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Today's Top News
DNA Could Have Saved the Last Man Executed by Bush
Landmark investigation disproves death penalty case for first time
The last man to be executed during George W Bush's term as governor of Texas was sentenced to death on the basis of a single piece of evidence - one human hair - which did not actually belong to him, DNA tests have shown.
Claude Howard Jones is seen in family snapshots taken at the Texas death row visitors' room the day before he was executed by lethal injection in late 2000.
Claude Howard Jones was convicted in 1990 of murdering an off-license owner
and was put to death by lethal injection 10 years later. He suffered the
ultimate penalty because jurors were informed that a strand of his hair had
been found on the floor close to the victim's body.
That now turns out to be untrue: laboratory analysis of the crucial item of evidence has revealed that it actually came from the head of the store's owner, Allen Hilzendager.
"My father never claimed to be a saint, but he always maintained that he didn't commit this murder," Jones's son, Duane, said yesterday. "I hope these results will serve as a wake-up call ... Serious problems exist in the criminal justice system that must be fixed if our society is to continue using the death penalty."
This week's discovery has huge legal significance because there has previously been no clear-cut case in modern US history of a defendant being sentenced to death on the back of evidence which is demonstrably false.
It does not necessarily prove that Jones, who was 60 at the time of his death, was innocent of murder. But it does add weight his claim that he was waiting in a car outside the liquor store on the afternoon of 14 November 1989 when an accomplice, Kerry Daniel Dixon, walked in and shot Hilzendager.
The men, both career criminals, planned to steal the till, which contained several hundred dollars in cash, from the off-license at Point Blank, 80 miles east of Houston. Witnesses said they saw one man walk into the store to commit the crime while the other stayed behind to act as getaway driver.
Without the hair from the scene, Jones would have received life imprisonment, since under Texas law it is impossible to secure a death penalty conviction without corroborating physical evidence that the suspect was directly responsible for a crime such as murder.
None of the witnesses was able to positively identify which of the two men had walked into the store and pulled the trigger. A third accomplice, Timothy Jordan, who supplied the fatal weapon, testified that Jones had confessed to the killing, but later withdrew his evidence, saying he had embellished it to secure a lighter sentence.
For the original trial in 1990, analysis of the hair was carried out under a microscope, a technique now obsolete because it is thought to be unreliable. By the time Jones was executed a decade later, DNA testing was relatively commonplace, but his attorneys were unable to convince any court in Texas to have the crucial hair reviewed.
In 2000, just before Jones was killed, Mr Bush declined a request to order a stay of execution. The Texas Observer magazine, which carried out this week's DNA test, claimed that state attorneys "failed to inform him that DNA evidence might exonerate Jones".
The former US president, who is on the road this week publicizing his memoirs, has declined to comment. Although he signed 151 execution orders - more than any other governor - during his time in office, Bush has previously stated his support for DNA testing as a means to confirm a suspect's guilt.
In the years after his execution, Jones's family tried repeatedly to get access to the hair sample, but their requests to have it DNA tested were blocked by the local district attorney, who attempted to have it destroyed. It was only released after the Texas Observer resorted to filing a lawsuit demanding access to the item.
That kind of obstruction is true to form in Texas, which has executed 464 people since the death penalty was re-introduced to the US more than three decades ago, giving it one of the world's busiest death rows outside Saudi Arabia and China.
Earlier this year, doubt was cast on the conviction of Cameron Todd Willingham, who was was put to death in 2004 after being convicted of starting a fire in 1991 that killed his three daughters. Several experts have claimed that he was completely innocent and that prosecutors obscured crucial evidence.
An official report into Willingham's case by the Texas Forensic Science Commission will not be completed until next year. Its release was delayed by the current Governor of Texas, Rick Perry, who last October removed three members of the panel that is writing the report and replaced them with people thought to be more supportive of capital punishment.
Miscarriages Of Justice?
Cameron Todd Willingham
In February 2004, the unemployed car mechanic was given a lethal injection in Texas for the murder of his three young daughters in an arson attack in 1991. He protested his innocence until his death. Expert fire investigators have since produced reports showing that none of the alleged signs of arson cited at the trial stood up to scrutiny. A final report on the Willingham case is due next year.
