Judge, panel examine death penalty
Natalie Bailey
News Writer
A forum Thursday night in the Hesburgh Center Auditorium investigated the humanity of the United States' justice system, featuring a lecture by Indiana district judge Sheila Murphy followed by a panel discussion with other experts.
"As Americans we have to hang our heads in shame," said Murphy, retired presiding judge of the sixth municipal district circuit court of Cook County. "The death penalty is such an embarrassment."
"The United States is really quite an outlier in how it uses and abuses the death penalty," Paolo Carozza, law professor at Notre Dame, said.
Twelve countries have outlawed the death penalty and few others actually execute their citizens, the panel said. In recent years, 90 percent of death penalty executions occurred within China, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United States. In addition, the United States stood alone in executing the mentally retarded until a Supreme Court ruling in June 2002.
"The basic question is whether the death penalty violates human dignity, not if it is just, not if it is imposed fairly, not if it makes the victim's family feel better and not if it is an effective punishment," Carozza said. "It is an existential question just as much as any, who are we and who should we be? We need to look to the world arena to answer these questions."
The death penalty is affecting the way the world views the United States, panel members said..
"It is very difficult for the United States to take steps forward in the areas of terrorism and other diplomatic issues due to the obstacle of capital punishment," Carozza said.
St. Joseph County Superior Court Judge Jerome Frese said the death penalty is anything but just.
"It is an eye for an eye mentality," Frese said. "I am against the death penalty; I don't like the death penalty; I would like to see us get rid of the death penalty. It just doesn't make sense."
Frese said presiding in a district that supports the death penalty, particularly where a unanimous jury recommendation requires the judge to impose the punishment, creates a conflict of interest.
"I can't say the state doesn't have the right to take a life," Frese said. "I also took an oath to follow the law. I cannot prevent state's right to a fair trial."
A practicing Catholic, Frese said the Catholic Church only recently took an active stance against the death penalty. In a conference in the 1980's the Bishops were split on the issue. The church found it justifiable to take a life to prevent further harm to others.
"The death penalty corrupts us because we get this sense of righteousness and justice out of it. Law and punishments are not meant to be based on emotions, it has to be based on justice," Frese said.
Charlotte D. Pfeifer, director of Student and Community Relations at Indiana University, said South Bend was mainly concerned with people of color and mental retardation. She compared Hitler's final solution to exterminate unwanted people in the community with the implementation of the death penalty in the United States.
"Black people are disproportionately represented in the criminal justice system. Black people continue to suffer from the remnants of slavery and white people continue to benefit from them," Pfeiffer said. "I am talking about institutional oppression. It is easier to try a person who is not seen as valuable to the community. The usage of the death penalty depends on who the victim is and it depends on who the perpetrator is."
John Maciejczyk, chief deputy prosecutor for St. Joseph County, seemingly the only proponent of the death penalty in the auditorium, agreed that the death penalty is not implemented uniformly.
Maciejczyk spoke from his experience with the families of the victim's that he has represented in murder trials. He said it was after dealing with murder cases that he found himself to be a strong supporter of capital punishment.
"There are certain crimes where the criminal deserves to die," he said.
Paolo Manicinelli of Sant'Egidio Community, an organization that works with death row inmates all over the country, said putting the offender to death is not an appropriate or helpful way to deal with the death of a loved one.
"The death penalty never gives the victims back their lives and it never pays back the victims families."
The majority of the panel agreed.
"The greatest love and solidarity calls us to oppose the death penalty," Carozza said.
The discussion will continue with Murphy in a panel discussion on "The Death Penalty and the Work of the Sant'Egidio Community" at noon today at Notre Dame's Center for Social Concerns. Other panelists will include Mancinelli and Darrin Belousek, assistant professor of philosophy at Goshen College.
The events are sponsored by the Sant'Egidio Community, Notre Dame's Joan B. Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, the office of Campus Ministry, and several other campus and local organizations.
All News Stories for Friday, November 22, 2002
