Bar leaders tell ABA to oppose death penalty

International Bar leaders -- including Law Society President David McIntosh -- this week challenged the American Bar Association (ABA) to come off the fence and campaign for the abolition of the death penalty throughout the US.Eleven leaders from around Europe, plus those from Hong Kong, Canada and Australia, passed a unanimous resolution deploring the US's 'odious and barbaric' system at this week's ABA annual conference in Chicago.The ABA has resolutely avoided having a position on the morality of capital punishment for adults, although it opposes the execution of those who committed their crimes as juveniles.

Instead it concentrates on problems with the system, and ensuring defendants receive a fair trial and proper defence.

It is calling for a moratorium until these issues are sorted out.An ABA report last December found that the rate of executions in the US increased 158% between 1993 and 1999.

Since the reinstatement of capital punishment in 1976, more than 3,500 prisoners have been sentenced to death.The international Bar leaders said a much more robust response to capital punishment was required from the ABA.

The resolution acknowledged the difficulties the ABA might face because of the strength of opinion on both sides among its members.Mr McIntosh said: 'The US is out of step with worldwide human rights trends in allowing 38 of its states to retain the death penalty.

Despite views to the contrary amongst its members, I believe that the ABA, as the world's largest Bar association, ought to come out clearly for the abolition of the death penalty in line with its attitude towards human rights elsewhere in the world.' Outgoing ABA president Martha Barnett last week described the current system as 'absolutely unacceptable' for failing to live up 'to our highest ideals of due process, fairness, and simple justice'.Concerns about miscarriages of justice have escalated in recent years, and Ms Barnett said that in the last 18 months alone, 11 defendants on death row have beenexonerated.

Ignoring international pressure, the US government resumed federal executions on 11 June after a 38-year hiatus with the execution of Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh.