House committee narrowly approves Racial Justice Act; cost estimates released
By a 7-6 vote, the House Judiciary I Committee approved a “clean” version of the Racial Justice Act (SB 461), which would prevent the execution of defendants who can prove race was an underlying factor in the decision to seek, or impose, the death penalty at the time of their trial. The committee had previously passed a similar House version of the bill.
The bill the House J1 Committee approved today does not include controversial clauses that would ensure the resumption of the death penalty in North Carolina, which were added on the Senate floor but later removed in the House Ways and Means Committee. It also contained several technical amendments to the version Ways and Means had passed. The bill now heads to the House Appropriations Committee, before coming up for a vote on the House floor. If House members succeed in keeping the bill free of the execution amendments, a compromise will likely need to be struck in conference committee.
After a discussion by committee members, Committee Chair Deborah Ross asked if anyone in the audience wished to speak against the bill. Nobody raised his hand.
Rep. John Blust (R-Guilford) offered an explanation: “People might not like the idea of coming forward and being against something that’s titled ‘the Racial Justice Act.” He added:
If we really want to talk about racial justice we need to think about the people out there right now, in the various communities in this state, some of whom live in very rough communities and face a survival question day-to-day, at the hands of people who often prey on them. And it’s those African-American citizens, out in the community, that I have more concern about their racial justice, to be able to live their lives. That’s going to be impacted with the DA’s having to look over their shoulders in prosecuting capital cases from now on.
The Rev. William Barber II, president of the NAACP state chapter, walked to the podium to debunk the concern: “African-Americans want to see this passed.”
In an interview after the vote, he cited better schools, jobs and economic development–not the death penalty–as “the deterrents that we need in regards to the issues [Blust] was talking about.”
“The African-American community is somewhat conservative, when it comes to crime,” he said. “We believe, if you do the crime, you ought to do the time. What we fight for is there not being one system of sentencing for black folk, and then another system for others.”
He added: “No prosecutor that’s really interested in justice is worried about anyone reviewing what they have done.”
Meanwhile, a fiscal note (PDF, 96 KB) has been added to the Racial Justice Act’s ncleg.net page, including broad estimates on the cost of implementing the bill. N.C. Indigent Defense Services estimated “there will likely be a net savings associated with implementing the bill,” due to the removal of trial and post-conviction appeal costs when defendants successfully make a Racial Justice Act claim, meaning they would instead be sentenced to life without parole, or, if their trial has not yet begun, tried for life without parole. Continue reading »
