The N.C. House voted yesterday to set up new ways for defendants to challenge the use of the death penalty by arguing that it is racially biased.
With a 61-55 vote, the House gave tentative approval to a bill known as the N.C. Racial Justice Act. A second vote is required today.
The bill's chief sponsors are two Democrats from Winston-Salem: Reps. Larry Womble and Earline Parmon. They said that the bill is meant to ensure that capital punishment in North Carolina is carried out fairly, and they said that it would help mend a history of discrimination in the criminal-justice system.
"If we're going to kill people, then we must be as fair and objective as we possibly can," Womble said in a long, impassioned speech on the House floor.
"People do not shed their personal experiences, or their personal prejudice, or their biases at the courtroom door. Race is still a matter in this state," he said.
The bill's supporters pointed to data showing that the death penalty is more likely to be handed down in cases involving white victims or black defendants. Defendants should be allowed to use such data as evidence in court, the bill's supporters say.
The bill was vigorously opposed by Republicans, who argued that it would clog up the court system with unnecessary appeals, further postpone the resumption of executions in North Carolina, and cost the state millions of dollars.
They also objected to the bill's most controversial provision -- allowing statistical evidence from other cases as a way for a defendant to try to prove racial bias.
Under the bill, a defendant could cite statistical disparities from other death-penalty cases, either in the state at large, or in the defendant's jurisdiction. If the statistics showed significant racial disparities in how the death penalty has been applied, a judge could block a prosecutor from pursuing the death penalty in that case, or overturn a jury's decision to impose a death sentence.
In addition, all inmates now on death row would have the opportunity to argue under the bill's provisions that their death sentences were racially motivated.
If a death sentence were thrown out under the bill, it would be converted to a sentence of life in prison without parole.
Republicans said that the use of statistics is inappropriate.
"If we were to apply the same logic of this bill to gender or sexual differences, we would have to vastly increase the number of women executed before we could execute any more men. Is that what you want?" said Rep. Paul "Skip" Stam, R-Wake and the House minority leader.
The bill's opponents also said that there are already numerous legal protections in state law aimed at rooting out racial bias in criminal trials.
Legislators debated the bill for more than two hours in one of the most heated and emotional legislative sessions of the year. The debate frequently expanded beyond the legal scope of the bill, as legislators gave personal accounts of racial discrimination or invoked cases of black men, such as Winston-Salem's Darryl Hunt, who have been exonerated after spending years in prison. Opponents, meanwhile, brought up crime victims, and pleaded with their colleagues to vote against the bill on behalf of those victims.
Assuming that the bill gets final House approval on its second vote today, it will move back to the N.C. Senate.
The Senate previously approved a version of the Racial Justice Act, but it had contained an accompanying amendment that made it more palatable to death-penalty supporters. The amendment was removed by the House.
Once the House bill goes back to the Senate, the Senate can vote to agree to the House version or it can have the bill sent to a conference committee, where House and Senate negotiators would try to work out a version that is acceptable to both chambers.
■ James Romoser can be reached at 919-210-6794 or at jromoser@wsjournal.com.
Email
Facebook
Google
Twitter
Favorites
More
Advertisement