Tuesday, January 14, 2003

Despite prosecutors' resolve, the landscape for capital cases remains uncertain. Illinois death-row inmates waited an average of 13 years between sentencing and execution, and it seems unlikely that the death chamber will be used any time soon.


Illinois Prosecutors Assess Death Penalty's New Era
The Illinois death row should be empty within a month. But prosecutors say they plan to start filling it up again immediately.

They cannot undo outgoing Gov. George Ryan's blanket commutation of 167 death sentences this weekend, but local prosecutors across the state said today that they would not let his action hinder their pursuit of capital punishment in dozens of pending cases. Even so, several acknowledged that they would probably face new challenges in convincing juries that the death penalty is just and fair — and a realistic option.

Three years after calling a moratorium on executions, Mr. Ryan, a Republican whose term ended today, last week pardoned four death-row inmates and commuted the remaining sentences to terms of life imprisonment, or less.

Outraged prosecutors said today that they would try to challenge about 20 of the cases. In those cases, inmates were in the middle of retrials, and the prosecutors argued that since they were not actively under a sentence of death, they were ineligible for commutation.

The new governor, Rod R. Blagojevich, a Democrat, plans to extend the moratorium on executions until he has more confidence in the application of the death penalty. It remains unclear, however, which if any of the 85 reforms recommended by a blue-ribbon commission — but so far rejected by the Legislature — Mr. Blagojevich might deem essential.

The joy lawyers for the death row inmates might feel was mitigated today by the task of reviewing scores of files to determine how the commutations would affect their clients' broader appeals. Those who were seeking new trials based on their clients' claims of innocence now have a lifetime sentence to fight.

"If our client didn't get a fair trial, then we're still seeking a fair trial," said Theodore A. Gottfried, the state appellate defender, whose office handled about 120 of the 167 commuted cases.

Prosecutors expressed hope that a backlash against Mr. Ryan's action might make juries more likely to impose capital punishment, and that the clean slate would render moot any concerns about people sentenced under an old system.

They acknowledged, though, that Mr. Ryan's condemnation of the state's capital system as fundamentally unfair could make some potential jurors uneasy, and that others might feel little interest in supporting executions that might not ever take place.
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/14/national/14DEAT.html

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