"In the past year, the appalling injustice of Pennsylvania’s death penalty system has been the subject of review and debate among the state judiciary, lawyers and the media. Two new judicial reports and a recent death sentence for an indigent defendant in Philadelphia further bolster the case to abolish the system.
In February, a report by a Philadelphia judge ordered by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court found that the amount the city has long paid court-appointed private lawyers in death cases is “grossly inadequate” and has increased “the risk of ineffective counsel.” A RAND study in December similarly found that low pay and lack of support for court-appointed lawyers in Philadelphia were significant factors in inadequate legal representation. The consequences have played out in legal appeals: of the state’s capital convictions since 1976, 32 percent were reversed or sent back for new hearings because of errors by lawyers, according to an investigation by The Philadelphia Inquirer last October.
Another Philadelphia judge issued an order late last month suspending the work of a committee of judges and lawyers charged with identifying lawyers qualified to represent death penalty defendants. The committee came up with 12 names, which the judge said was “insufficient to meet the immediate needs.” He stopped the committee from doing further work, and, expressing frustration, put the task in the hands of a single judge.
On Feb. 29, a Philadelphia jury sentenced Derrick White to death for murder — in part because his lawyers provided the kind of ineffective counsel that has drawn harsh criticism for decades in the city.
Barely 20 when arrested in 2010, Mr. White received a death sentence after his lawyers failed to take the most rudimentary steps for capital cases. They did not enter as evidence records about his background or hire a death penalty expert to help prepare the case. The closing argument about whether he deserved death or life without parole was rambling and all but pointless, lasting 15 minutes.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/19/opinion/pennsylvania-and-the-death-penalty.html?_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120319
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