DEAR EDITOR: Murder the innocent. That is what the death penalty has done. Joseph Arridy, a 23-year-old who had the mental capacity of a 6-year-old was executed.
He was found to be a victim of a misled prosecution only after his death. Lengthy and costly procedural protections put in place since then are no use to Joe. The finality of an execution left him with nowhere to turn after the fact.
In 2011 Joe was granted a posthumous pardon citing an overwhelming body of evidence indicating his innocence. More than 70 years after he gave away his favorite toy train and entered the gas chamber, the pardon didn’t bring about his resurrection and freedom. He was murdered because we had the death penalty, and although nothing we do now can make it right for Joe, we can extinguish the possibility of repeating this mistake.
It is tempting to dismiss Joe’s case as a mistake of a different era. A mistake that could only happen because we didn’t have a mandatory appeals process, or DNA evidence, or other techniques and procedural protections. However, we must not forget that the reason we employ these new technologies and continue to develop additional procedures is because we know that mistakes do occur.
Furthermore, despite all the wisdom of modern science and procedural protections, wrongful conviction on capital offense cases still happen today. This fact is completely unacceptable when we hold presumption of innocence as a prime value in our criminal justice system. We must acknowledge that it is also entirely unavoidable. Whether it be due to malice, ambition, or chance, as long as humans are making the judgment, there will be wrongful convictions.
We cannot eliminate the possibility of a wrongful conviction, so we must remove the possibility of murdering another innocent soul by repealing the death penalty.
— Ray Higashi via letters@SentinelColorado.com