Alabama woman pushes for death penalty moratorium

By SAMIRA JAFARI

Esther Brown knew Lee County would be a tough one.

As she stood before the six county commissioners, urging support for a death penalty moratorium, she could see them shift in their seats and glance at their watches.

"I know you feel that I'm asking for a lot ... but I'm not asking you to be a trailblazer," she told the commission.

In the end, she couldn't even get them to take a vote.

But the 70-year-old Brown, who as a child in Nazi Germany saw the persecution of Jews and minorities, was not discouraged.

In the heart of one of the South's capitals of capital punishment, Brown and her supporters have convinced 24 local governments to call for a moratorium, demonstrating how the questioning of the death penalty resonates in small towns and rural counties with mostly black and economically struggling populations.

"The death penalty is not handled in a fair manner," she says. "They are singling out certain groups - minorities, the poor, the psychotics, the mentally retarded - and we kill them."

She contends a moratorium, enacted by the legislature, would allow time for an independent, two-year study on Alabama's death penalty system.

Brown, executive secretary for Project Hope to Abolish the Death Penalty, said such a study would reinforce that a disproportionate number of black inmates are sent to death row, especially those who are poor and can't afford a strong defense.

She also wants the study to examine death sentences for juveniles and the mentally retarded, and the issue of jury override - in Alabama a judge can impose the death penalty even when the jury recommends life without parole.

Alabama has more than 190 inmates on death row. Forty-six percent of them are black, though blacks make up only 26 percent of the state population.

Since 1976, when the U.S. Supreme Court allowed states to reinstate the death penalty, more than 900 people have been put to death nationwide. Alabama ranks ninth, with the executions of 28 inmates, 57 percent of them black.

Brown has developed a strategy that focuses on approaching predominantly poor, black cities or counties that she believes would want to send a message about the disproportionate numbers of blacks on Alabama's death row.

"On the whole, I do look at racial makeup," she said. "It's not that I haven't gone before a predominantly white one (council or commission). But my time is limited. I need to use my energy to the best advantage."

So far, Brown and her following are 24-for-28 in local government resolutions in Alabama - the highest number in the national push for state moratoriums.

North Carolina is second, with 21 city and county governments signed on, according to Equal Justice USA, an anti-death penalty group.

Illinois and Maryland are the only states that have imposed statewide moratoriums, but Maryland's was rescinded shortly after Republican Gov. Robert Ehrlich took office in November.

Getting local governments to join support is no easy task, especially in Alabama where conservative views on capital punishment dominate the Legislature.

Brown said the response of the Lee County Commission proves her point. The county is more than 77 percent white and five of the six commissioners are white.

Commissioner Sam Pierce, one of the whites, said it's not the job of local governments to vote on state-level issues.

"It's not an issue we have control over," Pierce said. "There are important issues the county does have control over. We don't want to encourage other groups to come up (to the commission) with an agenda."

Brown dismissed the Lee County Commission as being ignorant of the issue, but she needs to sway predominantly white local governments and larger districts to have a chance at the legislative level.

Most of the governments she's signed on are small, predominantly black city governments, representing populations of fewer than 5,000.

Perhaps her greatest achievement was convincing the Birmingham City Council, which represents more than 242,820 residents, to pass a resolution in support of the moratorium.

Birmingham City Councilman Lee Loder said he's confident that the growing number of local governments - small and large - supporting the moratorium will draw national attention to Alabama's death penalty system.

"Alabama ranks up there with the number of inmates executed," he said. "Highlight that and a reasonable person could see that the state is relatively cruel in the number of executions that have been completed."

His city is about 70 percent black, and while two other cities within Jefferson County have joined the call for a moratorium, the predominantly white county has not.

Brown, a former social worker, has been involved in death penalty cases for more than 20 years. Her childhood in Hitler's Germany was formative.

"I saw people's rights being violated, and grew up knowing the ones in power aren't necessarily right," she said. "That led me straight to the death penalty eventually."

She arrived in Alabama five years ago to protest the execution of Brian Baldwin, one of two men convicted in the 1977 abduction and hatchet slaying of a 16-year-old North Carolina girl.

Brown and defense attorneys argued that Baldwin was a victim of racial injustice, pointing to his conviction by an all-white jury and sworn testimony from a deputy who said Baldwin's confession was beaten out of him by white deputies.

Baldwin's execution deeply angered Brown. After vowing never to return to Alabama, she later decided that her passionate stance against the death penalty could draw Southern support.

Now she organizes visits to local governments from her home in Lanett, calling on sponsors from churches, colleges groups and minority organizations to participate in the push for a moratorium.

Brown hopes to gain enough support to pressure the Legislature into imposing a statewide moratorium for two years. But for five years, state Sen. Hank Sanders, D-Selma, a death penalty opponent, has pitched the idea to legislators, who never seem to find time to act on the bill.

"We're still going to have problems, but it's a little bit like rain washing against a stone - eventually it will give," Brown said.

Brown realizes it may take many more years to secure a moratorium. But accelerating Alabama to the No. 1 spot in local support motivates her to stick with her race-based strategy.

"Alabama with its bloody civil rights history - I don't know why they can't understand what they are doing."

On the Net:

Project Hope to Abolish the Death Penalty at www.phadp.org/
Equal Justice USA at www.quixote.org/ej/
Death Penalty Information Center at www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/