by TChris

Sadly, the transfer of sovereignty (full or partial) to Iraq's interim government has not lessened the death toll for American soldiers.

Nearly as many US soldiers lost their lives in Iraq in the first half of July as in all of June, even as Iraqi insurgents seem to have shifted focus from attacking US targets to aiming instead at Iraqi security forces and government officials.

Since the June 28 handover of power, the 160,000 coalition forces have averaged more than two deaths a day, among the highest rate of losses since the war began 15 months ago. By Saturday, 36 US soldiers had died this month, compared with 42 last month, according to a Globe analysis of official statistics.

How long this trend will continue is open to speculation.

[T]he continued attacks on US troops demonstrate the staying power and growing flexibility of the insurgency, believed to be made up largely of former Ba'ath Party elements as well as Sunni and Shia Muslim opponents of the US invasion, both Iraqis and foreigners. They have recently shown a greater ability to cut off US military supply routes and to force Americans to adjust their own tactics, officials said.

The United States is one of a small smattering of countries around the world that still allows the execution of juvenile offenders. It is one of our nation's greatest shames. Here's the company we keep:

In the past four years, only five nations have executed juveniles, the diplomats said: Congo, China, Iran, Pakistan and the United States.

Today, Jimmy Carter, Mikhail Gorbachev, the American Medical Association and 48 countries urged the Supreme Court to end the practice when it considers one such case, Roper v. Simmons, 03-633, in the fall.

"By continuing to execute child offenders in violation of international norms, the United States is not just leaving itself open to charges of hypocrisy, but is also endangering the rights of many around the world," said a friend of the court filing Monday on behalf of Nobel Peace Prize winners, including former President Carter and former Soviet President Gorbachev. "Countries whose human rights records are criticized by the United States have no incentive to improve their records when the United States fails to meet the most fundamental, baseline standards," it said. The 25-nation European Union, plus Mexico, Canada and other nations argued that execution of juvenile killers "violates widely accepted human rights norms and the minimum standards of human rights set forth by the United Nations."

The Houston Chronicle reported in January that the decision could affect 26 on death row in Texas. (available in online archives.) Can you imagine? Texas has 26 persons on death row who were under 18 at the time of their crimes?

Here are some statistics on juvenile executions.

Alex Jones in the LA Times rants about bloggers getting press credentials to cover the Democratic National Convention in Boston. Matt Welch, a journalist and blogger who is attending, responds:

There are two types of reporting that even the most nakedly partisan political bloggers routinely engage in: eyewitness testimony, and press review-style research. Both of which, and particularly the former, will add value to the conventions, which are largely made-for-TV fabrications that can benefit from more you-are-there-behind-the-curtain reportage. Also, it can be very useful to read descriptions by people whose politics are on their sleeve & whose takes on things you trust from intimate personal experience.

Jones writes:

"With the status conferred by convention credentials, blogging has arrived as an engaging, important new player in the information carnival."

Matt responds:

It takes the issuance of credentials by a friggin' political party to confer status on people who have built huge audiences from scratch and invigorated the mediasphere by writing for free? What a warped view of journalism.

Jones equates the blogger's attributes with those of "a blustering know-it-all in a bar." Well, he has that right. We're all meeting for drinks Sunday night in Cambridge. Matt, see you then. [link via Instapundit.]

Apparently, this is a first. Eddie Crawford is on Georgia's death row and scheduled for execution tonight. Last week, the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles refused the Innocence Project's request for a DNA test--even though the IP offered to pay it.

Barry Scheck, a lawyer who presented the case to the Board of Pardons and Paroles last week, said that to his knowledge it was the first time a death row inmate had been denied DNA testing after making every possible appeal at the state level. "It's just never happened before," Mr. Scheck said. "Usually some clemency board, or the governor or someone, will step in." In Georgia, the Board of Pardons is the final authority on clemency matters.

