Focus 580; Justice and Community

Good morning welcome back to the second hour of focus 580 This is our telephone talk program money. David enjoy. Glad to have you with us this morning. The producers for the program Harriet Williams and Jack Brighton and Brian Wagner is at the controls this morning. Before we begin this hour just a very quick mention that on Monday we'll be talking with Hank Speace from the species Home Inspection Service. He is on the program each month and we talk about home maintenance. He knows a lot about the way single family homes are put together and some of the things that can go wrong so if you have a problem you're thinking about making some changes you need some advice. He can help. Then in the second hour we'll be talking a little bit about what a lot of folks consider to be the golden age of radio. And our guest will be Gerald noctem and he has spent a long time as a theatre film critic mostly in newspapers and he's written a book titled raised on radio which in part reflects some of his childhood experiences where there was a day when instead of everyone gathering around the television set everyone gathered around the radio and will talk about some of the programs that were important there in those days and how they wanted to influence

American culture. So that will be Monday We're here weekday mornings from 10:00 until noon we have 10 different topics for you each week and we always offer the opportunity to call in with questions comments. And we'd also like to mention that we are now and have for some time now been on the web 24 hours a day in fact if you would like to listen through your computer you may do that and for some folks particularly at night that's the way to do it now. W w w dot w i l l dot U R U C dot edu that's our website. Just go right there and give you all the information that you need to know in this part of focus 580. We'll be talking a little bit about some of the experiences of a judge working in a large urban court. We're talking here this morning with Eugene Hamilton who has just recently retired as chief judge of the Superior Court of the District of Columbia. He is however in senior status now on the court and does continue to hear

cases. He is here on the campus. To be honored by the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences for his achievement is an In fact he is a graduate of the University of Illinois his bachelor's degree in political science and also went to law school here. He was nominated by President Richard Nixon to be an associate judge of the Supreme Court in D.C. He was confirmed by the Senate and was appointed associate judge in 1970 and served continuously on the court since then. In October of 1993 he was named the chief judge of the court for a term of four years and was reappointed for a second term. In October of one thousand seven as I mentioned just has retired as chief judge but continues to serve there on the court and he's been good enough to come and give us some of his time while he is back here visiting his alma mater. And we're pleased that he's here. Pleased to be here David. Thank you very much for inviting me. I should also mention the telephone number two for people who would like calling 3 3 3 w.

while toll free 800 to 2 2 W while I'm at. At what point did you decide or start thinking about being in your creative start thinking about being a judge. Well back in 1970. In the District of Columbia we had a very backlog court and to address that backlog President Nixon decided to go to Congress and ask for one expansion in the number of judges who were appointed to that court. I was in the Justice Department at that time and I did some work on the preliminary legislation for the expansion of the court and after that work had been done and the legislation had been passed and President Nixon was given the task of appointing some new judges some 10 of 15 new judges. The thought occurred to me that perhaps it would be nice to go to the court now and do some work in the court and I just mention that in

passing to then Attorney General John Mitchell. And a couple weeks later. I was called by the White House and told my President Nixon that he intended to nominate me. I don't know if that well I'm white imagine that every lawyer does not aspire to be a judge. Some would just as soon stay on that side of the bench. What what sort of things influence your decision and your interest and taking on a different sort of role. Well one of the things that was very very backlog at that time David. Was the juvenile docket. We had a lot of juvenile cases that had not been reached and disposed of. I mean many many do not cases and most people think that well why be concerned about the knowledge occasion of do not get well the point is there are a lot of juveniles who are awaiting adjudication that need help and need various interventions and treatments and programs to take

them off of that juvenile delinquency track. And with those cases not being adjudicated those children were not getting that help that they needed and that was really the thing that really concerned me we had. When I went on the bench over 5000 on duty kid juvenile cases involving 5000 juveniles who really need it whether they were guilty or not guilty they still needed some type of intervention and help to take them off of that juvenile track and that was a tremendous challenge I went to the bench and I assisted in adjudicating those cases and I sort of fell in love with the juvenile work at that time. You certainly have been credited with introducing a number of different programs there in D.C. that seem to be trying to get at underlying issues domestic and family issues drug issues for example and with the idea that.

