World court hears arguments in Mexico's challenge to (US)death penalty

[papau]

The United States asked the United Nations’ highest legal body not to interfere in its criminal justice system, demanding Tuesday that it throw out a case filed by Mexico over the death penalty.At the center of Mexico's claim is the Vienna Convention, a 1963 treaty signed by both countries that says people traveling or living abroad have the right to contact their consulates when they are accused of a serious crime.


http://msnbc.msn.com/id/3728619/

U.S. urges U.N. court to stay out of capital cases

The Associated Press THE HAGUE, Netherlands - The United States asked the United Nations' highest legal body not to interfere in its criminal justice system, demanding Tuesday that it throw out a case filed by Mexico over the death penalty.

The International Court of Justice is hearing a suit that alleges 52 Mexican citizens on U.S. death row were denied a fair trial because they weren't told they had a right to help from the Mexican consulate.

Mexico asked the court on Monday to order the men's cases be returned to the moment of their arrest and started again.<snip>

In the 2001 case, the court found that the United States had failed to inform a German citizen of his right to consular assistance. But Walter LaGrand had already been executed in Arizona, in defiance of an injunction by the international court.<snip>

In November, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal based on the Vienna Convention from Torres, who was convicted of killing two people during a burglary in Oklahoma City in 1993. But in a dissenting opinion, Justice Stephen Breyer wrote that it was manifestly unfair for U.S. courts to ignore such appeals. It surely is reasonable to presume that most foreign nationals are unaware of the provisions of the Vienna Convention (as are, it seems, many local prosecutors),Breyer wrote.

In all, there are 120 foreign nationals from 29 countries on death row in various states, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

[iverglas]

1. add one Canadian

Stan Faulder was executed in George Bush's Texas after being denied his Vienna Convention rights ... and after one of the fishiest trials you ever saw. The prosecution was bought and paid for -- literally -- by the wealthy Texan whose mother had been killed, a witness was paid handsomely, another witness (and quite possibly the real murderer) was never produced, there was no forensic evidence to connect Faulder to the crime, etc. etc.

The Cdn govt, and many US experts and authorities, including Madeleine Albright, attempted to intervene to prevent the execution, but to no avail.

http://venus.soci.niu.edu/~archives/ABOLISH/nov98/1025.html
-- add one Paraguayan, one Honduran, one Thai ...

The Joseph Stanley Faulder case in Texas is illustrative of the reason why U.S. law enforcement officials do not want you to have access to your government officials in a time of personal crisis. Mr. Faulder was held incommunicado for four days while Texas authorities coerced a confession out of him; a confession later quashed as being illegally obtained. Faulder, a Canadian citizen, I assume could at least speak English, so he may (or may not) have understood the Texas interrogators.

The rest of us would be so happy to refrain from intervening in the US's internal affairs if the US would stop executing our citizens without complying with international law, deporting our citizens to Syria in disregard of their Canadian passports and rights under international law, holding our citizens in Guantanamo without regard for international law ...

.

[papau]

2. One more topic our US Media is not excited about as it concerns Bush

Really, Amazing.

and sad.....

:-)

[Kellanved]

3. LaGrand was worse

There were two of them (brothers; sons of a GI, German citizens). They robbed a bank, one staying outside, and one inside. Both got the Death Sentence (despite the one waiting outside not even knowing about his brother getting trigger-happy). Both were denied the right to check back with the German embassy (for quality legal counsel). The embassy finally learned of the case and did everything to get a new trial for both (especially as there was evidence that their attorney did nothing to defend his clients).

The Governor of Arizona proceeded with the executions despite Clinton, Albright, the International Court of Justice and the Arizona Clemency Board demanding a new trial for Walter LaGrand (the one who didn't fire a shot).
http://en2.wikipedia.org/wiki/LaGrand_case

[funkyflathead]

4. What about the other countries that have the DP?

Why single out the US?

Russias got it, China too.

[MrBenchley]

5. How many Mexican citizens

do you suppose are ON death row in Beijing?

