On Jan. 10 in Sacramento - at the first of three hearings in 2008 to address flaws in California's death penalty system - Chief Supreme Court Justice Ronald George declared that thoughtful individuals on both sides of the capital punishment debate should be able to agree on one thing: "The existing system for handling capital appeals in California is dysfunctional and needs reform."

Echoing the chief justice's conviction, more than a dozen witnesses testified before the California Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice in Los Angeles on Feb. 20.

Some prosecutors, defense attorneys and law professors said the broken system could be fixed primarily with more funding and resources. But a number of death penalty opponents vehemently argued that capital punishment was grossly unfair, too costly for a state facing a $16 billion budget crisis and, most of all, fundamentally immoral. As a result, they asserted, California should follow the lead of New Jersey, whose legislature recently voted to abolish the death penalty.

Constitutional lawyer Stephen Rohde, a member of the clemency team for Stanley "Tookie" Williams, the last person to be executed in the state on Dec. 13, 2005, testified during the day-long hearing at the Hall of Administration. He reminded members of the four-year-old commission that they had made other investigations and recommendations regarding the death penalty. He said it was a "tragedy" that lawmakers had not adopted their findings.

Then the attorney simply read the words of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun from 1994, explaining why he had changed his mind about the legality of the death penalty: "'From this day forward, I no longer shall tinker with the machinery of death.... Rather than continue to coddle the forced delusion that the desired level of fairness has been achieved and the need for regulation eviscerated, I feel morally and intellectually obliged to concede that the death penalty experiment has failed.'"

Executing the innocent
Ramona Ripston, longtime American Civil Liberties Union executive director for Southern California, said she had observed many divisive battles over California's death penalty. She had seen race and geography factored into the decision to seek the death penalty, and how "wealth and privilege" determined if a defendant was found guilty or innocent. And she had witnessed a dozen death row inmates being exonerated.

"Even if you could reform the system, no reforms could remove the specter of executing the innocent, which hangs over our death rows," Ripston told the commissioners. "That is an error no reform can reverse, no law can remedy.

"Executing innocent people is a reckless risk no civilized society should take," she said. "Indeed, societies around the world have increasingly moved beyond state executions, leaving our system not only cruel, but unusual."

Professor Elisabeth Semel, director of the death penalty clinic at the University of California School of Law, stressed that lawyers who represent clients in capital cases need special skills, training and resources.

She said ABA (American Bar Association) guidelines exist to ensure that capital case defendants receive "high quality representation."

But Semel pointed out that many counties in California were moving away from a couple of the most critical guidelines: first, to always have two counsels in capital cases and, second, to never base the hiring of legal representation in capital cases on flat-fee, low-bid contracts. Los Angles County had adopted lowest-cost fee structure, she noted, along with Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Diego and other counties throughout the state.

8,000-plus lawyer hours
One post-conviction capital case taken on by a major California corporate law firm in 2004 involved 8,000 lawyer and 7,000 paralegal hours, Semel reported. If the firm was not doing the case pro bono, the billing would have come to more than $1 million plus at least $328,000 in expenses, far exceeding the state's reimbursement for capital appeal cases.

The law professor called for an "absolute, complete overhaul" of capital representation. "My recommendation and conclusion is very simple," she said. "The guidelines have to be enforced."

Cliff Gardner, a lawyer from San Francisco doing capital defense work for more than 20 years, talked about the difficulties facing private practice attorneys like himself. After he receives up to 200 boxes of legal documents for a case and meets with his new client, the seasoned criminal defense counsel said he comes up with a thorough investigative plan.

This "wish list" takes in the witnesses he wants to talk to, plus the private investigator, forensic criminalist, confession expert, ballistics tech, mitigation specialist, mental health professionals and other specialists he needs to hire to properly represent his death row client's appeal.

"When I meet with him again, I say, 'Here's the 40 things we have to do, but I don't think we can afford to do even seven,'" he reported. "And so every decision I make is based on money. And that's an inequity the system has to address."

Commission Chairman John Van de Kamp, former district attorney of Los Angeles and former attorney general of California, remarked that almost every speaker spoke about the need to increase funding for attorneys, investigations and other services in capital cases.

"But you end up going back to the reality of the state's budget situation, where everything from education to parks to police truly need to be cut back," he said. "Obviously, the death penalty, which is supported by some, may not be a political reality."

'Political cowardice'
Actor Mike Farrell, president of Death Penalty Focus of California, declared that he deplored state killing because it harms society by lowering U.S. standards, most "tragically exemplified" in the tortures inflicted by young American soldiers in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo. "I urge you to consider that our death penalty is not about justice," he said. "It's about politics. And, more to the point, political cowardice."

Professor Emeritus Michael Peddecord of the graduate school of public health at San Diego State University reported "there is no credible evidence that the death penalty or executions per se deter future murders or crime in our communities."

The Rev. Howard Dotson was part of a delegation at the hearing from California People of Faith Working Against the Death Penalty. After acknowledging the limited mandate of the commission, he still urged members to implore elected officials to abolish the death penalty.

"This commission has heard hours of expert testimony outlining the disparities and inconsistencies," the Los Angeles Presbyterian minister said. "Throughout California, people of color are disproportionately sentenced to death. No matter how many safeguards are put in place, we will never be able to reach the hearts and minds of jurors where hate and prejudice still dwells."

The most riveting testimony, however, came from two mothers of murdered crime victims - one in favor of capital punishment, the other opposed to it.

Living a nightmare
In 1983, Mary Ann Hughes' son Christopher was hacked to death with an ax by an escaped prisoner while staying overnight at a nearby friend's house, along with three members of the family. For more than 25 years, she said her own family had lived with this "nightmare," while the convicted killer had manipulated the legal system to stay alive.

"My son didn't deserve that to happen to him," she stated. "But what guarantee do you give to me that [his murderer] won't be out on the street doing this to one of your family members or somebody else's family member?

"The only way for this to finally come to an end is when the state finally carries out the death penalty on people like [my son's killer] and they're finally off the face of this earth."

Vera Ramirez-Crutcher's son Donald became a victim of homicide at the age of 22. She told the commissioners how he was at a party with his girlfriend, Lorelei, and she went back to the car to get something. Confronted by a group of young men, she locked herself in the car and started blowing the horn.

When Donald came out to see what was the matter, one guy stabbed him in the stomach and another shot him while he tried to escape. The only man charged with a crime received seven years in prison.

Ramirez-Crutcher said her son's brutal death had not shaken her opposition to the death penalty, which was based on her bedrock faith, specifically the Fifth Commandment, "Thou shalt not kill."

"When you have the death penalty, you're sanctioning death," she said. "I don't want my name on that."

The California Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice will hold its last hearing on March 28 at Santa Clara University.