Texas Governor Rick Perry Office

Texas Governor Rick Perry Office of the Governor PO Box [HIDDEN] Dear Governor Perry: Hello. I am writing to you with the utmost concern and sincerity to urge you to not only grant stays of execution for every death row inmate coming up for execution, as well as to consider standing behind the movement to end the death penalty in the State of Texas. As I am sure you know, virtually every true democracy, and all Western democracies have abolished the use of the death penalty.

However, the United States continues to not only implement the death penalty, but continues to do so despite clear evidence to its lack of deterrent value, the possible fallibility of the justice system, as well as to its very serious problems with regard to race and economic factors.

It is abhorrent to consider the death penalty to be an effective measure against crime in Texas, given the fact that crime rates do not decrease given the existence of the sentence that innocent people have been executed in the past and will likely be executed in the future. Further, the fact that every western democracy except the U.S.A. has abolished the death penalty indicates that the U.S. is trailing far behind in the realm of human rights.

Another factor that continues to rein shame upon the state of Texas, as well as the nation as a whole is the fact that there exists a huge discrepancy between white and non-white death row inmates, as well as between those coming from middle-class and wealthy families and the poor. This indicates that there is a strong racial and socio-economic component to the problem of crime that must be addressed, as well as a possible bias on the part of judges and juries against defendants of color.

Finally, perhaps the most onerous aspect of the death penalty is the fact that the State of Texas allows convicted criminals who are determined to be mentally retarded to face and be subjected to the death penalty. Given the fact that many consider the mentally retarded (with an IQ below 70) to be incapable of making sound decisions, it seems to represent injustice in the extreme to execute retarded individuals for crimes they may not have understood (either in nature, or in possible consequence).

Should these simple facts against the continued application of the death penalty in Texas fail to sway your moral conscience, Governor, let me also make the point that the state is currently suffering under the same budget constraints as much of the rest of the country. Given the fact that the average death row case actually costs significantly more to the state than one resulting in life imprisonment, one may imagine that the case could be made that erring on the.