Boy, we're really in the ranks of the elite freedom-loving nations, aren't we? Russia AND China...


"The death penalty is used extensively, arbitrarily, and frequently as a result of political interference. It is particularly used during periodic ''Strike Hard'' anti-crime campaigns, when defendants may be sentenced to death for crimes which at other times are punished by imprisonment. "

http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGASA170012002?open&of=ENG-CHN

<sarcasm>If only we could be more like China, praise Jeebus!</sarcasm> Sounds like what Texas wants to be.

[iverglas]

6. have you tried considering the actual issue?

The actual issue is the denial of foreign nationals' Vienna Convention rights in trials held in US states, and the argument that convictions and sentences of people denied those rights should be voided, and the people retried.

(One important aspect of exercising Vienna Convention rights is that the accused foreign national will generally be assured of competent counsel, something they often do not get when denied those rights.)

Are you aware of foreign nationals who have been executed in Russia and/or China and who were denied their Vienna Convention rights?

If so, were any of them Mexican?

Responding to a story about Mexico's challenge to the execution of its nationals, by governments in the United States, where those nationals were prevented from exercising their Vienna Convention rights, by saying "what about Russia/China? - they execute people too!" is kind of like responding to a story about a person injured in a car crash that occurred while s/he was driving a Ford car that Ford knew to have a dangerous defect but had failed to recall by saying "what about Daimler-Chrysler? - people are injured in their products too! why isn't this guy suing Daimler-Chrysler?"

Mexicans charged with capital offences in the US have been denied their Vienna Convention rights, and then tried and executed. So have Canadians and nationals of various other countries. Death penalty cases are simply the most egregious instances of the problem.

Mexico IS NOT CHALLENGING the death penalty in the US.

Mexico is demanding that governments in the US be required to honour their obligations under the Vienna Convention, to which the US is a party and which is binding on state governments in the US.

Any other smelly scarlet fish you'd like to complain about?

.

[slackmaster]

7. And the one NOBODY wants to talk about

Japan, the mere mention of which usually kills DP threads.

[iverglas]

8. "death penalty threads"?

This isn't a death penalty thread.

How could anyone (two) capable of reading multi-syllabic words be under the impression that this is a death penalty thread? (or ... why would said anyone(s) be so eager to portray it as such?)

So MSNBC inaccurately headlined this story "Mexico's challenge to death penalty". This is surprising? More or less surprising than someone(s) responding to a post without bothering to learn (acknowledge) what it's actually about?

The International Court of Justice is hearing a suit that alleges 52 Mexican citizens on U.S. death row were denied a fair trial because they weren't told they had a right to help from the Mexican consulate.

Mexico asked the court on Monday to order the men's cases be returned to the moment of their arrest and started again.

Mexico is plainly challenging the TRIALS which led to the sentences, not simply the SENTENCES, despite how MSNBC chooses to spin the story.

And despite how "William Taft -- great-grandson of President and Chief Justice William Howard Taft" chose to spin Mexico's action when he said "the international court was 'not a criminal appeal court'." Mexico is not saying that it is. Mexico is seeking to have the US compelled to honour ITS OWN COMMITMENTS under the Vienna Convention, which IT SIGNED VOLUNTARILY.

Mexican President Vincente Fox canceled a visit with President Bush last year after the execution in Texas of a Mexican man who was not included in the petition.

The violations by US state governments of their obligations under the Vienna Convention are just one more ugly impediment to good relations between the US and the rest of the world.


(spelling typo edited)

.

[slackmaster]

11. You are mistaken

This isn't a death penalty thread.

You'll have to take that issue up with funkyflathead, who created a death-penalty subthread.

So MSNBC inaccurately headlined this story "Mexico's challenge to death penalty". This is surprising?

Yes, the press gets things wrong about as often as they get them right.

The violations by US state governments of their obligations under the Vienna Convention are just one more ugly impediment to good relations between the US and the rest of the world.

Yes, I agree with you completely that the Mexican prisoners and others mentioned were denied their rights under international law.

