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Conferenza Transnational
Agora' Internet - 28 aprile 1995
Re: To Peter and Craig

From: Craig Harrison

To: Multiple recipients of list

Subject: Re: To Peter and Craig

X-Listprocessor-Version: 6.0 -- ListProcessor by Anastasios Kotsikonas

X-Comment: The Transnational Radical Party List

One thing bothers me about Dorry's implication that murder

convictions of innocent people are rare enough not to cause a

significant problem if there were a dramatic increase in the rate of

executions. I have personal knowledge of a number of such cases

which make me wonder. They all involve the issue of self-defense:

the Kung-Fu shcool I attend teaches a *very* hard style and the

students come from varied backgrounds--about half indigent and

inner city and about half with professional careers; the latter

(myself included) rarely get into trouble, but in the last year

or two I have heard of perhaps half a dozen cases where students

have been attacked and swiftly responded with a lethal punch. All

were immediately charged with murder. In three cases, witnesses came

forward and confirmed that they had been attacked, whereupon charges

were dropped. In the remaining instances, this didn't happen and

they ended up in jail. But if a murder conviction resulted in an

automatic death penalty, they would have been executed. It appears

that the police here always file the most serious possible charge

at the outset. But what bothers me is that in none of these cases

was there anything like a careful or thorough proceeding--it appears

that you don't get full due process unless you can afford a good

lawyer, and it seems to me that this problem would multiply in

direct proportion to the rate of executions.

--Craig Harrison, San Francisco

 
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