Capital Punishment Foes Race to Save Inmate’s Life

By Jorge Casuso

Feb. 4 -- Rev. Jesse Jackson joined religious leaders and more than 150 death penalty opponents outside St. Monica’s Church Tuesday morning in last-ditch effort to save the life of a death row inmate who was convicted after key evidence in his murder trial was allegedly ignored, tampered with or destroyed.

The rally outside Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s place of worship was one of several held across California to urge the former actor to stay the execution of Kevin Cooper by lethal injection next Tuesday at 12.01 a.m.

On Friday Schwarzenegger, who is facing his first death penalty case, denied clemency for Cooper, an African American convicted of murdering four people with a hatchet, knife and ice pick on the night of June 4, 1983 in San Bernardino County.

“This is like engaging in war without the evidence of weapons of mass destruction,” Jackson told the crowd. “There are four issues in this case that will not go away -- race and culture and poverty and politics.

“There are too many unanswered questions,” Jackson said. “We must appeal again and again to stop the execution… To see the media more obsessed with Janet Jackson’s breast than the life of Kevin Cooper is wrong. It’s obscene.”

Some in the crowd wore t-shirts and held signs calling for an end to the death penalty, as a row of children crouched under a banner reading “END EXECUTIONS” that spanned the front steps of the church. Organizers handed out small stones inscribed with the slogan and urged supporters to drop them into a basket.

“Jesus said, ‘Let those without sin cast the first stone,’” said Rev. George Regas, of All Saints Episcopal Church. “And they lay down their stones and walked away in silence.”

Cooper’s supporters contend that there is plenty of evidence the former inmate did not commit the highly publicized murders of Christopher Hughes and Doug, Peggy and Jessica Ryen, which were among the most gruesome in San Bernardino County history.

They point to the blonde hair never tested for DNA that was found in the clutch of one of the victims and the testimony of a woman who said her white boyfriend came home that night with overalls covered in blood. The overalls were destroyed by detectives, Cooper’s supporters said.

They also point to the only surviving witness, who said it was three white or Latino men who committed the murders and to a family who saw a car that looked like the Ryen’s speeding away with three people.

“That evidence was never presented to the jury,” said Mike Farrell, president of Death Penalty Focus. “Five members (of the jury) have asked the governor to stay the execution and reexamine the evidence.”

Cooper’s supporters also contend that authorities may have tampered with the evidence, and point to police logs that show that some of the suspect’s blood was removed from the evidence lab for 24 hours prior to the court-ordered DNA testing.

“What that says to me is that they took the blood and planted it on some of the evidence,” said Rabbi Jerry Goldstein. “Now, Cooper’s lawyers want a quick, inexpensive test on that blood to show it came from the labs, and prosecutors refuse. Don’t tell me this is a cut-and-dry case.”

But after hearing the arguments raised by Cooper’s lawyers last week, Schwarzenegger said in a written statement that there was no reason to delay the execution.

"Although I am grateful that Mr. Cooper has found solace in God during his incarceration,” Schwarzenegger said, “I find that the aggravating circumstances of these brutal murders and Mr. Cooper's long history of criminal conduct and violence against others outweigh any mitigating factors and I can find no compelling reason to grant clemency in this case."

The governor noted that Cooper’s 18-year effort to prove his innocence in state and federal courts had failed.

"I will not second-guess the decisions of these courts, and I will not disturb the jury's verdict of guilt and sentence of death," Schwarzenegger wrote.

Cooper, who was serving a three-year sentence for burglary when he escaped through a hole in the fence at Chino State Prison in 1983, broke into the Ryen home and attacked Douglas and Peggy Ryen, 41, in their sleep, the jury found.

He then killed the couple’s 10-year-old daughter, Jessica, and Christopher Hughes, an 11-year-old friend who was visiting the Ryen home. He also attacked 8-year-old Joshua Ryen, who survived, but was never able to identify the attacker.

Cooper, who was wanted on rape charges in another state when he broke out of prison, was captured on a fishing boat off the coast of Santa Barbara after an intensive two-month manhunt when a woman on another boat reported he had raped her.

"To me, he is the poster child for the death penalty," John Kochis, the San Bernardino County prosecutor, has said.

Among those who have pleaded with Schwarzenegger to examine the evidence was Ruben “Hurricane” Carter, whose wrongful conviction for murder was the subject of a Bob Dylan song.

According to Farrell, Carter told the governor, “Without truth there is no freedom.”

Cooper, 45, is one of 637 people on death row, 15 of them women. He would be the first prisoner executed in California since January 2002 and the 11th since the state resumed executions in 1992 after 25 years without one.