Letters to the Editor: letters@pbpost.com
The Palm Beach Post
2751 South Dixie Highway
West Palm Beach, FL 33405
To the Editor:
Re: Justice, Florida style
Governor Jeb Bush and his nefarious network of state prosecutors deny that Florida has executed innocent victims with its flawed capital punishment system, but the facts prove otherwise. In recent years our state has discovered 20 real-life innocent persons on its death row and reluctantly freed them (The nationwide number is now up to 84 since 1976). That is a shameful and deplorable admission of absolute fact.
And what solution does Governor Bush offer for this out-of-control system of rampant injustice? Speed up the execution process to bring "closure" for the families of the victims. What about the victims of wrongful conviction, who still fight for their freedom after 22 years and more (in some cases) of innocent incarceration? What about the victims of wrongful execution whose bodies have been set ablaze by Florida’s torturous electric chair?
The death penalty begins with one inescapable given: an indigent—disproportionately minority—male of low IQ is represented by an overworked and ill-equipped public defender. The accused is all too often merely a scapegoat for the win-at-any-cost mindset of an overzealous prosecutor. Then a routine ritual of theoretical appeals begins with a little known commonality: The subject of appeal is literally haunted for all the years that it takes, to his grave, by the same prosecutor repeating his same prepackaged deception over and over again.
If the convicted is fortunate enough to have competent legal representation (which is rare), he will be stalled, stymied and manipulated by the legal entanglement of this criminal justice system until his funds are depleted, or he dies from neglect in his unheated, uncooled 6’x9’ Raiford cell. After meeting on the golf courses of their respective country clubs, the prosecuting attorneys and their co-conspirators will orchestrate the exact courtroom outcome prior to all the appellate dates.
Meanwhile, this outrageous procedure threatens to tarnish the emergence of a bold, bright, new millennium. You and I must tell Governor Jeb (and brother Dubya) Bush now attempting to hasten the execution of innocents: "Please, sir, end this insanity; do not kill these oft-times innocent people on my behalf."
"Not in my name!"
Bob Pauley
924 Lytle Street, West Palm Beach, FL 33405