Bill Pelke/Others Recently Interviewed at US SC

Don't Execute Bin Laden, Say Activists at Supreme Court
By Nicholas Ballasy CNSNews.com First published July 03, 2008

On the Spot (CNSNews.com) - Members of various activist groups from around the country, under the umbrella of the Abolitionist Action Committee (AAC), gathered at the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday to protest capital punishment as well as Sens. Barack Obama and John McCain's support for the death penalty.

Some activists said the death penalty should not be imposed against terrorist Osama bin Laden or, in retrospect, against dictator Adolf Hitler.

According to the group's official Web site, the AAC is "an ad-hoc group of individuals committed to highly visible and effective public education for alternatives to the death penalty through nonviolent direct action."

The site also says nine people were arrested during last year's protest for refusing to put down a 30-foot banner that read "STOP EXECUTIONS!" on the stairs of the Court. The Court's security arrested all nine members and put them in jail for more than 30 hours before they were released by a Superior Court judge.

Cybercast News Service interviewed some of the activists. They were asked about McCain and Obama's support of the death penalty; if Osama Bin Laden, the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks should be given the death penalty if captured; and if dictator Adolf Hitler should have been given the death penalty.

Cybercast News Service interviewed Bill Pelke, whose grandmother was murdered. Her killer was given the death penalty but he said he later had a "change of heart."

Cybercast News Service also spoke to Andre Latallade, who walked from Trenton, New Jersey, on March 31, 2008 -- after the state legislature abolished the death penalty -- to Texas, the U.S. state with the most executions, to protest capital punishment; Scott Langley, who was arrested at last year's protest and said if you wear a shirt with "any kind of political message," you are not able to walk on the steps of the Supreme Court; and Anne Feczko, a member of Amnesty International who hopes that Obama is saying he supports the death penalty only because it is "politically inconvenient" to say otherwise.

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