Benetton Sued Over Death Row Visits

Pudgy or gaunt, with stubble, with biceps, the death row inmates posed for photos in their prison scrubs. Then they talked: about their moms, bass fishing, pizza. About how they fear execution.

The photos and interviews filled a magazine--a 96-page plea for compassion. An attempt to show that the killers our courts condemn to death are people just like us.

The magazine’s producers call it social commentary.

But is it crass commercialism as well?

Missouri’s attorney general thinks so.

For every few pages in the magazine, standing out splashy against the pallor of death row, is a bright green logo with white lettering that reads: United Colors of Benetton. The Italian clothing company, notorious for its provocative ads, sponsored this magazine and calls it a catalog, although not a stitch of Benetton clothing appears.

Furious that Benetton would use convicted murderers as its latest anti-models, Missouri Atty. Gen. Jay Nixon has sued the company for fraud, alleging that the company’s representatives masqueraded as journalists to gain access to inmates--then used that access to help them sell sweaters.

“Death row is not for sale,” Nixon fumed.

“It’s a very secure place,” he added. “And the fact that people would lie to get in concerns us greatly. What’s next? Are we going to let people film sneaker commercials there?”

Benetton’s response is simple: There was no fraud. And there is no attempt to sell sweaters.

The company argues that it’s spending $15 million on global distribution of the death row photos solely to spark debate on capital punishment. The magazine, then, is not a Benetton ad, but a legitimate piece of journalism. Yes, the Benetton logo is sprinkled throughout. But only because the firm sponsored the project--and deserves credit for trying to make folks think.

“If you can raise awareness of an important issue and also raise awareness that your company cares about that issue, what’s wrong with doing two things at once?” asks Mark Major, a Benetton spokesman.

Not that he expects sales to zoom if consumers associate the Benetton brand with sallow, sad-eyed killers: “Just as big a case could be made that we could lose sales,” he said.

As for the lawsuit, Major dismisses it as a political ploy.

The death penalty magazine--distributed as a supplement to the February issue of Talk--outraged victims’ advocates, who accused Benetton of glamorizing murderers while ignoring their crimes. So furious was public reaction, in fact, that Sears, Roebuck and Co. last week canceled an exclusive contract to sell a line of Benetton clothes, calling the death row images--which also appeared on billboards and in magazine ads--”terribly insensitive.”

Given the outcry, Major argued, it was inevitable that state officials would try to distance themselves.

“I don’t think they’d be suing if Benetton had printed the photos [with the text] ‘It’s high time these prisoners were executed,’ ” agreed attorney Les Weatherhead, who is fighting the lawsuit.

Nixon, however, says he’s targeting Benetton’s methods, not its message.

In requesting access to death row, a law professor working with Benetton did not mention a catalog, billboards or a global ad campaign. Instead, he spoke of a “photo essay . . . designed to create a lasting record on the issue of the death penalty,” to be compiled by journalists as a project of the National Assn. of Criminal Defense Lawyers.

The professor, Speedy Rice of Gonzaga University, named Benetton as the project’s sponsor. But he assured officials in Missouri and other states that “no profits are generated from the publication of this photo essay.”

Benetton stands by those descriptions of the project.

The death row magazine was not sold, so it did not earn a cent, Major said. What’s more, state officials received copies of other photo essays Benetton has sponsored, such as one on Mideast peace, so they should have known the “United Colors” logo would appear. As for the billboards and magazine ads, Major said Benetton decided on them only after completing all inmate interviews. Even then, he insisted, they were not ads, as no Benetton clothing appears.

“That’s galling,” Nixon responds.

His lawsuit, he added, will “give a jury the chance to make sure they don’t profit from it.”

Benetton has experienced legal backlash before. In 1995, a German court banned three ads, including a photo of child laborers, ruling that they exploited suffering. That same year, a French court ordered Benetton to pay damages for offending AIDS patients with a photo of bodies stamped ‘HIV-Positive.’

So far, Missouri is the only state to sue over the death row images. But a Kentucky prison spokeswoman echoed the complaint that Benetton was “not upfront about their intentions” in requesting access to inmates.

And victims’ advocate Nancy Munch has urged other states that let Benetton’s representatives onto death row--including Illinois, Nebraska and North Carolina--to consider joining Missouri in court. “It would send a message to others,” Munch said, “who might try to market murder for profit.”