Lena Baker
The only woman to die in the US state of Georgia's electric chair, Lena Baker was a black maid executed in 1945 for shooting her white male employer. An all-white jury sentenced Baker to death despite the 44-year-old's claims that her boss had kept her as a slave, raped her and threatened to kill her. In 2005, Georgia's Board of Pardons and Paroles found that Baker should have been convicted of involuntary manslaughter and granted her a pardon.
Derek Bentley
The 19-year-old was hanged in 1952 for his part in the murder of Pc Sidney Miles during a bungled break-in at a Surrey warehouse. Bentley's sister campaigned to clear his name, claiming he had learning difficulties. In 1998, the Court of Appeal found that the original trial judge had been biased against the defendants and that scientific evidence showed the police officers who testified against Bentley had lied under oath.
Marinus van der Lubbe
Scapegoat for one of the defining moments of 20th-century history, the 24-year-old Dutch bricklayer was beheaded for setting fire to the Reichstag in Germany in 1933. He was pardoned 75 years later. Hitler used the arson to suspend civil liberties and establish a dictatorship. Much debate has surrounded the subject of Van der Lubbe's guilt. Lawyers finally achieved a symbolic pardon in 2008, citing legislation based on the idea that Nazi law "went against the basic ideas of justice".
George Kelly
Kelly was hanged in 1950 after one of Liverpool's most famous murder trials. Some 65,000 people were questioned after a cinema manager and his cashier were shot in a botched robbery while an audience enjoyed a thriller. Kelly was tried alongside Charles Connolly, who pleaded guilty to lesser charges to save his own life, although both maintained that neither committed murder. In 2003, appeal judges ruled that the evidence had been circumstantial and Kelly's verdict had been "unsafe".
Enjoli Liston
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55 Comments so far
Show AllBush will not loose one strand of hair fretting over this headline. He blissfully admits he is responsible for the death of thousands of US troops and hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians. He launched an entire war with fraudulent-faked-and manipulated evidence.
...let those hairs loose before you lose them...
The last man hanged in Rhode Island a century and a half ago was innocent.
Usually it takes a particular out-and-out murder of an innocent man by the government to convince a state to forswear its death penalty. One murdered nonviolent troublemaker, Jesus of Nazareth, should have been enough of a deterrent in the first place.
I believe the same was true in Michigan: in the middle of the nineteenth century that state abandoned capital punishment after executing an innocent man. Thank Heaven the law still stands.
I grew up on Jesus Christ. Went to Catholic school. Then, I started reading the Bible. What I found was mass abuse of women, praise for crimes against humanity, pornography and plain stupidity... like the dude who walked on water, the dude who parted the sea... incredibly stupid stuff that only a total fool would believe... which means that the majority of Americans are total fools.
People often tell me to respect religious rights. Baloney! Stupidity that results in genocides is not a right. It is a tragic circumstance that needs to be corrected.
Imagine a world without Jesus! Just imagine! G. W. Bush would never have been president. There'd be a million more Iraqis alive. Tens of millions less crippled, terrorized and pornographicly tortured people. Tens of millions less children crying and trembling of terror from US and European heroes. Palestine would be a paradise for the Palestinian people. My conscience wouldn't have to deal with the guilt of paying for all the violence.
Just imagine!
The headline of this piece is misleading. Mr. Jones was not executed by G. W. Bush but by the State of Texas representing every resident of that state on the day of execution. When the Governor of Texas approves an execution he does so in the name of every resident of the State on the day of approval.
I defend neither the death penalty nor the actions of former Governor G. W. Bush. I am trying to point out that the issue is far more complex than this superficial posting suggests. As long as a majority of "We The People of Texas" approve the death penalty any Governor, including one that opposes the death penalty, must "faithfully execute the law" or resign when that terrible document reaches his/her desk.
Since the U.S. President has the power to commute sentences I will even argue that every citizen of our nation is co-responsible for every execution in every state. To single out Texas is therefore an act of cowardice.
