� 19/06/01                                                              English

Usa, nuova esecuzione federale oggi a Terre Haute, Indiana

Bush ha negato la grazia. Due appelli respinti

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Un trafficante di droga messicano, Juan Raul Garza, � stato giustiziato oggi a Terre Haute in Indiana. E' la seconda esecuzione federale negli Stati Uniti negli ultimi otto giorni, dopo quella di Timothy McVeigh, condannato per la strage di Oklahoma City. E dopo 38 anni nei quali non ce n'erano state.

Il presidente George W. Bush ha respinto luned� la richiesta di clemenza per il quarantaquattrenne messicano condannato per tre omicidi; ed era l'ultima speranza per trasformare la condanna a morte in un ergastolo senza possibilit� di libert� vigilata.

Garza � morto nella stessa camera dove la settimana scorsa � stato giustiziato McVeigh e allo stesso modo, con un'iniezione letale. L'esecuzione, fissata per le 7 del mattino ora locale (le 15 italiane) � la seconda al livello federale dal 1963.

Prima dell'iniezione letale Garza � rimasto detenuto nella cella adiacente alla camera della morte; la stessa nella quale anche McVeigh ha passato le ultime ore. Luned� ha trascorso la giornata leggendo, guardando la televisione e parlando con i propri avvocati, secondo quanto ha riferito un funzionario del penitenziario, Jim Cross. Gli � stato poi spiegato in che cosa consiste l'esecuzione e che cosa accadr� nelle prossime ore.

Come ultimo pasto, riferisce l'Associated Press, Garza ha scelto bistecca, patatine e cipolle fritte, coca-cola dietetica e tre fette di pane. All'esecuzione ha assistito un consigliere spirituale del condannato.

Bush ha negato la grazia

Bush ha negato la richiesta di grazia dopo che la Corte suprema aveva respinto due appelli presentati in extremis dagli avvocati, secondo i quali sarebbero stati violati i diritti riconosciuti dall'Organizzazione degli stati americani (Osa) e la giuria non avrebbe ricevuto informazioni complete sulle possibili alternative alla condanna a morte.

Per quest'ultimo argomento esisteva un precedente favorevole: nel caso Shafer contro lo Stato del South Carolina, la Corte suprema aveva stabilito che la giuria doveva essere informata chiaramente di tutte le alternative possibili alla pena capitale.

Il presidente ha respinto la grazia perch� non ha riscontrato "alcun motivo" per salvare la vita a Garza, ha spiegato il portavoce della Casa Bianca Ari Fleischer.

Due appelli respinti

Garza, un narcotrafficante, � stato condannato a morte nell'agosto del 1993 in Texas per omicidio e per aver commissionato l'uccisione di tre altre trafficanti di droga, in modo da controllare maggiormente il campo della distribuzione di stupefacenti.

Nell'ultima richiesta di clemenza i suoi avvocati sostenevano che la pena di morte federale � applicata in maniera pregiudiziale nei confronti delle minoranze etniche. Argomento rifiutato dal ministro della Giustizia John Ashcroft, che ha ricordato come la pubblica accusa e sette delle otto vittime fossero di razza ispanica, come lo stesso Garza

20/06/2001

Usa, nuova esecuzione per Bush � la numero 154 Giustizia federale per Juan Raul Garza, il presidente ignora l'appello del Messico. Da domani a Strasburgo il congresso degli abolizionisti

LA sfida del Vecchio Continente ai boia parte poco lontano dall'Europarlamento. Domani a Strasburgo gli abolizionisti di tutto il mondo apriranno il Congresso mondiale contro la pena di morte. La risposta dell'America � arrivata in anticipo, ieri, dall'Indiana, quando il medico del carcere di Terre Haute ha accostato lo stetoscopio al petto di Juan Raul Garza e lo ha dichiarato morto. Bush l'aveva detto da tempo: non aveva nessuna intenzione di concedere la grazia a quello che la stampa locale chiamava "il Barone della droga", colpevole di tre omicidi legati al narcotraffico a cavallo del confine fra Texas e Messico.Il presidente americano non si � commosso alle implorazioni della famiglia n� si � fatto influenzare dalle pressioni messicane, e ha dato via libera alla seconda esecuzione federale in otto giorni. �Mi dispiace e chiedo scusa per il dolore e la sofferenza che ho causato�, ha detto Garza nei suoi ultimi minuti. Alle 7 di ieri (le 14 in Italia) si � sdraiato sul lettino dell'iniezione letale, nove minuti pi� tardi la miscela di tre sostanze chimiche iniettata in vena aveva compiuto il suo lavoro.

