----- Original Message -----
From: Sherry Swiney
To: Patrick Crusade Sent: Saturday, August 02, 2008 1:18 AM
Subject: Letter to Alabama Germany Partnership by Patrick Swiney 07-25-08You may all recall the wonderful article by Amnesty International regarding Philip Alston's UN Report about Alabama. If not, that article is at the bottom of this email. I printed the Amnesty email, along with copies of two of the linked articles, and mailed them to Patrick. As a result of him reading this information, he wrote a letter to one of the companies in one of the linked articles. I want to share his letter with you and the rest of the world.
Love and Blessings, Sherry
25 July 2008
Patrick Swiney
154406 L20A
100 Warrior Lane
Bessemer, AL 35023
http://www.patrickswiney.com
Mr. Hajo Drees
Alabama Germany Partnership
500 Beacon Parkway West Re: Human Rights Concerns
Birmingham, Ala. 35209
Dear Mr. Drees:
I am writing to you in regard to an Associated Press article about: German companies being at home in Alabama. You stated: “It becomes a quality-of-life issue.” Drees said, “Germans are respected [in Alabama] you can feel it.”
I agree 100%. I am 64 years old and even as a small child anything made in Germany, or made by German people, meant the very highest of quality one could find anywhere in the world. I have also personally known many German people. I correspond with many and every single one – wonderful people. And yes, indeed, highly respected. But Mr. Dress, that’s exactly the very thing that disturbs me – so, so greatly.
Obviously, you yourself do not know, nor do you have any idea as to the “real” state of Alabama. If you knew the ugly “facts” no way would you recruit German Firms to locate in Alabama – no way! Here, you have the most Human Rights Abuses within the so-called free world. Please see parts of the United Nations Human Rights Council Special Rapporteur’s Report enclosed.
As stated, I’m a 64 year old man, have been in an Alabama prison on a wrongful conviction. No court in this state will give me a fair trial, even though we have scientific proof of actual innocence.
I do not expect you to believe me. As a matter of fact, I don’t want you to believe me. We have established a website http://www.patrickswiney.com. Every single thing pertaining to my case is right on that website. I would so greatly love for you to get a few German Law Schools to study my case. . . For all the World to see!
Also, my former Lead Attorney is in Bagdad, Iraq with the U.S. State Department (letter enclosed). He would welcome your contacting him on this matter. To be 100% truthful with you – I am a Political Prisoner – period!
Oddly, as I write, a group of your countrymen are trying to get your government to offer me political asylum, while at the very same time you’re over here [unwittingly] feeding the Beast.
I’m in very ill health, so in the near future it may be a non-event as far as me personally – but Sir, there are others.
But I do know for certain, that history shall be very cruel to those who support and feed this horrible beast. Mr. Drees, for the sake of your grandchildren, I so hope your family name shall not be associated with such horrors.
I simply ask that you search for Truth.
Respectfully, I am
Patrick Swiney
http://www.patrickswiney.com
Contact Info:
Wife: Sherry Swiney (205) 621-7699
Death Penalty
Alabama, Germany and the Death Penaltydeath-penalty on June 30, 2008 at 2:52 PM
Today Philip Alston, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary and Arbitrary Executions concluded a two-week tour of the US by issuing a strong statement on a variety of issues, including the death penalty. Professor Alston visited two states, Alabama and Texas. The former, because it has the highest per capita execution rate, and the latter, because it has the most executions period.
Logical choices given his limited amount of time. His statement comes to unsurprising conclusions.
That, in Texas, he met with officials who "acknowledged that innocent people might have been executed."
That: "While some officials seem to consider due process rights as mere 'technicalities', the growing number of exonerations underscores that they are in fact indispensible safeguards against injustice in cases in which an error can be fatal."
That, in Alabama: "Government officials seem strikingly indifferent to the risk of executing innocent people and have a range of standard responses, most of which are characterized by a refusal to engage with the facts."
A less anticipated part of the statement concerns Alabama's cozy economic relationship with Germany:
"Alabama's systematic rejection of concerns that basic international standards are being violated sits oddly alongside the Government's determined and successful bid to attract foreign investment from the European Union in particular. Indeed, Alabama's largest export market in 2007 was Germany. It would thus be appropriate for Alabama to engage in a dialogue on due process concerns in its death penalty with the international community."
Of course, given their "refusal to engage with the facts", it is highly doubtful that Alabama would be the one to initiate a "dialogue on due process concerns in its death penalty with the international community." So it would probably be up to the international community to make the first move.
According to this AP article from about a month ago, "Alabama is now home to 50 German industries that state officials say employ upward of 12,000 people. Thousands more work in related companies." Major German investors include ThyssenKrupp, currently building "a mammoth, $3.7 billion steel plant near the Gulf of Mexico in Mobile County", as well as BASF AG, Degussa AG and DaimlerChrysler AG's Mercedes-Benz. Much more information on this interesting relationship can be had at the Alabama Germany Partnership.
