Lawmakers look to next steps in death-penalty debate

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By the Lincoln Journal Star

Now it’s up to the Legislature: Find a new method of execution or do away with the death penalty altogether.

“The state really needs to think hard about whether we want to continue to have the death penalty at all,” Omaha Sen. Brad Ashford said after the Nebraska Supreme Court dismantled the use of the electric chair Friday.

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Speaker of the Nebraska Legislature Mike Flood

Speaker of the Nebraska Legislature Mike Flood

Bradford is chairman of the Legislature’s Judiciary Committee. Several other senators said they are in a wait-and-see mode, trying to get questions answered.

Speaker Mike Flood still believes electrocution is an appropriate sanction for those who commit the most heinous crimes.

Keeping the death penalty is important to Nebraskans, he said, and he will work on a solution to the court’s problematic ruling as long as he is in the Legislature. He is running for another term this year.

But, he said, “it is unlikely, in my opinion, much can get done this session.”

Gov. Dave Heineman wants the death penalty to remain intact, and spokeswoman Jen Rae Hein said he is looking at all possible options to ensure that happens.

It’s past the deadline for bill introduction, but the governor can still request a bill be introduced.

It would take a suspension of the rules for a senator to act — something not likely to happen with Omaha Sen. Ernie Chambers still in office.

“It would be stupid and a waste of time to offer a bill based on lethal injection,” Chambers said. “If they want to let the governor tear up the session for his petty political posturing … I am ready to fight it.”

The Judiciary Committee has already made its statement, voting 6-1 Thursday to send a death penalty repeal bill (LB1063) out of committee for debate.

Chambers’ bill would allow a judge to decide, based on a pre-sentence investigation report, whether a person convicted of first-degree murder would get a sentence of life and eligibility at some point for parole, or life without the possibility of parole.

If the bill becomes law, the sentences of the 10 men now on death row would be converted to life without parole.

Chambers believes Friday’s ruling means that because the electric chair was the means of execution prescribed by law when current death row inmates were sentenced, they cannot be killed by another method put into law in the future. The ruling means their sentences must become life sentences, he said.

Chambers criticized Heineman for saying the court asserted itself improperly as a policymaker.

“He’s a political creature through and through,” he said. “He’s not careful about what he says.”

And he took exception with Chief Justice Mike Heavican’s statement in his dissent that concern for contemporary standards tempts judges to inject their own subjective values into constitutional analyses.

Courts have always interpreted laws, Chambers said, and they’ve always paid attention to what is happening in the real world. The U.S. Constitution once sanctioned mutilation, he said, until courts ruled it unconstitutional. Society matures and as it becomes more civil, the courts respond, he said.

The Legislature will push forward with Chambers’ repeal bill, Ashford said.

Rather than spending time debating changing the method of execution, he said, the state needs to spend its time, money and effort on developing strategies to reduce crime.

Last year, the Legislature debated two bills related to the death penalty.

The first, which would have repealed the death penalty, lost by 24-25 on first-round voting. The second would have changed how the death penalty is assigned, based on whether a convicted murderer could be safely confined in prison. It went down on a 23-25 first-round vote.

Heineman had threatened to veto those bills, and would do the same if Chambers’ reaches his desk, Hein said.

Sen. John Harms of Scottsbluff, where Raymond Mata killed 3-year-old Adam Gomez, said he was shocked by the decision. The state has used the electric chair for decades, he said, and now the court decides it is cruel and unusual punishment?

Senators must find another solution and move forward, he said. He still thinks most Nebraskans believe in the death penalty.

“We’ll have to take into consideration what we think the public wants,” he said.

Sen. Greg Adams of York said he was shocked the ruling came so soon, but not surprised by its conclusion.

“I thought the electric chair would in time be ruled unconstitutional,” he said.

The issue has gnawed at him, he said. But he’s not ready to give up his belief there is a place in Nebraska law for the death penalty.

This ruling, however, will add a new dimension to the debate.

“I still have a bunch of questions,” Adams said.

Lincoln Sen. Tony Fulton agreed the ruling is something Nebraskans have anticipated for a long time. Now the state needs to determine if it should have a death penalty — and, if yes, what the method should be.

“There will be one side that believes in the death penalty at all costs. I’m not in that category.

“I don’t see the urgency,” Fulton said. “We need to be more deliberative.”

Reach JoAnne Young at 473-7228 or jyoung@journalstar.com.