Alabama misses by less than 24 hours executing a man for a crime another man has now confessed to. The vote in the Alabama Supreme Court was 5-4.
Four out of nine justices (using the term “justice” rather loosely) of the Alabama Supreme Court are willing to let a man be executed for a crime that another man has confessed to. Oh, yeah, and the state seems to have “lost” the key piece of forensic evidence. It takes a lot of legal education to get that far from common sense and common morality.
Author: Mark Kleiman
Professor of Public Policy at the NYU Marron Institute for Urban Management and editor of the Journal of Drug Policy Analysis. Teaches about the methods of policy analysis about drug abuse control and crime control policy, working out the implications of two principles: that swift and certain sanctions don't have to be severe to be effective, and that well-designed threats usually don't have to be carried out.
Books:
Drugs and Drug Policy: What Everyone Needs to Know (with Jonathan Caulkins and Angela Hawken)
When Brute Force Fails: How to Have Less Crime and Less Punishment (Princeton, 2009; named one of the "books of the year" by The Economist
Against Excess: Drug Policy for Results (Basic, 1993)
Marijuana: Costs of Abuse, Costs of Control (Greenwood, 1989)
UCLA Homepage
Curriculum Vitae
Contact: Markarkleiman-at-gmail.com
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