Unless you really deal with those then you may well find yourself with these same people in front of you over and over again. Just for example drug courts instituted drug courts for both adults and for juveniles. Why was it you thought that was a particular issue that needed a special emphasis. Well substance abuse is one of the if not the leading cause of both juvenile delinquency and adult criminal behavior. And if we can address that that substance dependence and abuse at the front man rather than the back again we can actually cut off a large number of people who would otherwise come into the court. And so there's a point an object of both the juvenile and adult drug corn. It's to get those people when they come to the court and their primary problem is substance abuse or substance use to give them the

treatment to force them through the judicial mandate and that's a powerful mandate to force those people into treatment to keep them from coming back to get them off of that substance abuse and substance dependence which leads to that criminality to keep them from coming back. And so we reduce the number of cases that we have to deal with by reducing the number of people who are substance dippin. And so we attack the backlog from the front end rather than from the back. It seems to be a place though where some people would argue that we don't put nearly as many resources in that as we should. There is particularly in correctional facilities and we've cut back a lot on the money that's available for providing drug treatment for people who are in prison but also these other kinds of programs that are that are diversionary in nature that we hope will keep people from getting serious trouble that aren't funded at the level that they should and there are a lot of people who need help for whom help just not available.

Well it's absolutely true. And I have found in being chief judge in trying to get a lot of these programs started that you get the greatest amount of assistance in overcoming that reluctance to put the funds in at the front end from the most unlikely source. And that is from the police because they more than anyone else understand this revolving door type or they see the same people over and over and over again you arrest them the day they are released they're back the next day and so forth. And the same problem is there substance abuse and substance use. So you go to the police and you ask for their assistance and they give it to you to get the necessary funds to institute these programs. So the the the adult drug court the juvenile drug court. We were indeed successful have been successful. Yes very very successful because it does cut off this revolving door

type situation where people just keep coming back time and time again. Unless you treat the underlying cause of that criminality you don't prevent a person from using and abusing drugs simply by rest in them prosecuting them and incarcerating you because you leave intact the underlying reason and motive for their being then a first play. Now if you treat that substance use then and only then can you cut it off. Our guest in this hour of focus 580 is Eugene Hamilton. He is just recently retired as chief judge of the Superior Court of the District of Columbia. He is now retired and in senior status that means he's still working and is still hearing cases. He's a graduate of the University of Illinois went to undergraduate school here and law school and is here visiting the campus he's being honored by the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences for his work as a judge. And the questions are welcome. Three three three W I L L toll free

800 1:58 W while also one of the things that you did was you established a domestic violence court. Yeah what was that. What was the idea there. Well the idea there is is that a domestic violence like substance abuse grows out of some underlying problems that need to be addressed. Now Drew you have to protect people who have been battered in domestic violence but Or when above that you have to treat the cause of the violence which has been exhibited by one of the partners in the relationship against the elder. So we put in a very very proactive program which required people who have been found guilty of domestic violent acts to submit themselves to psycho psychological analysis psychological treatment and treatment which address their tendency to express their frustrations against their domestic partner

and in a violent way. This not only protected the batterer of the battered person but it also all increased the likelihood that families could be kept intact for the benefit and support of any of the children that may have been a part of that domestic relationship. What strikes me is that here. It gives us an opportunity to talk about. How it is in this country we talk about crime and punishment and prevention and there often are extreme points of view. One extreme being that if people commit crimes we simply should punish them as severely as we possibly can. That's what the law is about. And so when we look at the resources that we have to allocate what we should be doing primarily is spending that on police officers and hiring just as many police officers as we can certainly as many as we

need and then arresting people. And if they're guilty convicting them and if they're convicted. Putting them in jail. And if that if the numbers continue to grow and that means we have to build more prisons well that we're going to do that. On the other hand there are people who make this argument that says. That's really not a very good way to deal with crime because it's dealing with it after the fact. And what we really ought to do is look at crime as a as a social matter as a social social issue and look at what's going on in the lives of people who are committing crimes and trying to understand is there something that we could do as a society to make it less likely that they're going to be involved in criminal activity. It seems as though the difficulty here is that this conversation first of all it becomes highly politicized and that then in the time where we seem to be people seem much more sympathetic to the punishment idea than the prevention idea.