"When the Governor of [whatever state] approves an execution he does so in the name of every resident of the State on the day of approval." I never expected this controversy to be personal but TN is trying to give the needle to a guy who raped and murdered two of my distant cousins. If he is executed it won't be in my name! Never met these kinfolk. If I had maybe I'd feel enragedly different. He'll just be dead- not suffering the loss of his life. A friend- a cycling team-mate- spent a year in the state pen on a drug rap. It was hell- let it stretch on for 20, 40, 60 years- that's punishment.
actually a gentle-hearted MD
MistyDawn: In absolute monarchies the rulers pretended that their authority was given them by God. Hitler claimed authority from Providence. Stalin claimed Marx and Lenin. That is not the case in Texas or any other U.S. State where the authority of Governors is based on the assent of the governed. Whenever a prisoner is executed in my state it is in my name too even if I did not vote for that governor. I have always cowardly hidden behind the bromide that "my Governor did not commute the sentence" but did nothing to stop the killing.
To end executions we, who live in death-sentence states, must vote for representatives, senators, and governors who have vowed to end the executions. Presidents must fight to appoint Supreme Court Justices willing to rule that the death penalty is "unusual and cruel punishment in all cases".
No, the act of cowardice is Texans trying to pass the blame onto others.
People in other states do not vote on the US president based on the attitudes of Texans to the death penalty.
If we were to accept your argument and take it to its logical conclusion, everyone would be responsible for everything, and no one would be to blame for anything.
A drunk killing someone with his car? Well, everyone is to blame, since if they cared more, they would have elected politicians who would pass tougher laws against drunk driving. Etc.
Quote: "A drunk killing someone with his car? Well, everyone is to blame,..."
I am astonished at your uncanny ability to take my writing and twist and screw it to something that has nothing, absolutely nothing to do with what I argued. Here is my lesson for you: I posited that the execution of a condemned person (which by-the-way I oppose)in Texas is done by the State of Texas in the name of all citizens of the state. If that were not the case then we would be living in a fully dictatorial society in which the State of Texas and its Governor are never accountable for anything to anyone.
More lesson: In my book a drunken driver who kills a pedestrian is the only person accountable for the death of the pedestrian.
If a citizen of Texas is asked :"do you know that hundreds of persons have been executed in our state since the death penalty was approved again by the U.S. Supreme Court" most likely he/she will answer "Ich habe es nicht gewusst" (obviously in English). My argument was, in part, an attempt to show that "Ich habe es nicht gewusst" is not acceptable in Texas any more than it was in Germany after the end of WW2.
Have you got it now or are you a slow learner?
I don"t think you are getting the point
The point is that Bush was the only one who who had the authourity to stop this muderous practice. what would Bush care ?
It is been stated before he has no concience
You are both correct. Bush could have legally stopped all executions but only by commuting every sentence to, say, life in prison. What the Illinois governor did was extremely dangerous and bordering on dictatorship. If a governor can legally declare a law to be unconstitutional he can do so for any law he does not support. In fact, he changes his role from executive to judicial which is unconstitutional itself in a land where the three powers are supposed to be separated.
On January 10, 2003, Illinois Governor George Ryan singlehandedly stopped the death penalty in that state.
"Because the Illinois death penalty is arbitrary and capricious--and therefore immoral--I no longer shall tinker with the machinery of death," he said.
156 inmates on death row had their death sentences commuted.
A state's Governor can stop the practice of the death penalty.
B B ( beyond bush), this means that the U.S. must take a very hard and necessary look at the death penalty. Even more, we need to take a look at what often seems to game- playing and notch- counting that prosecutors seem to display in often refusing to take a look at new evidence. A "win" for them is not necessairly a "win" for society.
Why do so many judges and courts refuse to take a look at evidence that could save a person's life? Sadly, it is true in this country that lack of money, rather than evidence or competent judges, can so easily become a death warrant. The poor and uneducated are not the only people who may commit a crime; Wall St. is certainly proof of that. The job title of someone's high paying occupation should not give an automatic right to innoence either.
In war, we disregard civilian deaths, and at home, as a country we are more and more disregarding life. It is time for the People to demand that government serves the People.
Times change and I'm sorry JFK, but it is time for the country to ask what IT can do for its people, for the People have been DONE to death.
