Statement from Seantor Leahy on HR 107 Senate passage
Mr. LEAHY: On February 1, 2000, I came to the floor to call attention to the growing national crisis in the administration of capital punishment. I noted that since the reinstatement of capital punishment in the 1970s, 85 people had been found innocent and released from death row. And I urged Senators on both sides of the aisle, both those who supported the death penalty and those who opposed it, to join in seeking ways to minimize the risk that innocent persons will be put to death. A few days later, I introduced the Innocence Protection Act of 2000.
That was more than four years ago. During that time, many more innocent people have been freed from death row – the total is now 117, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. During that time, the Republican Governor of Illinois commuted all the death sentences in his State to life in prison, having lost confidence in a system that exonerated more death row inmates than it executed. During that time, we learned about problems at the Houston crime lab so serious that the city’s top police official called for a moratorium on executions of the inmates who were convicted based on evidence that the lab handled or analyzed. And during that time, the bipartisan, bicameral coalition supporting the Innocence Protection Act has continued to grow.
Earlier this week, the House of Representatives passed the Justice For All Act of 2004, a wide-ranging criminal justice package that includes the Innocence Protection Act. The House bill also includes the Debbie Smith Act and the DNA Sexual Assault Justice Act, which together authorize more than $1 billion over the next five years to eliminate the DNA backlog crisis in the Nation’s crime labs and fund other DNA-related programs. Finally, the House bill includes crime victims’ rights provisions that I sponsored with Senators Feinstein and Kyl, and which already passed the Senate earlier this year.
Today, at long last, the Senate is poised to pass the Justice For All Act and to send this important legislation to the President. I hope he will sign it, despite his Justice Department’s continued efforts to kill this bill. The reforms it enacts will create a fairer system of justice, where the problems that have sent innocent people to death row are less likely to occur, where the American people can be more certain that violent criminals are caught and convicted instead of the innocent people who have been wrongly put behind bars for their crimes, and where victims and their families can be more certain of the accuracy, and finality, of the results.
This bill has been many years in the making, and there are many people to acknowledge and thank. Let me begin by thanking Kirk Bloodsworth, Debbie Smith, the Justice Project, and through them all the crime victims and the victims of a flawed criminal justice system who have made these changes possible. Without their commitment and dedication, these straightforward reforms simply would not have happened. Kirk and Debbie sat patiently, hour after hour, through our committee’s work on this bill, and their presence was strong and eloquent testimony of the need for this legislation.
Part of this legislation is appropriately named for Kirk Bloodsworth. Kirk was a young man, just out of the Marines, when he was arrested, convicted, and sentenced to death for a heinous crime that he did not commit. DNA evidence ultimately freed him and identified the real killer. He became the first person in the United States to be freed from a death row crime through use of DNA evidence. The years he spent in prison were hard years, and he was treated horribly even after he was released. He could have become embittered by all he has endured. But instead, he has chosen to turn his experience into something constructive, to help others, and one way he has chosen to help is by being part of the effort to enact this bill. Kirk and his wife Brenda are remarkable people, and I thank them both. I am proud to have come to know them through our work together on this constructive cause.
I want to commend the Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Congressman James Sensenbrenner, who spearheaded this effort in the House. Chairman Sensenbrenner deserves high praise for steering this bill through some very rough patches to final passage. We would not be where we are today without his leadership, tenacity, and steadfast commitment to getting this done.
I also want to thank my longtime colleagues in this endeavor, Representative Bill Delahunt of Massachusetts and Representative Ray LaHood of Illinois. They have worked tirelessly over many years to pass the Innocence Protection Act, and they deserve much of the credit for building the strong support for the bill in the House.
I also want to acknowledge Senator Hatch, the Chairman of our Committee, with whom I have debated these issues for years and with whom I have cosponsored many measures over the last 10 years. Had he continued to oppose these efforts we could never have been successful. Over the last couple of weeks he has focused on this bill, and the Judiciary Committee reported the Advancing Justice Through DNA Technology Act under his leadership just a few weeks ago. I am grateful for his help in overcoming objections to the bill from his side of the aisle. I know how hard he has worked to do that.
