Kenneth Foster: Sentence Commuted!!!

In a surprise move Texas Governor Rick Perry accepted a 6-1 Paroled Board recommendation to spare Kenneth Foster's life. In an equally surprising move, as part of his statement announcing the decision, the Governor called attention to the absurd practice of trying multiple defendants in capital murder cases at the same time in the same trial,

"I am concerned about Texas law that allowed capital murder defendants to be tried simultaneously and it is an issue I think the legislature should examine."

Kenneth Foster: Final Day

The Texas Board of Pardons was supposed to announce its decision regarding Kenneth Foster yesterday. Now, the Boards is planning to announce its decision whether or not Foster will be put to death today, his scheduled execution date. If the board does not grant a pardon the governor of Texas has the power to grant a 30 day stay. If the board does grant a pardon, by a 5 out of 7 vote. the governor has to approve the pardon. It's unclear at what time the decision will be announced but the recent executions in Texas have been scheduled for 5pm although they have actually been occurring at different times in the evenings.

Kenneth Foster: Jimmy Carter, Desmond Tutu Call for Stay

Democracy Now is today reporting that former President Jimmy Carter and Archbishop of South Africa Desmond Tutu are urging Texas to stay the execution of Kenneth Foster scheduled for tomorrow. Carter and Tutu are two giants of humanitarian action, maybe their pleas will be heard...

Also, Foster's attorney has filed a last minute appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court.

UPDATE: New York Rep. Charles Rangel (D) "shuts the door" on death penalty activists. According to Dissidentvoice.org Civil Rights minded Representative Rangel has failed to come through and speak out against the execution of Kenneth Foster. Dissdentvoice reports on their experience at Rangel's office,

"They didn’t want to let us up at first, but at last Rangel’s policy advisor came down to meet our community delegation. He sat us around a cafeteria table, and explained to us that Rangel was a very busy man, that he hadn’t read the letter and that we hadn’t gotten it to him in time. He explained that whether we liked it or not, Kenneth had been convicted by a real law in Texas, and that Rangel had to be careful what he said about that. He seemed to have forgotten that the fight for racial justice in the US meant overturning “real” laws like slavery and Jim Crow. Unjust laws are made to be broken. Rangel, the man said, had a pile of papers on his desk. This representative of our elected official sat at a table with those who’d been railroaded by the criminal injustice system and had their lives destroyed by it and told them that Kenneth’s case was not urgent enough."

Kenneth Foster: Announcement Tomorrow at 1pm

This from the Texas Moratorium Network,

"We have just heard that the Board of Pardons and Paroles has delayed their decision on Foster until 1 PM on Wednesday. They had planned to announce it by the 28th, but now they are taking one extra day."

Meanwhile, two other men on Texas' death row are scheduled to be executed today and tomorrow.

Kenneth Foster: Bloodlust, Not Justice

A guest column in todays Waco Tribune points out that the execution of Kenneth Foster in 4 days is not justice or even revenge but rather blood lust.

An editorial in today's Dallas Morning News points out that Kenneth Foster is not an innocent man, he committed robberies and was an accessory after the fact in the murder for which he is sentenced to die. The editorial does a good job of pointing out that the death penalty is supposed to be reserved for the absolute worst criminals.

With only a few days left get you opinion heard by emailing or phoning the governor of Texas. You can call and leave a message t the telephone number below.

E-mail the governor through his Web site:
www.governor.state.tx.us/contact

Call the governor's opinion hotline:
1-800-252-9600

Kenneth Foster via Google

I have set up two google email alerts for news and blog posts about Kenneth Foster. I am happy to report (to myself mostly) that there has been a good amount of buzz going around. So, for the sake of spreading it around here are the news stories and blog postings I have been alerted to in the last day or so. Click them.

http://www.trews.org/node/529
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/08/22/1421223
http://graham72.blogspot.com/2007/08/25-metres-from-shooting-dan-glaister.html
http://www.pegasusnews.com/news/2007/aug/21/speed-reading-death-row/
http://www.socialistworker.org/2007-2/641/641_05_Kenneth.shtml
http://www.kxan.com/Global/story.asp?S=6965248&nav=0s3d
http://thinkoutsidethecage2.blogspot.com/2007/08/what-they-wont-let-kenneth-foster-read.html
http://badsis.livejournal.com/155044.html
http://www.kvue.com/news/hu/stories/082107kvueEUdeathpenalty-cb.572fdae0.html
http://txcommie.wordpress.com/2007/08/21/last-letters-from-kenneth-foster/
http://eddiegriffinbasg.blogspot.com/2007/08/hat-tip-to-lilana-segura.html
http://savekenneth.blogspot.com/2007/08/kenneth-in-london-guardian.html

Kenneth Foster: Hunger Strike

Kenneth Foster has vowed to begin a Hunger Strike beginning today up until his execution scheduled for August 30th. Along with a man scheduled to die on August 29th the two will participate in non-violent protest against their upcoming executions.

