Free Republic

A new study softens Texas' image as the nation's death penalty capital, finding the state doles out death sentences less often than even Oregon, a state better known for approving assisted suicide than for demanding capital punishment. Figures in this month's Journal of Empirical Legal Studies show Texas imposed death penalties in 2 percent of murder cases that had an arrest — just below the national average and slightly behind Oregon, which ranked No. 15 among the 31 states with more than 10 inmates on death row. By comparing death sentences with solved murder cases between 1977 and 1999, the...

Utah May End Executions by Firing Squad Reporters look at the chair where John Albert Taylor was later strapped into and executed in by a firing squad, during a media tour of the execution chamber in Utah State Prison at Point of the Mountain, Utah, Jan. 24, 1996. The Utah Senate approved a bill Thursday, Feb. 19, 2004, that would eliminate firing squad executions - used most recently here in 1996 - unless lethal injection executions are found unconstitutional. There has not been an execution by firing squad in the United States since Taylor's execution in 1996. Utah moved toward...

DALLAS - Despite its reputation as the nation's death penalty leader, Texas is less likely than some other states to sentence convicted murders to death, according to a new study. It is, however, more likely than other states to carry out a death sentence once it is imposed, according to the study, sponsored by the Cornell Law School Death Penalty Project, which provides legal services to death-row inmates. Texas actually trails the national average when it comes to the percentage of people convicted of murder who are sentenced to death, says the study, published in the new Journal of Empirical...

Executing young killers to be reviewedSupreme Court will weigh whether death is cruel, unusual penalty10:19 PM CST on Monday, January 26, 2004Associated Press HUNTSVILLE, Texas – Twenty-six Texas death row inmates, including three scheduled for lethal injection in the coming months, would be affected if the U.S. Supreme Court bars execution of convicted killers whose crimes were committed when they were younger than 18. The high court, which two years ago abolished executions for the mentally retarded, said Monday that it would reopen the question of whether executing very young killers violates the Constitution's ban on "cruel and unusual punishment."...

Dozens of activists protested outside Beirut's parliament Lebanon has resumed capital punishment by executing three convicted murderers despite international protests. The three were executed in Beirut's Roumieh prison early on Saturday - two by firing squad and one by hanging. They were the first prisoners to face the death penalty in Lebanon since President Emile Lahoud came to power in late 1998. The EU and human rights groups had urged the Beirut government not to carry out the sentences. Under Lebanese law, a death sentence has to be approved by the president, prime minister and justice minister. The men's...

Osbaldo Torres, a convicted murderer on Oklahoma's Death Row, might have been dead by now -- his appeals exhausted, his time up. But 15 judges in The Hague, acting at the request of the Mexican government, have ordered his execution stayed for now, so he is alive in a cell in McAlester, awaiting the next move from the Netherlands. The judges also ordered stays in the cases of Texas Death Row inmates Cesar Fierro Reyna and Roberto Moreno Ramos, both Mexican citizens. Texas officials' response to the court's order could not be learned Thursday night. Execution dates have not been...

Scientists carefully document thousands so carelessly killed MAHAWEEL, Iraq - The killers kept bankers' hours. They showed up for work at the barley field at 9 a.m., trailed by backhoes and three buses filled with blindfolded men, women and children as young as 1. Every day, witnesses say, the routine was the same: The backhoes dug a trench. Fifty people were led to the edge of the hole and shot, one by one, in the head. The backhoes covered them with dirt, then dug another hole for the next group. At 5 p.m., the killers - officials of Saddam Hussein's...

Death Chamber Unusually Quiet in Texas By MICHAEL GRACZYK Associated Press Writer HUNTSVILLE, Texas (AP) -- The state is in the midst of its longest break in executions in seven years, a lull some attribute to coincidence but others say may be due to recent changes affecting death row prisoners. So far this year, 21 convicted killers have been put to death in the nation's busiest death chamber, the last in September. But no one is on Texas' execution calendar again until December, when four are planned in about a week's time. The last time the state went so long...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Two Iraqi scientists were shot in Baghdad after they talked to the U.S.-led team hunting weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and others believe they will be in danger if they collaborate in the search, Washington's chief weapons inspector David Kay said on Friday. Kay, who is directing the WMD hunt as an adviser to the CIA, presented an interim report to U.S. lawmakers this week that said no banned weapons had yet been found. Some Iraqi scientists have sought relocation in the United States out of fear for the safety of their families, and others who...

Guarded by hundreds of armed rebels deep in a malaria-infested jungle, three American captives pass the time playing with a homemade deck of cards and dreaming of their families. The threat of death always hangs nearby. The three U.S. military contractors have been cut off from the outside world since their capture by rebels seven months ago. That isolation was broken when a Colombian journalist traveled for days over rough roads and jungle rivers with a rebel escort to interview them July 25 in remote southern Colombia. "They were nervous, and there were traces of fear on their faces," freelance...

