Approximately 150 students and faculty listened firsthand to the stories of two death row inmates via a speakerphone from a Chicago prison yesterday evening. This “Live from Death Row” event was the keynote event for Georgetown’s first “Death Penalty Awareness Week,” organized by Georgetown’s chapter of the Campaign to End the Death Penalty.
Anne Thompson (CAS ‘04), co-chair of the Georgetown chapter, said that this week’s events were aimed at providing the campus with more information about the issues surrounding capital punishment.
“The purpose of the Death Penalty Awareness Week is to better inform the University community about the implementation of the death penalty in the United States,” Thompson said.
David Bates, a former prison inmate who was tortured to admit to a crime that he did not commit and who has since been proven innocent, said that it was important for people to understand the reality of the current prison situation.
“I need to paint a different picture of the incarcerated than what you’ve been given,” Bates said.
He said that when he was brought to the police station in his local Chicago town, the police officers told him “that by the end of the day, [he] would know about the murder case and tell them everything they needed to know.”
Bates said that when he told the police officers that he was innocent, they handcuffed him and placed a plastic bag over his head to inhibit his breathing several times until he confessed to the crime.
“I can’t begin to explain to you how I was feeling … I can’t ask you to relate,” Bates said.
He said that he shared a prison cell with another inmate measuring 6 feet by 9 feet for 12 years. The cell included two beds and a toilet that inmates had to also use as a sink, Bates said.
“Animals have more space, more medical attention, better food than [we did], no matter what the crime,” he said.
Bates said that it was up to college students to stir up the energy needed in the movement to abolish the death penalty. “We’re going to have to work with you guys to get the message out about death row,” he said. “The only way they’re going to get off [death row] is you guys,” Bates said.
Marlene Martin, the official coordinator for the National Campaign to End the Death Penalty, said that activism was necessary to make progress in the fight against capitol punishment.
“We have enough studies, we have enough statistics … what we need now is activism,” Martin said.
Martin, who visits death row inmates in Chicago every two months, expressed concern over the lack of investigations into prison torture. “It’s not even being investigated … we’re not going to stay silent anymore,” she said.
Martin said that President George W. Bush presided over 152 executions during his term as governor of Texas. Since he began his term as president, Martin said that Bush has overseen two federal executions.
“In my mind, that makes him a serial killer,” Martin said.
Thompson said the Georgetown chapter of the Campaign to End the Death Penalty, “drew its inspiration from Justice Thurgood Marshall, who said, ‘The American people are largely unaware of the information critical to a judgment on the morality of the death penalty … if they were better informed, they would consider it shocking, unjust and unacceptable,’” she said.
Thompson said that she thought that the week’s events had been successful so far. Events have included a demonstration highlighting the mistakes made in death row sentences and a recording shown in Red Square of an execution.
“I have overheard conversations about the death penalty in New South and on Copley Lawn. Our mission is to encourage more discussion and debate, and that has been happening,” she said.
