Usual Monday morning office small-talk...
"Hey..."
"Hi!"
"How was your weekend?"
"Oh good, you?"
"I signed up for death penalty training."
"What? Why?"
"I don't know...seems interesting. And it's free for Freshfields employees."
"But it's not really relevant is it?"
Woah woah woah... hang on a minute, how is this not relevant? State-sanctioned homicide (cause of death by execution is listed as "homicide" on death certificates) on a large scale (34 states in the US currently have the death penalty, not to mention other countries like China, Yemen, Malaysia...), and it's not relevant?
Usually it doesn't get to me, but for some reason the apathy seriously pissed me off this morning... Bloody hell, how is this NOT relevant???!!!!
Rant aside, I really enjoyed my weekend of being a student again.
The death penalty training was organised by Amicus and held at the Freshfields office. I turned up not knowing what to expect (because for some reason no one sent me a copy of the programme), but when I finally got my hands on it and saw topics such as "The US Supreme Court and Politics", "Jury Selection and Questioning", "Evidence and Trial in Capital Murder Cases", I got seriously, seriously excited.
The sessions did not disappoint. They were confronting, informative, engaging, emotional, traumatic at times. We had speakers who had been on death row for 10 years, 20 years, and were later found to be innocent; people who had been convicted for no apparent reason other than race, in spite of mountains of exonerating evidence (one black man was convicted of murder-rape, despite medical reports clearly showing the victim was a virgin); one man whose grandparents were murdered but whose 2 brothers were later convicted and executed for (a separate) murder committed during a robbery... Their stories were unbelievable and horrific, almost too painful to sit through, and so many around me were reduced to tears, multiple times.
But for me, what I could not deal with most of all, was the stance of the United States Supreme Court. We were given a very detailed breakdown of all 9 judges of the Supreme Court - their background, ideological views, political affiliations, history of voting on death penalty cases. Seems like the Court is now permanently frozen 5-4 in favour of the death penalty, and only one judge is considered a "winnable" vote by capital defence lawyers (i.e. a death penalty verdict is almost certainly going to be upheld unless that particular judge "swings" his vote).
Yup, you read that right, in favour.
I have never thought it could be traumatic to listen to the judges rationalise the death penalty in eloquent legal argument. A red-neck in Texas, yes, I can understand. But there is nothing worse than listening to an obviously brilliant, clear-minded and rational person - judges of the highest court of the United States, no less - spelling out why they think the death penalty is appropriate, why another human being deserves to die.
I simply could not believe it.
As lawyers, we learn to have an innate respect for the law, despite all its flaws and inadequacies. And because of that, we treat judges, purported guardians of the law, with a sense of reverence. We may not always agree with their views and reasoning, but at least we can trust in the fact that they are intelligent people, they are bound by the duty of their office, and by the force of argument, there is always the possibility that they will be persuaded.
But seeing the Supreme Court judges, wielding the power of the highest court in the land, facing a person who has only one last chance to argue and plead for his life, and then calmly read him his death sentence... I felt physically ill, almost as if I had been betrayed.
To have the power to end the life of another person and to use it so unquestioningly - I am running out of words to express the outrage...
Have you ever been to the execution room?
Have you ever seen the prisoner being led, handcuffed till the very end, to his death?
Have you ever seen the indignity of a man spending the last minutes of his life being watched by the family of the murder victim, people who hated him and gloried in his death?
Have you ever seen the executioners flick the switch on the electric chair, pull the lever operating the trap door, press the button releasing the lethal injection, shut the door on the gas chamber?
Have you ever tried to imagine what it must have been like that few conscious seconds before death, the absolute terror, despair, the knowledge that the next few breaths will be your last?
Can you even imagine all this?
If you can, how on earth can you put another human being through this?
... is what I want to ask the judges, if I could, face to face.
I want an answer.
