Advocates plan to push for end of death penalty in Maryland

Jan. 6



MARYLAND:

Advocates plan to push for end of death penalty in Maryland


Stricter oversight of the states crime laboratories and better standards
governing eyewitness identification during police investigations are among
the proposals criminal justice advocacy groups and some lawmakers plan to
push for in Annapolis this year.

They also will seek repeal of Marylands death penalty.

"You have a governor now who would sign a bill if it passes, and we hope
will lend his leadership, his political and moral support and leadership,
to the repeal," said Del. Samuel I. "Sandy" Rosenberg, the Baltimore
Democrat who is the lead sponsor for death penalty repeal legislation.

Gov.-elect Martin OMalley has said that while he personally is opposed to
the death penalty, he would defer to court rulings giving opponents of
capital punishment cause for optimism. Executions were halted last month
after the Court of Appeals ruled that Maryland adopted its execution
protocols without complying to provisions of the Administrative Procedure
Act.

Cynthia M. Boersma, legislative director for the ACLU of Maryland, said
advocates also plan to argue that repealing the death penalty would save
the state money.

"We have a governor-elect who has been public about his personal
opposition to the death penalty and his opinion that its cost is not
justified, and considering how costly it is to administer a death penalty,
it would be more cost-effective to eliminate the death penalty and put the
associated savings into more effective public-safety efforts," she said.

Some of the proposals are intended to improve the integrity of criminal
prosecutions, Boersma said. One such proposal would place crime labs under
the state Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, the same agency that
monitors medical labs.

"We're looking for oversight comparable to clinical lab oversight: the
ability to license, set standards, enforce standards and work with labs to
maintain those standards to prevent erroneous convictions and ensure that
accurate forensic science evidence is being used in court," Boersma said.

Faulty forensic analysis has resulted in the conviction of innocent people
and the guilty going free, Laurel Albin, a lobbyist for the public
defender, told The (Baltimore) Daily Record.

The public defenders office and the ACLU of Maryland also support
legislation setting standards for eyewitness photo arrays and lineups.
About 85 % of wrongful convictions nationwide involve mistaken eyewitness
identifications, Boersma said.

Lineups and photo arrays are often conducted by the person who is
investigating the case, who already believes he or she knows who the
perpetrator is, Boersma said. She said eyewitness identification
procedures should be done by a 3rd party who does not know who the suspect
is.

Witnesses should also be told that they can choose not to identify any of
the people in the lineup or the photo array instead of being told to
choose the person who looks most like the perpetrator, she said.

"Over 30 years of research into the psychology of memory and
identification and investigations show that this is calculated to produce
inaccurate eyewitness identification," Boersma said.