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Ron Jackson's Perspective
The Sunday Journal -
Think
Kankakee, Illinois
August 25, 2002
What they don't
know won't hurt |
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I wish I could sing. I
am talking about singing with a voice that people would listen to,
not your typical shower singing caliber.
If I could sing, I would try to get a gig on death row
to sing to inmates. My song of choice would be the theme song
from the television police series, "Baretta" - "Keep Your Eye on the
Sparrow" by Dave Grusin and M. Ames.
Standing in the aisle of any prison with men waiting to
be executed, specifically mentally retarded felons, I would sing at
the top of my voice, "Don't go to bed, with no price on your head.
No, No, don't do it. Don't do the crime, if you can't do the
time. Yeah, don't do it."
In what seems one of its busiest summers ever, the U.S.
Supreme Court, by a 6-3 decision, ruled that capital punishment for
mentally retarded criminals is excessive, unusual and violates the
Constitution.
Citing a "national consensus" against executing
mentally retarded criminals, Justice John Paul Stevens said the
practice has become unusual and "doubted that the execution of
mentally retarded criminals will measurably advance the deterrent or
retributive purpose of the death penalty."
No matter how anyone feels about the decision, it is
now law. The execution of this law will not be as easy because
determining who is mentally retarded will be left up to the
individual states.
The general definition of mental retardation is having
an I.Q. below 70. Each state will determine its own level.
That will make this interesting. A person in New York with an
I.Q. of 70 may not be considered retarded, but he may be in
Illinois. Similarly, states have various standards regarding
legal ages of sexual consent. In Hawaii the age of consent is
14. In Illinois it's 17. If only R. Kelly had made that
videotape on a Pacific Island.
In anticipation of the Supreme Court's ruling, one
Illinois condemned inmate has already filed a petition seeking to
have his sentence overturned. He will claim he is too retarded
to be executed. Obviously, he is intelligent enough to file a
petition.
"You can't just say at the age of 35, 'I'm mentally
retarded,'" says Anna Ahronheim, Illinois assistant deputy defender
who handles death penalty appeals. I disagree with her.
It happens all the time when men reach age 35 and suddenly decide to
run for president.
I don't understand this ruling. I also don't
understand why a defendant must be mentally competent to stand
trial. Why only the defendant? Wouldn't it be better for
the defendant if the judge, jury, witnesses and counsel all be
required to be psychologically tested before the trial? Or if
the defendant was retarded, doesn't the law mandate he be judged by
a jury of his retarded peers?
The Sixth Amendment states in part, "In all criminal
prosecutions, the accused shall be informed of the nature and cause
of the accusation." Why does the accused have to understand
the charges? The Constitution merely says "informed."
In my limited and possibly retarded reasoning, if
retarded criminals don't know the wrong done when they have killed
someone, they won't know the wrong done to them when they are
executed, and what they don't know won't hurt them. |
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