Two Democratic state legislators from Winston-Salem will try again to pass a bill aimed at reducing racial disparities in the imposition of the death penalty.
Last year, the bill, known as the North Carolina Racial Justice Act, passed in the N.C. House of Representatives. But it died in the N.C. Senate without a hearing.
Supporters of the bill say they believe that it has a better chance this year. A new session of the General Assembly begins next week.
Rep. Larry Womble, D-Forsyth, said he believes that the bill was killed by electoral politics. Because 2008 was an election year, Democratic leaders in the Senate were reluctant to allow a vote on the bill, which is controversial because of how it attempts to deal with the delicate issues of race and capital punishment.
“That’s the only reason that I kept hearing. So now that there is no election year, what reason do they have?” Womble said. “So yes, I’m going to keep bringing it up.”
He and Rep. Earline Parmon, D-Forsyth, are the chief authors of the bill.
Even without an election looming, the bill is likely to be the subject of contention. It would allow defendants in capital cases to challenge the imposition of the death penalty by citing statistics showing racial disparities in other capital cases.
For instance, a black defendant could present statistics showing that, in his county, or in the state at large, blacks are more likely than whites to be subject to the death penalty. If the bill passes, such statistics could be enough for a judge to overrule a prosecutor’s decision to request the death penalty or a jury’s decision to sentence a defendant to death.
Prosecutors say that the Racial Justice Act has a noble intent and a good-sounding name, but it would make for bad law. They say that it would allow easily manipulated statistics to overcome the specific facts of a case.
“Death-penalty cases, each one has to be weighed on the merits of the case,” said Peg Dorer, the director of the N.C. Conference of District Attorneys. “It should never have anything to do with race, absolutely. But what this does is apply quotas and statistics, and that is inappropriate.”
Opponents of the death penalty have long argued that the death penalty is much more likely to be applied in cases involving black defendants, or white victims, or both. In North Carolina, blacks make up 54 percent of the inmates on death row but only 22 percent of the state’s overall population.
Racial disparities are just one element of a continuing debate over capital punishment. Several legal challenges have created a de facto moratorium on executions in North Carolina.
Jeremy Collins, the head of the N.C. Coalition for a Moratorium, said that his group’s main priority this session will be getting the Racial Justice Act passed. Collins said he believes that there are enough votes for it to pass in the House and the Senate.
Sen. Marc Basnight, the Democratic leader of the state Senate, wasn’t so sure. He said that the bill, as it was written last year, would be unlikely to get a majority of votes in the Senate. But he also said he and other Democratic senators have not had a chance to study it and possibly amend it. Unlike last year, the bill is likely to get a hearing in the Senate this year, Basnight said.
The House and the Senate are controlled by Democrats, but in recent years the Senate has tended to be more conservative.
Womble said he will re-file the bill in the same form as last year’s, but he would be open to adjustments as long as they did not change the main objective of the bill. “I look at it as a fairness bill. I look at it as just another tool in our toolbox,” he said.
