Solitary Confinement Until Death by State-Sponsored Homicide: An Eighth Amendment Assessment of the Modern Execution Process
2016; Washington and Lee University School of Law; Volume: 73; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
1942-6658
Autores Tópico(s)Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis
ResumoTable of ContentsI. Introduction.1213II. Death Row Is Human Warehouse.1215III. Death Row Confinement Is Objectively Dehumanizing.1223IV. Death Row Confinement Is Form of Torture.1227V. Death Row Confinement Is Cruel in Eighth Amendment Sense of Term.1236I. IntroductionThe death penalty in America punishment with two essential and inseparable dimensions: (1) solitary confinement under sentence of death for years and even decades, followed by (2) execution in death chamber in what amounts to state-sponsored homicide. In practice, these dimensions merge, yielding regime of solitary confinement that culminates in death by state-sponsored homicide. killing process-from solitary confinement on death row through execution in death house- an objectively dehumanizing one: condemned prisoners are stored on death row like objects rather than human beings, and then dispatched in death chamber following an impersonal and degrading execution routine.It fitting, then, that many condemned prisoners see themselves as the living and death row confinement as a living death. These observations were first established in my ethnographic study of life under sentence of death on Alabama's death row at Holman Prison in 1979,1 reinforced in my study of death house and execution process in Virginia in 1989,2 and recently confirmed by other observers (including ACLU).3 notion that condemned are in some sense dead before they are executed supports prescient observations of French existentialist, Albert Camus. In Camus' reckoning, condemned prisoner is undone by waiting for capital punishment well before he dies. Two deaths are inflicted on him, first being worse than second . . . . Compared to such torture, penalty of retaliation seems like civilized law.4Drawing on my prior writing on death penalty, from which I borrow liberally, I will dissect process by which prisoner dies twice under sentence of death and show how this process facilitates executions that are carried out efficiently, with no resistance from typical condemned prisoner.5 In essence, this process entails dehumanization of prisoner-the death of person's humanity, which in turn paves way for passive participation in death of body carried out in killing process that unfolds in death chamber.6 I will argue that totality of experience of prisoners put to death in America today necessarily and inevitably entails dehumanization, which I contend at heart of all forms of torture.7 I conclude that death penalty in practice form of torture (exposing condemned prisoners to intense suffering in form of ongoing torment),8 that it cruel for Eighth Amendment purposes (failing to meet carceral burden9 to respect and protect prisoners, which essential to humane punishment), and that death penalty therefore in clear violation of Eighth Amendment.10II. Death Row as Human WarehouseThere something basic and timeless about plight of those held captive awaiting execution. very label, Death Row, evocative. Helen Prejean-noted author of Dead Man Walking- upon her first visit to death row, observed: My stomach can read letters better than my brain.11 Her stomach can read words better than her brain because she has gut feeling of empathy evoked by helplessness and vulnerability of condemned.12 Michael Lesy reports similarly basic reaction upon visiting death row, falling back on image of setting as dungeon for dispossessed: The place was dungeon, he stated, full of men who were as good as dead.13Death rows, even best of them, are human warehouses. vast majority of death rows-more than ninety percent by recent count-store condemned prisoners in their solitary cells for up to twenty-two hours day as they await execution. …
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