27 February 2005

Contact:
Abe Bonowitz, CUADP: 561-371-5204 (mobile)
David Elliot, National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty: 202-607-7036

Dozens of anti-death penalty organizations throughout the United States are organizing around Tuesday, March 1st, in celebration of International Death Penalty Abolition Day, the 158th anniversary of the date in 1847 when the State of Michigan officially became the first English-speaking territory in the world to abolish the death penalty.

FOR A LISTING OF SOME OF THE EVENTS SCHEDULED ACROSS THE UNITED STATES, as well as background information on Abolition Day, please visit http://www.cuadp.org and click on the Abolition Day Banner.

STATES WITH LISTED ACTIVITIES INCLUDE:

Arizona
California
Florida
Georgia
Indiana
Massachusetts
Nebraska
Ohio
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Tennessee
Texas
and also Toronto, Canada.

"People in the United States are beginning to take a hard look at how our criminal justice system is failing," said Abe Bonowitz, Director of Citizens United for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (CUADP). "As a former supporter of the death penalty, it is clear to me that anyone who examines the system from a non-emotional standpoint will find that economically, socially and morally, the practice of the death penalty is bad public policy. Billions of dollars have been spent on the death penalty in this country since 1972, for a net result of 950 dead bodies. This is hardly a good return on that investment. Alternatives to the death penalty exist that punish severely while protecting society, without more killing."

Even as we approach the 950th execution since 1977, scheduled to take place in Georgia on Abolition Day, CUADP notes the following very current events which point to a crumbling of the foundations of the death penalty in the modern era:

• Conservative voices and policy makers continue to acknowledge at least the need for a Time-Out on executions in the form of a moratorium on the death penalty pending review and reform of legal systems throughout the nation. Even George W. Bush, who executed 152 prisoners as Governor of Texas and who as President has overseen the first three federal executions under current law, acknowledged in his State of the Union address that serious problems exist in our legal system (see http://www.cuadp.org/pressrel72.html ). For more on conservative voices, see http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?did=482&scid=16

• The US Supreme Court has taken up the question of "evolving standards of decency" with regard to juvenile offenders and the death penalty. Numerous states are this year considering bills to ensure that no person under the age of 18 at the time of the crime will face the death penalty.

• Where it was previously considered political suicide to question any aspect of the death penalty, state legislatures are considering ways to limit or even do away with the death penalty. In the past year several states raised the minimum age for death penalty eligibility to 18. In Florida the effort to raise the age to 18 is led by one of the most pro-death penalty legislators, Senator Victor Crist. New York, New Jersey, and New Mexico are all approaching the tipping point, with serious death penalty repeal efforts in consideration in current legislative sessions.

• More than 118 prisoners have been exonerated and released from death rows in the United States - SO FAR.

• Countries normally allied with the United States are unequivocal in their opposition to the death penalty, refusing to extradite prisoners to the US without guarantees that those prisoners will not face execution - even in the cases of terrorists and war criminals. Mexico has successfully sued the United States over its violation of the Vienna Convention on Consular Affairs with regard to more than 50 Mexican nationals on US death rows.

• Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly President Peter Schieder last year launched an appeal for the abolition of the death penalty, saying "The abolition of the death penalty is one of our Organisation's priorities, and any new member state must pledge to take this step. We have succeeded in making the territory of our 45 member states, with its 800 million inhabitants, a death-penalty-free zone. Our ambition is to persuade Japan and the USA, who both hold observer status with the Council of Europe, to join us. Japan and the United States are leading democracies which have been very vocal on their commitment to human rights. We are calling on them to stand by their own standards of civilised behaviour. My message on the eve of International Death Penalty Abolition Day (1 March) is a call on states across the world to reject the use of capital punishment. Death penalty is not justice. And as Martin Luther King said: 'Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.' "

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Organizers of "Abolition Day" events point to the State of Michigan as an example that viable alternatives to the death penalty exist. "They got rid of the death penalty because they found that they could not trust themselves to use it fairly, and they learned too late that they had killed an innocent man," said Bonowitz. Michigan has been without the death penalty for 158 years. The first act of their new legislature when Michigan became a state was to abolish the death penalty.

"Politicians owe it to the people of this country to take a serious look at the alternatives to the death penalty already in use across this country," said Bonowitz. "Violent criminals can be punished, and society protected, through the use of long-term prison sentences before a convicted person can be considered for parole. It works in Michigan and in other states like California, which has the oldest 'Life Without Parole' (LWOP) statute in the country. Not one of the people sentenced to LWOP has been released. We are saying to the people our country, 'Don't make us become that which we deplore. Don't kill in our names. We can do better.'"

http://www.cuadp.org and click on "Abolition Day."

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ON THE WEB: www.CUADP.org and www.NCADP.org

For more information, please contact CUADP director Abe Bonowitz at 800-973-6548 or 561-371-5204. Free information is available to the public from Citizens United for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (CUADP), a Florida-based national organization working to increase the level of informed dialogue about viable alternatives to the death penalty. CUADP may be reached toll-free at 800-973-6548 or on the internet at http://www.cuadp.org.

SENT BY:

Abraham J. Bonowitz
Director, CUADP
email: abe@cuadp.org

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YES FRIENDS!
There is an Alternative to the Death Penalty

Citizens United for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (CUADP) works to end the death penalty in the United States through aggressive campaigns of public education and the promotion of tactical grassroots activism.

Visit http://www.cuadp.org or call 800-973-6548
PMB 335, 2603 NW 13th St (AKA Dr. MLK Jr. Hwy)
Gainesville, FL 32609

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