Sep
06

The Death Clerk

By

The Supreme Court watches execution schedules carefully. Every Monday, the Justices receive an update on all executions scheduled nationwide for the next six or seven weeks. It is compiled by Danny Bickell, whose formal title is Emergency Applications Clerk. The capital defense bar calls him, “The Death Clerk.” Bickell described his role to a conference of lawyers in Washington recently, and was profiled in a revealing Adam Liptak piece this week in the New York Times:    http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/04/us/in-capital-punishment-cases-weeks-go-into-deciding-last-minute-reprieves-sidebar.html

Bickell outlines the Court’s carefully-designed procedures for dealing with last-minute appeals. He stays in close touch with defense lawyers as an execution approaches so that he is prepared to bring the Justices up to speed. Rarely will a Justice act alone to halt an execution, he says; most requests will be referred to the full Court. Liptak’s takeout is a really good read.

Categories : Uncategorized

Comments are closed.

MOYERS


BILL MOYERS, journalist, author, and managing editor, Moyers & Company

“This book is a lightning strike. It quickens the mind, illuminates the landscape, and guarantees you will see things differently—in this case, how the jagged edges of justice come to bear on decisions of life and death. Clancy and O’Brien are journalists at the top of their class, where facts matter and reporting can read like a novel.”

WALTERS

BARBARA WALTERS, ABC News

“Takes the smoke screen out of the capital-punishment debate and dishes out the realities: the

challenges to judges and lawmakers posed by awful crimes, competing pressures on the scale of

justice, and the role of victims in determining punishment. A great read and more. . . . An

important book.”

TOOBIN

Jeffrey Toobin, writer for the New Yorker, legal analyst for CNN

“A thoughtful and fascinating look behind the headlines of some of the most grisly—and

important—murder cases at the Supreme Court."