Many of the state's DAs oppose Racial Justice Act

The name of the bill says it all: the Racial Justice Act.

Its aim is noble, and its goal appeals to the better instincts in us all. If we're going to insist on using the death penalty in North Carolina, it must be applied fairly and justly. And if race is truly a factor in its application, then race ought to be removed from the equation, right?

The Racial Justice Act -- sponsored by Reps. Earline Parmon and Larry Womble, both Democrats of Winston-Salem -- has passed the N.C. House of Representatives and is up for consideration in the Senate.

The bill's chances of passing the Senate, which postponed a scheduled vote on the measure yesterday, are pretty good. Other than mouth-breathing racists, who in their right mind would dare stand in opposition to a bill entitled "the Racial Justice Act?"

Most of the state's elected district attorneys -- including Tom Keith of Forsyth County and Garry Frank of District 22B, which includes Davidson and Davie counties -- that's who.

"The title, Racial Justice Act, is very clever," Keith said. "How do you stand in front of that train and say, ‘I'm against racial justice?'"

Case-by-case basis

Like most elected officials, district attorneys are protective of their power. They view with great caution any attempts by the Legislature to water down, undermine or usurp their authority.

So it is that a good number of them, Keith and Frank included, have (and are) lobbying senators who represent portions of their districts.

Keith, who has said he won't run for another term in 2010, has been vocal in his opposition. He's appeared on talk-radio programs across the state and written an op-ed piece published recently in the Journal. Frank, who has a high-profile murder case on his plate right now, hasn't been as visible, yet he's burned up quite a few minutes on the cell phone quietly pleading his case to legislators.

The district attorneys' first (and most persuasive) line of defense goes like this: We take the death penalty very seriously and invoke it only in the most atrocious and deserving cases. We decide whether to use it on a case-by-case basis, considering all the facts without worrying about historical trends or statistics.

Their second point attacks the portion of the bill that would allow inmates currently on death row to get another bite at the appeals apple. Estimates vary wildly, but a single capital-punishment appeal can take years and cost tens of thousands of dollars. That's potentially an expensive proposition for lean budgetary times.

"The retroactive application would break the bank," Frank said.

He and other district attorneys believe that the bill's true intent is ending the death penalty in North Carolina by adding more legal roadblocks to discourage its use.

"Let's just call it what it is: a de facto taking-away of the death penalty in North Carolina," Frank said.

Statistics and more statistics

Proponents of the bill are correct when they say that according to population figures, blacks are over-represented on death row. Raw population statistics show it to be so.

Of the 163 inmates in North Carolina under a sentence of death, 87 are black -- 53 percent. Blacks comprise 22.7 percent of the state's population. Ergo, the judicial system is racially biased.

In his opposition, Keith touts another set of numbers that he gathered from the N.C. Department of Correction a few weeks back: Of 2,168 inmates in state prisons who have been convicted of first-degree murder, 1,296 (60 percent) are black. (One-third, 722, are white, and 3 percent, 63, are American Indians.)

"If you use those statistics, wouldn't African-Americans then be underrepresented on death row?" Keith asked.

If the House-approved version of the Racial Justice Act passes, don't be surprised if clever defense lawyers use those numbers to argue that white killers were unjustly convicted.

Whatever way the statistics are parsed, the number of convicted murderers in North Carolina -- black, white and American Indian -- is way too high.

To get a true Racial Justice Act, shouldn't the Legislature go much further in examining (and rectifying) the underlying economic, social and educational inequities that help cause so many people to kill?

■ Scott Sexton can be reached at 727-7481 or at ssexton@wsjournal.com.