Justice For Arthur Tyler

Perhaps the bleakest fact of all is that the death penalty is imposed not only in a freakish and discriminatory manner, but also in some cases upon defendants who are actually innocent. -Justice William J. Brennan, Jr., 1994

Ian Heisey Letter To Plain Dealer

 
                  
 
 
"Our silence is our compliance," said Sr. Helen Prejean at the City Club last week referring to executions done in our name in Ohio.
 
Kudos to the Plain Dealer for its editorial ("Time to end executions," September 21) calling for an end in Ohio to capital punishment.
 
Recently it's been reported in the New Yorker and on NPR that Texas may have executed an innocent man, Cameron Todd Willingham, in 2004, for arson, even though top state arson examiners now conclude that the initial investigation used "discredited forensic evidence" and likely got the case wrong.
 
A total of 136 people in the U.S., initially sentenced to die at our hands, have later been found innocent and released from death row.
 
How many on Ohio's death row, such as Arthur Tyler, who has been there for 26 years while another man confessed to the crime, have cases that involve withheld evidence and deserve a closer look?
 
It's time Ohio follow the lead of New Jersey and New Mexico and end state executions, not follow Texas toward irreversible errors and committing murder to teach that murder is wrong.  
 
 
Ian Heisey
1736 Randall Rd.
Cleveland, OH 44113
216.973.1486 (daytime cell)

Welcome

Recent Blog Entries

by justiceforarthur | 0 comments
by justiceforarthur | 0 comments
by justiceforarthur | 0 comments

Recent Photos

 

Recent Videos

Recent Forum Posts

by justiceforarthur 10 months ago
by justiceforarthur 10 months ago
by justiceforarthur 10 months ago
by justiceforarthur 10 months ago

Albert Camus (1957)

An execution is not simply death. It is just as different from the privation of life as a concentration camp is from prison. It adds to death a rule, a public premeditation known to the future victim, an organization which is itself a source of moral sufferings more terrible than death. Capital punishment is the most premeditated of murders, to which no criminal's deed, however calculated can be compared. For there to be an equivalency, the death penalty would have to punish a criminal who had warned his victim of the date at which he would inflict a horrible death on him and who, from that moment onward, had confined him at his mercy for months. Such a monster is not encountered in private life.

Sister Helen Prejean

 The profound moral question is not, "Do they deserve to die?" but "Do we deserve to kill them?"

Harry A. Blackmun, former U.S. Supreme Court Judge, (1) & (2) Callins v. Collins, 114 S.Ct.1127 (1994); (3) PBS Online NewsHour, 3/5/2004; (4) Herrera v. Collins 506 US 390 (1993).

Of one thing, however, I am certain. Just as an execution without adequate safeguards is unacceptable, so too is an execution when the condemned prisoner can prove that he is innocent. The execution of a person who can show that he is innocent comes perilously close to simple murder.

Sister Helen Prejean

It should be clear that the death penalty does just the opposite of promoting decency and respect for life. It dehumanizes people and promotes murder. It can never be applied fairly.


“I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides. . Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. To remain silent and indifferent is the greatest sin of all.. Elie Wiesel Nobel Prize for Peace in 1986

You just need to be a flea against injustice. Enough committed fleas biting strategically can make even the biggest dog uncomfortable and transform even the biggest nation.

There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest.  Elie Wiesel

Martin Luther King

 Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. 

Edmund Burke (attributed)

The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing


Newest Members

Karenfreespirit