Well you're absolutely right David. And of course I found that that dilemma very prevalent as I thought about these various prevention programs. But. Here again I think what what has been happening in the past is all of the people in the criminal justice community have not been talking to each other have not been cooperating with each other have not been trying really and in a very collaborative way to address the same problem each has been operating in their own little little area and trying to protect that little area by getting as much of the resource pie and the dollars if you will as each possibly could so one of the things that I did with the other members of the criminal justice community in a disco cumbia was to set up what we call the criminal justice coronating Council.

Where all of the members of the criminal justice to police the prosecutors the corrections the probation the parole we all sat down around the same table and address the same problem at the same time and decided what resources were needed on the funnyman what resources were needed in the middle and what resources were and where needed it. In an appeal system in the probation systems and soap or so that we had a coordinated approach to the criminal and juvenile delinquency problems in the District of Columbia. And I think that has been going on around the country take all his politics out take all of this turf protection take all of this finger pointing out and sit down and share experiences share our knowledge share concerns and arrive at a quorum needed solution to the criminal justice problems now in domestic violence for example. We had a very high homicide rate

arising out of domestic situations in the district and it was just absolutely phenomenal. And after we sat down with all of the members of criminal justice community the police the social workers parole corrections in salt water we concentrated on his domestic violence homicide problem and we brought that problem down. I mean absolutely significantly in the first year of the operation of the domestic violence coronated domestic violence program which included a domestic violence court that was not only part of it. I was just one part of it. The police had a domestic violence program. Probation had to do it. The Corrections had intimate. We all put our resources together and the first year of the operation of that program we virtually eliminated any domestic. Homicides in the District of Columbia where I was a boyfriend or a wife or girlfriend had had kill the other.

It strikes me that it still must be difficult even if you if you get all the people who are involved in the criminal justice system to sit down and talk about it. Where they think resources should be allocated then you still have to some point you have to go to some legislative body and get them to elec. They're the ones that have to provide the money. And it still seems that it's that it's often more appealing to be able to say to your constituents I am tough on crime. I'm going to put those criminals behind bars where they belong we're going to put more police on the streets and that sort of thing and then it makes it's easier more appealing to do that than to say I really think that we ought to put more resources into providing drug treatment and to providing counseling for people who are have been violent and that sort of thing it's just unfortunately that seems to be the case.

Yes you're absolutely right and that's one of the things that we have to constantly strive to try to overcome and that is the tendency sometimes on the part of our politicians to politicize the criminal justice system by trying to point to the fact that they have. Put more police on the street and more people have been arrested and more people may have even been convicted. But that's not the solution complete solution to the criminal justice problem. And it is an ongoing struggle to try to get that message out but believe me the greatest allies in striking the death blow to those types of arguments are the police themselves and that I have found them to be tremendous allies in overhauling the entire criminal justice system. I remember some years ago a brief interview with the man who at the time was the chief of police for the city of champagne who himself has recently retired

and one of my colleagues was talking to him about crime prevention and asked a question. Just some of the effect of well what do you think that we could do to eliminate crime. And his comment was Well I think we should be spending more money on Head Start and to my colleagues that he almost fell over because he he was so surprised by an answer like that. And this was Don Carter who was the chief of police there and I think a lot of people respected him for a number of reasons but that was one that he recognised that. If you didn't deal with sort of infrastructure issues that you could have all the police in nearly all police officers in the world and that really wouldn't quite get it and you still wouldn't have enough. Yeah. Yes exactly. So I think but I think that messages really get nowt in the law enforcement community. And I think that realization has been one of the real major factors in

