Ending the Death Penalty: Vanguard to Hold Event on July 26

By David Greenwald
Davis Vanguard 

In November, California voters will be asked to decide whether to keep the death penalty in place or convert the sentences to life without parole. Proponents of the effort to repeal the state's death penalty point to the fact that the state has only executed 13 people since the death penalty was reinstated at a cost of $184 million per year, according to a recent study.

On July 26 at Woodland Heidrick Ag Museum, the Davis Vanguard will host a dinner and awards ceremony featuring speakers who will educate the public on why they believe California should end the death penalty.

• Maurice Possley - 2008 Pulitzer Prize Winning Journalist
• Jeanne Woodford - Former Warden San Quentin
• Don Heller - Author of California's 1978 Death Penalty
• Ellen Eggers - Public Defender - State of California
• Franky Carrillo - Exoneree after 19 years in prison

Our Keynote Speaker is Maurice Possley, a Pulitzer Prize winning reporter with the Chicago Tribune, who uncovered not one, but two executions of people who did not commit the crimes they were accused of committing.

In 2004, it was Possley's work with the Chicago Tribune, with co-writer Steve Mills that first reported on the now-notorious case of Cameron Todd Willingham, executed in 2004 despite strong evidence at that time that no crime ever occurred. The story of Mr. Willingham gained national attention, first with a New Yorker article and then with the Frontline episode, "Death by Fire." Prior to Mr. Willingham's February 17 execution, "Texas judges and Gov. Rick Perry turned aside a report from a prominent fire scientist questioning the conviction." Lousiana Fire Chief Kendall Ryland, a former fire instructor at Louisiana State University, said that he tried to re-create, in his workshop, the conditions the original fire investigators described. When he could not, he said it "made me sick to think this guy was executed based on this investigation. ... They executed this guy and they've just got no idea--at least not scientifically--if he set the fire, or if the fire was even intentionally set."

Mr. Possley reported on another story involving a wrongful execution in Texas. Carlos DeLuna was executed in 1989 for a murder in Corpus Christi. Mr. Possley told the Atlantic this spring, "I remember that what really got me interested in the case was seeing the crime scene photos with all of the blood and then learning that there was no blood on DeLuna. It just didn't seem possible that he committed such a crime and was caught so quickly and had no blood on his clothing. That fact was so startling to me." He adds, "I thought it was a colossal, global failure of every corner of the criminal justice system. The media failed to question the case (not unusual in smaller markets where police and prosecutors are the best sources) as well."

Mr. Possley is not the only one of the Vanguard's speakers concerned about the execution of an innocent person.

Franky Carrillo spent 20 years in prison for a murder he did not convict. Carrillo was sentenced in 1992 to one life term and 30 years to life in prison after being convicted of one count of first-degree murder and six counts of attempted murder in a fatal drive-by shooting.

Mr. Carrillo had been in prison for nearly 14 years when a Sacramento-based attorney with the California Public Defender's office, Ellen Eggers, learned of his case.

Critical to Mr. Carrillo's case were six eyewitnesses who testified to seeing him pull the trigger.  It was the victim's son who finally admitted to Ms. Eggers, "He hadn't seen anything and he had relied entirely on one of the other witnesses because [he] had assured [the son] it was Franky.  But we already knew [from the second witness] that the Sheriff's Department had told [him] who to pick."

"So it all led back to a corrupt Sheriff's deputy that made a mistake and thought he had the right guy but he didn't," Ms. Eggers told us. Ms. Eggers convinced the defense team to hire an eyewitness identification expert, Scott Frasier, to do a complete reenactment of the crime.  Eventually she convinced the judge to go to the crime scene.

"[The reenactment] established that none of those witnesses could have seen what they claimed to have seen," she said.  This meant it was not merely adult witnesses recanting years later - there was actually evidence to support that recantation.

Still, even armed with all of that exonerating information, had Ms. Eggers not reached out to the DA's office, she believes Mr. Carrillo would still be in prison today.

In 1978 Don Heller helped write California's Death Penalty law for Senator Briggs.  But now he no longer believes in the law he once crafted.

"When I wrote it, I was absolutely certain beyond any doubt that what I was writing was morally right, was constitutionally sound, and would bring justice to people that deserved to be executed for heinous homicides," he said.  "I've gone from certainty to change."

At the same time, Mr. Heller believes at least one of California's 13 executed individuals was innocent.

"I believe that Tommy Thompson was innocent of the rape-murder that he was convicted of and sentenced to death," Mr. Heller said in response to a question from the Vanguard.  "Thompson's case relied almost exclusively on the testimony of an informant, aptly named Mr. Fink."

"Mr. Fink was a professional informant, he had actually put several people on death row by people confessing to him in jail and it just so happened that Mr. Fink always benefitted from this confession that was made to him," Mr. Heller continued.

"I think that Tommy Thompson was innocent," he said. "He was executed under the law I wrote and that has stayed with me since 1998 that I participated in the execution of an innocent man."

Jeanne Woodford is almost as unlikely a person to lead the anti-death penalty movement as Don Heller.  For years, she served as a warden at San Quentin, overseeing the executions of four individuals.

Even as a warden at San Quentin, she said was never in favor of the death penalty.  She told the Vanguard, "I always thought it was time to get rid of the death penalty and my experience in San Quentin just really reiterated my own, personal beliefs."

"After each execution, I faced the reality that I had not made the world any safer.  The death penalty is a failed public policy and I am committed to spending the rest of my career working to end this costly and ineffective practice," said Ms. Woodford in another interview.  "The death penalty fails to serve victims' families, does not keep the public safer than the alternative of life without the possibility of parole, inflicts unnecessary stress and trauma on prison personnel, and drains taxpayer resources that could be better spent providing crucial services to homicide victims' families."

Please plan on attending this worthwhile event.  You can buy tickets at www.davisvanguard.org.