Save Reginald Blanton
EveryOne Group - 21.08.2008 02:03
THE 25TH OF AUGUST THE U.S. COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT WILL GRANT AN ORAL ARGUMENT TO THE LAWYERS AND WILL DECIDE IN A FEW DAYS IF REOPEN THE CASE OR CONFIRM THE EXECUTION BY LETHAL INJECTION
August 21st, 2008
DEATH PENALTY/EVERYONE GROUP: SAVE REGINALD BLANTON, SENTENCED TO DEATH IN TEXAS DUE TO RACIAL PREJUDICE AND WITHOUT EVIDENCES
THE 25TH OF AUGUST THE U.S. COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT WILL GRANT AN ORAL ARGUMENT TO THE LAWYERS AND WILL DECIDE IN A FEW DAYS IF REOPEN THE CASE OR CONFIRM THE EXECUTION BY LETHAL INJECTION
REGINALD BLANTON, AFRICAN AMERICAN, AGED 27, ON PRISON’S DEATH ROW FROM 7 YEARS IN TEXAS ACCUSED OF MURDER. SINCE HE’S BEEN ARRESTED, HE FIGHTS TO PROVE HIS INNOCENCE AND TO ABOLISH THE DEATH PENALTY. EVERYONE GROUP’S ACTIVISTS APPEAL TO THE UNITED NATIONS, TO THE USA PRESIDENCY CANDIDATE BARACK OBAMA, TO THE RADICAL PARTY AND ALL THE DEMOCRATIC NATIONS: “SAVE HIS LIFE, STOP ABUSES ON PRISONERS AND ABOLISH THE DEATH PENALTY, STARTING FROM THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA”
Reginal Blanton, aged 27, an African American, originally from California but domiciled since he was teen in Texas, has been in jail for the last 8 years accused of having killed the 13th of April 2000 –when he was 18 – his close friend Carlos Garza.
He is presently an inmate on Death Row in Polunksy Prison, in Livingston, Texas. For the last seven years he has been attempting to prove his innocence, but most of all to show the level of inhumanity the inmates of Death Row are subjected to and the level of approximation adopted in trials for crimes that provide the death penalty, especially towards black defendants like him.
EveryOne Group, in constant contact with Reginald’s mother, Anna Terrell, has decided to promote an international campaign in the attempt to save Reginald Blanton’s life.
“We are convinced the inquiry and trial that led to Reginald being sentenced to death reveal an abuse of the law, errors of form and procedural flaws” say EveryOne Group’s leader Roberto Malini, Matteo Pegoraro and Dario Picciau and the activist Elisabetta Vivaldi. “Reginald is African American, he was a street kid and a member of a gang. He belonged to a world that the US institutions, and Texas in particular, fight with such rigor it often becomes prejudice. We suspect” continue the activists “the verdict contains elements of racial discrimination and this is confirmed by the fact that Reginald Blanton was not judged, according to his constitutional rights, by a jury of his peers. The District Attorney also arranged it so that the entire jury was made up of white Americans. And it is for this reason that the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals recognized this violation of his assurance of a fair trial”.
Blanton – part of his story is published on www.everyonegroup.com – had a childhood marked by poverty and marginalization: when he was 16, he left home to join a street gang. He had problems with the law for drug pushing and was diagnosed as suffering from attention deficit disorder; he was placed in a 2 years “re-socialization program” organized by the Texas Youth Commission, but when he was 18, while he was changing life, he was accused of the murder of his friend, Carlos Garza. Carlos was shot twice in his apartment and died a few hours later in hospital.
“Reginald Blanton was sentenced on evidence given by unreliable witnesses, extorted under grave threats from his brother Robert – members of a gang him too – and to the latter’s girlfriend. Even if they withdraw their charges in front of the Court,” explain EveryOne Group’s activists “the climate of intolerance and prejudice has inexplicably brought to a guilt verdict. This, in the bargain, in spite of the fact that there was no eye witness able to identify the culprit; no murder weapon has never been found; there were no Reginald’s fingerprints or traces of his DNA into the victim’s apartment. Moreover,” go on EveryOne’s Group members “there is a damning evidence that can prove the defendant is not guilty. The evidence consists of the footprint left by the killer as he kicked open the door to Garza’s apartment: the print of a size 12 shoe, whereas Reginald Blanton wears a size 9. Blanton required several times that his shoes, worn the day of the crime, would be shown to the jury during the trial, so that they could notice this detail, but his request, as many others, has never been approved”.
After nine requests for appeal, his lawyers Scott Sullivan and John Carroll will finally be allowed to appear on Monday, August 25th, at 9,30 a.m., before the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. On that occasion the judges could decide to reopen the trial due to the fact that Reginald was judged by a jury made up entirely of white Americans and possibly sentenced on the basis of racial prejudice, but could also establish the date of the imminent execution. “We are able to demonstrate an incredible sequence of errors and violations of human rights in Reginald Blanton’s case,” say the activists “and we are convinced the US judicial system ( which still makes use of the death penalty) too often makes legal errors and procedural flaws. The law decides whether a human being should live or die with a margin of error that is inevitably high and often linked to social and personal bias, as well as to the defendant’s previous record and race. All this in defiance of article 11 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. We ask ourselves how many other innocent people will be put to death by the executioner before the death penalty is abolished and a respect of life is re-established”.
EveryOne Group appeal to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navanethem Pillay, to the democratic USA presidency candidate, senator Barack Obama, but also to the members of the Italian and Transnational Radical Party, promoters of the universal moratorium for the death penalty, and to all democratic nations: “Considering the impossibility, by both the police and judicial system, to prove the guilt “without the shadow of a doubt” of an accused person and considering the prejudice that is inevitably present in some members of a jury, and considering the fact that any human being found guilty has the right to be re-enabled, we consider the death penalty a medieval heritage. It is important to support the legal appeal in favor of Reginald Blanton and other prisoners” ends EveryOne Group “because we are convinced that many innocent people have been put to death. Those in power often want to set a example in an attempt to fight crime. But when institutional revenge puts an innocent person to death, it makes a martyr of him, and in that moment democracy, civilization and humanity are transformed into cruelty, injustice and brutality”.
On www.everyonegroup.com are available all the information to sustain Reginal Blanton’s life campaign and ask the abolishment of the death penalty, starting from United States of America. You can also sign a petition: www.petitiononline.com/reggie.
For further information:
EveryOne Group
Tel: (+ 39) 334-8429527 – (+ 39) 334-3449180
www.everyonegroup.com ::  info@everyonegroup.com
 E-Mail: info@everyonegroup.com  Website: http://www.everyonegroup.com
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