Heather Hedrick, a spokeswoman for the board, said it reached its decision because DNA testing had already proven guilt, there had been overwhelming circumstantial evidence and Mr. Crawford had confessed shortly after the crime.
Mr. Scheck said there was a great deal of evidence that had never been tested. "They have nothing to lose," he said. "And I'm mystified and extremely disappointed."

Given the abundance of cases showing DNA lab fraud or mistaken test results, as well as false confessions, Mr. Crawford should get a retest. It is very hard to get the Innocence Project to take up a case. The review process is very stringent. If Mr. Crawford didn't have a good claim of innocence, the IP would have passed on it.

The Supreme Court will get a chance to stay Mr. Crawford's execution. Let's hope the Court establishes once and for all that "defendants have a constitutional right to DNA testing of existing evidence."

We don't know enough about the ins and outs of security to know if these photos are cause for concern for not, but Granite Island Group thinks they render the Fleet Center vulnerable during the Democratic Convention. We're pretty optimistic that the authorities will have everything under control by the time we all descend on Boston. (Via Cryptome and Brain-stream.

Remember last March when TChris wrote about Paul Bremer's announcement that the U.S. was shutting down the radical Shiite al-Hawza newspaper because it increased the threat of violence against the occupying forces? Well, the new Iraqi Government has announced al-Hawza will resume publication.

Prime Minister Iyad Allawi on Sunday ordered the reopening of a radical Shiite newspaper closed by United States soldiers nearly four months ago. The closing was a catalyst for some of the worst anti-American mayhem of the occupation. Dr. Allawi's decree concerning the newspaper, Al Hawza, was a pointedly conciliatory gesture to Moktada al-Sadr, the rebel Shiite cleric whose associates run the newspaper. The decree came on the same day as Dr. Allawi approved an American airstrike meant to pound another branch of insurgent fighters, in the city of Falluja, a center for attacks on American and Iraqi forces here.

What is the import?

Together, Dr. Allawi's two actions seemed early evidence of his stated strategy for taming the deadly insurgency by making concessions to fighters who cooperate and cracking down on those who do not.

Dr. Allawi says it's simply a matter of honoring the freedom of the press.

There will be unprecedented video surveillance in Boston during the Democratic National Convention, including:

...some 30 cameras near the FleetCenter, the Coast Guard using infrared devices and night-vision cameras in the harbor, and dozens of pieces of surveillance equipment mounted on downtown buildings to monitor crowds for terrorists, unruly demonstrators, and ordinary street crime.

For the first time, 75 high-tech video cameras operated by the federal government will be linked into a surveillance network to monitor the Central Artery, City Hall Plaza, the FleetCenter, and other sensitive sites. Their feeds from cameras mounted on various downtown buildings will be piped to monitoring stations in the Boston area and in Washington, D.C., and officials will be able to zoom in from their work stations to gather details of facial descriptions or read license plates.

More than 100 cameras will monitor activity on buses and the subway. To demonstrate a point we make frequently, that once you give new powers to the Government it rarely gives them back, consider this:

While video surveillance has become a common tool for police and private security personnel, Boston police and federal officials concede that the additional cameras and new technology represent another chapter in Boston. And it's here to stay: Boston police say the 30 or so cameras installed for the convention will be used throughout the city once the event is over. ''We own them now," said police Superintendent Robert Dunford. ''We're certainly not going to put them in a closet."

We share the concerns of the ACLU and other civil libertarians:

Civil libertarians warn that the latest technology will be used to scare away protesters and others exercising their rights under the First Amendment. The critics complain that there are few state and federal laws regulating the use of video surveillance in public places. ''What this demonstrates is that '1984' is now technologically possible," said Barry Steinhardt, director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Technology and Liberty Program, referring to George Orwell's vision of an all-seeing totalitarian state. ''This is really a situation where we are really being asked to blindly trust the government. There is no oversight of this. There are no safeguards."