reducing nationwide the crime that we have seen across the country because I think the police more so as I said than anyone else understand that you reduce crime most efficiently and effectively by preventing it. We have seen reductions in recent years in levels of violent crime in the United States and I think that. Different people depending on what their agendas are might want to lay claim to that. Yeah it's and it may indeed be a difficult question to answer why it is that has happened before. But from your perspective what do you think have been the most important factors that have contributed to this decrease that we've seen. Well I think first of all we have programs out there like the juvenile and adult drug court. Like the domestic violence court and

all the programs like that that have really made a substantial impact in the number of people that are recycling in the system and by reducing that number of people into recycling. I think we have a limb unaided the need for a lot of these people to graduate from the nonviolent crimes to the violent crime because you take a substance abuser who stays in the system long enough. There may be nonviolent when they start off but as they progress along the way the prosecution conviction prosecution conviction track they become increasingly frustrated increasingly hardened and increasingly violent. If you cut that off I think you cut off the stream of individuals that would otherwise be going into the commission of violent crimes. Secondly I think with the cooperation between the police on the one hand and courts on the other hand it

probation and parole on the other hand so poor you have a greater exchange of information and this exchange of information permits more efficient more effective law enforcement and with more efficient effective law enforcement that really suppresses the amount of crime is being committed also or in the community so with these agencies sitting down talking to each other sharing information with each other listening to each other addressing the same concerns at the same time from different points of view not just from one point not just from prevention or treatment but from apprehension prosecution conviction and so forth from all those points of view with that type of cooperation I think is teamed up to really fact it really and efficiently reduce crime in the community. We have a caller here and would welcome others here in Champaign Urbana 3 3 3 9 4 5 5. I also have a toll free line good a good anywhere that you can hear

us that's 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5 and again I should introduce our guest We're speaking with Eugene Hamilton. He is a retired chief judge in senior status of the superior court in the District of Columbia and has been on the court as I mentioned for a number of years. He was nominated to serve by President Nixon and was confirmed by the Senate. And I was appointed an associate judge in one thousand seventy and then was named the chief judge in 1903 for a term of four years and then was re appointed. And he just within the past couple of weeks has retired as chief judge but continues to be a judge and continues to hear cases and as I mentioned also he's a graduate of the University of Illinois he's here to be honored by the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences along with some other alarms. Questions again welcome three three three W I L L toll free 800 1:58 W

while the call here is in urban or on line 1. Well what disturbs me about the criminal justice system is the Vietnam mentality. The drug laws as the Channel 37 on cable last night pointed out that drug offenders are taking up the spaces so well and served longer so in many cases sort of longer sentence sentences than rapists or murderers. Now there are tens of thousands of citizens in the United States who had no criminal intent whatsoever. All they wanted to do was to get high. And yet they are behind bars. And I think that is ridiculous it's a holdover from the Nixon or Oz mentality and it's ruining lives. Maybe not as violently and as terribly as some of the Vietnam War but it's the same mentality. Well I think you're absolutely right.

I think that was the whole theory about substance uses and substance abusers but I think the modern day theory is is that we waste too much time and money and effort on just simply warehousing people whose only problem really is substance abuse or substance dependence and now the criminal justice system has recognized that. And what we're trying to do is funnel all of those cases to which you have just referred which involve people as you say who who simply wanted to get high. I mean that's that's the only thing that they really were interested in. We are sending those people now through the drug courts and believe you mean the moving force in the drug court is treatment and prevention. So you're absolutely right. Well thank you for your pragmatic consideration I would like to add one more point. In

Genesis the first chapter 28 through 31 it talks about I have given the God is speaking saying I have given thee every green light for me to every beast of your through every fowl of your air and everything to create this upon the earth. I've given thee for our sustenance. And that evening in the morn. On the sixth day and I think it's ridiculous. The criminal justice system to rob. I would go for that. Well I think you're right. Thank you very much. And other questions comments are certainly welcome here in Champaign Urbana 3 3 3 W I L L toll free 800 1:58 W while I'm official law enforcement officials in New York City. I've gotten a lot of attention in recent years for an approach to law enforcement there that I think they believe perhaps other people believe has really helped lower the rate of crime in New York.

