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Ryan does right

Author:   Matt Deatherage  
Posted: 1/11/03; 12:38:11 PM
Topic: Ryan does right
Msg #: 459 (top msg in thread)
Prev/Next: 458/460
Reads: 2961

George Ryan really has balls.

The outgoing Republican Illinois governor, after three years of work and consideration, this weekend pardoned four men on death row because he was convinced, with mountains of evidence, that all four men were tortured into confessing. Here's one quote from the AP:

Patterson, 38, claims he was tortured into falsely confessing to murder after police threatened him with a gun, beat him and tried to suffocate him in 1986. He previously turned down a deal to admit guilt and drop his claim of police torture in exchange for freedom.

Ryan found out early in his term that a completely innocent man was on death row and pardoned him, and like someone genuinely concerned about criminal justice should have done, he initiated an investigation into the state's death penalty system. When he learned that thirteen inmates had been wrongly sent to death row -- as determined by the courts -- during a period where 12 inmates had been executed, he put a moratorium on all Illinois executions. After all, when you're having to release more inmates than you're executing (and you're not 100% sure about the guilt of the dead, either), it's wise to stop and step back.

For this, of course, Ryan was pilloried, especially by his own party. "Justice" in the US courts is a synonym for "revenge," and when blame has been assigned to someone, that person must be punished without looking too closely at how the blame was assigned.

That's exactly how prosecutors like it. Real justice is not Law & Order. Real district attorneys and US attorneys have political ambitions, if not actual God complexes, and the one thing they hate is having their big convictions and defendants taken away from them. Look at what happened when Bill Clinton pardoned Marc Rich. As I noted last year, it was a good pardon. The laws Rich allegedly broke in the late 70s were not only complex, they were rewritten by Republican administrations so that what Rich allegedly did would today be completely legal. But the New York US Attorney had a "big fish" and wouldn't let him go, and provided plenty of evidence that Rich wouldn't even get a fair trial.

So what did the US Attorney do when Clinton robbed her of her prize catch? That's right -- she started investigating the former president to see if she could prosecute him for exercising his complete and absolute Constitutional authority. Chief executives have pardon authority because the framers assumed a president or governor could make that decision. Pittsburgh's School of Law has good background on pardons, including these quotes from Alexander Hamilton himself:

It is not to be doubted, that a single man of prudence and good sense is better fitted, in delicate conjunctures, to balance the motives which may plead for and against the remission of the punishment, than any numerous body whatever. [...]

In seasons of insurrection or rebellion, there are often critical moments, when a well-timed offer of pardon to the insurgents or rebels may restore the tranquility of the commonwealth.

Prosecutors regularly ignore the Constitution, and when this part comes back to bite them, they get really mad. Look at these quotes from prosecutors of the men who were pardoned simply because objective evidence shows they were tortured into confessing crimes that would send them to death row:

Cook County State's Attorney Dick Devine said the future of the four men should have been decided by the courts.

"Instead, they were ripped away from (the courts) by a man who is a pharmacist by training and a politician by trade," he said.

Devine also criticized Ryan for pardoning the men and not consulting with his office before making his decision.

"Yes the system is broken and the governor broke it today," Devine said.

Devine's office is trying determine if the pardons could be challenged, but Devine said the clemency powers for an Illinois governor are among the broadest in the country.

Now, who do you want to believe about the best place to lodge clemency authority: Cook's County Prosecutor Richard Devine, or Alexander Hamilton?

Ryan believes strongly that Illinois's capital punishment system is, pardon the term, fatally flawed. At least 17 of the men were wrongfully convicted and placed on death row, and there's no time to investigate the rest before he leaves office on Monday. Every attempt he's made to reform the system -- just to prevent executing innocent people (Ryan did not run on an anti-capital punishment platform) -- has been resisted by both prosecutors and the legislature. They know that the public wants their public hangings, and rather than keep the oaths they took to provide justice and uphold the constitution, they accede to public demands.

So Ryan, in one of the ballsiest acts in recent state government history, today issued a blanket commutation to "almost all" of the 156 men still on Illinois Death Row. Their sentences will be reduced to life with the possibility of parole, but don't count on that ever happening. None will be eligible for release at this time.

CNN has more prosecutor reaction, including more from Devine:

"I believe that he is wiping his muddy shoes on the face of victims, using them as the doormat as he leaves his office," said Peoria County State's Attorney Kevin Lyons on CNN's Newsnight. "It says much more about George Ryan than it does about the death penalty."

"By his actions today, the governor has breached faith with the memory of the dead victims, their families and the people he was elected to serve," said Cook County State's Attorney Richard Devine, who called the pardons "unconscionable."

You'd think that people like Devine, who allegedly graduated law school, would understand that the state constitution gives the governor broad clemency powers exactly because people like Devine always oppose clemency. Devine has no reason to care that the system is broken: he wants to look tough on crime, and he gets that reputation by convictions and executions. And you have to take victim family statements with a grain of salt, because you can be damn sure that if the prosecutors or police lied to the courts about torturing suspects, they're not going to tell the truth to the families. Victim families regularly argue against death row inmates released based on DNA evidence. After you've believed with all your heart for ten or twenty years that someone killed a member of your family, science isn't going to make that feeling change in a month or two.

So why does Ryan have balls to do this two days before leaving office, especially when he didn't stand for re-election? He's in the midst of a corruption scandal.

A criminal trial is expected to get under way next week on federal prosecutor's allegations that Ryan's former chief aide and his campaign committee illegally diverted state resources for campaign purposes. A number of Ryan's close advisers have been indicted, and federal prosecutors have alleged the governor knew of attempts to conceal potential wrongdoing from investigators.

Ryan has not been charged.

Now true, these are federal and not state charges, but what do you think will happen if "Cook County State's Attorney Richard Devine" or "Peoria County State's Attorney Kevin Lyons" finds any evidence that someone associated with Ryan committed some kind of state crime? That person will likely be granted immediate immunity to say anything that would implicate the former governor in criminal activity.

The prosecutors didn't reform the system because, like prosecutors everywhere, they're not interested in justice. They're interested in convictions. They've convinced everyone that trials are a high-stakes game, and since defense attorneys can lead juries to believe falsehoods as long as neither the attorneys nor their witnesses knowingly lie, that's somehow good enough for the prosecution as well. It's not. Defense attorneys are supposed to represent their clients. Prosecutors are supposed to seek justice, like on TV.

The exercise of pardon authority in cases of clear malfeasance is just about the best evidence you'll get that prosecutors really don't believe the parts of their state constitution that interfere with their own authority. George Ryan showed that his state's justice system is incredibly broken, to the point of continually trying to execute at least 17 innocent people. For pointing it out and fixing it as his state's constitution intended, the same prosecutors are now looking for any way at all to prosecute him.

Don't believe the depictions of criminal justice you see on TV.

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