Post by Anja Nieser on Sept 12, 2006 3:26:31 GMT -5
Death penalty hovers in AG race
By Herbert A. Sample - Bee San Francisco Bureau
Published 1:35 am PDT Sunday, September 10, 2006
OAKLAND -- For most of his adult life, and now in the midst of his bid to become California's next attorney general, one political issue has hovered over Jerry Brown: the death penalty.
In 1960, Brown helped persuade his father, then-Gov. Edmund G. "Pat" Brown, to delay the execution of convicted murderer Caryl Chessman.
As governor in the late 1970s, Jerry Brown vetoed a bill reinstating the death penalty, but exerted little effort to block a legislative override that subsequently enacted the law. Almost a decade later, his appointee as state Supreme Court chief justice, Rose Bird, was removed from office by voters angry in part because of her handling of death penalty cases.
In the years before he became mayor of Oakland in 1998, Brown railed against capital punishment on his radio show, "We, the People," describing it as "state murder."
Now, as the Democratic nominee for attorney general, Brown remains morally opposed to the practice but insists he will follow the law.
Brown brings that history to the contest against Republican Chuck Poochigian, whose views on the death penalty are much less nuanced. A state senator from Fresno, Poochigian unabashedly supports it as a deterrent and a measure of justice for perpetrators and their victims.
"No one should take pleasure in the loss of anyone's life," Poochigian said in an interview. "But in those cases in which the death penalty is applicable, given the heinous crimes being committed against innocent people, it is in my mind imperative that we have it."
The death penalty was a potent topic in California campaigns of the 1970s and '80s, particularly in gubernatorial and attorney general races. Since then, however, some political observers say, the death penalty has faded as a campaign issue.
Poochigian hopes his campaign can benefit from Brown's personal aversion to capital punishment. Brown has much wider name identification among voters and a 21-percentage-point lead in a month-old Field Poll.
As a candidate for attorney general, Brown has appeared less fervent in his criticism of the death penalty.
"I think we'd do better without it, but a majority of Californians disagree with that," Brown said in a wide-ranging interview in March. He added that he would "strongly ... carry out the law of California."
His campaign staff declined several recent invitations for Brown to discuss the subject.
Brown's position disturbs death penalty opponents, who once counted him as an ally because he often described the sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole as a more humane and equally effective deterrent as capital punishment.
"It's somewhat tiresome when somebody gives me that excuse," said Mike Farrell, an actor and president of Death Penalty Focus. "I would love to see him sort of put his career, if you will, where his mouth is."
Homicide cases in state courts generally are prosecuted by county district attorneys. If a jury hands down a death sentence, the case is automatically appealed to the state Supreme Court, where the attorney general serves as prosecutor. That office also handles federal appeals of death sentences, such as a pending case challenging California's lethal injection method of execution.
Among recent attorneys general, three, all Democrats, opposed the death penalty on moral grounds -- Brown's father, Stanley Mosk and John Van de Kamp. Republicans Evelle Younger, George Deukmejian and Dan Lungren backed capital punishment, as does the current attorney general, Democrat Bill Lockyer.
Brown has cited his dad, Mosk and Van de Kamp as models for how he would defend capital cases, despite his personal misgivings.
Pat Brown's history on the subject, though, is complicated. As governor, he allowed 36 executions and commuted 23 sentences to life without parole. But in his 1989 book, "Public Justice, Private Mercy," the elder Brown recounted how in 1959 he considered capital punishment a "necessary evil" but later deemed it a "gross failure" as a deterrent.
Van de Kamp said in an interview that it was not a contradiction for him to pursue death sentences when he was attorney general from 1983 through 1990.
"You swear on the Bible, if you will, that you will uphold the laws and the constitution of the state of California," said Van de Kamp, now a private attorney in Los Angeles.
But Michael Rushford, a death penalty supporter who heads the Sacramento-based Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, is skeptical that Brown would be assertive in defending the state's capital punishment laws. Rushford suggested that Brown could slow the work of the attorney general's death penalty unit or assign inexperienced lawyers to it.
"You don't have to be a brain surgeon to understand that someone who is personally opposed is not going to be aggressive," Rushford said. "It would be like hiring (former Moral Majority leader) Jerry Falwell to ... run an abortion clinic."
Brown once was strenuous in his opposition to capital punishment. On his KPFA radio shows, Brown insisted that too little attention was paid to social causes of crime, that criminals are undeterred by the death penalty, that doctors violate their oath by participating in lethal injections and that politicians benefit from executions.
Five years before, as a presidential candidate, Brown said he favored televising executions as a means of boosting opposition to them. In 1967, he demonstrated against the execution of Aaron Mitchell outside San Quentin State Prison.
But later, as governor in the late 1970s, Brown accepted the Legislature's desire to reinstate the death penalty. "Now that it is a valid law," he said at the time, "I will carry out my oath of office."
Poochigian, who co-chaired the campaign for a successful 2000 ballot measure that in part made gang-related murders eligible for death sentences, said his views were set as a teenager even before a distant relative was murdered in Chicago.
"I remember being very angry about it and perplexed by how the system didn't deal more effectively with the perpetrators," he said.
Death penalty foes contend there are too few precautions against executing innocent people and too few politicians willing to forcefully oppose capital punishment. They have little hope that Brown will turn out to be one of them.