Garza viene dopo Timothy McVeigh, folle bombarolo di Oklahoma City, che ha chiuso i 38 anni di sospensione delle esecuzioni federali. Poi toccher� ad altri detenuti federali, �quasi tutti membri di minoranze etniche�, dice Amnesty Usa. A distinguere le esecuzioni federali da quelle "comuni", cio� disposte dai singoli stati, � la natura del reato. La legge americana prevede che la pena capitale sia attribuita ai responsabili di omicidio aggravato da violenza che quindi viene punito con la morte in tutti gli stati conservazionisti mentre le sentenze federali arrivano quando il reato (le fattispecie previste sono 60) � considerato rivolto verso gli Stati Uniti.

Per Bush, Juan Raul Garza � il giustiziato numero 154, il secondo da quando l'ex governatore del Texas � entrato alla Casa Bianca. Ma anche il suo successore ad Austin, Rick Perry, ha fatto capire subito quale linea seguir� nei prossimi anni, mettendo il veto alla legge che vietava l'esecuzione dei ritardati mentali. Evidentemente non si � lasciato influenzare dalla decisione della Corte Suprema, che aveva annullato nei giorni scorsi la condanna capitale di Johnny Paul Penry, l'uomo che con le guardie carcerarie parla di Babbo Natale e che durante il processo aveva preteso i pastelli per colorare i suoi disegni.Non tutta l'America condivide la linea dura: il governatore dell'Oklahoma, Frank Keating, ha appena concesso un rinvio a Gerardo Valdez, messicano condannato a morte in violazione della Convenzione di Vienna, che garantisce agli stranieri il diritto ad avvertire la rappresentanza diplomatica del proprio paese dopo l'arresto. 

Dall'altra parte dell'Atlantico la mobilitazione cresce: il primo congresso ha raccolto adesioni da tutto il mondo. Oltre al sostegno del Consiglio d'Europa e del Parlamento europeo, militanti e associazioni sperano di rilanciare da Strasburgo la crociata per "convertire" gli Stati Uniti e allo stesso tempo per fare luce sulle condanne nei paesi in cui i massacri di Stato vengono coperti dalla censura. E la comunit� di Sant'Egidio, per rilanciare la raccolta di firme online sulla moratoria, vara due nuovi appelli per la revisione del processo: per Tommy Zeigler, condannato in Florida, e per Mark Lankford, dell'Idaho.(g.cad.) 

� 20/06/01

 GIUSTIZIA INUMANA E VENDETTE DI STATO

Maurizio Blondet 

Juan Raul Garza era, al di l� di ogni ragionevole dubbio, un assassino.

Capobanda di una gang di spacciatori, aveva ordinato l'omicidio di due persone e aveva ucciso di sua mano una terza. Ieri ha ricevuto la morte di Stato, l'iniezione letale, sullo stesso lettino dove pochi giorni fa la giustizia federale aveva steso McVeigh, lo stragista di Oklahoma City.

Nell'uno e nell'altro caso, i due condannati non hanno avuto il beneficio di una vera, grande campagna d'opinione per risparmiarli. McVeigh, un neonazista e assassino gratuito, era indifendibile dai gruppi "politicamente corretti" che di solito si battono contro la pena suprema; attorno a Garza s'� tentata una difesa improbabile, puntando sul fatto che era d'origine messicana e sull'accusa volta al sistema penale americano di mandare a morte soprattutto ispanici o neri: accusa vera, ma in certi Stati; non proponibile invece contro le sentenze della Federazione, serie e ponderate.