I don't dispute the likelihood that Claude Howard Jones' scalp belongs on the belt holding up Dubya's droopy drawers.
But the rush to administer capital punishment, as well as the sordid rush True Believers get when it finally occurs, is far broader and deeper than any one deluded, narcissistic, and arguably sociopathic head of state government.
It seems to me that once a person is "duly" sentenced to death, the momentum to follow through and take care of bidness begins to build up in the public mob that favors capital punishment.
Yes, we all know that there are supposedly irksome, endless appeals that can run on for years and years. But supporters of state-sanctioned homicide see this post-capital conviction due process as a major bug, not a feature.
And these last-chance remedies are studded with mechanisms similar to those pointy tire treadles in restricted traffic or parking areas that prevent motor vehicles from backing up by shredding the rear tires if the vehicle moves in reverse.
The heartless, vile governor or clemency board that remains steadfastly unwilling to go the extra mile to investigate the legitimacy of a capital conviction are only the tip of an iceberg of widespread misplaced and delusional brutality.
I am in NO way excusing or defending the obscene and pathological zeal with which governors and prosecutors support and administer the death penalty.
Dubya's sarcastic mimicry of Karla Faye Tucker's unsuccessful plea for clemency alone merits prison time at hard labor*. Not recreational brush-cutting, either! Perhaps having to write "I will not mock Death Row inmates" a few million times on a very large blackboard would suffice.
But if a significant bloc of citizens did not defend and enthusiastically subscribe to a philosophy of bloody-minded rationalized vengeance, and play into the demagogues' manipulations, there would be more political will to correct the abysmal entrenched predilection to execute first and ask questions later.
________________________
* http://www.ccadp.org/bushkills.htm
Im sure being the good right-to-lifer that he is, he feels very bad about this...
Hey it could happen, no?
I believe that there are some violent crimes that are so heinous that the perpetrator does deserve to die. I do not however, support the death penalty in any case because of insurmountable systemic problems with the criminal justice system.
To name just a few:
The very adversarial nature of the criminal justice system. To put it bluntly, its not about truth or justice, its about winning. Witness all the prosecutors who push to destroy evidence after trial, or fight any modern scientific analysis of existing evidence.
The arbitrary nature of even seeking the death penalty. Two identical crimes are handled differently depending on who the district attorney is, whether they are up for reelection, what the public pressure is, and most damning of all, who the accused is. Rich, famous, politically well connected, no need to worry. Poor, minority, or not part of mainstream society - plan your last meal.
The simple fact that we are human, and humans make mistakes. Judges, prosecutors, jurors, police, crime scene investigators, crime lab technicians, pathologists, other witnesses - especially eye witnesses.
PERHAPS THE BEST ARGUMENT OF ALL,
Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even the very wise cannot see all ends."
~ Gandolf the Grey, Lord of the Rings
Thanks for the Tolkien quote - it's the best bit in all of his books. I refer to it often when arguing against state-sanctioned murder.
Yes, that bit of dialogue between Gandalf and Frodo is powerful and sublime.
It's a bit of a "tell" that anticipates the moral of the epic story.
FWIW, it took me a very long time to appreciate that Gandalf's closing observation, "Even the Wise cannot see all ends", is as important as the rest. It really drives the point home.
"Even the Wise" has always been the hook for me.
To me the most important problem with the criminal justice system is that it is the best that money can buy, which is a sarcastic way of saying that if a rich person has better odds than a poor one, then it is not justice.
"Better odds"? Christ, that is like calling a camel kind. Has a rich person ever been murdered by the state?
"Serious problems exist in the criminal justice system that must be fixed if our society is to continue using the death penalty."
serious problems exist in a society that continues using the death penalty.
George W. Bush is just a despicable man for so many reasons.
politicscorner "George W. Bush is just a despicable man for so many reason"
I can think of three compelling reasons Dubya did for me:
1. He made me not to believe in god. I refuse to be in heaven with him.
2. He makes me quit smoking. I tried for years to quit, finally, I gave up: Quit smoking or the streets in SFO. I am just too poor now and I still wanna smoke!
