Errors permeate military justice

August 28, 2011 at 12:00a.m.

McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON

In December 2008, former Army Pvt. Ronald Gray was on the brink of becoming the first military execution in almost 50 years.

The rapist and murderer of four women had sat on death row for two decades by the time President George W. Bush approved his death warrant.

But the week before Gray was to receive a lethal injection, a federal judge halted the execution because of a new appeal.

Now, federal defenders who took over his case say they’ve found new evidence that his original military lawyers should have discovered. If they’re successful, Gray could join a growing number of soldiers, airman and Marines who have been spared execution.

Of the 16 men sentenced to death since the military overhauled its system in 1984, 10 have been taken off death row. The military’s appeals courts have overturned most of the sentences, not because of a change in heart about the death penalty or questions about the men’s guilt, but because of mistakes made at every level of the military’s judicial system.

The problems included defense attorneys who bungled representation, judges who didn’t know how to properly instruct a jury and prosecutors who mishandled evidence.

In all of the cases, the men have been resentenced to life in prison. Eventually, they could be eligible for parole.

Yet by many measures, they’re the military’s worst of the worst. Convicted of crimes such as serial murder and rape, they’re the kinds of criminals that many people would agree the death penalty should be reserved for.

Then why have they been spared?

Critics say the military botched the cases because its judicial system lags behind civilian courts and isn’t equipped to handle the complex legal and moral questions that capital cases raise.