Ultimate Punishment (15 page)

wrong cases had reached death row
: For example, at the time
Furman
was decided, Illinois had only 31 persons on death row, as opposed to the 171 who were there at the end of 2002. See J. Marquart and J. Sorensen, “A National Study of
Furman
-Commuted Prisoners: Assessing the Threat to Society from Capital Offenders,” reprinted in
The Death Penalty in America
, p. 164.

all…interrogations…videotaped
: See Report, Recommendations 4–7, pp. 24–28, for the discussion of videotaping and related proposals. See also p. 33, discussing related jury instructions.

altering lineup procedures
: The Recommendations regarding identification procedures are numbers 10–15, Report, pp. 31–40.

pretrial hearings to determine the reliability of…informants
: Recommendations 51 and 52, Report, pp. 121–23, set forth proposed procedures regarding in-custody informants.

death sentence not…imposed without…concurrence…trial judge
: Trial judge concurrence in death sentences was outlined in Recommendation 66, Report, pp. 152–54.

banning…death penalty…based solely on…lone eyewitness or…accomplice
: Recommendation 69, Report, p. 158, would bar capital sentences when based on the uncorroborated testimony of a single eyewitness or jailed informant.

eligibility criteria…trimmed to five
: Our proposals for reduced eligibility criteria, Recommendations 27 and 28, were set forth and explained at Report, pp. 65–79.

urged creation of a statewide oversight body
: Recommendation 30, Report, pp. 84–88, details the composition and function of the proposed statewide review panel.

guaranteed sentences of natural life
: Recommendation 67, Report, pp. 155–56, proposed the new mandatory natural life sentence for death-eligible cases.

expediting…post-conviction
: Recommendations 72–75, Report, pp. 169–76, set forth our ideas for trying to shorten the death penalty endgame.

major newspapers endorsed…as did…state bar
: The State Bar Association endorsed seventy-six of our eighty-five proposals, including the state review commission and reducing death penalty eligibility. See
ISBA Bar News
, vol. 43, no. 1, 7/15/02,
http://www.isba.org/association/027%2D15a.htm
.

state prosecutors' organization…dug in its heels
: The state prosecutors' association responded on May 16, 2002, with its own report. See Illinois State's Attorneys Association, Response to the Report of the Governor Ryan's Commission on Capital Punishment, 5/16/02, and “Ryan Panel Plans Hit by Prosecutors,”
Chicago Tribune
, 5/17/02.

major players…supported significant changes
: Response to the Commission report in its aftermath and in the months following was regularly documented in the local press. S. Mills and C. Parsons, “Ryan's Panel Urges Fixes in Death Penalty; 2-Year Study Says Fatal Flaw Exists,”
Chicago Tribune
[Sports Final, CN Edition], 4/15/02, p. 1; “Justice Demands Death Penalty Fix,” Chicagoland
Daily Herald
, 4/17/02; S. Mills and M. Possley, “ ‘We're Talking About Life and Death…Not About Losing an Election,' Reform Plan Would Have Kept 115 from a Cell on Death Row,”
Chicago Tribune
[North Sports Final Edition], 4/16/02, p. 1; “Nothing Short of Justice,”
Chicago Tribune
[North Sports Final Edition], 4/16/02, p. 18; M. Possley and E. Ferkenhoff, “Daley, Cops Question Death Penalty Reform Plan,”
Chicago Tribune
[North Sports Final Edition], 4/17/02, p. 1; R. Pearson, “Governor Hopefuls Differ on Death-Eligible Crimes, Ryan Sees It Only For ‘Worst of Worst,' ”
Chicago Tribune
[McHenry County, MC Edition], 4/23/02; R. Pearson, “Candidates Agree on Reform; Birkett, Madigan Say Death Penalty Plan Goes Too Far,”
Chicago Tribune
, 4/26/02; “Fixing the Death Penalty Series: Restoring Justice. First of five parts,”
Chicago Tribune
[Chicagoland Final Edition], 9/29/02, p. 10. (The remaining four parts of the series appeared on successive days.)

none…enacted
: C. Parsons and R. Long, “Death Penalty Reform Falters; House Rejects Ryan Plan As Senate Works on Compromise,”
Chicago Tribune
[Lake Final Edition], 11/20/02, p. 1.

“
headed straight for the trash bin
”: Senator Dillard was quoted in S. Mills and C. Parsons, “Ryan's Panel Urges Fixes in Death Penalty; 2-Year Study Says Fatal Flaw Exists,”
Chicago Tribune
[Sports Final, CN Edition], 4/15/02, p. 1. His role in sponsoring legislation embodying the commission's reforms is described in J. Patterson, “Ryan Urges Legislators to Hurry, Approve Death Penalty Reforms,” Chicagoland
Daily Herald
, 5/14/02; C. Parsons, “Ryan Making End Run on Death Penalty; Veto Could Set Up Vote in Legislature,”
Chicago Tribune
[North Final Edition], 8/24/02, p. 1.

