Opinion ID: 2239438
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The number of prisoners executed since 1930 is as follows:

Text: Entire Indiana United States 1930-1939 31 1667 1940-1949 7 1284 1950-1959 2 717 1960 0 56 1961 0 42 1962 1 47 1963 0 21 1964 0 15 1965 0 7 1966 0 1 1967 0 2 1968 0 0 1969 0 0 1970 0 0 1971 0 0 National Prisoner Statistics, No. 45, August, 1969, Bureau of Prisons. These statistics indicate a dramatic decrease in the number of executions. I believe this has resulted from a growing reluctance on the part of the judiciary and the general community to sanction the execution of prisoners as punishment for criminal conduct. This reluctance has resulted in the de facto abolition of the death penalty since 1962 in Indiana, the date of our last execution. In the entire United States there has been a de facto abolition of the death penalty since 1967. (2) It appears that in 1966, approximately 47% of the American public opposed capital punishment for convicted murderers, while 42% favored it and 11% were undecided. In 1960, the comparable figures were 36% opposed, 51% in favor, and 13% undecided. Witherspoon v. Illinois (1968), 391 U.S. 510, 88 S.Ct. 1770, 20 L.Ed.2d 776. (3) The jury in Indiana, hears all of the facts in first degree murder cases and upon conviction must choose between life imprisonment or death as the punishment. In making this choice, a jury reflects the broad community feelings regarding the use of the death penalty. a jury that must choose between life imprisonment and capital punishment can do little more  and must do nothing less  than express the conscience of the community on the ultimate question of life or death. 391 U.S. at 519, 88 S.Ct. at 1775. So it is with the judge when trial by court is held and a conviction results or a plea of guilty is received, and the choice becomes his. At the present time there are 154 men in Indiana prisons committed for first degree murder. Only 7 of those men are under sentence of death. In the period of 1966 to date 58 were committed to Indiana prisons for first degree murder and only three of those are under sentence of death. Therefore, the jury or judge, when faced with the necessity of choosing between life and death for the person convicted of first degree murder, has chosen life 95% of the time since 1966 and 96% of the time considering all men now committed for first degree murder. (4) The General Assembly of this State in 1965 enacted the following statute: AN ACT to abolish capital punishment and prescribe in lieu thereof imprisonment during life. BE IT ENACTED BY THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF INDIANA: SECTION 1. Hereafter no person shall suffer death upon conviction of any public offense but in instances in which the penalty of death is now prescribed by statute any person convicted thereunder shall be imprisoned during life, or imprisoned during life without eligibility for parole at any time. SEC. 2. All laws and parts of laws in conflict with the provisions of this act are hereby repealed. SEC. 3. Whereas an emergency exists for the immediate taking effect of this act, the same shall be in full force and effect from and after its passage. The Governor of Indiana vetoed that enactment with the following message: Mr. Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives I return herewith, without approval, House Enrolled Act No. 1054. In my heart, I am opposed to taking the life of another. But, as Governor, I cannot, in good conscience, take the easy course of signing away this awful penalty unless it is the clear mandate of the people. They must have the opportunity, in an election where this is an issue, to determine whether the penalty, which we have had in our law since statehood, shall no longer be. Until the issue is decided no man's life should be taken. I have sought the help of many people in reaching a conclusion, including governors of our state, but the decision is my own. (Emphasis added.) In spite of the veto and the fact that this statute did not become law it commanded the overwhelming support of the elected representatives of the people of Indiana and showed that the death penalty has ceased to have the support of the people. In that session of our General Assembly the State Senate passed the death penalty repealer by a vote of 35 to 4. The House of Representatives passed the death penalty repealer by a vote of 75 to 18. It constitutes a clear expression that the death penalty offends the standards of decency held by the people of this State. (5) Statistics appearing in 39 N.Y.U.L. Rev. 136, 191 (1964), show that approximately one out of every three persons under sentence of death in this century in the United States received executive commutation. The significance of these statistics is that after the defendant has been tried in a court of law, convicted, and has exhausted all avenues of appellate review including post-conviction remedies, the executive has felt the need to commute one-third of these cases. (6) There are nine sister states and Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands which do not provide for the death penalty for any crime. NPS #45. In addition in Delaware, Massachusetts and North Dakota where the death penalty has been officially retained