Governor's race not tuned to death penalty

State activists push for moratorium on execution

March 02, 2002

By Josh Richman
STAFF WRITER

California's death penalty debate is heating up as moratorium efforts gain steam in this gubernatorial election year.

Yet as East Bay Democrats start pressing Alameda County and its cities to call for a temporary ban on executions, the only gubernatorial candidate willing to consider such a thing is GOP primary contender Richard Riordan -- and he believes there's not enough evidence to support it.

Oakland criminal defense lawyer and anti-death penalty activist Gary Sirbu said this nonpartisan effort will continue regardless: "In my view it has a momentum that will not be denied."

Moratorium advocates claim the risk of executing innocent people is too high under current practices; racial, economic or geographic discrimination are determining who's put to death, and many condemned inmates had inadequate defense counsel or were targets of police or prosecutorial misconduct. Moratorium foes call the death penalty a key deterrent to violent crime, and say the system has enough safeguards to protect the innocent.

Sirbu co-chairs the criminal justice committee of the Metropolitan-Greater Oakland Democratic Club, which recently announced it will take the moratorium issue to the Alameda County Board of Supervisors and local city councils. Oakland, Berkeley, San Francisco, Menlo Park and Santa Cruz, as well as Santa Clara County, already have passed pro-moratorium resolutions.

Democratic clubs in Fremont and Hayward are taking the issue to their members in March. The MGO, Alameda County's largest grass-roots political group, plans to coordinate with these and other religious, civic and even Republican groups, for a few months before going to county supervisors by late spring.

That could roughly coincide with May 1's Moratorium Day 2002, when death penalty opponents from across the state will march through Sacramento and present 100,000 petition signatures to Gov. Gray Davis.

But Davis, a staunch death penalty supporter who has repeatedly said he sees no need for a moratorium, isn't likely to be receptive. Recent polls show he faces a tough race this year, and he's unlikely to risk the support -- particularly his lucrative law enforcement endorsements -- that a moratorium could cost him.

GOP gubernatorial contenders Bill Jones and Bill Simon don't want a moratorium either. Riordan, however, said Jan. 24 in San Francisco that while he supports the death penalty as "a wonderful weapon for discouraging people from committing this heinous crime of murder," he has "an open mind" about examining whether it's being applied fairly.

Davis began airing a television advertisement Feb. 7 attacking Riordan's death penalty record, based both on the January remarks and on a 1987 interview in which Riordan said he personally opposed capital punishment.

Riordan spokeswoman Kim Serafin reiterated "the former mayor is a strong supporter of the death penalty and sees it as a useful deterrent.

"If an overwhelming mountain of evidence came to him that there was something amiss, as a reasonable man, he would look at it," she said. "But right now, that overwhelming evidence does not exist."

There is some precedent for a moratorium. Illinois Gov. George Ryan in January 2000 halted executions pending an investigation into why more death sentences were overturned than carried out since the state reinstated its death penalty in 1977.

California's death row now has more than 600 inmates; the state has executed 11 since reinstating its death penalty in 1978, while 57 death sentences have been overturned. A field poll conducted five months after Illinois' action showed that while Californians supported the death penalty 2-to-1, they were almost 4-to-1 in favor of a moratorium to study how capital punishment is applied.

But that was two years ago, and the idea hasn't taken root. While 18 states and the federal government introduced execution moratorium bills in 2001, none passed.

The MGO's effort is part of a statewide Californians for a Moratorium on Executions campaign led by the San Francisco-based Death Penalty Focus.

"It's certainly intriguing what's happening with the governor's race. Our ongoing work is to show that Gov. Davis is on the wrong side of this issue," said moratorium campaign coordinator Missy Longshore.

She said the candidates have not yet reacted to a ground swell of public support for a moratorium
because "we haven't fully launched the campaign on a statewide scale." That will happen with the Sacramento event on May 1.

"It's a question of getting out there and demonstrating that support, and hoping that they (the candidates) see the light and fall on the right side of this issue, in favor of a moratorium," she said.

Death Penalty Focus is a nonprofit and so can't do direct lobbying, she said, but "certainly there will be people in our circles trying to have meetings and talking with people in the Legislature, and the governor's office and people in the potential governors' offices."

Meanwhile, capital punishment issues outside California could affect the Golden State's future.

The U.S. Supreme Court last month heard arguments on whether executing mentally retarded convicts is unconstitutionally cruel and unusual punishment. The federal government and 18 states already have banned such executions but California has not -- a bill put forth last year by Assemblywoman Dion Aroner, D-Berkeley, went nowhere -- so if the high court imposes a national ban, California will have to comply.

Former Oregon governor and U.S. Senator Mark Hatfield is a Republican now pushing an Oregon ballot initiative to replace that state's death penalty with guaranteed life sentences for aggravated murder convicts. The measure is supported by current Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber, a Democrat in his second and final term.

About California's situation, Hatfield noted modern candidates often rely on focus groups and consultants to pick campaign issues most likely to resonate strongly with voters, and often resist addressing thornier matters on which voters' minds aren't clear.

"They know there is controversy on capital punishment," he said, adding that especially in this age of terrorism, any rollback of capital punishment could be politically touchy.

A Gallup poll last October found 68 percent of 1,011 adults surveyed nationwide were in favor of the death penalty for someone convicted of murder, with 26 percent opposed and 6 percent without an opinion.