3. "Regime Change" was Dubya favorite word before he embarks into Iraq war,” We can now use the same words on Dubya third terms.
Regime Change Now! Change we can believe in! Yes, we Can, Yes We Can!
Surely there is a better poster child for death penalty abolition than this person, who at minimum was an accomplice to cold-blooded, greed-driven murder. The headline had me mumbling swear words at GWB, but upon reading the article it is easy to see why, in an especially corrupted state, foaming at the mouth to execute, this guy would not get a second look. I doubt that Jerry Brown or Bob Kerry or Barak Obama would have commuted his sentence. It seems that the idea is more to vilify Bush (as if the million truly innocent Iraqis whose murder he presided over were not enough!) than to right a wrong.
The comments above about the error of assigning crimes of toxic capitalism to an individual are on target. It is the system that needs revolution, and the monster godfather in the governor's chair will topple at the same time. The sad truth is that MILLIONS of Texans (and New Yorkers, Alaskans, etc.) would be even more anxious to pull the switch than GWB. I hear their vile chatter daily at work and elsewhere, to the point where it can be very uncomfortable to speak up. ...Not to say that you shouldn't! I have found repeatedly that when I find courage and stand alone to speak against barbarism, others appear from all sides to stand by me. It is gratifying and inspiring, and it is absolutely necessary if we are ever to succeed.
It is not fruitful or accurate to say that all of us share the responsibility for the actions of the blood lusters. I, among many, have hit the streets innumerable times against the death penalty, imperialist wars, etc. I am a victim of imperialism, not a supporter! You might as well say that I am responsible for what my parents do. I am Oscar Grant and Tookie Williams and Joe Hill and Sacco and Vanzetti!
It was not about commuting the sentence but about allowing the defence to introduce proper DNA testing. As it turns out, the DNA test is what proved the innocence of the condemned man -- after W. refused to allow the evidence to be introduced.
And who are you to decide that anybody's scalp should hang on anyone's belt?
What has tickled your fantasy that Bush "refused" to allow "the evidence" to be introduced? It was two Texas courts which ruled that the DNA test could not be done. When the final papers reached Bush's desk there was no mention of the fact that the condemned man had asked for a DNA test. Hence there was no evidence for Bush to refuse.
It is always useful to study facts before making comments. You have not studied the facts and your opinion is made of the stuff that is called petard.
If I implied (or you interpreted so) that the man was rightly executed, that was unintended. I am against the death penalty, and even more against withholding critical evidence of innocence. That is an unspeakable crime, no matter how evil is the accused, and warrants very severe punishment for those responsible. Don't hold your breath waiting for justice in imperialist America, though.
Civilised societies don't murder people using teh law.
It's neither here nor there that innocent men died.
No one should die on principle.
I think that most of the people in the United States have a warped obsession with death. We produce and sell more arms than any other country. We spend probably trillions of U.S. tax dollars inventing newer and better weapons of death. We use death as a means of retaliating and lie about threats from other nations so we can use the weapons we spent so much money inventing and producing. The rich powerful Americans kill hundreds of thousands of innocent people and are lionized as strong leaders. Poor citizens, developmentally delayed, mentally ill, children, get death sentences by the government in retaliation for killing another whether they were able to understand what they did or what the charges are or if they got a fair trial.Drones are being sent all over to kill suspected terrorist without trials and without concern for the civilians causalities. Seems like many Americans are addicted to the narcissist power of killing human beings like it was a TV game.
It's repressed sexuality sublimated into violence.
I believe that, and when a whole society turns the murder of a scapegoat into a sacred ritual nobody should be so stolid as to miss the sexual sublimation of religion as well.
If anyone doubts that a socially sponsored murder is a religious ritual they should consider the pomp and ceremony with which these murders are carried out: The time of day must be exact, prepared words must be read as an incantation immediately preceding the execution and after the victim is strapped down, a priest/minister must be present, etc.
All this bullshit has one purpose: to turn the concrete act of murder into an abstract function of the state. What a wonderful tradition! It binds the state, religion, and the people of that state into one entity. We feel a sense of solidarity, a sense of brotherhood/sisterhood. For one day we are all one. A God's in his heaven, all's right with the world mentality bathes everyone in a sense of unity---and as one we have purged evil from within us, both individually and collectively.
