Capital Punishment

by J.J. Maloney

When I got to work that evening, in 1967, the ward was empty except for old Tony, who hadn't spoken an intelligible word for 21 years.

Tony was lying in bed staring vacuously at the ceiling, the flesh of his face sagging in tired folds. I'd fallen into the habit of stopping to watch his chest, to see if he were still breathing. Tony was the type who might lay there dead for hours before anyone realized that he was dead.

I discretely checked Tony's bed to see if he had messed it. He had, so I helped him out of bed and helped him out of his obscenely-soiled gown. With my head spinning from the odor, I stripped the sheets and blanket, wiped the rubber-coated mattress and went off in search of clean linen.

When I returned, Tony was sitting exactly as I had left him, staring at the floor in profound dejection, ignoring me as I washed him. (I detested the chore, but, since no one else would do it, and since I spent more time around him than anyone else, I had, so to speak, selfish reasons for keeping him as clean as possible.)

Sept. 30, 2009 Updated June 25, 2010

Caryl Chessman

Convicted in 1948 as “The Red Light Bandit,” Caryl Chessman would become an internationally known “Death Row” author and make the cover of Time Magazine. His appeal attorney came within minutes of preventing his wrongful execution in 1960.

by Randy Radic

by J. Patrick O’Connor

Since his conviction in 1982 for the murder of Philadelphia Police Officer Daniel Faulkner, Mumia Abu-Jamal, through his numerous books, essays and radio commentaries, has become the face of the anti-death penalty movement in the United States and an international cause célèbre. Paris, for example, made him an honorary citizen in 2003, bestowing the honor for the first time since Pablo Picasso received it in 1971. The “Free Mumia” slogan is seen and heard around the world. Over the last 27 years he has become the most visible of the invisible 3,600 Death Row inmates in the United States.

April 5, 2009 by J. Patrick O'Connor

Mumia Abu-Jamal's 27 years on Death Row for a murder he did not commit would have turned almost anyone else into an embittered, defeated man. Instead, he has remained what he always was, "the voice of the voiceless," as he demonstrates yet again in his most recent book, Jailhouse Lawyers: Prisoners Defending Prisoners v. the U.S.A. (City Lights Books, 2009.)