By John Lyon
Arkansas News Bureau

LITTLE ROCK — A state senator says she plans to file legislation calling for a study of possible inequities in Arkansas’ criminal justice system, including the way the state makes use of the death penalty.

Sen. Joyce Elliott, D-Little Rock, said she would file the bill Monday, the last day lawmakers can file bills for the 2009 session. The measure would create the Arkansas Commission to Study the Equity and Fairness of the Criminal Justice System.

“We believe … there are some disparities, especially in sentencing guidelines and the effects of our sentencing,” Elliott said. “These are things that we believe, but we want to do a study to make sure we are not just assuming and that we’ve got good, hard data.”

The commission would come up with recommendations that could be the basis for legislation in the 2011 session, Elliott said.

Elliott was asked to file the bill by the Arkansas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty, but she said the commission’s work would not necessarily reflect that group’s views.

“We will have a commission of people from different backgrounds, people who believe differently about all kinds of punishment we have in our justice system, so that we come up with recommendations that are reflective of our society as a whole,” she said.

Prosecutors, defenders, victims’ groups, community activists and faith-based organizations all would have voices on the commission, Elliott said.

“That’s the only way we can get good policy, is to hear all sides,” she said.

Several other states have created similar commissions, including Tennessee, Maryland and New Hampshire.

New Jersey abolished the death penalty in 2007 on the recommendation of that state’s commission. The Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty undoubtedly would welcome a similar outcome in Arkansas, but chairman David Rickard said ending capital punishment isn’t the group’s only purpose in pushing the legislation.

“The primary focus is not just on capital punishment but also on other Class Y, Class A felonies,” he said. “The issue is whether the criminal justice system treats people fairly and equitably regardless of race, gender, ethnicity, age or part of the state they live in.”

Last year, Gov. Mike Beebe said no to capital punishment opponents who asked him to create a commission to study how the death penalty is applied in Arkansas.

“We said that … if someone did a study on the death penalty we would look at it, but we wanted it to be an independent study, separate from state government,” Beebe spokesman Matt DeCample said Friday.

Asked about Elliott’s proposal for a commission to study the entire criminal justice system, DeCample said, “We’re always happy to look at any proposal she puts out.”

Attorney General Dustin McDaniel said he could not say whether he would support or oppose the proposal, but he said he supports capital punishment and does not believe anyone has been sentenced to death in Arkansas since he took office in 2007 without “all of the due process that our system allows, and more.”

But McDaniel added, “It’s always appropriate to review the checks and balances that are built into that system, and I trust Sen. Elliott to do that in a fair fashion. I think that she is a person who has justice and fairness in her heart.”

Rickard said his group is not asking for a moratorium this time around because an inmate’s lawsuit over lethal injection procedures has effectively halted executions in the state.

The suit by death row inmate Frank Williams Jr. alleges that the state Department of Correction improperly adopted its lethal-injection procedures without going through a public-comment process. The Arkansas Administrative Procedures Act requires state agencies to give public notice and take comments regarding any new rules.

Rep. Bobby Pierce, D-Sheridan, recently filed a bill that would write Arkansas’ lethal-injection procedures into law and declare that the procedures are “not subject to the Arkansas Administrative Procedures Act.”

Pierce said Friday he believes passage of the bill would resolve the issues in Williams’ suit.

“We never had a law that said, ‘This is the way we’re going to carry it out.’ So that’s what this is about,” he said.

Pierce said he hopes to present the bill in the House Judiciary Committee this week.