Qui, si rivela un problema. Proprio l'altro ieri "Nessuno tocchi Caino" ha fornito la triste contabilit� delle pene capitali nel mondo (1892 esecuzioni nel Duemila: ogni anno il boia spazza via un villaggio di esseri umani), denunciando una accelerazione del triste fenomeno (quest'anno appena cominciato, siamo gi� a quota 1290). Ma per la prima volta, le benemerita organizzazione ha puntato il dito su un certo moralismo che grida giustamente alle esecuzioni in Usa, ma sorvola su altre per motivi di correttezza politica. La piccola Cuba, per esempio, in proporzione condanna a morte cinque volte pi� degli Usa. E la Cina da sola conta per l'80 per cento delle esecuzioni nel mondo.

E' una denuncia coraggiosa e da condividere. Ma forse non sufficiente, e gli attivisti anti-pena di morte gioverebbero meglio alla loro causa, se arrivassero a fare alcune distinzioni. Il regime di Pechino ha lanciato quest'anno una campagna di repressione, "Colpire Duro", la quale rende la gi� discutibile "giustizia penale" del Paese una feroce e febbrile macchina di massacro. La Cina condanna a morte per una miriade di reati che negli stati di diritto sono considerati minori; spesso reati contro il patrimonio.

Cuba, una delle ultime dittatore comuniste, prevede la morte per 112 reati, non per il solo omicidio premeditato e aggravato come negli Stati Uniti.

Compresi i reati d'opinione. E con quali garanzie legali per l'imputato, con quali procedure giuridiche, con quale informazione dell'opinione pubblica, la natura di quei regimi lascia immaginare.

C'� una tragica differenza, nonostante tutto, fra Usa e Cina o Cuba. Al punto che � improprio bollare con lo stesso giudizio i due tipi di esecuzioni. Quelle cubane e cinesi sono troppo spesso vendette di Stato; piaccia o no, la pena di morte in Usa � la faccia terribile della democrazia come la storia della Federazione � venuta formandola: a comminare le pene capitali, con i suoi errori e i suoi fatali pregiudizi (anche razziali), sono giurie popolari. Vagliate oltretutto tenacemente dagli avvocati difensori. Comminare la morte, in America, � un esercizio, e terribile prerogativa, della sovranit� popolare. In Cina, a Cuba, e non parliamo dell'Afghanistan e dell'Irak (400 esecuzioni nel 2000) la sovranit� popolare non c'entra per nulla. C'entra l'arbitrio del dittatore locale.

Ci� non vale, s'intende, a condonare la dura giustizia americana. Ma va riconosciuto che almeno, l�, la questione della pena di morte viene discussa incessantemente. Che ci sono minoranze che vi si oppongono con tenacia, e tenaci argomenti; e che hanno voce nel dibattito pubblico. In America, � una minoranza contro la maggioranza; ma la libert� di pensiero e di manifestazione tiene aperta la speranza che la minoranza di oggi possa infine convincere la maggioranza - gi� � riuscita a scuoterla, ad assottigliarla - e che un giorno otterr� l'abrogazione della morte di Stato.

In Cina, a Cuba, e non parliamo dell'Irak, anche solo obiettare contro il matattatoio di Stato � in s� un reato. E' persino banale ricordarlo. Ma forse a volte, anche fra i benintenzionati, c'� chi lo dimentica.

Maurizio Blondet

ABC News

Garza Apologizes Before Execution

Drug Lord Garza Asks Forgiveness in Final Moments

By REX W. HUPPKE,

TERRE HAUTE, Ind. (AP) - Strapped to the same padded gurney on which Timothy McVeigh (news - web sites) died, drug kingpin Juan Raul Garza received a chemical injection Tuesday and became the second inmate in eight days to be executed by the U.S. government.

While the Oklahoma City bomber died stoic and remorseless, Garza was fidgety as he awaited execution, and apologized for the murders for which he was condemned to die.

``I just want to say that I'm sorry and I apologize for all the pain and grief that I have caused,'' the 44-year-old Garza said. ``I ask your forgiveness, and God bless.''

Garza's pleas for clemency were rebuffed the night before by a Bush administration that ended 38 years of no federal executions by having two in just over a week. On June 11, McVeigh became the first federal inmate put to death since 1963. Garza, the second, was pronounced dead at 8:09 EDT.

