Texas executes Mexican national after court stay rejected

@white_swan53 Said

I only statement I made is that I agree with Texas .What you are trying to be all wa wa about is what I said I IMO about.
I'll say the same to you as I said to the other poster, just because we don't agree on this topic does not make either of us more or wrong.

@hoppy Said

No, I didn't become a bully. Didn't have to. Because of my size and new found ability to fight, other students walked wide of me. Once, I got in a fight with a farm boy who was a bit taller and faster than I was. I threw the first punch, hoping it would be enough. He beat the s*** out of me.

@white_swan53 Said

I never claimed anything.
I said IMO

@jonnythan Said
does it bother you that the US just violated a treaty with Mexico in order to execute a man?

Now here's the real question. How would you react if Mexico violated a treaty with the US to execute a man accused of, say, political dissent?

@someone_else Said

Okay, maybe you know more about this than I do, but if he was an American citizen (and therefore not an illegal alien) and had been since he was two years old, why would he have been eligible for assistance from the Mexican consulate?

That's where my confusion stems from. Did he have dual citizenship? And if so, doesn't that mean that he is indeed a citizen of the US and therefore subject to our laws (and also execution)?

Quote:
The Term in the US

According to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security a foreign national is defined simply as "an individual who is a citizen of any country other than the United States."[3] The Brookhaven National Laboratory, under direction from the U.S. Department of Energy, further explains that, from the perspective of the United States, a foreign national is, "A person who was born outside the jurisdiction of the United States, is a citizen of a foreign country, and has not become a naturalized U.S. citizen under U.S. law. This includes Legal Permanent Residents (also known as Permanent Resident Aliens)."[4] This definition presumably also applies to anyone who has successfully renounced his or her U.S. citizenship.

The term "foreign national" came into usage when the previously used term "foreigner" developed negative connotations. They are synonyms.

Quote:


June 14, 2011

WASHINGTON (Tuesday, June 14, 2011) – Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) introduced legislation Tuesday to address a long-standing international concern regarding U.S. compliance with the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations (VCCR), a key treaty providing access for citizens detained abroad to their consulates.


Government efforts to address this problem began during the George W. Bush administration, when President Bush issued an executive memorandum directing the state courts to provide review of the convictions and death sentences. The executive order was challenged in the U.S. Supreme Court, and the Court held that the Executive Branch did not have the authority to compel the state courts to act. The Court held that Congress must pass legislation instead.


The VCCR was negotiated during the Kennedy administration, and ratified during the Nixon administration.

Quote:
In 2008, the Supreme Court ruled that states were not obligated to comply with the Vienna Convention, and that only Congress -- not the president -- could force them to obey the treaty

Quote:
First, let us be clear about applicant's claim. Born in Mexico, applicant was brought to the United States when he was three years old and, at the time he was arrested, had lived in this country for fifteen of his eighteen years. He spoke fluent English, but he never obtained, nor apparently ever sought, U.S. citizenship. So, at the time of his arrest and trial, he was legally a Mexican citizen. His claim is that no one informed him of his right to contact the Mexican consulate. This is true. It is also true that he was never denied access to the Mexican consulate. The problem is that he apparently never told any law enforcement or judicial official that he was a Mexican citizen until some four years after his conviction. Applicant never informed the arresting officers that he was a Mexican citizen. (1) He makes no claim that he informed any magistrate that he was a Mexican citizen. He points to no evidence that he informed the trial judge before or during his trial that he was a Mexican citizen. (2) We do not know what the arresting officers, the magistrate, or the trial judge would have done had any of them been informed that applicant was a citizen of Mexico. Perhaps they would have informed him of his right to contact his consulate for assistance. While Texas authorities clearly failed in their duty to inform this foreign national of his rights under the Vienna Convention, this foreign national equally failed in his duty to inform those authorities that he was a Mexican citizen. Although one would like to think that all Texas public officials are clairvoyant about the nationality of all who appear before them, they are not required to be, nor, when there is no reason to believe that a defendant is anything but a U.S. citizen, should they be.

As this Court explained at considerable length in applicant's last application for a writ of habeas corpus, Texas law does not permit a defendant to raise a claim four years after his trial that he was not notified before or during his trial of his rights under the Vienna Convention, the U.S. Constitution, the Texas Constitution, or any other law. This claim was procedurally defaulted by the failure to raise it in a timely manner.

@DorkySupergirl Said

First, people are asking why it was only brought up now, the fact he was not given the right to meet with his consulate. The reason is probably because there are appellate lawyers who go through the case and try to find any legal ground whatsoever to try and stop the execution.

Second, a person can live in one country legally and not be a citizen. Many Canadian hockey players live in American most of the year as they play for an American team but keep their Canadian citizenship. They are there legally.

Third, I think because he's Mexican, people think its okay to deny someone their legal rights. What if an American went to Mexico, accused of a crime and no one let him meet with his consulate and then he was put to death. There would be a s*** storm like you would not believe.



He had a legal right and it was denied. Its like arresting me and not giving me my miranda, good luck getting my confession into a court of law then.

I also heard it violated treaty rights. If this is the case, I think it set an example, and not a good one, and now it could happen to an American in Mexico.

@white_swan53 Said

He , the defendant, didn't inform anyone that he was a Mexican citizen until some 4 years after his conviction.

@jonnythan Said

That can't be right. You can't go through an entire death penalty case with no one realizing the defendant isn't a citizen.