Hang The Bastard, He's A Foreigner

On Monday, March 28th SCOTUS will here another argument involving capital punishment, this time the case involves a Mexican national named Jose Ernesto Medellin. Those of you not familiar with the case, Jose Medellin was charged and convicted of a brutal double homicide that took place on June 24, 1993, for a better understanding of the brutality of the case you can go here. Jose was 18 years old at the time the crime was committed and was sentenced to death under Texas state law.

Jose Medellin was assigned a public defender who according to briefs filed with the Supreme Court was less then competent to handle the case.

B. The Decisions of the Texas Courts.

On June 29, 1993, law enforcement authorities arrested Mr. Medellín, 18 years old at the time, in connection with two murders in Houston, Texas. Mr. Medellín, a Mexican national, told the arresting officers that he was born in Laredo, Mexico, and informed Harris County Pretrial Services that he was not a United States citizen. It is uncontested that, nevertheless, Mr. Medellín was not advised of his right under Article 36 of the Vienna Convention to contact the Mexican consul. The United States recognizes that the consular assistance Mexico provides its nationals in capital cases is “extraordinary.” At the time Mr. Medellín was arrested and tried, Mexican consular officers routinely assisted capital defendants by providing funding for experts and investigators, gathering mitigating evidence, acting as a liaison with Spanish-speaking family members, and, most importantly, ensuring that Mexican nationals were represented by competent and experienced defense counsel.4 As a result of the Article 36 violation in his case, however, Mr. Medellín had no opportunity to receive the assistance of Mexican consular officers either before or during his trial. The Texas trial court appointed counsel to represent Mr. Medellín, who was indigent.

On September 16, 1994, Mr. Medellín was convicted of capital murder and, upon the jury’s recommendation, the trial court sentenced Mr. Medellín to death on October 11, 1994.

On March 16, 1997, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed Mr. Medellín’s conviction and sentence in an unpublished opinion.

On April 29, 1997, some six weeks after the affirmance of his death sentence on direct appeal, Mexican consular authorities first learned of Mr. Medellín’s arrest, detention, trial, conviction, and sentence. They promptly began rendering assistance. During the course of the preparation for Mr. Medellín’s trial, lead counsel was suspended from the practice of law for ethics violations in another case. During jury selection, he failed to strike jurors who indicated they would automatically impose the death penalty. During the guilt phase of trial, counsel called no witnesses. At the penalty phase, he presented only one expert witness (a psychologist who had never met Mr. Medellín) and Mr. Medellín’s parents testified only briefly. The entire penalty phase defense lasted less than two hours.

The incompetency of Mr. Medellin's lawyer is, unfortunately, not the reason this case is going in front of SCOTUS. To sum it up in a nut shell, the Mexican government is arguing that the United States violated Mr. Medellin's rights by not informing him or giving him access to the Mexican Consular when he was arrested. For this reason Mr. Medellin's case needs to be reviewed siting that local law enforcement violated the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations and Article 36 within this treaty that the United States, itself, designed that allows the World Court to hear disputes over consular access.

This case was in fact brought before the World Court and the court ruled that the United States was in fact in violation of Article 36 of the treaty and that Mr. Medellins case would have to be reviewed again. The United States is not unfamiliar with Article 36 of the treaty because they used it in 1979 to successfully sue Iran for the taking of American hostages.

Now the right wingers are arguing that this is just another instance of international law, U.N. law interfering in our domestic affairs and that the international community does not have a right to influence decision within our courts.

This cannot be farther from the truth, the fact of the matter is that we signed a treaty with 166 other countries in the world that if our citizens get arrested in their countries or their citizens get arrested in our country they would have unfettered access to their consular. That's it, its that simple, its not about international influence, its not about the death penalty, its about honoring a treaty that we signed to help protect our citizens abroad.

And you would think in these times we live in this would be high on the agenda of the Bush administration to protect our citizens abroad. Well folks, its not, just last week in an effort to influence the upcoming SCOTUS hearing the State Department said it has withdrawn from the optional protocol under Article 36 of the Vienna Convention. In effect putting every U.S. citizen abroad at risk of having their individual rights violated.

Now when your in Mexico or anywhere else overseas and you get arrested, you have no rights accept their rights. And they have the right to remember this case and lock you up with seven or eight butt loving conquistadors all named Paco and throw away the key. No one would ever know because since we are not part of the treaty anymore they don't have to tell anyone you are there.

I can hear it now, oh, you don't think this guy needs to die, oh, you're against the death penalty. Well, lets put an end to the spin before it begins, there is no doubt in my mind that this guy needs to be strung from the highest tree in Texas and they have every right  to do so. But the bottom line is that Mr. Medellin has rights too and local law enforcement violated them after they arrested him.

You want to blame anyone for this guy not getting the chair you need to blame the local law enforcement for not doing their job. Don't they watch Law and Order? The city prosecutor is always yelling at the cops for not crossing their t's and dotting their i's because they might put the case in jeopardy.