Chris,
Let me start out by saying that I am pro Capital punishment. With that said, you can put the appropriate biases where you want.

>>>Death is the kind of mistake you can't really take back. Oops, my bad just doesn't cut it. And it has everything to do with George W., as Texas by far executes more people than any other state.
>>
>>Non-answer. Florida has the highest rate of citrus canker because it has the most citrus. Must be those damn orange trees at fault. Doh! Again, WTF?
>
>At this point, can anyone be totally convinced that every person about to be executed is really guilty? Not me. After 9 death row inmates were exonerated after DNA testing? Not me. For what it's worth, I use to be in favor of the death penalty, but after the OJ trial, I have a better understanding of how the criminal justice system works. You have the money, you don't do the time.
>
>Here's a story about how the death penalty works in Texas:
>
>http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/ws/0,1246,45186,00.html

Did you read the entire story? Let's take it point for point.

40 involved trials where the defense attorneys presented no evidence or only one witness during the sentencing phase.

Is this a problem? They presented witnesses and a defense during the trial. Perhaps the only witnesses he had to bring were already presented during that phase. Maybe by reading the jury, they didn't like those witnesses and bringing them forth again would have no effect. On face value, this means nothing and there was no further information as to the whys in the article.

29 included a psychiatrist who gave testimony that the American Psychiatric Association condemned as unethical and untrustworthy.

These 29 cases involved psychiatrists predicting future behavior based on past behavior without examining the defendants first hand. Even with my limited knowledge of human nature, this seems very natural. In the past, based on documented evidence, I have been seen eating at Denny's on several occasions. It is probable that I will eat there again in the future. You need not eat at Denny's with me to make the prediction after seeing it on paper.

43 included defense attorneys publicly sanctioned for misconduct -- either before or after their work on these cases.

It doesn't matter what an attorney does after a trial. Unlike the above which uses the past to predict the future, the same can not be used in reverse. You can not use a new event and say that the person must have also done it in the past. The new event could be something new. So you have to throw those out entirely. As for the others that were santioned or disbarred before the case in question, the article doesn't say that the defendant had multiple occurances of this (i.e. disbarred/sanctioned laywer for trial and all subsequent appeals). They had a competent attorney at some point. This is all that's required.

23 included jailhouse informants, considered to be among the least credible of witnesses.

The article states that the states case included jailhouse informants. It does not say (nor would I expect it to) that the states case was limited to only jailhouse informant testimony. Again, this does not invalidate the conviction, in my mind.

23 included visual hair analysis, which has consistently proved unreliable.

I can't comment on this one. What does "visual anlysis" mean? Microscopic visual? 20/400 eye site visual?

>
>And George W. keeps signing them. Yeah, that's a big problem for me.
>
>>>>Oh, wait, that couldn't have been Democrat Bob Graham that signed execution warrants for years here in Florida!
>>
>>No comment?
>
>I am not a supporter of Bob Graham, and not terribly concerned about him, as
>
>1. He does not represent my state
>2. Is not going to be my next President
>
>Now, if he should run for President, or suddenly become a Senator from Kentucky, I'll be concerned. Matter of fact, I did not bring up any other governors, nor Senators, nor Representatives because last time I checked, none of them were going to be President.

The fact that a person is going to be your President has little bearing in my mind on this topic. You can say you don't like him because he thinks like this or not. But as President, he doesn't have any power over capital cases. Those are state matters.

As I said, I read the article and the Tribune cites in detail a few out of the 131 cases. The biggest problem I see here is they are focusing on the process after the fact. What happened in the appeals process or what happened in the sentencing phase. However, by that time 12 people already found the defendant guilty. And while a person is innocent until proven guilty before a conviction, they are guilty until proven innocent after that. No evidence was introduced that proved the defendants innocent. While the process may have been flawed (and I grant that), it seems to have worked out in the end.

And on one last note about the original article cited. Perhaps he was found innocent using DNA but two facts still remain:

1. He was a violent predicate felon who should have been executed for if not the first murder then at least the second.
2. He was not executed. The appeals process was still going on when he died so there is no way of telling what would have happened if everything had played out.