Most state D.A.'s silent on death-penalty reasoning
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Three-quarters of California's elected district attorneys refused to disclose how they choose defendants to face the death penalty, according to a report slated for presentation at a public hearing in Los Angeles today.
Three-quarters of California's elected district attorneys refused to disclose how they choose defendants to face the death penalty, according to a report slated for presentation at a public hearing in Los Angeles today.
In a report to the California Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice, which is examining how the death penalty is applied in California, Pepperdine law school professors Harry M. Caldwell, Carol Chase and Christine Goodman said only 14 of the state's 58 counties agreed to provide detailed answers to questions about the selection process.
Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley got high marks for his careful responses, but district attorneys in many large counties that frequently seek the death penalty -- including Orange, Riverside and San Diego -- submitted no answers, despite repeated entreaties by the professors and their research assistants, according to the report.
In all, 20 D.A.s did not respond to the commission, 14 said they would not cooperate and the remainder provided limited responses. Several issued identical or near-identical refusals: "With all due respect, I must decline to answer the questions in Part I of your survey. However, I can assure you that my decision to file a capital charge is based on my sound discretion, as vested pursuant to Government Code section 26500."
The professors said they believed that those offices "acted in concert in deciding to refuse participation" and expressed dismay at the lack of candor. "Of all the decisions that a government can make, the decision to seek to end the life of another human being must be the most important and sobering," Caldwell, Chase and Goodman wrote.
"As the ultimate decision for each county rests with an elected official, the district attorney, one would hope that the district attorney would value transparency in his/her decision-making process, both to ensure that these important decisions are being made as evenhandedly as possible and to give the electorate the opportunity to voice approval or disapproval of the process," the professors said.
"A record of 14 relatively complete responses out of 58 counties paints a distressing picture of the willingness of those who tinker with the machinery of the death penalty to expose their decision-making process to the electorate," the professors said.
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