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February 23, 2006
The judiciary's war on the death penalty
It’s infuriating, isn’t it? The condemned prisoner admitted crushing the skull of his victim, raping her as she lay dying, then stabbed her in the chest to make sure she was dead.
And a federal judge is concerned that the murderer not feel any pain. And in order to make sure that the killer's death was painless, the judge ordered that a doctor participate.
Michael Morales, 46, was scheduled to die Tuesday by injection for torturing, raping and murdering a 17-year-old girl 25 years ago. But officials at San Quentin State Prison could not meet the demands of a federal judge who ordered licensed medical personnel to take part in the execution. Because of ethical considerations, there were no takers, and the execution was called off.
The reprieve meant California, with 650 condemned inmates, awoke Wednesday to what effectively was a moratorium on executions.
The case may eventually place the issue of lethal injection before the U.S. Supreme Court. Thirty-seven of the 38 states with capital punishment use a procedure similar to California's.
Last week's ruling in the Morales case by U.S. District Judge Jeremy Fogel shifted the debate subtly to whether licensed medical personnel should play an active role in an execution, something the American Medical Association and other medical groups have long opposed on ethical grounds.
It’s a combination of two things: judges gaming the system to figure out a way to prohibit any and all executions by couching their obstruction in terms of an 8th Amendment violation; and it's also a result of the public’s squeamishness at the prospect of putting the death back in the death penalty.
Sedating the prisoner and letting him drift off into oblivion on a tidal wave of drugs ain’t my idea of retributive justice.
If judges wanted to ensure that death was quick and relatively painless, we’d bring back the firing squad, with the bullseye on the condemned man’s head, or appropriate the guillotine, which is fast and foolproof.
The problem with both of those methods is they offend our aesthetic requirements: bloodless and neat.
Finally, the single most offensive thing about this judge’s actions is the insistence on making medical professionals violate the Hippocratic oath. It’s far too close to the worst characteristics of the Third Reich, and I salute the doctors for telling the judge, in essence, to buzz off.
Daffyd Ab Hugh has a good post on the issue, with a comment from someone who purports to be a friend of the victim. It makes for compelling reading, and should make you both angry and sad; it did me.
It was in November 1980 that this story begins for me. I was busy with college, working at the skating rink . . . This was also the month I first met Terri Lynn Winchell. She was about 5 feet tall with beautiful flowing brown hair in a style we now make fun of as big hair of the 70’s.
She worked at the skating rink and was your typical 17 year old girl. She smiled and giggled and brighten any room she entered. She loved to sing at the piano and write songs . . . In high school, Winchell was a straight-A student and a humble beauty, those closest to her said. Her mother said her daughter had planned a bid to become Miss San Joaquin County.
In 1980, she was a contender to become a "Pibb Girl," the next face of the Coca-Cola Bottle Co., because of her striking resemblance to a composite of the most prominent female celebrities of the time. She had Pam Dawber's hair, Susan Anton's eyes and Kristy McNichol's nose.
On slow evenings at the rink she would wander away from her station at the snack bar and join me at the railing next to the rink just to talk and watch. We had a lot of good times together chatting. Out on the floor of the rink were our friends . . . .
Only one of those "friends" was the mastermind of her murder, who lured her into the car where Michael Morales waited.
Terri Lynn Winchell died a terrible death twenty-five years ago, strangled with a belt, head bashed in with a hammer, raped, stabbed in the chest, and left in a field like garbage, all by Morales.
The last thing a civilized society should concern itself with is his "right" to avoid all pain as he pays for his crime.
Posted by Mike Lief at February 23, 2006 12:29 PM
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Comments
Uh Mike:
Doctors no longer have to take the hippocratic oath (or probably Oregon would not be able to find many takers for their assisted euthanasia laws). Maybe they should have asked some "planned parenthood medical care providers" as they don't seem to have issues with ending human life.
Posted by: A friend at February 24, 2006 02:53 PM
I agree that the physicians who take part in assisted suicide are arguably violating their oaths to "do no harm," although there is a case to be made that they are alleviating the pain of a patient, as well as acting in accordance with the patient's wishes.
Conversely, I think everyone will agree that any doctor assisting in the execution of Morales is neither acting at the behest of the patient, nor fulfilling his duty to avoid harming the patient.
Posted by: Mike at February 24, 2006 07:51 PM