Kenneth Foster, A Countdown

This tiny blog is trying desperately to do it's part to bring to light the case of Kenneth Foster, a martyr in waiting for the cause of the death penalty and its vindictive ways. I fear that the way the death penalty has polarized the majority against a very vocal and active minority clouds the specific issue of Kenneth Foster's case. He killed no one! The influx of news and blog items about his case have begun and will continue. I assume his case will soon break into the mainstream media in the coming days as his execution date comes near.

I really think this is something of a seminal moment in the death penalty debate. I do not think that this case will sway public opinion on the death penalty in general but I do think it has the potential to call into question the way the death penalty is used. This is nothing more than vindictiveness. There is no justice here. There is not deterrence here.

Kenneth Foster should not be a free man. He played a roll in an armed robbery crime spree and he should do time for it. Even if you believe in the death penalty as a proper punishment, in this case it is not.

Kenneth Foster: 10 Days

Kenneth Foster's execution remains set for August 30th. As I have mentioned before Foster is sentenced to die for his involvement in a homicide in 1996. Foster was over 80 feet away when a friend of his, who was a passenger in the car Foster had been driving that night, shot and killed a man. The shooter was executed last summer. The undisputed facts in all of this are that Kenneth Foster did not shoot anyone, Foster did not see the shooting take place, and Foster was in the car at the time of the shooting. Foster and others who were at the scene claim he had no idea a shooting was going to take place. However, the Texas "Law of Parties" allows people in Kenneth's position to be sentenced to death. It is, truly, punishment for wrong place, wrong time.

Updates:

1. A Youtube group has been set up for people to submit videos aimed, ultimately, at Texas Governor Perry calling for Foster to be spared the death penalty. You can view or submit videos here.
2. I will be trying to update this blog daily up until August 30th with news stories that arise out of Kenneth Foster's plight.
   
3. Author Dave Zirin wrote to the Ft. Worth Star-Telegram (the letter was published August 19) concerning a silly power play by the Department of Corrections concerning correspondence between Zirin and Foster. Zirin's letter can be read right here. In brief, the Department of Corrections refused to let Foster receive the first book written by Zirin on the subject of Jackie Robinson. The reason given for denying Foster the chance to read an uplifting story days before he is put to death was out of fear that the words in the book may lead, "offender disruption such as strikes or riot". Zirin's analysis of the situation is particularly astute, he writes, "The officials' fear that ideas -- even the ideas of sports history -- could cause a crisis in the Texas prisons reveals only how aware the Lone Star jailers are of how inhumanely they treat their prisoners."
   

Having some experience working with prisoners this appears to be a classic case of petty institutional punishment of prisoners who "make waves". In my experience prisoners that contacted lawyers and/or complained about conditions or abusive guards were almost without fail faced with sometimes petty and often times serious and violent retribution at the hands of prison officials. This was such a problem that correspondence with prisoners often included warnings and reminders that what they say or do may be answered not with solutions to their complaints but vindictive action by their jailers.

Kenneth Foster

In another case of what continues to be an endless stream of instituional racism in the criminal justice system, a 33 year old black man from Texas, named Kenneth Foster, will be executed two weeks from tomorrow. The facts of the case and the law used to sentence Foster to death are particularly ridiculous. The following is a short exerpt from a transcript of the show Democracy Now:

Foster is scheduled to be executed under a controversial Texan law known as the law of parties. The law imposes the death penalty on anybody involved in a crime where a murder occurred. In Foster's case he was driving a car with three passengers, one of whom left the car, got into an altercation and shot a Michael LaHood dead. At the time of the shooting, Kenneth Foster was 80 feet away in his car. Since Foster's original trial, the other passengers have testified that Foster had no idea a shooting was going to take place.

The shooter in the case has been executed. Now, texas wants to continue the vengence. It is not disputed that Foster was not ivolved in the actual shooting.

Foster has become something of a Death Penalty activist during his time on death row. Foster has vowed to non-violently protest his death sentence up until the execution is carried out or commuted. At this point, Foster's legal appeals in Texas have run their course. The last step is the Governor. IN order for the Governor to be able to step in and grant clemency to Foster the state Board of Pardons and Paroles must vote to recommend clemency to the Governor.

Here are some links for more info:
http://www.freekenneth.com/
a petition - sign it!
http://savekenneth.blogspot.com/