U.S. 'HUMAN RIGHTS'?
Death penalty under fire
Bold Texas actions hit death row
By Gloria Rubac
Houston
As the pace of executions speeds up in Texas and conditions
on death row deteriorate daily, activists on both sides of the
walls are increasing their fight back.
In May, men on death row initiated a voluntary lay-in. This
means they will not go to recreation, to shower, or to the
commissary except for stamps and hygiene products. And they
will not speak to guards except to give their prison number
during counts.
They are refusing to participate in normal prison life. An
innocent youth activist on Pod D, Nanon Williams, initiated
this.
There are reports that others prisoners are organizing
different actions. The 450 men on Texas death row are on the
move.
Held in six-by-10-foot cells behind steel doors and going to
their one hour of recreation alone, communication is difficult.
Yet struggle and actions are taking place and a proactive
spirit is building.
Every Saturday in May lines of angry people, ranging in age
from pre-teen to senior citizens, are holding signs and
chanting into bullhorns up and down Farm-to-Market Highway 350
in Livingston, Texas, to demand the cruel, inhumane treatment
stop.
"Guard brutality, gassings with pepper spray, a starvation
diet, lack of medical care, tampering with mail including legal
mail from attorneys and courts, and the sensory deprivation and
isolation are issues we are raising. Also, there is no work
program, no educational program, no religious services, no
television or newspapers. All this compounds the isolation that
is pushing prisoners to the brink of insanity," explained
abolition movement activist Njeri Shakur.
The protests are a continuation of the actions initiated by
the Texas Death Penalty Abolition Movement that took place
every Wednesday in March. A death-row mother in a wheelchair
joins activists and other families. There's a Houston Catholic
priest with his lay youth volunteers, prisoners' pen pals from
as far as Chicago and even Europe, a law student from New York
University, a retired member of the long shore union, students
from Texas A & M University, a merchant marine, a lawyer
who represents Texas prisoners, mothers, fathers, wives and
children of those on death row, and activists from around the
state.
When the weekly protests began in March, the prison cops
told demonstrators that they couldn't stand on the sides of the
highway and police would be called unless they moved. No one
moved.
The cops came. The sheriffs came. Prison security from
Austin and San Antonio came. Not a single protester was
intimidated into leaving.
Visiting families stop to take fliers along the highway.
Neighbors stop and say they didn't know of the brutal
conditions. A man living across the highway who raises goats
allows demonstrators to park and protest on his property and
comes out to visit every week.
Each week the protesters walk from the prison entrance about
a quarter mile down to the highway and rally across from Warden
Zeller's house.
Zeller lives on the vast prison property in a big,
well-maintained house. One prisoner wrote Workers World that as
he looked out of the three-inch slit of a window toward the
warden's house, he wasn't sure what century he was in. He saw
Black men in white uniforms washing the warden's cars, mowing
his expansive lawn, and working on the roof.
It looked like a plantation scene from the past.
As the microphone is passed around at the protests, everyone
tells why they are there. Anger builds. So does the solidarity
of families and activists, who pledge they will not stop until
the torture and executions stop.
Texas has already executed 11 men this year. Thirteen more
executions are scheduled through August.
As another state, Maryland, announced a moratorium on
executions, Texas is going full steam ahead, planning to
execute innocent men, men with mental problems, men who didn't
have decent attorneys and a man who was a juvenile when
arrested.
The juvenile case is that of Napoleon Beasley, who was 17 at
the time. He is scheduled to die May 28. In a clemency petition
filed May 7th with the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles, his
lawyers asked for a 120-day reprieve to allow the Supreme Court
to rule in this case.
Beasley is mentally disabled. His attorney Walter Long said
in the petition that he believes the court soon will bar the
execution of mentally disabled defendants and persons who were
17 at the time of their offense because a national consensus
has developed against executing those individuals.
Twenty-eight states bar the death penalty for offenders
younger than 18. "I predict that, whether or not Texas
continues to kill child offenders, the United States Supreme
Court will soon put an end to it," Long wrote.
"For his sake, the health of his parents and family, and the
well-being of his community, I do not want my client to be the
last child offender executed by Texas."
As happened last summer when Beasley had an August execution
date, his case is drawing an unusually high level of attention.
Pleas for leniency are pouring in from all over the world. Most
mention Beasley's age and the fact that international law bars
the execution of juvenile offenders.
"The amount of attention he is drawing is above the norm,"
said Gerald Garrett, who chairs the parole board.
Last August, the board voted 10 to six against recommending
clemency for Beasley. Garrett said the board will vote later
this month on Beasley's latest petition.
The board has received letters in German, French, Polish and
Spanish seeking mercy for Beasley.
To send a letter asking the parole board to grant a stay,
write:
Board Of Pardons and Paroles, Gerald Garrett, Chairman, P.O.
Box 13401, Austin, Texas 78711-3401; Phone: (512) 463-1679;
Fax: (512) 463-8120. Also, please sign a petition for Beasley
at: http://www.PetitionOnline.com/ab17an77.
Reprinted from the May 23, 2002, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011
Email: ww@workers.org
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