Must we relive death penalty fight?

Illinois does not have a valid capital crimes statute any longer – our state officials abolished the death penalty a few years go after years of evidence indicating how flawed it was.

PORTER: Did he really do it, after all?

But it seems we still have some people determined to fight for the cause of putting people to death so as to satisfy someone else’s need for “vengeance!”

OR AT LEAST that’s the reaction I got in my gut when I read reports earlier this week that said former Cook County state’s attorney Richard Devine prosecuted an innocent man for a crime for which the state had previously sentenced the real “killer” to death.

The only problem is that this particular case is that of Anthony Porter – who for a short stretch was an international figure in the death penalty debate.

Porter served 16 years of his life in the Illinois Department of Corrections under a death sentence – and at one point was just a few hours away from actually facing execution by lethal injection.

But that execution was put on hold, and Porter was eventually released from prison due to clemency from now-former Gov. George Ryan. In fact, it was Porter’s case that supposedly motivated Ryan to think that Illinois’ death penalty system was too flawed to be kept on the books.

IT CAUSED RYAN to impose the moratorium on executions that remained through the time when the General Assembly finally voted to abolish the death penalty AND Gov. Pat Quinn signed that change into Illinois law!

Porter’s evidence of his innocence included the work of students of a now-former Northwestern University professor, who in working with private investigators got another man to say he committed the crime for which Porter was convicted.

And they got him to say it on videotape, which is what made the story so intriguing (and easy) for television to pick up on. Television stations everywhere picked up the story. That caused Devine to decide not to resist fighting to keep Porter in prison, and to go along with a prosecution of the man on videotape.

He ultimately pleaded guilty and received a lengthy prison sentence, for which he still is incarcerated – although the Chicago Sun-Times reported he could be up for parole in 2017.

BUT THE SUN-TIMES’ report focused on the fact that now-retired prosecutor Thomas Epach, Jr., is saying he wonders if the man now in prison is truly innocent, and if Porter really did do the crime for which he has been exonerated for the past 15 years.

I’ll be the first to admit that back when David Protess’ students showed their video confession publicly (I was a reporter-type back then, and I remember the death penalty fiasco in Illinois all too well), my gut reaction was to wonder, “How do we know he’s telling the truth?”

But nobody else seemed to be concerned. That question seemed to get swept aside in the storm over whether Illinois was too sloppy in prosecuting capital offenses that we couldn’t be assured the convictions were legitimate.

Although now, Epach is trying to argue the same point, saying in an affidavit, “It is my opinion that it was highly unusual, if not unprecedented, to make a decision to release an individual convicted of murder, based upon the broadcast of a video, the reliability and authenticity of which had not been thoroughly investigated and established.”

WHICH MIGHT BE a legitimate point if he had forcefully brought it up back then.

Now? It comes across as someone’s last-ditch effort to find a wrench to throw into the gears.

Does anyone think we can somehow undo the abolishment of the death penalty? Particularly since after all these years, it has come down to the ultimate “he said/she said” argument that a prosecutor usually would denounce if it were made against them!

Are we supposed to put an asterisk (*) next to Porter’s name on the list of Illinois Death Row inmates of the 1990s who wound up having to be released from prison alive, rather than in a cheap casket?

THIS IS ONE fight that is best left in the past. Otherwise, we might as well show down the whole criminal justice system – if we come to the conclusion that none of its verdicts can be trusted; regardless of which way they come down.

Let the “law and order” types mull over that concept, for awhile.

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EDITOR'S NOTE: Remember the "Ford Heights Four," another set of Death Row inmates who wound up being exonerated for the crimes they were accused of? The Chicago Tribune tells us their lives aren't exactly free of stigma, despite the freedom they have now had for nearly two decades.

EXTRA: Quinn maintains legacy as a man who significantly offends establishment

QUINN: A new legacy topper?

Gov. Pat Quinn’s name is now mud (or is that Mudd) to state’s attorneys across Illinois – many of whom have a prosecutorial mentality that makes them want to be able to talk about taking life away from others as a punishment.

I’m sure many of these state’s attorneys will forevermore demonize Quinn’s name and image. He’s the enemy, and I’m curious to see if any of them try to advance their own professional aspirations by taking Quinn on head-to-head.

YET I’M SURE that Quinn didn’t lose much sleep over the thought that he offended prosecutors in all 102 Illinois counties with his action.

For Quinn is the veteran politician who has always been willing to offend people with his actions. If anything, all this does is add “prosecutors” to the list of groups of people who can’t stand him. “Legislators” and “utilities” also can be on the list.

Because the Quinn legacy was cemented decades ago when the one-time tax attorney helped to create the Citizens Utility Board that serves as an excessively vocal watchdog group of utility companies and their issues.

He also was the guy who led the early 1980s effort that resulted in the Illinois General Assembly being slashed in size from 236 members to 177. The cutback amendment, which a whole generation of people who follow the Illinois political scene demonize as the move that made the state Legislature overly partisan.

MY POINT BEING that Pat Quinn’s name has been taken in vain so often in the past few decades that I doubt it even phases him that prosecutors (some, at least) will hold a lengthy grudge because he brought to the only logical conclusion the process started in 2003 when then-Gov. George Ryan imposed the moratorium that effectively abolished capital punishment in Illinois.

People such as state Sen. Kirk Dillard, R-Hinsdale, who talk about now pushing for bills to reinstate a capital crimes statute, run the risk of making themselves look ridiculous – wanting to live in the past instead of accepting that we’re now in the 21^st Century. Those who criticize him are revealing the degree to which they’re ideologues, and nothing more!

