DEATH PENALTY

The ‘Hidden’ Third Parties as Victims
years—directly representing five executed individuals and attending
four executions. She explains that “the death row lawyer uniquely
experiences the vicarious trauma within a system that is bent on
killing her client,” 45 which induces a cycle of hope and despair and
feelings of guilt. Michael Mello wrote of how in 1985, when he had
a mere two years’ experience of practising law, he worked as a capital
defender in Florida with responsibility for 35 condemned prisoners.
In 1995, Mello concluded that he must become a “conscientious
objector” to capital punishment—to stop participating at all in a
system that was so flawed. In his memoir, he related his “exhausted
sadness […] for the manifold ways capital punishment has deformed
our law and the people who practice it.” 46
Gregory Delzin and Douglas Mendes are both attorneys who have
worked on capital appeals in Trinidad and Tobago. In conversation
with two of the authors of this article, 47 Delzin explained that the
execution of Glen Ashby in 1994 was the one instance where he felt
traumatized by a case. Ashby’s case was still under appeal and a stay of
execution had been granted by the Judicial Committee of the Privy
Council. 48 The attorney general had confirmed that Ashby would
not be hanged until applications for a stay had been exhausted. 49
However, at 6.40 a.m. on 14 July, only a day after this assurance was
made, Ashby was executed. 50 Delzin described how he felt tricked by
the authorities and also shocked, as he expected that Ashby would still
be alive that morning. He felt deeply affected emotionally. Mendes
related how Delzin told him that Ashby had already been executed
despite the fact that they were still arguing his case before the courts.
This was “unbelievable” and the cause of “fits of anger” at the state’s
unreasonable behaviour.
45 Adcock, 2010, p. 297.
46 Michael Mello. 1997. Dead Wrong: A Death Row Lawyer Speaks Out Against Capital Punishment,
Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press. p. 12.
47 Conversation with Lizzie Seal and Florence Seemungal, April 14, 2016.
48 This is based in the UK and is the highest court of appeal for Commonwealth Caribbean countries,
see Dennis Morrison. 2006. “Judicial Committee of the Privy Council and the Death Penalty
in the Commonwealth Caribbean: Studies in Judicial Activism.” Nova Law Review 30(3):403-
24.
49 Geoffrey Robertson. 2006. Crimes Against Humanity (3rd ed.). London: Penguin. p. 187.
50 Amnesty International. “Trinidad and Tobago: Man Executed While Appeals Still in Progress,”
Death Penalty News International, September 1994, p. 1. Available from https://www.amnesty.org/
download/Documents/184000/act530031994en.pdf. (accessed 19 April 2016).
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