Homer Alaska - News

Two men with opposite experiences of murder speak next week in Homer against the death penalty. In a presentation sponsored by Alaskans Against the Death Penalty, exonerated death-row inmate Curtis McCarty talks about his 21 years in prison for a murder he didn't commit. Bill Pelke, cofounder of Journey of Hope — From Violence to Healing, speaks about how he came to forgive the woman sentenced to die for the murder of his grandmother.

The talk is 7 to 9 p.m. Monday at the Homer Council on the Arts.

Although Alaska abolished the death penalty before statehood, Alaskans Against the Death Penalty has been advocating against capital punishment for over 20 years, said executive director Sue Johnson.

Most recently, it lobbied against a bill filed in 2009 by Rep. Mike Chenault, R-Nikiski, to establish a death penalty in Alaska. House Bill 9 has not yet passed out of committee.

The organization also has been following bills filed by Rep. Bob Lynn, R-Anchorage, and Gov. Sean Parnell setting out procedures for convicted defendants to seek new DNA testing that could exonerate them.

That's how McCarty eventually was released from prison and his conviction set aside. In 1986, McCarty was convicted of murdering Pamela Kaye Willis, an acquaintance, in Oklahoma City. On appeal, his conviction was overturned because of misconduct by a prosecutor and a police lab analyst. He was retried and sentenced to death. After new DNA tests showed semen on Willis did not come from McCarty, and citing government misconduct, the Oklahoma Court of Appeals overturned McCarty's conviction.

Lawyers with the Innocence Project helped exonerate McCarty.

"This is by far one of the worst cases of law enforcement misconduct in the history of the American criminal justice system," said Barry Scheck, co-director of the Innocence Project.

Pelke's grandmother, Ruth Pelke, was murdered in 1985 by four teenage girls in Indiana. Paula Cooper, then 15, was sentenced to die for her involvement. At first he supported Cooper's execution, but he later came to understand he didn't need to see her die in order for him to heal from his grandmother's death. Pelke will speak from his experience as family of a murder victim, Johnson said.

"It's not necessarily the best way to deal with the crime," she said. "Victims are a very strong voice in our movement."

Alaskans Against the Death Penalty opposes capital punishment for many reasons, Johnson said. As many states cope with the recession, some question the expense of trying and executing defendants. To establish a death penalty in Alaska would have cost $85 million, one budget analysis showed, including $5 million to build a prison to hold death-row inmates. Johnson said it costs $9,000 more a year to house a death-row inmate than an inmate in the general prison population.

Death penalty advocates argue that execution serves as a deterrent. Even the threat of death can lead to convictions, as when defendants make a plea bargain in exchange for life in prison instead of death, they argue.

Johnson said some convicted murderers have written her group letters saying they prefer death.

"A lot of people would rather die than be in the prison population — if you're talking punishment," she said.

Money saved from not having a death penalty also can fund investigations into unsolved murders, Johnson said.

Monday's talk is free and open to the public. McCarty and Pelke also will visit Homer next week to talk to school groups.

For more information on Alaskans Against the Death Penalty, visit www.aadp.info.

Michael Armstrong can be reached at michael.armstrong.@homernews.com.