``With this administration there's no doubt that they are more clearly in favor of supporting the death penalty at all costs than doing anything of substance to correct the system,'' Garza attorney Gregory Wiercioch said.

It could be months or even years before there is another execution at the Terre Haute prison, home of the only federal death row. No execution dates have been set for any of the 18 other men there under death sentences.

Death penalty opponents and some former Justice Department (news - web sites) officials have complained of racial and geographic bias in the way capital punishment is imposed, questioning whether Garza - a Mexican-American born in the United States - would have been sentenced to death if he had been white or had committed his crimes somewhere other than Texas.

Six of the 18 men under federal death sentences were convicted in Texas; 16 are minorities.

Garza was a ruthless killer who operated a smuggling ring from his Texas home of Brownsville, bringing tons of marijuana across the Mexican border into the United States.

He shot a suspected informant, Thomas Rumbo, in the head, dragged him from a car into a field and shot the corpse four more times. He also ordered the deaths of two men, one killed in an auto body shop, the other in a Brownsville nightclub.

One witness testified that Garza arranged for the death of his own son-in-law because he suspected he was a snitch and had a woman beaten to death for the same reason. Garza was not charged with those two killings.

``My son only lived 35 years,'' Rumbo's mother, Shannon Rumbo, said Tuesday in Harlingen, Texas. ``For 10 years we went through this, all these reasons why (Garza) should have extenuating circumstances. He did not give my son any. God will judge him.''

The prison grounds that were filled with hundreds of reporters last week during McVeigh's execution were nearly empty by comparison Tuesday.

About 50 anti-death penalty protesters outside the U.S. Penitentiary sang ``We Shall Overcome'' and other protest songs. Not a single death penalty supporter made the trek to the area designated for the pro-side.

Prison Warden Harley Lappin, looking weary, demonstrated how much focus had been put on McVeigh when he announced Garza's death to the news media by saying, ``Inmate Tim ...'' He quickly corrected himself.

Garza was the first person executed under the 1988 federal Anti-Drug Abuse Act, which imposes a death sentence for murders stemming from drug trafficking. President Bush (news - web sites) and the U.S. Supreme Court (news - web sites) refused on Monday to delay the execution.

Wiercioch said a recent report from Attorney General John Ashcroft (news - web sites) saying there is no evidence of racial or geographic bias in the use of the federal death penalty will someday be placed on the shelf next to the Dred Scott decision and Plessy v. Ferguson - the separate-but-equal ruling on race - ``as a shameful attempt to justify the unjustifiable.''

``Some day this precise savagery will end, but not today,'' Wiercioch said. ``Today President Bush had the last word. But he will not have the final say on the death penalty. History will.''

Ashcroft said Monday there was no evidence of racial bias in Garza's case.

U.S. executes 2nd Death Row inmate

Unlike McVeigh, Garza is repentant

By Naftali Bendavid, Tribune staff reporter. Tribune staff reporter Naftali Bendavid was selected at random to be...

June 20, 2001

TERRE HAUTE, Ind. -- Juan Raul Garza, convicted of murdering three men to maintain his drug empire, was executed Tuesday morning in the same death chamber as Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh eight days earlier.

The 44-year-old Texan had mounted an extraordinary effort to save his life. In addition to petitioning the U.S. Supreme Court and President Bush, Garza sent Bush a videotape begging for his life, and his young daughters also made tearful appeals.

By Tuesday morning Garza appeared reconciled to his fate. When offered the chance for a last statement just after 7 a.m., he spoke repentantly, contrasting with McVeigh's silent defiance.

"I just want to say that I'm sorry and I apologize for all the pain and grief that I've caused," Garza said haltingly. "I ask for your forgiveness. God bless."

Warden Harley Lappin said Garza was calm and cooperative as his execution approached. For his last meal Monday night, Garza requested steak, french fries, onion rings, diet cola and three slices of bread.

