Alabama editorial roundup: Feb. 10, 2019 edition
Recent editorials from Alabama newspapers: ____ Feb. 9 The Dothan Eagle on the recent execution in Alabama: The State of Alabama put a man to death Thursday. He was the 217th person to die under the state’s death penalty – the 64th execution since a moratorium on executions in Alabama was lifted in 1983. Dominique Ray’s execution is troubling. Not because there was any question about his guilt. Debates about the moral failings of the death penalty aside, there was no reason why Ray should not see the sentence imposed on him for the murder of 15-year-old Tiffany Harville almost 25 years ago carried out at long last. What’s troubling about Ray’s execution is the constitutional question it raises. Ray, who embraced Islam while incarcerated, wanted an imam present with him in the death chamber. Prison officials refused, saying they could provide a Christian prison chaplain. Ray’s attorneys sued, and a stay of execution was issued to sort it all out. Prison officials argue that only corrections system employees are allowed in the execution chamber as a matter of security, which is reasonable. In an earlier editorial, we suggested the prison system work to create a pool of spiritual leaders from other faiths, and vet them accordingly. That seems reasonable as well. However, Ray’s position was that he was receiving unequal treatment because he, a Muslim, did not have the same opportunity in the execution chamber as a Christian prisoner would. And he’s right – the constitutional religious protections suggest that a condemned inmate of any stripe should have the same access to a representative of their chosen faith. Read the rest online: dothaneagle.com ______ Feb. 10 The Gadsden Times on the U.S. cancelling nuclear weapons treaty with Russia: Tangible is defined by “Webster’s New World Dictionary” as 1. corporeal and able to be appraised for value; 2. can be understood; definite; objective. Those are simple definitions for a wonderful word, which is just the opposite of innuendo and gossip. I prefer to deal in tangibles, but sometimes let tradition and “it has always been that way” overcome my thought process. A good example is the Russian/United States Strategic Arms Limitation Talks signed in 1972. The agreement was intended to restrain the arms race in strategic ballistic missiles armed with nuclear weapons. SALT I was followed by SALT II, which basically never took effect. Both sides have indicated nullification of the first accord. At first blush, I thought the consequences of calling a halt to the treaty could be disastrous for the populations of the U.S. and Russia. However, I came to the conclusion that the U.S. cancelling the treaty is essential to maintaining substantial military superiority over not only Russia, but our No. 1 adversary, China. While we have been limited in developing and modernizing the U.S. military by the SALT agreement with Russia, the Chinese government has been modernizing and expanding its military exponentially. The SALT agreement was an excellent deterrent to nuclear war between the then-Soviets and the U.S., but the agreement allowed China to develop a formidable nuclear military, one that has become a threat to U.S. global dominance. Read the rest online: Gadsdentimes.com _____ Feb. 9 Anniston Star on the relationship between journalists and law enforcement: An article in Friday’s Anniston Star drew the ire of the Anniston Police Department and its supporters on social media. The article reported on statistics provided by city officials detailing the frequency of police stops and arrests, breaking those numbers down according to race — black, white and other. Facebook commenters describe the article as a hit piece, fake news and an obvious attempt to attack police and sell newspapers. To the contrary, The Anniston Star works closely with Anniston PD and applauds its efforts to address crime through community policing, including the creation of a community-based committee tasked with following up on complaints from residents. No, we’re not out to get the police. Here’s what actually happened. A week ago, the NAACP held a meeting at the Anniston City Meeting Center where residents accused APD of disproportionately making traffic stops on African-Americans. Their evidence, however, was all anecdotal. Coverage of that story also provided the response from city officials and police denying any notion of racial profiling. As journalists, our aim is always to pursue truth, and collecting and reporting actual numbers is a non biased way to do that. It’s what we did when Councilman Ben Little claimed that his district’s requests for work orders consistently failed to get response from the city. An examination of the work orders, however, showed that Ward 3 actually had almost twice as many completed work orders as any of the other wards. Read the rest online: annistonstar.com ____ Feb. 8 Montgomery Advertiser on poverty It was cruel to force unemployment upon millions of Americans over a political dispute borne of a foolish promise that has nothing to do with them. It is shameful that the president showed little if any empathy for these citizens — many of whom supported him — and acquiesced via his silence to assessments made by his economic adviser, Kevin Hassett, and billionaire Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross. Hassett said that furloughed federal workers are “better off” because “they have the vacation but they don’t have to use their vacation days.” Ross said there is no “good excuse why there … should be a liquidity crisis” and that he didn’t “understand why” federal employees with no income were going to food banks and homeless shelters. Ross incredibly advised those employees — already indebted beyond their ability to pay — to get a bank loan to cover expenses. Notwithstanding these contemporary echoes of “let them eat cake,” the previous, (un)presidential shutdown of the federal government — and the one that may reoccur next week — may force us to rethink some common misunderstandings. This third and final edition of my “start-at-the-beginning series” focuses on poverty. Next to race relations, poverty is the longest rhetorical highway along which people begin their expository
Supreme Court: Execution of Muslim inmate can proceed