So what are we to do about it? I'd say getting rid of the Bush administration would be a good start.

[iverglas]

12. well ...

"So what are we to do about it? I'd say getting rid
of the Bush administration would be a good start."

Back in 1999, when Dubya was a mere governor, and his minions were champing at the bit to kill the Canadian guy, Stan Faulder, I did send him an email.

I advised him that if he should ever show up on the streets of Canada's capital as a head of state, he could be assured that a lot of people, including me, wouldn't have forgotten how he presided over the violation of that Canadian's rights under international law (not to mention US law), not to mention the killing of said Canadian, and would be out there on those same streets loudly reminding him.

Damn thing is, when (if) he ever does show up on the streets of Canada's capital, he will by then have presided over the deaths of such a whole lot more people (including a few Canadians) and the violation of the rights under international law of such a whole lot more people (including a few Canadians) that ... well, I guess Stan Faulder will almost pale in comparison, eh?

He shoulda just paid that routine first official state visit to Canada the way he was supposed to, instead of issuing yet another snub and going someplace else, and it would have been so much easier on him.

I'll bet my name's on another list now, though.

.

[Spoonman]

9. Mexico looking for simpathy!

What a joke!
They have a lot of nerve questioning the treatment of prisoners!

There prison system is so corrupt and substandard, most prisoners in a Mexican jail would welcome death!

A Scottsdale businessman, has been in a Nogales, Sonora, jail for three weeks since Mexican customs officials found ammunition and a pistol case in his vehicle.
James Brunen, 45, went to Mexico on July 23 to buy some pots as a gift for a relative and
simply forgot he had the cartridges, his wife, Merry Brunen, said Monday. When he realized
the ammunition was in the back of his vehicle, he alerted customs officials. But it was too late.
The blunder, his wife said, landed him in the middle of his worst nightmare: a filthy holding
cell with 46 other men, many suffering from hepatitis. There are 20 cots and dozens of rats.
“He was in a cage that didn’t have a chair, a bed, a sink or a toilet and it was flooded with backed-up sewage,”

http://216.239.41.104/search?q=cache:B4Oe6GSTCmkJ:www.lmtonline.com/news/archive/081298/pagea2.pdf+James+Brunen+&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

Screw them, they need to their shit together before they make any claims about "injustice".

[iverglas]

10. Huh

And he was then denied his Vienna Convention rights and executed after a corruptly conducted trial at which he was represented by incompetent counsel, I assume?

Boyo, the smelly scarlet fish are just a-flyin' today.

And how about the Canadian that George W. Bush had killed?

The Canadian criminal justice and corrections systems have all the mod cons -- rights to silence and counsel and a speedy trial by an impartial tribunal, even the right to vote during incarceration, while on parole and at all other times. Do we get to complain?

.

[MrBenchley]

13. B-b-b-b-but!

Don't you understand, this is somebody with a gun who broke the law (that was posted on a big sign on his side of the border) and is being held to account for his transgression!

Whatever happened to "personal responsibility except when it comes to guns", our most cherished legal principle under Prince Duh?

[iverglas]

14. now, now

He's a law-abiding gun owner who "simply forgot he had the cartridges" in his car.

If I go home now and have a couple or five drinks (as I'd like to do, except I find it less enjoyable the older I get, and besides right now I'm going to opt for codeine instead), and then forget I have those drinks in my belly and go unpark my car and head for the mall ... well, nobody'd better try tossing me in a cell, that's all I can say. I'm a law-abiding car driver with a bad memory, that's all.

Maybe I could even replace that car. Go to the dealership, take a test drive ... and simply forget that the car isn't mine ...

.

[MrBenchley]

15. Meanwhile

what an advertisement for responsible gun ownership...a pinhead who not only doesn't keep track of his ammunition but doesn't pay attention to a sign warning him he will face consequences if he doesn't.

Yeah, that's much worse than having an unelected drunk trample all over your country's laws despite treaties.

[Name removed]

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