Executions fuel Saudi fury over pardon By John R Bradley in Jeddah 11 August 2003 The public beheading of an Afghan and a Pakistani yesterday for drug smuggling has exacerbated the anger among ordinary Saudis at the royal pardon given last week to five Britons and a Canadian found guilty of alcohol smuggling and a string of bombings.A British national escaped unhurt last week after being shot at while driving his car and there are concerns for the security of other expatriate Britons living in the kingdom. Saudi Arabia imposes the death penalty for murder, rape, apostasy, armed robbery and...

A CHIEF executioner to one of Saddam’s sons has revealed how he helped drag two victims into a cage to be devoured by lions. The executioner said that he was ordered to seize two 19-year-old students and take them to a farm of Uday Hussein, Saddam’s oldest son who was killed by American forces last week. As soon as they arrived the students were dragged to a cage containing the lions and forced inside. “I saw the head of the first student literally come off his body with the first bite,” he said. He then had to stand and watch...

Summary executions become routine in Aceh as Jakarta's generals break their promises By Kathy Marks in Seunade, Aceh 26 May 2003 The handsome young army captain with the elegant moustache lit another cigarette and placed it between his perfect white teeth. "You must understand," he said, languidly blowing a smoke ring into the air. "We want to protect human rights. We don't want to kill the wrong people." Two miles down the road, the village of Seunade has just experienced the Indonesian military's interpretation of protecting human rights. On Friday, three men were gunned down on a bridge as they...

Travis County calls for execution ban 05/18/2003 By TERRENCE STUTZ / The Dallas Morning News AUSTIN – In an unprecedented request to the Legislature, Travis County commissioners have joined a chorus of death penalty critics across the nation and asked state lawmakers to temporarily halt executions in Texas. Led by Travis County Judge Sam Biscoe, the Commissioners Court made its county the first in the state to take such action, calling for a moratorium until the fairness of the capital punishment law can be assessed. This year, Houston Mayor Lee Brown asked Gov. Rick Perry to postpone executions of some...

The following email was sent to Rush. To listen to Rush read this email (complete with his all knowing commentary) click here. http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_041103/content/who_s_responsible_for_more_deaths__enron_or_cnn_.guest.html This man (Eason Jordan) is disgusting. He lifts rationalizing to new heights. To tell the truth or not to tell the truth, that is the question. Is it nobler in the mind to tell the truth and save some lives, or to refrain, thus costing more lives over time. Oh, and silly me. I thought it was a journalists duty to report the truth. But not when it interferes with the bottom line apparently. After all CNN...

Saddam executes 60 Iraqi officers PAUL GALLAGHER SADDAM Hussein has executed 60 army officers and replaced them with some of his most fanatical supporters to dissuade soldiers from deserting in the face of allied attack, according to an exiled Iraqi general. Mohammed Nafee, who was a commander in Saddam’s forces in the Iran-Iraq war, claims the purge of the army higher ranks took place at the weekend. He has contacted Iraqi military sources in Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq, who passed on news of the mass executions. Mr Nafee said the commanding officers of army units considered most likely to surrender were...

FOX NEWS: Major Garret Reports that POWS Were EXECUTED, by being SHOT in head

<p>Arabic news channel Al-Jazeera showed footage Sunday of what it said were five U.S. prisoners, including one woman.</p> <p>The station showed footage of the alleged soldiers being questioned by their captors and being asked things such as where they were from and their names. The tape that was broadcast was reportedly provided by Iraqi television and was edited.</p>

Supreme Court stays Texas 300 execution Associated Press HUNTSVILLE, Texas (AP) - The U.S. Supreme Court, acting on appeals that raised questions about the legitimacy of his conviction, granted a last-minute reprieve Wednesday to keep condemned killer Delma Banks from becoming the 300th prisoner executed in Texas. "I just thank the Lord," Banks said when informed by prison officials about 10 minutes before he could have been moved to the death chamber gurney. "Give Jesus all the credit." Family members waiting outside the prison Wednesday night jumped joyously and hugged as word spread. "I wish we could have brought it...

ARBITRARY AND SUMMARY KILLINGSExecutions are carried out without due process of law. Relatives are often prevented from burying the victims in accordance with Islamic practice, and have even been charged for the bullets used. Human rights organisations, such as Human Rights Watch, and the UN Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in Iraq have reported the phenomenon of killing inmates in order to 'cleanse' the prisons. In 1984, 4,000 political prisoners were executed at a single prison, the Abu Ghraib. An estimated 2,500 prisoners were executed between 1997 and 1999 in a further "prison cleansing" campaign. In February 2000,...