June, I testified
: I testified before the Illinois State Senate Capital Litigation Subcommittee on June 26, 2002.

General Assembly…added a twenty-first factor
: Public Act 92–0854. See
http://www.law.northwestern.edu/faculty/fulltime/bienen/bienen.html, Seminar Task Force Report: Murder and Its Consequences
, p. 94.

lawyers…petition the Governor to exercise…clemency
: See S. Mills, “Clemency Push for All 160 on Death Row,”
Chicago Tribune
, 5/16/02.

victims and prosecutors appeared…before the Prisoner Review Board
: See J. Keilman, “Clemency Pleas Rile Panelists; Some Attack Defense Claims, Hearings' Pace,”
Chicago Tribune
[Northwest Final, NW Edition], 10/17/02, p. 1; S. Mills and C. Parsons, “Tears Send a Message; Hearings' Emotional Impact Surprises Death Penalty Foes,”
Chicago Tribune
[Chicagoland Final Edition], 10/27/02, p. 1; H. G. Meyer, “Death Penalty Foes Rally Near Hearings,”
Chicago Tribune
[North Final Edition], 10/26/02, p. 17; J. Keilman and S. Kapos, “Attack Victims Speak at Hearings; Survivors Recall Horrors, Seek to Influence Ryan,”
Chicago Tribune
[North Sports Final Edition], 10/24/02, p. 1; S. Mills, “Life-or-Death Debate Rages at Hearings; Attorneys Argue over Clemency As Victims' Families Relive Grief, Pain,”
Chicago Tribune
[North Sports Final Edition], 10/16/02, p. 1; E. Zorn, “Prosecutors Are Directors in Theater of Pain,”
Chicago Tribune
[North Sports Final Edition], 10/24/02, p. 1.

Death penalty opponents responded with…mediagenic events
: C. Jones, “ ‘Exonerated' an Enlightening Evening for Ryan,”
Chicago Tribune
[North Sports Final, C Edition], 12/18/02, p. 1; D. Mendell, “March from Death Row; Ex-Inmates Carry Plea to Governor from Stateville,”
Chicago Tribune
[North Sports Final Edition], 12/17/02, p. 1; W. Hageman, “2 Days of Events on Wrongful Convictions,”
Chicago Tribune
[Chicagoland Final Edition], 12/15/02, p. 3.

Governor might have had some role in unsavory doings
: M. O'Connor and R. Gibson, “U.S. Links Ryan to Cover-up; Prosecutors Say He Knew Campaign Records Would Be Destroyed,”
Chicago Tribune
[North Sports Final Edition], 12/19/02, p. 1.

Ryan…vetoed bills that…added new eligibility factors
: See Report, p. 16, nn. 13–14, for a full discussion of the new death penalty provisions Governor Ryan vetoed.

first-hand experience…prosecutorial power
: I do not mean to question the need for the investigation. The duration and zeal of the grand jury proceedings have troubled me at times, but the resulting convictions clearly establish a basis for further inquiry.

Ryan pardoned four men on death row
: The four men pardoned were Stanley Howard, Madison Hobley, Leroy Orange, and Aaron Patterson. S. Mills and C. Parsons, “ ‘The System Has Failed' Ryan Condemns Injustice, Pardons 6; Paves the Way for Sweeping Clemency,”
Chicago Tribune
[North Final Edition], 1/11/03, p. 19. See also
People v. Stanley Howard
, 147 Ill. 2d 103, 588 N.E.2d 1044 (1992);
People v. Madison Hobley
, 159 Ill. 2d 272, 637 N.E.2d 992 (1994); 182 Ill. 2d 404, 696 N.E.2d 313 (1998);
People. v. Leroy Orange
, 121 Ill. 2d 364, 521 N.E.2d 69 (1988); 168 Ill. 2d 138, 659 N.E.2d 935 (1995); 195 Ill. 2d 437, 749 N.E.2d 932 (2001);
People v. Aaron Patterson
, 154 Ill. 2d 414, 610 N.E.2d 16 (1992); 192 Ill.2d 93, 735 N.E. 2d 616 (2000). See also R. Bush and J. Coen, “3 Awaken to Busy Day of Freedom,”
Chicago Tribune
[Chicagoland Final Edition], 1/12/03, p. 14; “Excerpts from Ryan Speech at DePaul,”
Chicago Tribune
[Chicagoland Edition], 1/12/03, p. 16; “Freed from Death Row,”
Chicago Tribune
[Chicagoland Edition], 1/12/03, p. 8; “Excerpts from Gov. Ryan's Speech,”
Chicago Tribune
[North Final Edition], 1/11/03, p. 18.