On Tuesday, Garza talked with a Roman Catholic priest from 5:15 a.m. to 5:45 a.m. Then he was searched and strapped to a gurney, and an intravenous needle was inserted. By 6:30 Garza was in the execution room, his feet moving nervously underneath the sheet.

As the chemicals took effect, Garza looked over at the priest, the only witness he asked to attend. Garza had said goodbye to his wife and other family members Monday, and they did not come to the execution.

Garza appeared not to fight the poison as it entered his veins, but rather drifted off with his eyes open and his head turned slightly to the left. After the first chemical rendered Garza unconscious he stopped blinking. His eyes remained open, and Lappin declared him dead at 7:09.

Lappin has now overseen the death of two federal inmates in eight days, after nearly four decades in which the U.S. government did not execute anyone. As he announced that Garza was dead, Lappin began uttering McVeigh's name before catching and correcting himself.

Garza's lawyer, Greg Wiercioch, was visibly anguished as he addressed reporters after his client's death. He lashed out against capital punishment and the racially discriminatory way he said the federal government administers it.

"Someday this precise savagery will end. But not today," Wiercioch said. "I do not have an answer when I am asked about the families devastated by Juan Garza's crimes. But I do know that justice does not demand death."

In Harlingen, Texas, the mother of one of Garza's victims stayed home, her eyes weary as she answered the door.

"My son only lived 35 years," Shannon Rumbo said of her son Thomas, who was killed by Garza in 1991 on a deserted road in south Texas. "`For 10 years we went through this, all these reasons why [Garza] should have extenuating circumstances. He did not give my son any. God will judge him."

More than 1,000 reporters came to Terre Haute for the execution of McVeigh, who killed 168 people in America's deadliest act of domestic terrorism. In contrast, fewer than 100 attended Garza's execution.

Garza was the first inmate executed under the 1988 "drug kingpin" law, which made it a capital crime to commit murder during a drug operation. His case has ignited a debate on the federal death penalty and whether it is racially biased.

White House spokesman Ari Fleischer and Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft asserted this week that there is no such bias. Fleischer reiterated that view Tuesday, noting the president was informed of Garza's death shortly after the execution.

In a statement, Ashcroft said: "Juan Raul Garza's guilt is not in doubt." He added that the judge, prosecutor and most of the jurors in Garza's case were Hispanic like him.

Critics noted that 70 percent of those against whom federal prosecutors seek the death penalty are minorities. Sixteen of the 18 men remaining on federal Death Row are minorities. None has an execution date.

"Most of the cases coming out of federal Death Row are not going to look like Tim McVeigh; they're going to look like Juan Garza," Wiercioch said. "I think the debate has started, and I hope it continues."

20/06/01

Garza Executed 8 Days After McVeigh

By Peter Slevin

TERRE HAUTE, Ind., June 19 -- After apologizing for the grief he had caused, convicted murderer Juan Raul Garza was put to death by federal executioners today on the same padded gurney where Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh died eight days ago.

Garza spoke his last words at 7:04 a.m. Central time, strapped on the table and covered to his shoulders by a crisp white sheet. Three tubes stretched into his body from an opening in the far wall, ready for the mix of chemicals that would kill him five minutes later.

He turned his face toward the prison warden and the viewing room beyond, where relatives of his murder victims watched from behind a tinted window.

"I just want to say that I'm sorry and I apologize for all the pain and grief that I have caused," he said. "I ask for your forgiveness. And God bless."

At 7:05 a.m., Warden Harley G. Lappin received the order to proceed. The poisons that would stop Garza's lungs, then his heart, flowed silently, one at a time, each taking about 60 seconds to cross the room and disappear under the sheet. Garza, who had moved his feet nervously before the execution began, blinked a few times and then was still. Like McVeigh, he died with his eyes open.

The long legal fight over Garza's execution had ended quietly Monday, when the U.S. Supreme Court turned down two of his appeals to halt the execution and President Bush rejected a clemency plea. They were not persuaded by arguments that the federal death penalty is enforced unequally against minorities and that Garza was treated unfairly during his trial.

"Some day this precise savagery will end. But not today," defense attorney Greg Wiercioch told reporters on the prison grounds. "Today, President Bush had the last word. But he will not have the final say on the death penalty. History will."

