Lobby Day Against the Death Penalty was a Huge Success!
Tuesday March 24, 2009
Texas State Capitol
11th and Congress
Austin, Texas
People from across Texas came to Austin on Tuesday, March 24, for a Death Penalty Reform Lobby Day to speak with legislators about the injustice of the Texas death penalty system. Issues we discussed included the risk of executing an innocent person (HB788), the need for a moratorium on executions (HB 913, HJR 24), abolition of the death penalty (HB 297, HB 682), the Law of Parties (HB 304, HB 2267), and impeaching Sharon Keller (HR 480).
The Texas Legislature meets once every two years, so we conduct a lobby day during the time when they are in session. This year was the largest lobby day ever against the Texas Death Penalty. We held a training session in the morning from 10 AM to noon to discuss the bills and issues and to train people in how best to communicate with legislators. Two weeks ago we held a special training session in Houston, so the group of people who attended that session were able to start lobbying at 10 AM after leaving Houston at 7 in the morning to drive to Austin. There was also a group of people who drove all the way from the Rio Grande Valley in South Texas to come to Lobby Day, included in that group was the family of Humberto Garza and Robert Garza, both of whom are on death row in Texas. Members of the Garza family are in the picture below.
The main focus of the lobby day was to advocate for the bill that would end the death penalty for people convicted under the Law of Parties, which is the law that allows people to be sentenced to death even though they did not kill anyone. The families of Kenneth Foster and Jeff Wood were at Lobby Day and went to many legislative offices all day telling and retelling the stories of Kenneth and Jeff, two people who were sentenced to death even though they did not kill anyone. Kenneth's death sentence was commuted to life in prison in 2007, after a long campaign on his behalf by many of the groups and people who also organized lobby day. Jeff Wood remains on death row, but many people are still fighting and organizing to save his life. Jeff never killed anyone. He was sentenced to death under the law of parties because someone else killed someone.
The sponsor of the bill, State Representative Terri Hodge, met with us at 1 PM in the House Speaker's Committee Room. She gave us an inspiring speech and pledged to do everything in her power to work for this bill. She broke down in tears briefly telling us how emotionally affected she was by the testimony she heard from the family members of people convicted under the law of parties at last week's committee hearing.
You can watch the video of that hearing by clicking on this link, which will stream a video file to your computer. It is powerful stuff, so as Shakespeare wrote, "if you have tears, prepare to shed them now." The father of Kenneth Foster starts speaking at around minute 23. The girlfriend of Randy Halprin gives her moving testimony at around the one hour point. The sister of Jeff Wood, Terri Been, starts her powerful testimony at around minute 32. Terri does a wonderful job explaining to the committee the injustice of the Law of Parties.
In all we contacted 90 legislative offices on lobby day, the majority were in person visits by the people who came to lobby day, others were contacts by phone and email. We had many teams going to visit offices all day. We heard reports back from the teams that the receptions they got were overwhelmingly favorable. Based on the feedback we received, we believe that the bill to end the death penalty under the law of parties will receive a favorable vote in committee soon.
Lobby Day was Sponsored by: Texas Moratorium Network, Texas Death Penalty Abolition Movement, Campaign to End the Death Penalty - Austin Chapter, Texas Students Against the Death Penalty, Texas CURE, the Student Prison Caucus, the Eye & Tooth Project: Forum Theatre on the Death Penalty, Kids Against the Death Penalty, People Organized in Defense of Earth and Her Resources (PODER) and the Friends Meeting of Austin.
