Ivo Skoric on Wed, 26 Feb 2003 04:27:01 +0100 (CET) |
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[Nettime-bold] Tyranny of Law |
Society run by law that does not know limits is like a perfect man without a soul. Are the laws made for the people, or are the people made for the laws? Is protecting the law more important to us, the people, the ones who establish laws to rule over ourselves, or is it protecting the human life, the life one of us? Prosecutors See Limits to Doubt in Capital Cases By ADAM LIPTAK [Unable to display image]udge Laura Denvir Stith seemed not to believe what she was hearing. A prosecutor was trying to block a death row inmate from having his conviction reopened on the basis of new evidence, and Judge Stith, of the Missouri Supreme Court, was getting exasperated. "Are you suggesting," she asked the prosecutor, that "even if we find Mr. Amrine is actually innocent, he should be executed?" Frank A. Jung, an assistant state attorney general, replied, "That's correct, your honor." That exchange was, legal experts say, unusual only for its frankness. After a trial and appeal, many prosecutors say, new evidence of claimed innocence should generally not be considered by the courts. While death row inmates have always peppered the courts with legal filings, the recent wave of death row exonerations, based on DNA and other evidence, has inspired more defense lawyers and academics to seek to reopen death penalty cases in a sustained and vigorous way. Courts are beginning to express concern that they may be parties to the occasional miscarriage of justice. Gov. George Ryan's commutations of the death sentences of all 164 prisoners on death row in Illinois focused public attention on the issues of wrongful convictions and flaws in the capital justice system. Jeremiah W. Nixon, Missouri's attorney general, said Mr. Jung's response to Judge Stith was a legally correct answer to an inflammatory hypothetical question. The point Mr. Jung was trying to make, he said, is that there must come a time when cases can be closed. _______________________________________________ Nettime-bold mailing list Nettime-bold@nettime.org http://amsterdam.nettime.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/nettime-bold