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F L O R I DI A N S FOR A L T E R N A T I V E S 1 March 2005 - International Death Penalty Abolition Day
CONTACT: Abe Bonowitz, US SUPREME COURT RULING SAVES FLORIDA LIVES; SAYS KIDS ARE DIFFERENT; U.S. JOINS INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY IN BANNING JUVENILE DEATH PENALTY March 1, 2005 - Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (FADP) today welcomed the U.S. Supreme Court decision outlawing the execution of juvenile offenders, a ruling that conforms with public opinion at home and international human rights norms abroad. "This decision confirms what we all know and what science recently has proven: kids are different," said FADP Director Abe Bonowitz. "This is a good day for our country and for Florida, and this decision effectively spares the lives of three Florida death row prisoners who will now have their sentences reduced to life in prison: Cleo Lecroy, James Bonifay and Nathan Ramirez." Bonowitz noted that a historically broad coalition of national civil rights groups, religious denominations, legal organizations and medical associations had urged the court to strike down the juvenile death penalty. In addition, polls demonstrate solid public opposition against the practice. Many of these coalition partners have been active here in Florida, where bills have been introduced in the current legislature to raise the minimum age in Florida to 18. "We applaud the fact that the court recognized the strong consensus against the juvenile death penalty," Bonowitz said. "This consensus is further evidence that the U.S. public does not want the death penalty applied too broadly. It is also quite fitting that this ruling came down today - March 1st - which is recognized as International Death Penalty Abolition Day, the anniversary of the date in 1847 when the State of Michigan became the first English Speaking territory in the world to abolish the death penalty." BACKGROUND INFORMATION As of today, Including Missouri, from which Roper v. Simmons sprang, 31 states ban the execution of juvenile offenders. Of the remaining states, only 12 have juvenile offenders on death row. They are Alabama, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia. To read more about the juvenile death penalty, please visit http://www.fadp.org/#juvenile During the past two decades, 22 juvenile offender executions have occurred in the United States, including 13 in the state of Texas. 9 such executions have occurred since the year 2000. Six of those 9 took place in Texas and involved an African American offender. The other 3 executions took place in Oklahoma and Virginia. More than half of the juvenile offenders on death row are housed in two states - Alabama and Texas - and about two-thirds are people of color. SENT BY:
Abraham J. Bonowitz
Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (FADP)
Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty works for
restorative
justice in the form of effective alternatives to the death penalty.
It
does so by
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