NCJ Number
193463
Date Published
2001
Length
28 pages
Annotation
This paper argues that the death penalty in the United States is a barrier to extradition.
Abstract
The United States is increasingly isolated in the international community because of its acceptance of the death penalty. The United States’ isolation on this fundamental human rights issue has considerable consequences for its foreign relations. This article reviews the evolving international consensus on the death penalty; the emergence of death penalty clauses in extradition treaties and laws; death penalty limitations in regional extradition conventions; extradition rulings by international bodies and the U.S. response; national court rulings on extradition and the death penalty; and the waiving of the death penalty by U.S. courts and circumvention of extradition protections by the U.S. Government. In the United States, the death sentence has been carried out on average of one prisoner per week from 1990 to the present. While the international community has turned against capital punishment, the United States continues to use this cruel form of punishment. In doing so it not only disregards world abolitionist trends, it violates international standards. In an ever-increasing growing list of countries, it is now unlawful to inflict the death penalty or send any person to face this punishment elsewhere. Any attempt by the U.S. government to resort to questionable tactics to subvert existing extradition protections against the death penalty risks undermining the rule of law and respect for human rights. Amnesty International supports efforts to bring to justice those suspected of criminal acts, including the attacks of September 11. However, measures must be taken in the pursuit of justice, including extradition procedures, which must be consistent with international human rights standards. The U.N. Commission for Human Rights has called upon all nations to enhance their cooperation with a view to bringing terrorists to justice. The solution to the judicial barriers raised in capital extraditions is not weakening the extradition safeguards, but it is the total abolition of the death penalty by those countries that continue to use it.