Two Executions

There were thirteen executions in the first half of this year. They are divided among Florida, Missouri, and Texas. Oklahoma, which has been playing catch-up after an extended moratorium after botches, has one so far. The next two are out of Oklahoma and Alabama.  

Jemaine Cannon was another person that committed a violent crime but was held in a low-security environment. As the story notes: 

Corrections officials acknowledged that Cannon should have been at a higher security level but said space in such facilities already was filled.

Cannon had a violent history including one attack where a woman "was beaten in the head with an iron, a toaster and a hammer."  Who is to know what leads a few people to do things like this?  One sympathetic account references his childhood abuse.  His lawyers also say he suffers from stage three Sarcoidosis that affects his eyes, lungs, liver, spleen bones, and skin.  The condition is often treatable but allegedly he doesn't have much longer.  

A brutal murder after escaping from prison and then fleeing to another state lead to a death sentence.  This was back in 1995.  It remains unclear (granting a daughter of the victim wants "justice and closure" -- when surviving victims oppose execution, their desires are often ignored)  what executing him over thirty years later will do.  I remain of the belief that at some point the legitimate state interest to execute lapses.  

(Granting execution is acceptable.) 

Cannon rather pathetically also claims self-defense. What of the other woman he attacked for which he was in prison in the first place? I grant the abused often eventually abuse.  My bottom line: the government had some fault here given he was in prison for a serious violent crime.  Once he was convicted for the murder and (now) confined appropriately, the extended prison time is appropriate.  The execution here is arbitrary and capricious.  

It is not one of the most grievous cases, but when you confine someone for almost thirty years, sorry, executing him seems gratuitous. 

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Alabama has not had a good one with botched execution.  After a moratorium, they are ready (so to speak) to get back on the horse. The new rules include providing a bigger window to execute so as not to run out of time as happened not that long ago.  Not so ready with the nitrogen.

(Nitrogen was promised to be an ideal alternative for approaching a decade now, but no state used it yet. And, there are grounds to think it is not as ideal as all that, just as lethal injection turned out not to be.) 

The desire to be executed with nitrogen gas after Alabama botched more than one lethal injection is the focus of the last days of James Barber's life.  Barber about twenty years old murdered an old lady as part of a robbery.  He previously dated her daughter and did some repair work for her. 

Barber denied guilt but there really doesn't seem to be much reasonable doubt.  His lawyers asked for LWOP, but the judge followed the 11-1 jury recommendation of death. The murder of a 75-year-old woman whose daughter you dated and doing it with your fists and a claw hammer is liable to get you that sort of sentence.  Barber is white while Cannon is black.

Again, the focus is how Alabama has botched executions, suggesting they have no legitimate power to try and try again.  Executions are botched some fraction of the time but certain states, including Alabama, has had a harder time of it.  Maybe, executing him after around twenty years in prison isn't the way to go.  Maybe, leave him there until 75, if you want.

The coverage does not suggest why Barber in his 40s decided the murder of an elderly woman was the way to go.  He claims innocence so I guess he might not be the best one to ask.  This murder is somewhat less "worse of the worst," not having that murderer on the run from prison, where you already was there for a horrible violent attack angle.  

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So, where is the Supreme Court at the end of the line in these cases?  Cannon was executed Thursday morning without any final appeals. 

The court of appeals on Wednesday upheld the Barber execution with a 2-1 vote.  Then, it went to the Supreme Court.  Meanwhile, his lawyer was denied a chance to wear a wristwatch to the execution:

The issue of the wristwatch goes back to concerns raised by Barber’s attorneys about the extended amount of time personnel may need to successfully establish the IV lines. That has been problematic in the state’s last three execution attempts, only one of which was successful.

Petty bullshit. The new rules gave Alabama until 6AM (CST) so as midnight approached, they still had time to execute him.  But, the same old morbid execution night vigil routine (somewhat less the case in recent cases) occurred. Why not have a rule where the final appeal is 24 hours before the scheduled execution?   

After midnight (local time), SCOTUS handed down an unexplained denial with three dissenters on record with an eleven-page dissenting opinion by Sotomayor.  The link above said "6-3" though we are supposed to say that we don't know since it was anonymous and theoretically could have been five with one silently dissenting.  I think silence is consent here.

After an unbroken sequence of faulty executions, Alabama asks the Court to trust that this time will be different.

He was executed.  It happened around 1:30AM local time and you can read about it.  Many, including the victim's family, won't be impressed with how Barber comes off as a sort of sacrificial lamb.  Did the state, after three botched attempts (two of whom survived), do it okay this time?

The account does not suggest any problems with the procedure.  I think the Eighth Amendment includes avoiding risk and due process requires a careful process.  The dissents suggest there is a real chance that was not met.  A "try, try again" system, even after all this time, should not be how we do executions in this country.  

The next scheduled executions are in August.  

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The Senate Judiciary Committee by a party line voted a SCOTUS ethics bill out.  Little chance it will pass but it's a good fight.