 |
| Brandon Rhode |
Rhode's attorney, Brian Kammer, filed a motion for an emergency stay after learning of his client's suicide attempt, arguing "Mr. Rhode is incompetent to be executed and his execution would violate the Eighth Amendment."
In the motion, Kammer said he received no information regarding his client's whereabouts or condition. "Execution of Mr. Rhode ... does not comport with [Department of Corrections] lethal injection protocols and is nothing less than a ‘descent into brutality, transgressing the constitutional commitment to decency and restraint.' "
Granting of the stay gives Rhode the opportunity to file an application challenging his mental competency to be executed, court spokeswoman Jane Hansen said.
Rhode would be the 25th person in Georgia to die by lethal injection and the 48th the state has executed since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1973.
The 31-year-old was convicted in the 1998 murders of an 11-year-old boy, 15-year-old girl and their father, Steven Moss, a trucking company owner who caught Rhode and an accomplice, Daniel Lucas, burglarizing the family's Jones County residence. Lucas remains on death row.
Rhode was denied clemency last Friday by the state Board of Pardons and Paroles. His attorneys argued that Lucas killed the victims and that Rhode's life should be spared because he suffered brain damage as a child.
Rhode's suicide was the second attempt reported on Georgia's death row this year. On Jan. 1, guards at the state prison in Jackson found 35-year-old Leeland Mark Braley hanging in his cell.
Source: ajc, September 22, 2010
Execution delayed after 'utterly terrified' killer tries to commit suicide just hours before he was to be put to death
The U.S. state of Georgia has delayed the execution of a convicted killer after the 'utterly terrified' man tried to commit suicide.
Brandon Joseph Rhode, 31, tried to slit his wrists and throat just hours before he was due to be put to death by lethal injection.
Now his lawyers are arguing that his attempt proves he is incompetent.
And Rhode's attorney Brian Kammer said executing him violates the Constitution's ban on cruel and unusual punishment.
'He's utterly terrified and just hopeless,' said Kammer.
'He was very morose, frightened and subdued.
'This was a product of him just being in terror, of losing hope altogether.'
Georgia prisons officials have rescheduled the execution for Friday.
Rhode was convicted in 2000 of the killings of Steven Moss, 37, his 11-year-old son and 15-year-old daughter during a burglary of their home.
His co-conspirator, Daniel Lucas, was also sentenced to death in a separate trial and is on death row.
Suicide attempts on death row are rare, but have happened.
In March, Ohio inmate Lawrence Reynolds overdosed on an antidepressant hours before he was to be transferred to the state's death chamber. He recovered in a hospital and was executed a week later.
In Texas, David Long was executed in December 1999 after overdosing on antidepressants authorities believe he hoarded in his death row cell.
Long's attorneys sought to postpone the execution, but a judge refused a reprieve, saying that because Long previously was judged competent to be executed, there was a presumption of competency.
Source: dailymail.co.uk, September 22, 2010
Please Stay Alive, We Are Supposed to Kill You
Brandon Rhode was rushed to the hospital today to prevent him from dying following his attempt at suicide. This afternoon, the Georgia Department of Corrections announced a delay in his scheduled execution, vaguely referring to an “incident”. Rhodes did not get strapped to the gurney tonight, but the state may try to kill him Thursday instead.
It is the irregular situation like this one that magnifies the cruelty of the death penalty. Clearly, the thought of being executed was terrifying to Rhode, as it must be for every individual facing the pre-ordained and publicly announced time, date and method by which their life is to be ended. What will it be like for him between now and Thursday as his body and mind recuperates from his failed suicide attempt, and as he contemplates the moment when he will be strapped to a gurney and killed?
Those who believe the death penalty is not cruel are focused on the acts of those who commit murder and the belief that retribution is a legitimate means to justice. The idea of human rights, however, is that society sets a standard based on what is cruel and inhuman period, not what is cruel and inhuman in comparison to the worst things an individual may have done to others. Somehow, we get that it would be disgusting to rape someone convicted of rape and we don’t burn down the property of arsonists, but killing those who commit murder seems to be fair game, at least in the minority of nations left using the death penalty.
Retributive justice may feel satisfying to a primitive part of the brain or to a society that wants a simple and loud outlet to relieve a base level of outrage. But retribution is a dangerous place to take justified feelings of anger about the injustice of violent crime. The attempt by Mr. Rhode to violently end his life breaks the façade of the sterile, hospital room-looking, “civilized” execution chamber. Homicides are performed on the gurney in that room in the name of the citizens of the state, dragging us all into a new crime. And we pour millions into this system rather than ask ourselves what went wrong in Mr. Rhodes’ life that led him to do what he did (and a lot did!) and how could we prevent future violent crimes? How could we give law enforcement more tools to effectively tackle crime? They know the death penalty is not a deterrent and doesn’t make our streets safer. What are the needs of the loved ones who survive the victims of violent crime? So many things we could do with our energy (and money) besides resuscitating prisoners only to then kill them.
Source: Human Rights Now, September 21, 2010
Comments
Post a Comment
Pro-DP comments will not be published.