White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said Bush was notified of the execution one minute after Garza was declared dead. "The president believes strongly that the death penalty, when it's administered fairly and effectively, and when defendants have full access to the courts, serves as a deterrent to crime," Fleischer said.

The orderly scene at the U.S. Penitentiary here was only a faint echo of the hubbub that surrounded the June 11 execution of McVeigh, who was convicted of killing 168 people in the 1995 bomb attack on the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building. McVeigh was the first federal prisoner executed since 1963.

Absent this time were the competing demonstrations of death penalty supporters and foes. About 50 capital punishment opponents sang "We Shall Overcome" in a fenced protest area as Garza, 44, was being executed. The grassy area set aside for execution supporters remained empty.

Gone also was much of the media circus. The 1,000-plus journalists given credentials for the McVeigh execution were replaced by a few dozen. There was no satellite feed to victims and their families. This time, four relatives of Garza's victims watched, along with 10 journalists and one person identified as his spiritual adviser.

Garza's family honored his request to stay away. His 12-year-old son and 10-year-old daughter stayed in a hotel with relatives. The boy told a lawyer Monday: "I don't want to be in the place where they kill my father."

Liz Garza -- the children's mother and Garza's ex-wife -- spent the execution hour with Garza's adult daughter from a first marriage and nuns on the campus of St. Mary-of-the-Woods College.

"The only thing making me okay is to know he's in heaven," said Norma Garza, 24. "What hurts me is that I'm going to miss him so much."

Relatives of Garza's victims declined most requests for interviews.

Garza, by his own admission, ran a marijuana smuggling operation. In 1991, he fatally shot Thomas Rumbo, manager of a Harlingen, Tex., trucking company. Rumbo had agreed to help the government pursue Garza after officers intercepted a marijuana shipment on one of Rumbo's trucks. Garza, accused of importing at least 2,200 pounds of marijuana into Brownsville, Tex., also ordered the killing of two Brownsville men. Garza was convicted in 1993 under a federal drug law.

Wiercioch noted that Garza was the only federal death row inmate whose jurors were not told that he would spend his life in prison without parole if they did not sentence him to death. Garza's attorneys also maintained that the federal death penalty is enforced unfairly, penalizing minorities and people who live in certain states. Sixteen of the 18 federal inmates sentenced to die are racial or ethnic minorities.

But a Justice Department report released this month asserted that white defendants are actually slightly more likely than minorities to face the death penalty. During Garza's final hours -- after a last meal of steak, french fries, onion rings and diet soda -- he spoke with his spiritual adviser and asked warden Lappin to deliver messages to friends on death row.

By 6:30 a.m., Garza had been moved the few feet from his holding cell and was strapped onto the gurney. When officials opened the opaque turquoise curtains at 7:03 a.m., Garza scanned the witnesses' faces. He made his final statement, and U.S. Marshal Frank Anderson raised the receiver of a red telephone.

"May we proceed with the execution?" Anderson asked the Justice command center. He turned to Lappin and said, "Warden, you may proceed with the execution."

Garza's eyes looked distant, and then went dull. The edges of his lips turned slightly blue. Four minutes after the chemicals started flowing, Lappin said, "Inmate Garza died at 7:09 a.m., Central Daylight Time. This concludes the execution."

Staff writer Anne Hull contributed to this report

  - June 20, 2001

Government Executes Killer in Drug Cases

By RAYMOND BONNER

The Associated Press 

A death penalty protester, Bill Quigley, stood outside the prison at Terre Haute, Ind., Tuesday as the execution of Juan Raul Garza neared. 

Bush Rejects Clemency for Drug Lord Set to Die Today (June 19, 2001)

Lawyers Trying to Stop Execution Cite Flaws in Bias Report (June 13, 2001)

WASHINGTON, June 19 � A Texas man convicted of three drug-related murders was put to death by lethal injection today at the federal penitentiary in Terre Haute, Ind., the same place Timothy J. McVeigh was executed last week.

The execution of the convict, Juan Raul Garza, 44, was only the second by the federal government in nearly four decades, but in a sign that more capital prosecutions are likely to take place, Attorney General John Ashcroft has amended the Justice Department guidelines for United States attorneys.