An approach that says we ought to pay as much attention maybe even more attention to really minor low level crimes things like things like petty theft vandalism vagrancy people one may want to take exception to even to the use of a word like that. But that's that sort of thing that we really ought to be paying as much attention to the guy who jumps the turnstile at the subway as somebody perhaps who is committing a higher level crime the idea being that by doing that and making the city a sort of a more civilized place to live in that that has an effect on Also the commission of more serious crime. And I wonder what you think of that Dan. Well I think that idea has a lot of merit to it. I think there are a lot of violent more serious crimes that

eventually that are committed eventually by people who are involved in these minor quality of life crimes like turnstile jumping urinating in public drinking in public etc. so that if you pay a lot of attention to these quality of life crimes I think you do prevent those individuals graduating into the more serious violent crime and I think that's what happened in New York and I think that's what has been happening to some extent across the country. The caviar is is it. When you pay a lot of attention to these quote mining the quality of life crimes you have to understand and realize that you made your point and objective and Panama attention is not to penalize those people but to treat old people to diagnose people to determine what their problem underlying problem is and treat that underlying problem rather than just trying to punish old people most of those

individuals who are engaged in that quality of life crime or individuals who are either alcoholics or people will have many many mental problems. Arbo and your system has to be prepared to recognize that and address and treat these underlying problems I think the city of New York has done then I think other places in the country have done it we've done it in the District of Columbia and that is a lesson that we overlooked for a long period of time but it is a lesson that we are now aware of. Yeah I guess there you certainly touch on what is fair in some people's minds the flip side of this and that is that what this kind of approach may fear is that what we're going to turn into is a program that ends up harassing people who are. Not committing serious crimes and that maybe that we would question is that the right way to allocate for SAR.

Well I think it well I think if you don't address the dandelion problems you are subject to that very legitimate criticism. Is it you're just basically harassing a whole lot of people for no good reason and with no good result. And Soledad that's another reason why very important you have just this treatment prevention aspect as a part of that in New York for example. They have what they call the community court in Manhattan which is composed of specially trained judges who have a great deal of understanding in dealing with the people who are perpetrating these quality of life crimes they are very much attuned to treatment to diagnosis and so we have someone else to talk with this is Clinton Indiana. It's our toll free line line for. Hello. Yes. I don't want to be one of your frequent callers. But I was I was interesting this last speculators call Bob you know you know God said You know you're in all this stuff you welcomed

everything under whatever just not three blocks from here a couple years ago. The two young fellows I knew who were they were a small composite. I don't believe they were some males from boozing and whatever and killed two young girls. They strangled and then consequently one of them put away for life. You know others not quite so long because he said he couldn't remember but that's in response to the other fellow's call. Well I don't think the lesson is lost on anyone that the use of mind altering and mood altering drugs is not something to be encouraged or tolerated by anyone. And any time you have a situation where people are using mind a mood altering drug you have a problem that needs to be

addressed. Substance use is just as much a problem as substance abuse and these matters should should be addressed in the criminal justice system but they should be addressed with a with a coordinated effort from both the law enforcement and the treatment communities. Thank you. Thank you. And again other questions comments welcome 3 3 3 W while toll free 800 to 2 2 W while I think we've certainly also seen. Fairly critically fairly recent last couple of years concerns about the use of deadly force by police officers. There have been some big city cases that got a lot of attention in the national media but. It's certainly not simply a big city issue. It's something champ and it happens in Champaign do as a man. Yes and indeed it does it is a kind of thing that that can and does happen everywhere particularly I think

