Conservatives Question Whether the Death Penalty is Working

March 12, 2013 By

Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty (A Project of EJUSA)For the PDF version of this press release, right click this link and select Save As.

Former Montana Senator will reach out to other conservatives at CPAC

March 12, 2013 - Roy Brown of Billings will be joining Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty at the upcoming CPAC gathering near the nation’s capitol (March 14-16).

Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty is a network of conservatives questioning the alignment of capital punishment with conservative principles. The new national group was spawned by the efforts of Montana Conservatives Concerned About The Death Penalty. “Conservatives from across the country have joined this effort since I first called for repeal of the death penalty as Majority Leader in 2003,” Brown said. “Today, in addition to the sanctity of life issue, conservatives are questioning the exorbitant costs, the errors that risk innocent lives, and the impact the system has on victims’ families.”

Mr. Brown will be joined at CPAC by other conservatives from Texas, Kentucky, Kansas and elsewhere who share his concerns.

Brown is a former Majority Leader of the Montana House of Representatives, a former state senator and was the republican nominee for governor in 2008. He is a founding member of Montana Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty.

“Conservatives should question how the death penalty actually works in order to stay true to small government, reduction in wasteful spending, and respect for human life,” said Jay Sekulow, Chief Counsel for the American Center for Law & Justice and a supporter of Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty.

For more information contact Jon Crane at 203-982-4575 or joncrane@criticalpr.com.

Filed Under: Press, Press Release Tagged With: , , , ,

Tell the Committee to vote YES!

February 19, 2013 By

Thank you for all your work so far to pass House Bill 370, which proposes to abolish the death penalty and replace it with life without parole.

 

On Friday, February 22nd, the House Judiciary Committee will vote on whether to pass the bill on to the floor of the House of Representatives for a full debate and vote. The committee members must vote YES to keep Montana on the road to repeal.  

 

EMAIL using our convenient online message form and ask the committee to send HB 370 to the floor. Tell the committee members that the death penalty is a system that is broken beyond repair, and its time for capital punishment to go. Click here to send an email now.

 

CALL the Capitol, and leave a message for the HOUSE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE:

(406) 444-4800. Tell the operator your address, and he/she will take a message and deliver it right to the Committee members. Be sure to say YES on HB 370. The switchboard is open from 7:30am to 5pm Monday through Friday and on Saturday mornings after 8am.

Contact the Committee NOW, and ask for them to send HB 370 to the floor.

To Abolition!

Filed Under: Press Release

Death penalty is bad public policy

February 19, 2013 By

I want to thank my colleagues and friends, Sen. Matt Rosendale and Rep. Doug Kary, for taking the lead in the efforts to abolish the death penalty in favor of life without the possibility of parole. Before I became a legislator, I was the “hang ‘em high” type. But soon after being elected to the Legislature, I began to see how Montana’s death penalty went against my faith, my conservative philosophies and my duty to ensure that Montana laws were equally exercised.

The death penalty does nothing to keep us safe. It wastes resources on a system that can go on for decades, dragging victims’ families through trial after trial, while making celebrities out of murderers. It risks executing the innocent — a risk that no one should be willing to take. Most of all, it’s just bad public policy. If we truly want to streamline our government and make it less wasteful and inefficient, then the death penalty must go.

Roy Brown

Billings

Filed Under: Letter to the Editor

Replace death penalty with lifetime in prison

February 19, 2013 By

I was very pleased with the intelligent and well reasoned opinion of Sen. Rosendale and Rep. Kary in the Feb. 8 Gazette. If we set aside our gut feeling that terrible crimes must be punished with death, we can learn from the fact that the death penalty is not helpful to anyone.

It does not bring closure to the victims; it victimizes them again and again. It creates a celebrity of the accused who ultimately may be proven innocent. So far, 140 people on death row have been found innocent and yet DNA evidence exists in less than 10 percent of cases. The expense of the appeals process that averages 17 years can come to over $1 million, while lifetime incarceration costs less.

The death penalty is not a deterrent to violent crime. Police chiefs would prefer funds to be spent on crime prevention and public safety. Effective justice must be swift, sure and fair. Life imprisonment without the possibility of parole is the most cost effective and fair solution. It is time to abolish the death penalty in Montana.

Ann Walters

Billings

Filed Under: Letter to the Editor

Death penalty fails victims’ families

February 18, 2013 By

By LAVONNE HOHN

A recent Associated Press article that was published in this paper and others across the state mentioned House Bill 370, a bill that replaces Montana’s death penalty with life without parole. As someone who has experienced the devastating murder of a loved one first hand, I know that the issue of capital punishment in Montana — especially in terms of how it affects murder victims’ families — is more complicated than most people think.

My daughter, Donna, was brutally murdered at my son’s place of business in Montana City. The murder was cold, heartless, pointless and devastating. Losing Donna in such an appalling way was devastating to me and my family. Our grief was only compounded by the senselessness of the act, the complete innocence of my daughter, and the lack of concern or remorse demonstrated by the perpetrators.

Donna’s murder shocked and hurt not just my family, but our entire community. Our friends gathered around to support us, and many of them told us that they hoped “they kill the bastards.” While I appreciated the support of my friends, they just didn’t understand. Aside from the fact that killing the murderers would not bring Donna back, executing them would be too easy! I want the perpetrators to live every day with their terrible acts. I want them to live out the rest of their days in prison while the rest of us enjoy our freedom.

