Compassion--on a Case-by-Case Basis

It is hard to feel compassionate toward someone who commits murder, regardless of the circumstances. Yet that is just the emotion that Gov. Pete Wilson needs to feel for a group of women whose petitions for clemency are before him.

The petitioners are women convicted of murdering or attempting to murder their spouses or partners. Currently in prison, they maintain they had to commit their heinous crimes in self-defense. Brutally and repeatedly beaten, these women contend they had to kill their abusers or be killed themselves.

More than 30 of these petitions are on Wilson’s desk, some of them there since last April. And more clemency requests are in the pipeline.

Because clemency is defined as an action of mercy, Wilson is not required to follow any set procedure or use any specific criteria in reaching decisions. He has the authority to grant petitioners a pardon, a reprieve (a temporary suspension of the sentence) or a commutation (in which a new, lesser sentence is substituted for the original one).

The notion of extending the definition of self-defense to domestic violence is controversial especially because the woman was not, in every instance, in immediate danger from her batterer when she killed. Gradually, a growing body of research is bringing into focus a grim picture of the scope and degree of violence in the home.

More American women are now injured by the men in their life than by car accidents, muggings and rape combined. Last year the American Medical Assn., backed by the U.S. surgeon general, declared that violent men constitute a major threat to women’s health. Between 22% and 35% of all visits by women to emergency rooms are for injuries from domestic assaults.

Despite these disturbing findings, in many states assaulting a stranger is considered a felony but assaulting a spouse only a misdemeanor.

A double standard of crime and punishment is also present: The average sentence for a woman who kills her mate is 15 to 20 years; for a man, two to six.

That’s why governors in Missouri, Ohio and Maryland have recently granted clemency to women convicted of murder who claim they had acted to end the severe abuse being committed against them.

Nonetheless, the California petitioners are fighting an uphill battle, to be sure. California governors have historically granted clemency petitions only in rare and extraordinary cases. Wilson has acted on only one clemency petition so far--when he denied a request last year by murderer Robert Alton Harris, subsequently executed.

The cases of women who kill their batterers raise complex and compelling legal issues. Aides say that Wilson has ruled out granting mass clemency. The governor should, however, carefully and compassionately consider each petition on its merits.