The Sacramento Bee, 2100 Q St., P.O. Box 15779, Sacramento, CA 95852
By Herbert A. Sample - Bee San Francisco Bureau
Published 1:35 am PDT Sunday, September 10, 2006
OAKLAND -- For most of his adult life, and now in the midst of his bid to become California's next attorney general, one political issue has hovered over Jerry Brown: the death penalty.
In 1960, Brown helped persuade his father, then-Gov. Edmund G. "Pat" Brown, to delay the execution of convicted murderer Caryl Chessman.
As governor in the late 1970s, Jerry Brown vetoed a bill reinstating the death penalty, but exerted little effort to block a legislative override that subsequently enacted the law. Almost a decade later, his appointee as state Supreme Court chief justice, Rose Bird, was removed from office by voters angry in part because of her handling of death penalty cases.
In the years before he became mayor of Oakland in 1998, Brown railed against capital punishment on his radio show, "We, the People," describing it as "state murder."
Now, as the Democratic nominee for attorney general, Brown remains morally opposed to the practice but insists he will follow the law.
Brown brings that history to the contest against Republican Chuck Poochigian, whose views on the death penalty are much less nuanced. A state senator from Fresno, Poochigian unabashedly supports it as a deterrent and a measure of justice for perpetrators and their victims.
"No one should take pleasure in the loss of anyone's life," Poochigian said in an interview. "But in those cases in which the death penalty is applicable, given the heinous crimes being committed against innocent people, it is in my mind imperative that we have it."
The death penalty was a potent topic in California campaigns of the 1970s and '80s, particularly in gubernatorial and attorney general races. Since then, however, some political observers say, the death penalty has faded as a campaign issue.
Poochigian hopes his campaign can benefit from Brown's personal aversion to capital punishment. Brown has much wider name identification among voters and a 21-percentage-point lead in a month-old Field Poll.
As a candidate for attorney general, Brown has appeared less fervent in his criticism of the death penalty.
"I think we'd do better without it, but a majority of Californians disagree with that," Brown said in a wide-ranging interview in March. He added that he would "strongly ... carry out the law of California."
His campaign staff declined several recent invitations for Brown to discuss the subject.
Brown's position disturbs death penalty opponents, who once counted him as an ally because he often described the sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole as a more humane and equally effective deterrent as capital punishment.
"It's somewhat tiresome when somebody gives me that excuse," said Mike Farrell, an actor and president of Death Penalty Focus. "I would love to see him sort of put his career, if you will, where his mouth is."
Homicide cases in state courts generally are prosecuted by county district attorneys. If a jury hands down a death sentence, the case is automatically appealed to the state Supreme Court, where the attorney general serves as prosecutor. That office also handles federal appeals of death sentences, such as a pending case challenging California's lethal injection method of execution.
Among recent attorneys general, three, all Democrats, opposed the death penalty on moral grounds -- Brown's father, Stanley Mosk and John Van de Kamp. Republicans Evelle Younger, George Deukmejian and Dan Lungren backed capital punishment, as does the current attorney general, Democrat Bill Lockyer.
Brown has cited his dad, Mosk and Van de Kamp as models for how he would defend capital cases, despite his personal misgivings.
Pat Brown's history on the subject, though, is complicated. As governor, he allowed 36 executions and commuted 23 sentences to life without parole. But in his 1989 book, "Public Justice, Private Mercy," the elder Brown recounted how in 1959 he considered capital punishment a "necessary evil" but later deemed it a "gross failure" as a deterrent.
Van de Kamp said in an interview that it was not a contradiction for him to pursue death sentences when he was attorney general from 1983 through 1990.
"You swear on the Bible, if you will, that you will uphold the laws and the constitution of the state of California," said Van de Kamp, now a private attorney in Los Angeles.
But Michael Rushford, a death penalty supporter who heads the Sacramento-based Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, is skeptical that Brown would be assertive in defending the state's capital punishment laws. Rushford suggested that Brown could slow the work of the attorney general's death penalty unit or assign inexperienced lawyers to it.
"You don't have to be a brain surgeon to understand that someone who is personally opposed is not going to be aggressive," Rushford said. "It would be like hiring (former Moral Majority leader) Jerry Falwell to ... run an abortion clinic."
Brown once was strenuous in his opposition to capital punishment. On his KPFA radio shows, Brown insisted that too little attention was paid to social causes of crime, that criminals are undeterred by the death penalty, that doctors violate their oath by participating in lethal injections and that politicians benefit from executions.
Five years before, as a presidential candidate, Brown said he favored televising executions as a means of boosting opposition to them. In 1967, he demonstrated against the execution of Aaron Mitchell outside San Quentin State Prison.
But later, as governor in the late 1970s, Brown accepted the Legislature's desire to reinstate the death penalty. "Now that it is a valid law," he said at the time, "I will carry out my oath of office."
Poochigian, who co-chaired the campaign for a successful 2000 ballot measure that in part made gang-related murders eligible for death sentences, said his views were set as a teenager even before a distant relative was murdered in Chicago.
"I remember being very angry about it and perplexed by how the system didn't deal more effectively with the perpetrators," he said.
Death penalty foes contend there are too few precautions against executing innocent people and too few politicians willing to forcefully oppose capital punishment. They have little hope that Brown will turn out to be one of them.
The Sacramento Bee, 2100 Q St., P.O. Box 15779, Sacramento, CA 95852