Under the new guidelines, which were sent to federal prosecutors around the country two weeks ago, it will be easier to bring cases in states without the death penalty. Twelve states and the District of Columbia fall into that category, and in the last decade, very few capital cases were prosecuted federally in those states. This was in part because under Attorney General Janet Reno the absence of the death penalty in a state was not enough to justify making the prosecution of a crime a federal case. That provision has been deleted in the new guidelines.

The new guidelines suggest "an intention to impose the death penalty in states that don't have it," said David I. Bruck, a veteran death penalty lawyer at the Federal Death Penalty Resource Counsel Project, which provides assistance to court- appointed lawyers in federal death penalty cases. "In that sense, it is the nationalization of the death penalty," Mr. Bruck added.

A spokeswoman for the Justice Department, Chris Watney, said the guidelines were changed because "the department does not want state sentencing laws to be singled out as a factor in these decisions."

There are now 19 men on federal death row under sentence of death, 14 of them black, but their cases are in various stages of appeal, and it is unlikely that any execution dates will be set this year.

But with President Bush and Mr. Ashcroft both firm supporters of the death penalty, the focus, death penalty lawyers and opponents say, will shift to watching whether there is an increase in prosecutions of federal capital cases.

In response to Mr. Garza's execution, the White House said today that Mr. Bush "believes strongly that the death penalty, when it's administered fairly and effectively, and when defendants have full access to the courts, that the death penalty serves as a deterrent to crime, and that's why he believes in the death penalty."

President Bill Clinton twice delayed Mr. Garza's execution because of statistics that showed glaring racial disparities in the application of the federal death penalty. Mr. Ashcroft promised last week to study the disparities, and some groups had urged a delay until the study was completed.

"The failure of the Bush administration to seriously examine the issues raised by the case of Juan Raul Garza is indefensible and calls into question the commitment of the U.S. government to ensure equal protection of the law in the federal death penalty process," said the Citizens for a Moratorium on Federal Executions, a group of civic and religious leaders formed last year, some of whom support the death penalty.

Senator Russell D. Feingold, a Wisconsin Democrat who is an outspoken opponent of the death penalty, said today that he would continue to push for a federal moratorium. His bill, which is co-sponsored by Senator Jon Corzine, Democrat of New Jersey, has 11 signers, all Democrats.

"If any good can come of the execution of Juan Raul Garza today," Mr. Feingold said, "I hope it will be that more members of Congress will step forward and support a moratorium on executions."

He said he would also be monitoring the Justice Department's review of the application of the federal death penalty. A Justice Department analysis of federal capital cases since 1995 found that in nearly 80 percent of the cases the defendant was a member of a racial or ethnic minority.

Fourteen of the 19 federal death row inmates are black, a greater percentage of blacks than in any state death rows.

Beyond the questions about possible racial bias, the federal system has not been under the criticism that many states have. There are no mentally retarded inmates on federal death row, and no juvenile offenders. And the level of representation in federal capital cases is far better than in most states with high death row populations.

A relatively small number of capital cases get into the federal system, in large part because law enforcement is generally considered a matter for the states.

For the country's first 200 years, federal prosecution of cases where the death penalty was possible was largely limited to espionage, murder on federal property, murder in the course of bank robbery, or, after the Lindbergh kidnapping, interstate kidnapping. Murder of an American president did not become a federal crime until after the assassination of President Kennedy.

Then, in 1988, Congress passed what has become known as the drug kingpin statute, which allows the death penalty in cases in which the murder was committed as part of a drug-running enterprise. This was the law under which Mr. Garza was prosecuted.

In 1994, Congress greatly expanded the number of crimes for which a defendant could be executed. They now include drive-by shootings, carjacking that result in death and destruction of a plane, car or train that results in death.

When the state and federal governments both have jurisdiction to prosecute a crime, Justice Department guidelines say that the federal government should take the case only when there is a "substantial federal interest."

The new guidelines go further, saying that United States attorneys may consider whether the "appropriate punishment upon conviction" is available in the state.