Former lawmaker who once supporter capital punishment asks for moratorium

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) -- A former lawmaker who voted nearly 25 years ago to reinstate capital punishment is pleading for a moratorium on the death penalty.

David Craighead, a Midwest City state representative from 1972 to 1988, was one of the 93 House lawmakers who voted to pass the death penalty bill in 1976.

"I believe most of us who voted for it believed it was the right thing to do and was what our constituents wanted," Craighead said at a news conference Wednesday.

In asking Gov. Frank Keating and the current Legislature to declare a moratorium on capital punishment, Craighead called it "a harsh penalty," which he said has been "mistakenly applied."

"I believe our nation is in the process of changing its mind about capital punishment," he said.

Craighead now lobbies and works for the Oklahoma Conference of Churches. He said Wednesday he is speaking for himself and not the OCC, but pointed out that the group has adopted a resolution calling for a moratorium on the death penalty.

Craighead said he's asking for a moratorium instead of outright repeal so that Keating and legislators would have time to study the issue. Keating could take the action on his own as did the governor of Illinois after it was discovered a number of condemned men on death row there were innocent, Craighead said.

Keating, a staunch supporter of capital punishment, has never granted clemency to anyone during his six years as governor.

In the early 1970s, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Georgia's capital punishment law, calling it arbitrary and capricious. The Georgia law was almost identical to Oklahoma's, effectively ending capital punishment here.

Since the state Legislature reinstated the death penalty in 1976, Oklahoma has executed 30 condemned men, 11 this year alone.

Eight more are scheduled to be executed in January, including Wanda Jean Allen, who would be the first woman put to death since Oklahoma became a state. Her clemency hearing is scheduled Dec. 15.

Craighead conceded that most Oklahomans "probably" support the death penalty. He was unable to point to any innocent person mistakenly executed in Oklahoma, although he said based on the experience of other states, it is likely to have happened here.

He said minorities are executed in disproportionate numbers and usually can't afford a first-class legal defense.

"We have executed people with mental deficiencies that may have been a factor in the crime, and we have executed people who, at least when they committed the crime, were minors," Craighead said.

He said he was moved to ask for a capital punishment moratorium at this time because of the pending execution of Allen, whom he said was "borderline mentally retarded."