Another Country

The first article is a bit long, but exceptionally well told and the basis of the follow-on pieces.

The problem with the death penalty: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/09/07/090907fa_fact_grann?currentPage=1

The morally bankrupt prosecutor attempts (rather ineffectually) to respond to the evidence against him:

http://corsicanadailysun.com/thewillinghamfiles/x46870434/-08-28-09-JACKSON-Guest-Commentary-Willingham-guilt-never-in-doubt

Response to the prosecutor's defense: 

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2009/09/david-grann-response-to-jackson.html

The guilty, negligent Governor (Rick Perry) engages in corrupt practices to cover up his malfeasance:

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2009/10/david-grann-a-sudden-dismissal.html

Now, tell me, what was the underlying cause of this result? I would call it lack of accountability among the prosecutorial class and their allies. We ought to consider a murder trial in which they stand as defendants.

 

 

I support the death penalty. To justify it, though, the trial process must be clean, competent, transparent, and imbued with legal mechanisms that hold legal officers accountable for maintaining this high quality. Having achieved this level of fairness, and so reduced the odds of erroneous conviction, I am willing to accept the inevitable, yet rare, instance in which an innocent is executed. Anyone who supports the death penalty must confess that such a miscarriage of justice is an unavoidable, yet acceptable, risk.