Read more: http://helenair.com/news/opinion/death-penalty-fails-victims-families/article_8443ec7c-77d2-11e2-897f-001a4bcf887a.html

Filed Under: Opinion Editorials

Death penalty does not deter murderers

February 18, 2013 By

HB 370 will replace the death penalty with life without parole. Facts show the death penalty is not a deterrent and is not cost effective. The death penalty generates notoriety for the murderer, and the media profits. Millions are spent for appeals that drag on for an average of 18 years.

Meanwhile, the victim’s family and loved ones suffer silently in the margins. Too many mistakes have been made.

Nationally, hundreds of men and women convicted of murder and put to death have later been found innocent. In 2011, after 24 years of incarceration in Montana State Prison, Barry Allan Beach, convicted of murder, was released when new information surfaced, allowing him another trial to prove his innocence. If our society is against murder, then let’s get out of the murder business. By retaining the death penalty, we all become murderers by proxy.

Filed Under: Letter to the Editor

Replace the death penalty

February 18, 2013 By

Feb. 14 was an exciting day. House Bill 370, which proposes to abolish the death penalty and replace it with life without parole, was heard on Valentine’s Day in the House Judiciary Committee. After years of trying to fix the death penalty, Montanans are ready to just get rid of it. People from both sides of the aisle are supporting this bill, especially since the Great Falls Tribune came out in support of it.

The death penalty is costing Montanans literally millions of dollars every time it’s used. Much less costly is a life sentence without possibility of parole. It sounds more expensive, but it isn’t, because a death sentence requires two complete trials, and numerous appeals, using specially trained lawyers from out of state. The average death sentence process takes 14 years.

A life sentence without parole allows the victim’s family members, and the perpetrator’s family to move on with their lives, without worry of more media, or more digging up of terrifying memories. And it allows the possibility of redemption for the perpetrator, perhaps one reason why all the major Christian church organizations stand behind this change.

Read More: http://www.ravallirepublic.com/news/opinion/mailbag/article_0ca821bc-7717-11e2-948a-0019bb2963f4.html

Filed Under: Letter to the Editor

Bill seeking death penalty abolition inspires emotional testimony

February 18, 2013 By

HELENA — Some families of murder victims lined up opposite side of a bill Thursday to abolish the death penalty in Montana and replace it with life imprisonment with no possibility of parole.

Some religious leaders also were divided on House Bill 370, by Rep. Doug Kary, R-Billings, at a long, emotional hearing before the House Judiciary Committee. The panel took no immediate action the bill.

Kary told the committee it isn’t a debate over whether the death penalty is philosophically or morally an acceptable punishment.

“This is about whether the death penalty is working here in Montana, whether it’s an effective policy,” he said. “I would argue it is not. I would argue it’s broken. If we haven’t executed an innocent person in Montana, it’s out of sheer luck.”
Read more: http://billingsgazette.com/news/state-and-regional/montana/bill-seeking-death-penalty-abolition-inspires-emotional-testimony/article_66e2d70a-b747-517a-b929-03fbfb18b9b7.html#ixzz2LH8OmcDk

Filed Under: In the News

Emotions run high in hearing on bill to abolish death penalty

February 14, 2013 By

HELENA — In 1973, Marietta Jager Lane’s 7-year-old daughter, Susie, was abducted in the night from a Montana campground. Over the course of a week, Susie Jager’s captor repeatedly raped her before strangling her and dismembering her body.

In 2000, Rep. Tom Berry’s 17-year-old son was kidnapped, beaten, tortured, and eventually shot in the head six times before his killers twice tried to burn his body.

What Lane and Berry do not share is the same view on the death penalty.

Their stories were among the two hours of heart-wrenching testimony given to members of the House Judiciary Committee on Thursday morning on a bill to end the death penalty in Montana.

The measure, House Bill 370, by Rep. Dough Kary, R-Billings, would replace the death penalty with the sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole. Kary told the committee that the death penalty is costly to taxpayer, ineffective as a deterrent and could eventually lead to the state-sanctioned death of an innocent, wrongfully convicted person.

Read more: http://www.greatfallstribune.com/article/20130214/NEWS05/302140041/Emotions-run-high-hearing-bill-abolish-death-penalty

Filed Under: In the News

Should Montana drop the death penalty?

February 14, 2013 By

The House Judiciary Committee heard an hour of testimony each for supporters and opponents of a measure seeking to abolish Montana’s death penalty, HB 370. We told you about this bill sponsored by Republicans and Democrats last week.

Sponsor Representative Doug Kary (R-Billings) says the death penalty is “wasting millions of dollars on less than a handful of cases while our police, courts and prisons are asking for more resources.” He calls it a failed policy and says the death penalty should be replaced with life in prison without parole. Kary says the fact that Montana has not executed an innocent person is out of sheer luck “and we cannot trust luck with matters of life and death.”

Read more: http://mtprnews.wordpress.com/2013/02/14/should-montana-drop-the-death-penalty/

Filed Under: Press
« Older Posts
0 Flares Twitter 0 Facebook 0 Buffer 0 Buffer Google+ 0 Email 0 Email to a friend 0 Flares ×