A year ago this August, 72 migrant workers -- 58 men and 14 women -- 'were on their way to the US border when they were
murdered by a drug gang at a ranch in northern Mexico, in circumstances that remain unexplained. Since then, a group of Mexican journalists and writers have created' a "Day of the Dead-style Virtual Altar" Spanish-language website,
72migrantes.com, to commemorate each of the victims, some of whom have never been identified. The New York Review of Books has
English translations of five of their profiles. [more inside]
posted by zarq
on Sep 7, 2011 -
7 comments
"I decided I had to do something to save this person’s life. That killing someone in Dallas is not an answer for what happened on Sept. 11."
Rais Bhuiyan petitions the state of Texas to
stay the execution of a white supremacist who shot him and murdered two others in a hate-motivated
crime.
posted by Blazecock Pileon
on Jul 18, 2011 -
87 comments
Utah Attorney General Announces Execution on Twitter. Today marked an evolution of sorts for Twitter. It’s no longer just for following your favorite celebrity rants or for informing your followers you’re having a ham sandwich or just took a shower.
And self-promotion on Twitter seems so yesterday. Consider Friday’s tweets from Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff. Around midnight, he tweeted that he’d given “the go ahead” to execute condemned inmate Ronnie Gardner.
posted by Fizz
on Jun 19, 2010 -
84 comments
The Torture Colony.
In a remote part of Chile, an evil German evangelist built a utopia whose members helped the Pinochet regime perform its foulest deeds... [i]nvestigations by Amnesty International and the governments of Chile, Germany, and France, as well as the testimony of former colonos who, over the years, managed to escape the colony, have revealed evidence of terrible crimes: child molestation, forced labor, weapons trafficking, money laundering, kidnapping, torture, and murder. It may sound like the farfetched plot of Saw VII (or
something out of Kafka) but it's horrifyingly true.
[Previously]
posted by dersins
on Apr 17, 2009 -
38 comments
The Supreme Court today issued a one line statement
refusing to hear Troy Davis' appeal.
Troy Davis was convicted of the 1989 murder of a police officer in Savannah, GA, and sentenced to death solely on eyewitness testimony. No murder weapon or any physical evidence linked him to the crime. Since the conviction, seven of the nine witnesses have recanted or changed their stories, and one of the two who haven't changed their stories is the other suspect in the case. Things were looking good for Davis when the Supreme Court
issued a stay two hours before his execution last month. Justice may really be dead in this country.
posted by x_3mta3
on Oct 14, 2008 -
60 comments
Executed Today offers "each day the story of an historical execution that took place on this date, and the story behind it."
posted by Knappster
on Aug 12, 2008 -
19 comments
Thirty years ago today,
Gary Gilmore was executed at the Utah State Prison, the first prisoner to be put to death since the moratorium on executions was established four years prior, and the first execution in Utah in sixteen years. His refusal to appeal his death sentence confounded his lawyers and attracted the attention of the
ACLU, among others, who fought to keep Gilmore alive, against his wishes. His frustrations with the uncertainty of his sentence led him to attempt suicide in prison twice.
His life and death have been recounted in
several books,
films, inspired a
few songs, and even an
SNL skit. His final words, “Let’s do it,” led to a
major marketing campaign.
posted by Nathanial Hörnblowér
on Jan 17, 2007 -
24 comments
Life and Death: an extraordinary post from Chris Clarke about his connection to serial killer Stephen Peter Morin. His family chimes in meaningfully in the comments.
Morin's execution is often pointed to as proof of the cruelty of lethal injection.
posted by Cassford
on Apr 4, 2005 -
20 comments
Another Fan Of Torture Reveals Himself Eugene Volokh, a former clerk to Justice O'Connor and a leading voice in conservative legal circles has some interesting opinions on punishment:
[T]hough for many instances I would prefer less painful forms of execution, I am especially pleased that the killing — and, yes, I am happy to call it a killing, a perfectly proper term for a perfectly proper act — was a slow throttling, and was preceded by a flogging. The one thing that troubles me (besides the fact that the murderer could only be killed once) is that the accomplice was sentenced to only 15 years in prison, but perhaps there's a good explanation.