he U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday rejected claims from a Muslim inmate who said his religious rights were being violated, clearing the way for the lethal injection to go forward Thursday night. In a 5-4 decision, justices vacated a stay issued by a lower court that had been blocking the execution of Dominique Ray, 42. Ray argued Alabama’s execution procedure favors Christian inmates because a Christian chaplain employed by the prison typically remains in the execution chamber during a lethal injection, but the state would not let his imam be present. Justice Elena Kagan wrote in a dissent that the dissenting justice considered the decision to let the execution go forward “profoundly wrong.” Attorneys for the state said Ray had ample opportunity to visit with his imam before his scheduled execution, that only prison employees are allowed in the chamber for security reasons, and that the imam can visit him before he’s led to the execution chamber and witness the execution from an adjoining room. Prison system spokesman Bob Horton said Ray was visited by his imam both Wednesday and Thursday and that Ray again renewed a request to have the adviser present — the request that has been denied. Other states generally allow spiritual advisers to accompany condemned inmates up to the execution chamber but not into it, said Robert Dunham, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, which studies capital punishment in the United States. Durham said did not know of any other state where the execution protocol calls for a Christian chaplain to be present in the execution chamber. Ray was sentenced to death for the slaying of 15-year-old Tiffany Harville. The girl disappeared from her Selma home in July 1995, and her decomposing body was found in a cotton field a month later. Ray was convicted in 1999 after another man, Marcus Owden, confessed to his role in the crime and implicated Ray. Owden told police that they had picked the girl up for a night out on the town and then raped her. Owden said that Ray cut the girl’s throat. Owden pleaded guilty to murder, testified against Ray and is serving a life sentence without parole. A jury recommended the death penalty for Ray by an 11-1 vote. Ray’s attorneys had also asked in legal filings to stay the execution on other grounds. Lawyers say it was not disclosed to the defense team that records from a state psychiatric facility suggested Owden suffered from schizophrenia and delusions. The Supreme Court also rejected that claim Thursday. Republished with permission from the Associated Press
Appeals court blocks Alabama execution of Muslim inmate
A federal appeals court on Wednesday blocked the planned execution of an Alabama inmate to consider whether the state was violating the Muslim inmate’s rights by not allowing an imam to replace a Christian prison chaplain in the death chamber. Alabama may be violating the religious rights of a Muslim inmate set for execution Thursday by refusing to allow an imam present at his death, a federal court said Wednesday in blocking the lethal injection. The 11th U.S Circuit Court of Appeals granted a stay for Dominique Ray, 42, a day before his scheduled execution for the slaying of a teenager more than two decades ago. The state is still pushing for the execution to take place Thursday, though, and swiftly changed its execution protocol in response to the judges’ concerns. The Alabama attorney general’s office on Wednesday afternoon asked the U.S. Supreme Court to vacate the stay. Ray objected to Alabama’s practice of allowing a Christian prison chaplain, who is a prison system employee, to stand near the inmate during the lethal injection and to pray with the inmate if the inmate requests that. Ray asked to bring in his imam to stand near him during the procedure, but was told he could not because only prison employees were allowed in the execution chamber. A three-judge panel of judges wrote that it was “exceedingly loath to substitute our judgment on prison procedures.” But, they added that it “looks substantially likely to us that Alabama has run afoul of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.” “The central constitutional problem here is that the state has regularly placed a Christian cleric in the execution room to minister to the needs of Christian inmates, but has refused to provide the same benefit to a devout Muslim and all other non-Christians,” the three-judge panel wrote. The Alabama chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations said it supported Ray’s bid to have an Islamic leader present. “We welcome this decision and hope Mr. Ray will ultimately be provided equal access to spiritual guidance,” Ali Massoud, government affairs coordinator for CAIR-Alabama, said in a statement. In the request to vacate the stay, the Alabama attorney general’s office said as a result of the 11th Circuit order, the state has amended its lethal injection protocol so that the chaplain will no longer be present. State attorneys said inmates can have their spiritual adviser witness the execution from a room adjoining the execution chamber. Robert Dunham, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, which studies capital punishment in the U.S., said other states generally allow spiritual or religious advisers to accompany the inmate up to the execution chamber but not into it. Instead the adviser can view the execution, as do others, from a designated area. He did not know of any other states where the execution protocol calls for a Christian chaplain to be present in the execution chamber. Ray was convicted in the fatal stabbing of a 15-year-old Tiffany Harville. Harville disappeared from her Selma home in July 1995. Her decomposing body was found in a field a month later. Ray was convicted in 1999 after co-defendant Marcus Owden told police that they had picked the girl up for a night out on the town and then raped her. Owden said that Ray cut the girl’s throat. Owden pleaded guilty to murder, testified against Ray and is serving a life sentence without parole. Ray’s legal team on Wednesday asked the U.S. Supreme Court to stay the execution on other grounds. They argued it was not disclosed to the defense team that records from a state psychiatric facility suggested Owden suffered from schizophrenia and delusions. Attorneys asked the Supreme Court to halt the execution to examine whether the state had a duty to find and produce the information. Republished with permission from the Associated Press
