My attention has been called to a sentence from a post-conviction opinion by Justice Carlson in a death penalty case in which the court remanded for a hearing on ineffective assistance of counsel: ”Contrary to the arguments of the State, even a murderer is entitled to the effective assistance of counsel.”
Am I take it from this language that someone in the attorney general’s office argued that one accused of a capital crime is not entitled to effective assistance of counsel? I thought this was resolved in, oh, the 1930s but certainly by 1961.
Just wondered has MS put someone to death that was not guilty in the last 25 years or so? Or do we let Texas just take the lead in that kind of thing?
We went a long period without executions. There is a lot smaller pool to produce the mistakes than there has been in Texas, although Mississippi has been perfectly willing to put innocent men on death row (witness the film Mississippi Innocence).
Here is the story on Mississippi and Texas executions. From 1983-1989, there were three in Mississippi (the US Supreme Court later noted that one, Edward Earl Johnson, was unconstitutional under clearly established law got wrong by both the Fifth Circuit and the Miss. Supreme Court). During that period, in Texas, there were thirty three. From 1990-June of 2002, there were no executions in Mississippi at all. There were 171 in Texas.
Last six months of 2002: Texas 16, Mississippi 2
2003-2009: Texas 158, Mississippi 4
2010-2011: Texas 30, Mississippi 5
2012 Texas, 5, Mississippi 6
Throughout this period, Mississippi has consistently had 50-60 people on death row.
The explanations for this (there are several causes) make for a very interesting story. For one thing, there was a persistent refusal by the majority in the Mississippi Supreme Court to take seriously US Supreme Court cases in the 80s about jury instructions (and a refusal by the Fifth Circuit to overturn cases that had that instruction). DAs were getting advice from the AG (not the current one) to be aggressive about issues like that instruction. Bad advice.
I got the Mississippi numbers from the MDOC site and the Texas numbers from Wikipedia.
I hate to point this out but I think one of the lawyers that was removed by the Court because the Court was dissatisfied with him is same lawyer the 5th Circuit Judge said he was embarrassed by his Brief in May! What gives??? With this guy??
I think I mentioned it here a few months ago, but in oral arguments at the Fifth Circuit, one of Hood’s special assistant attorney generals told a three-judge panel “you may not consider this due process, but we do.”
There are some good lawyers and good people in the AGs office, but they are vastly outnumbered by idiots and incompetents.
JL,
One of the problems is that we really can’t know if we’ve put innocent people to death or not. If they say they didn’t do it, there’s always a chance they didn’t do it.
Oh, and rarely when they say the did do it, they didn’t do it.
I’ve been sent an email comment that my 7:18 6/23 post transposed the 2012 Mississippi and Texas executions, which I had, and that there were 4 executions in Mississippi 2003-2009. It’s corrected now. The corrections do not change my essential point.