The Mexican government bankrolls a program to advise American attorneys on keeping Mexican nationals convicted of capital crimes off death row.
The Marshall Project reports that the Mexican Capital Legal Assistance Program, created by Mexican officials in 2000, furnishes lawyers defending Mexican nationals in the U.S. in capital cases with training, advice, and financial support throughout the post-conviction process. The Sunlight Foundation reports the Mexican government spent $3.5 million on the program between 2010 and 2011, and has an annual budget in that range. It tracks dozens of cases around the U.S. each year involving its nationals.
Through the program, lawyers representing Mexican nationals in death penalty cases receive advice on shaping mitigation themes. During the sentencing or appeals process, convicts are afforded the opportunity to present mitigating factors — evidence which lessens their culpability for a criminal act. Such factors could include drug addiction or family dysfunction. To that end, Mexican officials fly lawyers to a defendant’s home town in search of testimony or records which may bolster their mitigation claims. They also provide accommodations and logistical support in finding evidence and preparing briefs.
The program has been deployed to good effect. Only 10 Mexican nationals have been executed for capital crimes in the U.S. in the last 40 years.
The Mexican government provides the service for a variety of reasons. In the first place, Mexican nationals arrested or convicted of crimes in the U.S. are not always given the opportunity to contact their consulate, a practice Mexico claims contravenes the 1963 Vienna Convention on Consular Relations. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled the Convention is not binding on state courts since it has not been adopted by Congress. The Mexican government also opposes the death penalty. (RELATED: Federal Court: Children Must Face Deportation Proceedings Alone)
“Mexico in no way condones or sympathizes with any criminal behavior for which some of its citizens have been accused,” a spokesmen from the Mexican embassy told the Marshall Project. However, the Mexican government, “opposes the death penalty as a matter of principle and has a strong policy of protecting its nationals abroad including in the United States.”
The program’s utility is also a function of the constraints lawyers face representing indigent defendants. In most instances, these lawyers are public defenders or pro bono advocates who lack the resources and institutional capacity to robustly represent their clients.
“I think it’s shameful,” Sandra Babcock, the American lawyer who first ran the program, told The Texas Observer. “There’s extreme poverty and here we have the wealthiest country in the world that cannot provide adequate resources and competent legal counsel to people who are facing the loss of their lives.”
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