"Clinton to Get Recommendation on Federal Execution"
James ViciniYahoo Daily News
December 7, 2000WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Justice Department prepared to send to the White House on Thursday its recommendation on whether President Clinton should grant clemency or should delay the first federal execution in 37 years, a Justice Department official said.
With convicted drug smuggler and murderer Juan Raul Garza scheduled to be put to death on Tuesday by lethal injection, the official said the Justice Department could recommend that his clemency appeal be granted or denied, or that he get another temporary reprieve.
The official declined to say what the Justice Department would recommend, but acknowledged it could also recommend another reprieve, delaying the decision for Clinton's successor.
The official said Clinton, who has been under pressure from death penalty opponents to stop the execution, would not be bound by whatever the Justice Department recommended.
French President Jacques Chirac, in a letter on Wednesday, urged Clinton to show mercy and grant clemency. As president of the European Union, he appealed to Clinton as a ``statesman'' and as a ``man of conscience and conviction.''
A White House official said the Justice Department recommendation was expected on Thursday, and said Clinton has discussed the case for some time with his advisers.
Garza, 44, awaiting execution in a federal prison in Terre Haute, Indiana, was convicted in 1993 of running a marijuana-smuggling organization in Texas.
Clinton Delayed Execution In August
Clinton in August delayed Garza's execution until Dec. 12 to give Garza time to apply for presidential clemency under new guidelines.
Garza's attorneys in the clemency appeal argued that his sentence should be reduced to life in prison, saying the execution has more to do with race and geography than the seriousness of his crimes.
They cited a Justice Department study in September that found racial and geographical disparities in federal death penalty cases.
Attorney General Janet Reno said she still holds her position, first expressed in September when she released the study, that she has not seen any statistics that would justify a federal moratorium on the death penalty.
``I have not seen a basis for supporting it (a moratorium) thus far,'' she told reporters.
The Justice Department is gathering more statistics from federal prosecutors about defendants in which the death penalty could have been sought, but was not. A Justice Department official said Reno is familiar with the new numbers as prosecutors send in the statistics.
Asked if it was unfair to Garza and to the families of the victims for the clemency decision to be made so close to the scheduled execution, Reno said it would be ``terribly difficult'' for victims' families.
Reno: Important To Carry Out Death Penalty Correctly
She added, ``It is also very important that when you carry out the death penalty, if you do, it is done correctly.''
The last federal execution occurred in 1963.
The U.S. Supreme Court in 1972 struck down state death penalty laws, a ruling that also brought federal executions to a halt. In 1976 the high court reinstated the death penalty after the adoption of new procedures.
It was not until 1988 that Congress adopted a new federal death penalty law, which was expanded in 1994.
Garza is among the 19 inmates awaiting execution in the special unit of the Indiana prison. Another inmate is there, but his death sentence has been set aside, a Justice Department spokesman said.
The death-row inmates include 14 blacks, four whites, one Asian and Garza, the sole Hispanic.
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