posted by expriest
on Mar 17, 2005 -
84 comments
Décolleté takes you on a fascinating guided tour of decapitation through the ages that covers biblical head severers Judith and Salome, the hapless victims of the Tudor axe, as well as the dreaded guillotine. Site contains some mild artistic gore, but nothing too horrendous.
posted by MrBaliHai
on Sep 29, 2003 -
3 comments
"Mr. Banks, a man with no prior criminal record, is most likely innocent of the charge that put him on death row. Fearing a tragic miscarriage of justice, three former federal judges (including William Sessions, a former director of the F.B.I.) have urged the U.S. Supreme Court to block Wednesday's execution.
"So far, no one seems to be listening." [via atrios]
posted by donkeyschlong
on Mar 11, 2003 -
15 comments
Is forcing a prisoner on death row to take antipsychotic medication to make him sane enough to execute cruel and unusual punishment? (NYT link) A federal appeals court ruled that officials in Arkansas can force a prisoner on death row to take antipsychotic medication to make him sane enough to execute. The problem is that the American Medical Association's ethical guidelines prohibits precisely that.
To make the case more surreal, a representative of the Arkansas attorney general's office who argued for the state later said: "The ethical decisions involving doctors are difficult ones, but they are not ones for the courts". Does this mean that COs -Correction Officers- are to figure out for themselves which medication to administer? Do they also call the shots when deciding if the "waiting" patient is sane enough???
posted by magullo
on Feb 11, 2003 -
58 comments
Three Supreme Court Justices publicy oppose executing teenage criminals. In a rare move, Justices Ginsburg, Breyer, and Stevens made a public statement in a delay request to state their opposition to executing someone who committed murder before the age of 18. With the Court already banning the execution of the mentally retarded this year, is this another sign of a soon-to-be next step in the abolishment of the death penalty? Or does the average American still believe that regardless of what time, when you do the crime you walk the line?
posted by XQUZYPHYR
on Aug 30, 2002 -
49 comments
Is this Israel's Rodney King video? Warning: graphic depiction of an execution. Mahmoud Salah was subdued, stripped and then executed by Israeli soldiers who must have not realized they were being taped. Also reported
here.
This
article makes the assertion that the regular police opposed the killing and Special Forces committed this act.
posted by n9
on Apr 23, 2002 -
99 comments
In 1948 Caryl Chessman was awarded
two death sentences on two counts of attempted rape. He was probably innocent, yet he was executed in 1960 for more or less "being a smartass." In the years between his sentencing and death, he wrote three memoirs and a novel, which sold well. After the first memoir the prison forbade him to write about anything other than the legalities of his case, so he developed an elaborate code to get his work out to his lawyer. His spirit never broke, as strange as it was.
This is his story.
posted by kittyloop
on Nov 3, 2001 -
13 comments
China is on an
'execution frenzy' executing more people 1750+ over the past 3 months then the rest of the world combined over the past 3 years.. according to Amnesty International. The parades and stadiums add a nice Roman-era twist.
posted by stbalbach
on Jul 6, 2001 -
34 comments
Death with Commercials is how the ever apposite
Frank Rich sums up the media-saturated McVeigh execution, the
ultimate reality show. Rich thinks all the hoopla my have served to turn more people away from punishment by death.
posted by caraig
on Jun 23, 2001 -
8 comments
Policy or Parody? A group calling itself "Citizens for Capital Punishment" ran an ad in the Terre Haute paper (both the NYT and the WP rejected it) showing a family watching the McVeigh execution on television and cheering. This seems too far over the top to be a real pro-death-penalty piece, but if it's satire, the creators are playing it straight.
[via Media News]
posted by harmful
on Jun 19, 2001 -
9 comments
U.S. Embassy bomber given life sentence. This is kind of the flipside of the McVeigh execution; Saudi man helps bomb the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi which kills 213 people. Jury cannot agree to execute him, as some believe he would become a martyr for the cause, and others believe this wouldn't "alleviate the suffering of the victims or family members". Why is this any different from the McVeigh situation?
posted by Big Fat Tycoon
on Jun 13, 2001 -
31 comments