the last execution was held prior to 1950, in Montana prior to 1945, and in New Hampshire prior to 1940. President's Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice, Task Force Report: Courts, p. 27. (7) The National Commission on Reform of Federal Criminal Laws has recommended repeal of the death penalty. National Commission on Reform of Federal Criminal Laws, ch. 36. That commission was composed of federal judges and Congressmen, and was chaired by Edmund Brown, former Governor of California. (8) There are twenty-three nations of the world which have abolished capital punishment. They are: Argentina, Australia (Queensland), Austria, Brazil, Columbia, Costa Rica, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Federal Republic of Germany, Finland, Greenland, Iceland, Italy, Mexico (25 states out of 29), Norway, Netherlands, Netherlands Antilles, New Zealand, Portugal, Republic of San Marino, Sweden, Switzerland. United Nations pamphlet, Capital Punishment, 1962. (9) Appellate courts have gone to great lengths to avoid affirming death cases. Judge Jackson in Stein v. New York (1953), 346 U.S. 156, 73 S.Ct. 1077, 97 L.Ed. 1522, recognized this fact when he stated: When the penalty is death, we, like state court judges, are tempted to strain the evidence and even, in close cases, the law in order to give a doubtfully condemned man another chance. 346 U.S. at 196, 73 S.Ct. at 1099. This same judicial attitude is contained in the following statement of Justice Harlan in Reid v. Covert (1957), 354 U.S. 1, 77 S.Ct. 1222, 1 L.Ed.2d 1148: So far as capital cases are concerned, I think they stand on quite a different footing than other offenses. In such cases the law is especially sensitive to demands for that procedural fairness which inheres in a civilian trial   . I do not concede that whatever process is `due' an offender faced with a fine or a prison sentence necessarily satisfies the requirements of the Constitution in a capital case. 354 U.S. at 77, 77 S.Ct. at 1262. These comments are a recognition of the gut reaction of judges to death as a form of punishment and reflect their absorption of an evolving standard of decency. The reluctance of review tribunals to affirm in a death case is clearly shown in Boykin v. Alabama (1969), 395 U.S. 238, 89 S.Ct. 1709, 23 L.Ed.2d 274. There the defendant plead guilty to robbery and was sentenced to death by an Alabama court. Defendant appealed alleging that the death penalty was a cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth Amendment. The Alabama Supreme Court affirmed the conviction. The United States Supreme Court, in order to avoid deciding that issue, reversed the case on the grounds that the record of the guilty plea proceedings was faulty, an error which the defendant had not even alleged in his brief. The following cases reflect similar judicial attitudes: Kallas v. State (1949), 227 Ind. 103, 83 N.E.2d 769, and cases cited. State v. Laws (1968), 51 N.J. 494, 242 A.2d 333; State v. Ramirez (1921), 34 Idaho 623, 203 P. 279, 29 A.L.R. 297; Davis v. State (1922), 155 Ark. 245, 244 S.W. 750; Williams v. State (1931), 183 Ark. 870, 39 S.W.2d 295; Frady v. United States, 121 U.S. App.D.C. 78, 348 F.2d 84, certiorari denied, 382 U.S. 909, 86 S.Ct. 247, 15 L.Ed.2d 160 (1965); Coleman v. United States (1965), 123 U.S.App.D.C. 103, 357 F.2d 563; Spillers v. State (1968), 84 Nev. 23, 436 P.2d 18; cf. Hubka v. State (1928), 40 Okla. Cr. 161, 267 P. 864; Fritz v. State (1912), 8 Okla. Cr. 342, 128 P. 170; Commonwealth v. Garramone (1932), 307 Pa. 507, 161 A. 733, 89 A.L.R. 291. See also Austin v. United States, 127 U.S.App.D.C. 180, 382 F.2d 129 (1967). The above factors are but a portion of the indicia available which reflect a growing abhorence of the death penalty and that a standard of decency exists in this State, indeed in this country which renders the imposition of the death penalty cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the State and Federal Constitutions. b. The second basic approach used in Trop v. Dulles, supra , was to focus on the impact of the questioned punishment upon the individual being punished. We believe, as did Chief Judge Clark in the court below, that use of denationalization as a punishment is barred by the Eighth Amendment. There may be involved no physical mistreatment, no primitive torture. There is instead the total destruction of the individual's status in organized society. It is a form of punishment more primitive than torture, for it destroys for the individual the political existence that was centuries in the development. The punishment strips the citizen of his status in the national and international political community. His very existence is at the sufferance of the country in which he happens to find himself. While any one country may accord him some rights, and presumably as long as he remained in this country he would enjoy the limited rights of an alien, no country need do so because he is stateless. Furthermore, his enjoyment of even the limited rights of an alien might be subject to termination at any time by reason of deportation. In short, the expatriate has lost the right to have rights.    It subjects the individual to a fate of ever-increasing fear and distress. 356 U.S. at 101, 102, 78 S.Ct. at 598.