there has been some concern about some big city police departments and their methods employed by plain clothes street crimes units and some people are really concerned that they that some cases these officers may be adopting the methods of the people that they're trying to go after. Generally what do you think about this. This question and how we approach the idea of use of deadly force. Well the use of deadly force by law enforcement agencies. Is the bare bare serious matter. First of all police officers just like anyone else and perhaps more so than anyone else have to be subjected to intensive good quality training. And a part of that training is when and how and to what extent. Deadly force should be used. This is very very

important and you find a police department who has not learned a lesson and you will have a lot of trouble. Case in point is a Metropolitan Police Department in the District of Columbia. Last year we had a very very high rate of officers using deadly force through the use of deadly weapons usually pistols as a result of which many people have been killed and in order to gain a large number of people being killed. And the reason for that is is that training had gone on attended for such a long period of time. Police officers. Were put in situations where they were very confused about when and to what extent and how to use deadly force and as a consequence I would venture the guess that they were using deadly force to prevent it. So training is a force. Answer to that problem.

Secondly independent objective investigation and I was noting in the paper this morning that I read Riyadh about the champagne incident where that incident is being investigated by an independent agency. I believe the Urbana police department and I think good objective independent investigation each time you have the use by a police officer of deadly force is very very important and warrant it creates an atmosphere within the police department which tells police officers that there is accountability for their behavior. Secondly it creates an atmosphere of credibility on the part of the police department and the community and the police department like the courts cannot operate effectively in the community without credibility in the community. This gets us to maybe another issue that we might talk about. That's getting a lot of attention nationally and that is racial profiling. Yeah and gets to this very issue.

When a police officer goes out on the street he or she is looking around and thinking Who who. Who am I dealing with here. Who should I be concerned about it is is it is it possible for me to look and look all around and pick somebody and say Now this is a person that deserves watching more than than anybody else. It seems that way to a great extent here now. Race and racial issues shape distort. Relationships between law enforcement and citizens. What do we do about that. Well here again police offices like other people but particular police officers because they have so much power and they can wield so much power. Just in the back bending of an eyelash he had to be trained that you can't make good solid decisions simply based

upon a person's race or or ethnic background it tells you little or nothing about that person as an individual so this is one of the things that you just have to shut your mind to I mean I can't pick out a culprit anywhere it is simply based upon what what. And then the beige walls race is or is is not because if you do that you're likely to make some terrible mistakes about who you pick for this or who you pick for that race does bears no relationship generally to law enforcement and police officers just have to be taught that that put is out of your mind don't let it influence your judgment at all. If this is an issue that has come up in the presidential race and both of the candidates have talked about this and and the subject of legislation has been right some people think that the Congress

should pass a law banning racial profiling. And I guess my thing I wonder about is. Is that it. We may do that. But by passing a law can you actually. Eliminate racial profiling. Is that something you can do legislatively. Oh no I don't think so I don't think passing a law to ban racial profiling is the affective official way to deal with racial profiling. I think the appropriation of money to train law enforcement officers to put race out of your mind when you make decisions in law enforcement is a more efficient effective way to go about it than I would like to see some appropriations to train local police departments to eliminate this tendency to just resort to abject racial profiling in law enforcement.

Just less than 10 minutes left in this part of focus our guest is Eugene Hamilton. He is a retired just recently retired as chief judge of the Superior Court of the District of Columbia and is now a judge and senior status meaning that he is still hearing cases. He's a graduate of the University of Illinois and is here to be honored along with some other alumnus by the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. And certainly we welcome your questions three three three W. Weil toll free 800 1:58 W. alum. One issue having to do with justice that's that's been up for discussion quite a bit here over the last couple of years certainly here in the state of Illinois but elsewhere is the death penalty. And. It seems to be the case that there there still is public support for capital punishment generally speaking in the United States although it is something that is. Receiving a lot of discussion and people seem to be do seem to be concerned with the issue not so much