evidence…found to show…torture
: Burge's alleged torture, and the investigation of it, are well described in J. Conroy, “A Hell of a Deal,”
Chicago Reader
, 10/12/01, posted at
http://www.todesstrafeusa.de/death_penalty/alive_patterson.htm
. In a 1997 opinion, U.S. District Court Judge Milton Shadur wrote: “It is now common knowledge that in the early to mid-1980s Chicago Police Commander Jon Burge and many officers working under him regularly engaged in the physical abuse and torture of prisoners to extract confessions…Both internal police accounts and numerous lawsuits and appeals brought by suspects alleging such abuse substantiate that those beatings and other means of torture occurred as an established practice, not just on an isolated basis.”
United States ex rel. Maxwell v. Gilmore
, 37 F. Supp. 2d 1078, 1094 (N.D.Ill. 1999). See also
People v. Wilson
, 116 Ill. 2d 29, 506 N.E.2d 571, 106 Ill. Dec. 771 (1987), finding that convicted cop killer Andrew Wilson had been beaten into confessing, which culminated in a successful civil rights suit against the city of Chicago. See
Wilson v. City of Chicago
, 120 F.3d 681 (7th Cir. 1997); R. Kaiser, “Burge a Distant Memory at Far South Side Station; Ex-Cop Brass' Abuse Cited by Ryan in Pardons,”
Chicago Tribune
[Chicagoland Edition], 1/12/03, p. 14. The Cook County State's Attorney's Office had long opposed the efforts of these four defendants—and several others—to gain post-trial evidentiary hearings into the torture charges, even after their claims had gained substance from the revelations in other cases. In the meantime, nearly a decade after the evidence of torture had emerged, no criminal charges had been brought against any officer. The Chief Judge of the Circuit Court of Cook County ruled in 2002 that the State's Attorney's Office had a conflict of interest and appointed a special prosecutor to conduct a criminal investigation of Area Two officers. S. Mills and J. Hanna, “Counsel to Probe Torture by Police,”
Chicago Tribune
[North Sports Final Edition], 4/25/02, p. 1.

In…four pardoned cases…principal evidence…was a confession
: Madison Hobley, one of the four men who was pardoned, has long contended that he was tortured but never actually gave the oral confession that was used to convict him of setting a fire that killed seven people, including his wife and infant son. See
People v. Hobley
, 182 Ill. 2d 404, 696 N.E.2d 313 (1998), where Hobley was granted an evidentiary hearing to show that the state had suppressed evidence. The Illinois Supreme Court said Hobley's “petition make[s] a substantial showing that the State has acted with bad faith in suppressing exculpatory evidence throughout the course of proceedings in defendant's case.”

Aaron Patterson
: For a comprehensive account of Patterson's case, see J. Conroy, “Pure Torture,”
Chicago Reader
, 12/3/99,
http://www.ccadp.org/aaronpatterson-reader.htm
. The Illinois Supreme Court had decided that Patterson was entitled to an evidentiary hearing on his torture claim because the trial judge who had rejected those contentions had refused to consider Patterson's written message about what was happening to him, incorrectly deeming it inadmissible hearsay.
People v. Patterson
, 192 Ill. 2d 93, 735 N.E.2d 616 (2000).

only eyewitnesses who'd seen Brisbon…recanted
: See Remarks Concerning Clemency Petition of Henry Brisbon Presented to the Illinois Prisoner Review Board, 10/15/02 (presentation of Brisbon's lawyer, Jean MacLean Snyder of the MacArthur Justice Center) Link at
http://macarthur.uchicago.edu/deathpenalty/brisbon.html; United States ex rel. Brisbon v. Gilmore
(U.S.D.C.N.D.Ill. No. 95 C 5033 6/5/97) 1997 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 8314.

Kenneth Allen
: See
People v. Allen
, 79 Ill. 2d 471, 405 N.E. 2d 747 (1980) (Remand on Supreme Court's Order to Examine Plea); 101 Ill. 2d 24, 461 N.E.2d 337 (1984); “Death Row Inmates Receive Life,”
Chicago Tribune
[Chicagoland Final Edition], 1/12/03, Section 1, p. 18 [hereafter “
Tribune
Case Capsules”].

Latasha Pulliam: People v. Pulliam
, 176 Ill. 2d 261, 680 N.E.2d 343 (1997);
People v. Pulliam
, No. 89141 (Ill. Supreme Ct., decided 10/18/02) (remanding for hearing on retardation);
Tribune
Case Capsules, p. 19.

Andrew Johnson: People v. Andrew Johnson
, 149 Ill. 2d 118, 594 N.E.2d 253 (1992); 183 Ill. 2d 176, 700 N.E.2d 996 (1998),
Tribune
Case Capsules, p. 18.