Beyond this unexpected aside about EU and German investment, the lion's share of the Special Rapporteur's statement is devoted to death penalty flaws that are all too familiar to those of us who follow this issue regularly. The Rapporteur recommends, among other things, that problems related to "judicial independence and the absence of an adequate right to counsel should be addressed immediately"; and that "the federal courts should be able to review all substantive claims of injustice in capital cases." In far far too many cases, procedural technicalities cut off review of important issues, including questions of innocence, in capital cases, and the Rapporteur's recommendation seems reasonable:
"The best way forward would be for Congress to enact legislation permitting federal courts to review all issues in death penalty cases on the merits, with appropriate exceptions, such as where a defendant attempts to deliberately bypass state court procedures."
Yet, despite saying all the right things and making completely reasonable recommendations, the influence of this Special Rapporteur's visit, or indeed any United Nations criticism of the US death penalty system, will probably be seriously limited.
Which makes it even more interesting that today's statement drops such a strong hint about other possible avenues of influence.
Brian
DPAC
Tags:
united nations
death penalty
germany
alabama
Birmingham News
U.N. report blasts state's death penaltyWednesday, July 02, 2008
Stan Diel
News staff writerAlabama's death penalty system is so broken that the state may have executed the innocent, and state officials refuse to recognize the problem, a United Nations report has concluded.
Philip Alston, a special investigator with the U.N.'s Human Rights Council, identified what he said is a series of flaws in Alabama's system, including judges who convert life sentences to death sentences for purely political reasons and inadequate representation for the condemned. Most alarming, he said, was Alabama officials' refusal to even discuss the possibility that the state's capital punishment system is in need of improvement.
"(Alabama) officials seem strikingly indifferent to the risk of executing innocent people and have a range of standard responses, most of which are characterized by a refusal to engage with the facts," Alston wrote in the report, released Monday.
Asked Tuesday whether he had read the report, Alabama Attorney General Troy King said, "I've looked at all of it that I intend to look at," and accused the U.N. of pushing an ideological agenda.
"The United Nations has grievous injustices in its own building that it ought to address before it begins worrying about a speck in the eye of a state like Alabama," King said.
Alston visited Alabama and Texas in preparing his report, and found that Texas officials wanted to improve their system, and recognized that the innocent may already have been executed. Alabama officials had no interest in change, he said.
"(Alabama) officials would rather deny than confront flaws in the criminal justice system," Alston wrote. "It is entirely possible that Alabama has already executed innocent people."
Alston met with federal and state officials, judges, victims and anti-death penalty activists. He visited Alabama because it has the highest rate of executions per capita in the country, and Texas because it has the most inmates on Death Row, the report said.
The report singled out Alabama's "judicial override" system - under which judges can overrule jury decisions on punishment - as problematic. Elected judges in Alabama feel compelled to change life sentences to death to ensure re-election, not because they believe the jury erred, he said.
"Given the key role of the jury in American justice, it is difficult to justify giving officials who will be held to account for their stance on the death penalty every four years the power to substitute their own individual opinions for those of the 12-member jury," Alston wrote.
King said judges are more qualified than juries to determine whether a death sentence is appropriate, and there is no evidence that they feel politically pressured to override life sentences and impose lethal injection.
"I don't think there are judges who say, `I'm going to give this person the death sentence because I'm getting ready to stand for election,'" King said. "That is a serious allegation, and I don't believe it."
Representation issues:
Alston, an Australian who is a law professor at New York University, also argued that Death Row inmates are inadequately represented on appeal. Alabama is the only state that does not guarantee counsel after the first round of appeals.
King said Death Row inmates typically are represented by lawyers from big firms with more resources than prosecutors.
"The fact that you're not seeing a lot of these sentences reversed is not because they don't have good lawyers, it's because they're guilty," he said.
Richard Grenell, spokesman for the U.S. mission to the U.N., also rejected Alston's conclusions.
"We know our system isn't perfect, but we afford everyone the presumption of innocence and due process," he told Reuters news service. "Mr. Alston's sweeping judgments of our system after briefly visiting two out of 50 states show his personal dislike of the system we have, not fundamental problems with it."
Among Alston's recommendations:
Alabama and Texas should establish well-funded, statewide public defender services. Oversight of these should be independent of the executive and judicial branches.
Congress should enact legislation permitting federal courts to review all issues in death penalty post-conviction review cases on the merits.
Alabama should evaluate and respond in detail to the findings and recommendations of an American Bar Association report on the implementation of the death penalty.
The 2007 ABA report, which looked at eight states including Alabama, called for a national moratorium on the death penalty while problems, including inadequate representation, are addressed.
On the Net
www.un.org
www.ago.state.al.us/index.cfm sdiel@bhamnews.com
