations. The second step would be to give notice of withdrawal from accession to the UN Charter and from the Statute of the International Court of Justice.
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Bush is no longer welcomed in Texas....I suggest Maine....
Bush wants court to rule agin him.
Are you aware that the un’s existence itself is a ‘treaty?”
Sit down Jorge!....just ‘cause you have a cozy relationship with the Fox and have forgotten how many killers you toasted in Texas doesn’t mean the frying stops!
Everybody catch that?
One other, The Republic of Texas. ;)
Lol
People on FR scoff at the un. They underestimate our enemy when they do.
Have heard several of the talk radio stations in Texas picking up on the ROT theme lately.
Appears to me, he is trying to protect Americans overseas...make other countries have to follow the ICJ and allow Americans to talk to US reps before being railroaded through their foreign court systems...on the surface appears bad, but the big picture may be something else. Just my opinion and NO I don’t care for the ICJ!
Then again he may be forcing the issue of rights with the US courts....
Not a battle worth stiring up without a darn good reason...
I believe this is a test case to see just how far the IJC can go.
Don't kid yourself. If I go to England and break their laws, I expect to be tried by British law, not American.
Not a battle worth stiring up without a darn good reason...
To me the reason is obvious.
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