Part of the reason I feel the need to write this particular piece of commentary is because I have taken my share of cheap shots at Quinn in recent weeks because of how long it took him to come to the conclusion that capital punishment is a thing of the past, and that we as a society need to move forward.

This is one of those few issues where people have a “gut feeling” that determines where they stand on the thought of administering a lethal injection to kill people as punishment for violent crimes. Quinn came off as wishy-washy, as though he thought there might be some sort of compromise on the issue – which there isn’t.

BUT IN THE end, Quinn did what I would have hoped he would do – abolish the capital crimes statute and commute the sentences of the remaining “death row” inmates.

While also reducing the modern execution chamber at the Tamms Correctional Center (one designed specifically for lethal injection, instead of electrocution) to an historic relic with a few swoops of the pen.

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Abolish executions, commute sentences, upset the status quo – it’s the only way

QUINN: One more month to make up his mind

Illinois law gives Gov. Pat Quinn a little over one more month to make up his mind what to do with the bill approved by the old state Legislature that abolishes capital punishment. Yet the sooner Quinn realizes that there’s no way he can get out of this situation without upsetting somebody, the better off he (and we) will be.

There’s no compromise when it comes to the death penalty. Some people in Illinois are going to be completely outraged, no matter what Quinn chooses to do. Any attempt by him to create a chain reaction of legislation to appease people will be perceived as nothing but phony gestures, for which he will be lambasted even more than had he just acted on the bill and left it at that.

FOR THOSE WHOSE attention span is so short that you’ve already forgotten who won the Super Bowl, what is at stake is the capital crimes statute in Illinois.

The General Assembly, on its final day of business last month before transitioning into the new Legislature that was elected in November, did what some people considered to be the unthinkable – they did away with the idea of killing people as punishment for a crime.

No longer will the total number of homicides in Alexander County be inflated by the number of executions conducted at the state prison near Tamms.

Unless Quinn uses his “veto” power to kill the bill. Which he can do because he’s in the rare set of circumstances where he gets the last word. The old Legislature that approved abolition no longer exists, so they’re not capable of convening to try to override a Quinn veto.

THE REALITY OF the situation is that Quinn ideologically is inclined to support the people who would want to do away with the death penalty. He may have said during the campaign last year that he would let the death penalty remain, but he also was the candidate who wanted to keep the moratorium in place that prevents anyone on “death row” from actually being put to death.

Which means the bottom line for Quinn is that he didn’t want to be presiding over executions on his watch. Illinoisans who wanted the state to resume executions (there haven’t been any since 1999 when Andrew Kokoraleis was put to death by lethal injection) largely voted for Quinn’s Republican challenger, William Brady, who pledged during the campaign to lift the moratorium.

It is because of those circumstances that I think the people who are saying Quinn is obligated to veto the abolition bill because of his campaign promise are missing the point. I’m convinced Quinn only threw in the additional rhetoric because he never would have dreamed the state Legislature could get its act together and pass a bill to do away with the death penalty.

But they did.

AND NOW, THE matter lies within Quinn’s hands, since he’s also going to have to decide what to do with the 15 people now on death row, and the one or two individuals whose trials currently are pending who may wind up being sentenced to death before Quinn gets off his duff and acts.

If he vetoes and does not commute those sentences (realistically, the two acts must be done together, which may be the only thing death penalty proponent Peoria County State’s Attorney Kevin Lyons and I agree on), Quinn will upset the people who for the past two decades have worked to show how flawed our state’s capital crimes setup truly is.

Or he’s going to infuriate the conservative ideologues who drool over the image of a state that kills people for punishment. I’m talking about those goofs who had nothing better to do with their lives back in the 1990s than to show up outside of the Stateville Correctional Center near Joliet to rally for the deaths of the condemned – while also taunting those who showed up to protest the act.

Yes, I went from apathetic death penalty opponent to stringent one the night in 1994 when John Gacy was put to death, and I got to see people wearing t-shirts bearing slogans such as “No Tears For The Clown” heckle a nun who was trying to pray for Gacy’s soul.

I’M SURE THOSE people will be ticked off at Quinn if he signs the bill into law. But then again, perhaps their offense is evidence that we’re doing something right. Besides, I doubt that Quinn could do anything to truly please this type of person – who probably voted against him for a myriad of reasons, not just capital punishment.

There also are those people who are talking up some sort of legislative compromise, such as Quinn signs the abolition bill into law, then lobbies the General Assembly to create a new capital crimes statute – one that supposedly has safeguards and is so restrictive that its potential for abuse is minimal.

Doesn’t that sound sweet? It’s just too bad that it’s pure fantasy. You might as well tell me the Chicago Cubs are going to win the World Series this season.

If our Legislature were capable of coming up with that kind of statute, they would have amended the old death penalty laws years ago. Heck, the reason Ryan ultimately went with moratorium, then commutation of sentences for all 160-plus death row inmates in Illinois, was because the General Assembly didn’t want to touch the issue.

EVEN IN YEARS since, they have been reluctant to do a thing with the issue. It is why action as drastic as abolition is called for.

For what it’s worth, I can think of one other reason for Illinois to join the ranks of 15 other states that don’t have a death penalty. There are those who will claim that we ought to be with the majority 35 states, but I can’t help but notice that the 15 include our Midwestern neighbors of Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin.

I have always thought the Midwestern U.S. had a little more sense on many issues. Perhaps it’s time we got with the program that our neighbor states realized many years ago.

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