- June 4, 2001

Public Lives: A Lawyer Who Fights for Life Over the Death Penalty

By ELIZABETH BECKER

Susana Raab for The New York Times As Federal Execution Nears, Groups Call for Moratorium (June 4, 2001)

WASHINGTON -- TIMOTHY J. McVEIGH'S plea last week for a stay of execution for his role in the Oklahoma City bombing was one more piece of evidence for Diann Y. Rust-Tierney that few defendants can be assured a fair trial in the current system that determines who receives the death penalty."On the surface it seemed like an atypical case, that Mr. McVeigh would get a fair hearing, but with the government coming up with those missing documents we had another example of withholding evidence, one of the major problems for defendants facing the death penalty," said Ms. Rust-Tierney, one of the country's leading opponents of capital punishment.She saw other signs that her cause was receiving the critical attention she has been encouraging for two decades. Texas, which leads the country in executions, was on the verge of enacting laws to change its criminal justice system, including a possible moratorium on executions of the mentally disabled. "Now church by church, city council by city council, people are urging a moratorium on executions until they are convinced that this system is fair," said Ms. Rust-Tierney, the 45- year-old lawyer who heads the American Civil Liberties Union's capital punishment project. Her fight against the death penalty began with candlelight vigils in front of the Supreme Court in the early 80's, but she became opposed to state executions as a child listening to sermons at the Northminster Presbyterian Church here in Washington. "Basically, we were taught that everyone is precious in the eyes of the Creator," she said.The eldest of three children, Diann Rust was reared in the comfortable black middle- class neighborhood of Shepard Park, the daughter of a former Army sergeant who was a structural engineer for the federal government and a mother who was a full-time homemaker.In high school she transferred from the neighborhood public schools to the elite National Cathedral School, where she graduated in 1973. "I would take the S-2 bus, go through some poor, rough areas and I would end up at Woodley Park, a neighborhood of the very affluent and powerful. I got to learn from all of those worlds and I always felt welcome, never trapped, not in the world where all the houses were as big as mansions or in the world where the houses were so small they didn't have proper ventilation," she said.At the College of Wooster in Ohio she majored in political science, already determined to become a lawyer "and make a contribution, to fight racism and sexism." After college she volunteered for the federal Vista social services organization in Iowa."We had to live at the poverty level, with a $300 a month stipend and food stamps," she said."When a group of us applied for an apartment the landlady saw me and said, `I don't rent to no colored.' That was a rude awakening for me of what we were up against."She met another young Vista volunteer named Charles Tierney from Rochester, N.Y. They married and moved to Washington where they attended law school. Mr. Tierney is a lawyer in the public defender's office here.AFTER a stint with the National Women's Law Center, Ms. Rust-Tierney was hired by the American Civil Liberties Union in 1985. She asked to concentrate on the death penalty. Her timing proved unlucky.Within two years the Supreme Court ruled in McCleskey v. Kemp that the death penalty was constitutional even though the killers of whites were more often sentenced to death than the killers of blacks, a decision that triggered an increase in executions over the next decade."I was crying with my friends. We couldn't believe the court would say some inequities were inevitable. For our movement it was a ruling against African-Americans," she said. "That was the lowest point for me and I went through some personal soul searching."She decided to switch gears, to listen to the proponents of the death penalty and focus on the inequities of the system. "It's often lost, but we are angry and grieving for the victims of these crimes as well as angry over what the state does to the defendants," she said.It took another 10 years of publicizing cases where innocent defendants were sent to death row, and studies showing inequities faced by poor black and Hispanic defendants, before she and her colleagues saw a glimmer of light. Two death-row inmates in Illinois were freed after an investigation by journalism students at Northwestern University demonstrated their innocence, and then, last year, Gov. George Ryan of Illinois declared a moratorium on executions in the state. Ms. Rust-Tierney's parents care for her two sons - Gabriel, 12, and Erin, 5 - while she and her husband put in long hours at work. And even though she lives in Arlington, Va., all three generations attend her old church. "I know, I'm lucky," she said.