The Wall Street Journal (subscription only) has some very high praise today for Law Professor Doug Berman's Sentencing Law and Policy blog that is keeping track of all things Blakely related.

For the nation's federal judges and the defense lawyers and convicts who come before them, June 24 was a momentous day. For Douglas Berman, a 35-year-old law professor at Ohio State University in Columbus, the day marked the beginning of his Warholian moments of fame. On that date, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down tough sentencing guidelines used in Washington state. The high court said any factor increasing a criminal sentence must be admitted by the defendant in a plea deal or proved to a jury. Since then, Mr. Berman has become the chronicler of the sweeping effect of the Blakely v. Washington ruling on the nation's courts.

As the creator of a Web log, or blog, called Sentencing Law and Policy , Mr. Berman has established himself as the go-to guy for all things Blakely for federal and state judges, defense lawyers, prosecutors and prisoners' relatives. Although the 5-4 Supreme Court ruling technically affects only one state's court system, its greatest impact so far has been on federal sentencing guidelines, whose constitutionality has been called into question in dozens of court rulings nationwide, almost all of them posted on Mr. Berman's blog.

No question about it, Professor Berman has become the "go-to source" on Blakely. He's due not only praise, but a big thank you.

Crime and Federalism, the blog that studies the intersection between federalism and federal criminal laws by a third year Pepperdine law student, has declared this week Ken Lay week. The author begins with some very complimentary words for Lay's lawyer, Michael Ramsey, and some criticism for the AUSA in the case. Mostly, the criticism is directed at the media coverage and spin.

Unfortunately, I learned that the press accounts are garbage. The "legal commentary" has mostly consisted of pop culture slogans and references to acts not charged in the Indictment. "He ruined the company and must pay," for example. Well, unless there is a federal crime for "ruining a company," and unless this crime is charged, such lines do not belong in any discussion of the Ken Lay case. We will have none of that here.

So here's what will be happening at C&F during Ken Lay Week:

My discussion will be based exclusively on the law and facts of the case. I hope you enjoy this feature. Please scroll down for the first entry - The Indictment. On Tuesday you can read Conspiracy. On Wednesay, Wire Fraud. Thursay will bring Securities Fraud. Finally, on Friday, we will discuss the Bank Fraud (the so-called Reg. U crimes).

We look forward to reading it.

by TChris

Bob Ray Sanders looks at three cases -- Martha Stewart's, a multiple homicide in McKinney, Texas, and the Elashi brothers, accused of supporting terrorism by selling computers to Libya and Syria -- and concludes: "We are living in perilous times where authorities can do just about anything they want without much outcry from frightened citizens."

Lady Justice should be on the lookout every time the law decides to make an example of someone or send a strong message to other criminals or when the law is pressured by political or community forces to make a case. In such instances, a miscarriage of justice becomes much more likely.

by TChris

Prosecutors in Johnson County, Texas are apparently regaining their sanity, as evidenced by their decision to drop obscenity charges against a Burleson woman who sold sex toys to a pair of undercover police officers. The woman obtained the toys from Passion Parties, a company that provides erotic products to distributors who sell them at "Tupperware-style parties" in private homes.

by TChris

Tasers are billed as the nonlethal alternative to bullets, but that may not always be the case. Since 2001, fifty people have died after being shocked with Tasers. The manufacturer bases its safety claims on tests conducted on a pig and five dogs.

Company-paid researchers, not independent scientists, conducted the studies, which were never published in a peer-reviewed journal. Taser has no full-time medical director and has never created computer models to simulate the effect of its shocks, which are difficult to test in human clinical trials for ethical reasons.

In any event, testing may not reflect how the weapon is used in the field.

In training, volunteers usually receive a single shock of a half-second or less. In the field, Tasers automatically fire for five seconds. If an officer holds down the trigger, a Taser will discharge longer. And suspects are often hit repeatedly.

Because Tasers are marketed as nonlethal, they may be overused.