Senator John Kerry, who now seems close to winning...

Senator John Kerry, who now seems close to winning the Democratic nomination to run against President George Bush in the upcoming US presidential elections, declared himself for a moratorium because of "serious systemic flaws" in the country's death penalty system.
Kerry's position was stated to the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL), a Washington-based organisation, that in October 2003 sent a series of questions to President Bush, Vice-President Dick Cheney and the Democratic candidates asking them their stands with regard to various penal justice issues, including the death penalty.
"I oppose the death penalty other than in cases of real international and domestic terrorism. I support a moratorium on the death penalty because I believe that there are serious systemic flaws in the death penalty system, which have resulted in the conviction of people who are innocent. In fact, one hundred and eleven innocent people have already been released from death row because of wrongful convictions."
The Bush-Cheney electoral committee answered that it was premature for their candidates to take a stand as they had not yet made their candidature for a second presidential mandate formal (at the time of the survey).
The NACDL is the pre-eminent organization in the United States advancing the mission of the nation's criminal defence lawyers to ensure justice and due process for persons accused of crime or other misconduct. A professional bar association founded in 1958, NACDL's more than 10,000 direct members include private criminal defence lawyers, public defenders, active US military defence counsel, law professors and judges committed to preserving fairness within America's criminal justice system.