of capital punishment in the abstract but the idea that if someone's going to be executed we'd better be certain. That we have the right person. Do you think I wonder whether you think whether we as a society are anywhere close to at least having a serious conversation about whether or not we continue to want to have capital punishment. Well I think the governor of the state of Illinois came down in exactly the right place on this issue. There's nothing theoretically wrong or objectionable to capital punishment as as a concept. The problem is that before you put in place a system of capital punishment you must have in place a system which provides competent representation by counsel not just as some of the people who may be charged with a capital offense

offense but everyone. And unless you have that system in place and unless you're willing to pay for that system then I don't think we're ready for capital capital punishment. And that's a problem. It's appalling to me to see to read about so many cases where people have been convicted of capital offenses who have been represented by in adequate counsel and that hadn't got anything to do with whether a person is guilty or not guilty. How heinous the crime may have been. It just simply has to do with the fact that we are a country of laws and that means that anybody who is charged with and tried for a very serious offense involving a capital offense must must without regard to ability to pay be represented by competent counsel.

Well I think certainly that in other places and here in the state of Illinois when people have talk about what we might do that indeed is what's come up for discussion that is the idea that there ought to be a in a sense a a capital bar. Yes that the that it should be that if you're going to be an attorney and you're going to represent someone who is eligible for the death penalty you should be. Trained experienced in those kind of cases. Perhaps there ought to be even be some sort of certification process and then going further there's this issue of providing people with resources to do forensic work to hire people to do expert testimony those sorts of things. Particularly if you're if your client does not have the means to provide that kind of money so that then you can mount and an adequate defense. The thing is I think some people would say is that that makes it sound as if we think the problem with the death penalty basically as a lawyer problem that if it if somebody is wrongly convicted it's a lawyer ring issue. It's not

really an issue of fundamental justice issue is it. Is it somehow both. Well it may be both. But I but I think what we have to do based on the fact that we are a country of laws and Constitutional laws. We have to eliminate this law lawyering factor from the equation so that we're absolutely certain. That the conviction was not based on an adequate representation by counsel. And all of the requirements that you training experience certification the availability of resources all those things that you mention must be there so that we can eliminate this question whether or not it resulted from inadequate representation by counsel. And then that having been done. As I said let the chips fall where they will me. So you know you don't think that we. You think if those issues that could be addressed could be addressed then the concerns that most people have about the

death penalty would would be addressed or we wouldn't think so. I really really do. I think most people are really repulsed by the by the notion that we're not really certain whether this person had adequate representation by counsel because. In many instances the individuals that are providing this representation are inadequately trained some of whom have professional responsibility problems themselves with substance abuse problems some of them lack the resources the infrastructure and their own practice. And so far as the forensics are concerned to mount a competent defense not everybody has the money of an O.J. Simpson or some of the other people that have been mentioned in relation to capital cases but every person who is charged in a capital offense ought to have the ability to mount the best defense that is available to that individual before they're convicted.

I wonder whether in some people's minds there continues to be an uncertainty about the sentence of life in prison and that people don't really believe that that means what it means and if we could communicate to people that. If you want to consider that option we could guarantee if someone's convicted of murder we sentence them to life in prison. That's what that means that means that person will never step out the door again. They'll never be on the streets again. If we could make sure people understood that that really is what it meant. I wonder whether you think that would influence people's feeling about the death penalty. Well I think it would but I think really most people underline most people's apprehension or reluctance in the death penalty area is a question of adequate representation. I

really think that that's fundamental and I would like to see that that question put put to rest. If we could just simply say that each person who is charged with capital offense is guaranteed adequate representation by counsel. That being the case then I think I think there are a lot of a lot of people who should who should be charged and convicted of capital offenses and stop with the ultimate punishment. Well we're going to have to leave it at that because we're here at the end of the time. I want to say to our guest Eugene Hamilton retired chief judge in senior status in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia. Judge Hamilton thank you very much. Thank you. Been a pleasure to be with you Dave.