Thanks, too, to the many members on both sides of the aisle, in the Senate and in the House, who have supported this legislation over this long struggle for reform. Working together, we have finally begun to address the many problems facing our capital punishment system. Here in the Senate, Senator Biden has championed additional funding for rape kit testing. Senators Kennedy, Kohl, Feingold and Durbin have been longtime and steadfast proponents of sensible reform. Senators Feinstein and Specter were strong supporters of the Innocence Protection Act in the 107th Congress, and have been constructive partners in the effort in this Congress. Senator Gordon Smith and Senator Collins were early cosponsors of the Innocence Protection Act as well. Senator DeWine was a lead sponsor of the Senate DNA bill, and has made many important contributions. I have spoken to the Majority Leader a number of times over the last year having learned of his interest in these matters and thank him for allowing the Senate to turn to this important matter even as we approach adjournment of this session.
Many people have been generous with their time and expertise and experience over the years. Steve Bright, Bryan Stevenson, George Kendall, Jim Liebman, Larry Yackle, Scott Wallace and Kyl O’Dowd have offered useful and important suggestions on how to improve state indigent defense systems. Peter Neufeld and Barry Scheck have been invaluable resources on the intricacies of post-conviction DNA testing. Ron Weich has offered superb legal counsel to both Republican and Democratic Senators and their staffs as we have worked on this bill. Pat Griffin’s masterful advice has also been invaluable.
I have already mentioned the Justice Project, a nonprofit organization dedicated to criminal justice reform, which has been a staunch supporter of this bill from the beginning. I particularly want to recognize the contributions of my good friend Bobby Muller, as well as John Terzano, Cheryl Feeley, Laura Burstein, Cynthia Thomet and Peter Loge.
Finally, I want to thank several staff members of the Senate and House Judiciary Committees who worked tirelessly, some for years, to accomplish this goal. I commend the Chief Counsel to Chairman Sensenbrenner, Phil Kiko. He was instrumental in keeping the process moving over the past year. His hard work, fairness and judgment helped fulfill his Chairman’s dogged determination to get this done and make these needed changes. Also on the Chairman’s staff, I acknowledge the efforts of Jay Apperson and Katy Crooks. I want to express my deep gratitude to Mark Agrast, former counsel for Representative Delahunt, and his successor, Christine Leonard.
In the Senate, I want to acknowledge several Judiciary Committee staff members who made immeasurable contributions during this long and challenging effort. On Chairman Hatch’s staff, I want to thank Bruce Artim, Brett Tolman, and Michael Volkov, a former detailee, for investing so much of their time and expertise in helping us to arrive at this moment. My staff and I appreciate the contributions of Neil MacBride, Jonathan Meyer, and Louisa Terrell on Senator Biden’s staff, David Hantman on Senator Feinstein’s staff, and Robert Steinbuch with Senator DeWine. On my own staff, I want to express my appreciation to an entire team of talented and dedicated attorneys and staff who have devoted themselves so long to this effort and to this commitment to justice. Julie Katzman, a senior counsel on my staff, has devoted innumerable hours over the past four and a half years to accomplishing this goal, and I want to extend my deeply felt gratitude to her. Tara Magner began as a law clerk, and later as my counsel has dedicated herself to this effort with superb results. Beryl Howell, my former general counsel, guided this effort for years, and Bruce Cohen, my Chief Counsel, guided all of their efforts. Tim Rieser, Luke Albee, David Carle and more all supported and contributed to this extraordinary effort.
I also want personally to thank the Senate Legislative Counsel, in particular Bill Jensen and Matt McGhie, who labor in obscurity to produce the legislative text that is being constantly revised to reflect the understanding reached during this arduous process.
This bill is a rare example of bipartisan cooperation for a good cause. It reflects many years of work and intense negotiation. No one who has worked on this bill is entirely satisfied with everything in it, but that is what the legislative process is all about – finding the substantive, meaningful, middle ground that a broad majority can support.
The Justice For All Act is the most significant step we have taken in many years to improve the quality of justice in this country. DNA is the miracle forensic tool of our lifetimes. It has the power to convict the guilty and to exonerate the innocent. And as DNA has become more and more available, it also has opened a window on the flaws of the death penalty process. This is a bill to put this powerful tool into greater use in our police departments and our courtrooms. It also takes a modest step toward addressing one of the most frequent causes of wrongful convictions in capital cases, the lack of adequate legal counsel. These reforms, to put it simply, will mean better, faster, fairer criminal justice.
I thank each one of my colleagues in both bodies who worked hard to resolve conflicts and congratulate them on this legislative achievement.
