Richardson Takes a Citizen Poll & Repeals NM Death Penalty

On Wednesday afternoon, New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson signed a bill— passed last Friday in the NM State Legislature—that will abolish the death penalty in the state for the next ten years.

(The bill replaces the death penalty with life without possibility of parole.)

Interestingly, Richardson did so only after asking New Mexicans to weigh in on the issue—either by phone or by email.

As of noon on Wednesday, Richardson’s office told CNN, that it had received 10,847 phone calls, e-mails and walk-in comments from people who wanted to voice their opinions on the legislation.

It turned out that, in Richardson’s ad hoc poll, a repeal of the death penalty won by something of a landslide: 8,102 wanted the ban, and 2,745 thought the death penalty should stay put.

In addition, Richardson met Monday with more than 100 New Mexicans to discuss the issue, including law enforcement officers and the families of murder victims.

(By the way, while he has already signed the bill, you can still opine to or thank Governor Bill on the death penalty matter, even after the fact, by calling: 505-476-2225.)

New Mexico is only the second state to ban executions since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976. (It joins 14 other states that do not have capital punishment.)

Here are some clips from Richardson’s statement about why he signed:

Today marks the end of a long, personal journey for me and the issue of the death penalty.

Throughout my adult life, I have been a firm believer in the death penalty as a just punishment – in very rare instances, and only for the most heinous crimes. I still believe that.

[SNIP]

Regardless of my personal opinion about the death penalty, I do not have confidence in the criminal justice system as it currently operates to be the final arbiter when it comes to who lives and who dies for their crime. If the State is going to undertake this awesome responsibility, the system to impose this ultimate penalty must be perfect and can never be wrong.

But the reality is the system is not perfect – far from it. The system is inherently defective. DNA testing has proven that. Innocent people have been put on death row all across the country.

Even with advances in DNA and other forensic evidence technologies, we can’t be 100-percent sure that only the truly guilty are convicted of capital crimes. Evidence, including DNA evidence, can be manipulated. Prosecutors can still abuse their powers. We cannot ensure competent defense counsel for all defendants. The sad truth is the wrong person can still be convicted in this day and age, and in cases where that conviction carries with it the ultimate sanction, we must have ultimate confidence – I would say certitude – that the system is without flaw or prejudice. Unfortunately, this is demonstrably not the case.

And it bothers me greatly that minorities are overrepresented in the prison population and on death row….

There’s more here.

Certainly, Richardson made a political statement. But it is also a thoughtful one and represents, I suspect, the perspective of many other thoughtful people who have long favored the death penalty but who are made increasingly queasy by the now hundreds of people on death row and/or serving lengthy prison sentences—who have been found to be innocent after DNA technology was applied to their cases.

Richardson closes with the following:

More than 130 death row inmates have been exonerated in the past 10 years in this country, including four New Mexicans – a fact I cannot ignore.

From an international human rights perspective, there is no reason the United States should be behind the rest of the world on this issue. Many of the countries that continue to support and use the death penalty are also the most repressive nations in the world. That’s not something to be proud of.

In a society which values individual life and liberty above all else, where justice and not vengeance is the singular guiding principle of our system of criminal law, the potential for wrongful conviction and, God forbid, execution of an innocent person stands as anathema to our very sensibilities as human beings…..

Nicely put, Bill.

Kansas could possibly be next up to bat.

PS: Since fiscal issues are of prime concern in these bleak economic days, here’s a rundown on why the death penalty costs more than locking up someone for life.