One more proof, if any were needed, that the USA is a collection of sick fucks.
If anyone finds my profanity obscene just compare that obscenity to this sacred institution of state sanctioned murder.
sigh
What you can say about a society that thinks that images of breasts are unsuitable for children to see but ultra-violence is.
Why do "we" argue about sex and against sexualisation of men and women ? Crikey, how can men and women not be sexual, it's impossible.
But there is so little discussion about violence.
One is creation and healthy, the other destruction and sickness.
"DNA could have saved..." So could have a different career choice for Claude Howard Jones.
I know nothing about where Jones was born, nothing about his upbringing, how many career paths were open to him, what influences his community, social institutions, family had on him, but I can assure you that some people have no more choice in what career path they follow than a beef cow has a choice in who her owner will be or when and how she will be slaughtered.
Absent severe mental or physical disability, all of us are where we are and doing what we do as a result of our innate abilities and desires formed by the CHOICES we make to develop, ignore, or waste those abilities. It is true that some people do not have the mental or physical capacity to make choices. For the rest of us, we choose to pay attention in school, or to goof off. We choose to go back for our GED when our parents ignored our schooling. We choose to let the joint pass by, to leave when the meth comes out, when someone takes out a gun. We choose to turn ourselves around when we have a sober moment, or we don't.
To consign people to be victims of their raising and environment does a great disservice to those who have overcome great adversity, and those who will. Do not disdain the courage of those who win against the odds, and do not discourage those who might try. Triumph is not achieving greatness with ease, but achieving what you can against a great foe.
Spoken like a person who has had, on balance, mostly positive influences; parents who while not perfect did not do everything they could to convince you that you were worthless, did not matter, and there was nothing you could do about it; childhood friends, not predators for peers; adult mentors rather than indifferent or hostile adults.
There never has been, there never will be a self made man-----for good OR ill.
And so no one bears culpability for thier station in life, their daily actions, the harm or good that they do to others?
How pointless must such a philosophy be?
The point is that there is no point. No goal, no purpose. As for meaning, that is for each individual to find for him/her self. I have no responsibility or even a right to judge the actions of another.
A remarkable number of people feel it is incumbent upon them to make such judgments in every situation, whether or not they themselves are principals in a given situation. This seems to me to be a very strange approach to life.
If I saw a person sick and drunk, lying in a ditch, unable to get up, with the temperature at 25 degrees F. I would try to help him/her, no questions asked, no payment expected. Frankly I would consider the reasons for his condition none of my business.
The help I would give would be for my benefit, not his/hers.
And in your last sentence lies the difference in our outlooks, and what I consider to be the bankruptcy of your philosophy. To me, the help I would give would be for his benefit, not mine. What he does with the extra minutes, days, or years is up to him, and not for me to carry as debt. Our powers of judgment, of discerning right from wrong, of finding or attaching purpose to our lives are foundational to our well-being, and to our ability to do good for others.
"The death of one man is a tragedy. The death of millions is a statistic" -Joseph Stalin
When you are into, and desensitised by, over a million deaths like Bush I suspect he'd just say that this one got what he deserved.
This was not the last man executed by Bush. About a million more men, women, and children died later, in Iraq, at the hands of this ruthless butcher.
also based on faulty evidence.
also based on faulty evidence.
I shall never forget the smirk on George W Bush's face when he bragged about how many people had been excuted in Texas during his tenure as governor.
I believe he is a sociopath and incapable of feeling compassion for another human being let alone the millions he caused to be murdered. Unfortunately, we are also culpable because we did not stop him.
Bush Could Have Saved the Last Man Executed by Bush
and millions more...
The USA ( "we the people" ) murder hundreds of thousands of people without a second thought. ...what are one or two more dead innocents, more or less?
If this actually were a nation of laws, we'd just add murder to the indictment of Bush for war crimes and crimes against humanity.
But it isn't, and I see no reason to obey laws I, myself, find inconvenient.
Of course not unless you invite the wrath of a mean spirited, powerful, pitiless empire on yourself.