NJ Today

Death Penalty Foe No Human Rights Hero

Sen. Ray Lesniak rightfully claims credit as the leader of NJ's abolition of the death penalty, but the self-described political boss / power broker is no advocate of freedom, even as he claims an international award in the Memorial de Caen International Human Rights Competition.

I was a longtime friend of Sen. Lesniak who got thrown under the bus in 2006 when the mayor of Elizabeth demanded that my newspaper business be subjected to an illegal boycott by government entities and grant recipients. Chris Bollwage did not like the news published about him and Lesniak accomodated retaliation against my newspaper business.

Freedom of the press, or any form of freedom of expression, is a fundamental right that is essential to human justice. I am not the only victim of this treatment, with former Freeholders Adrian Mapp and Don Goncalves or former Councilman Tony Monteiro being among those that most readily come to mind.

A democracy is not just a place with majority rule; it is one where minority rights are protected. Lazyboy Lesniak is a soulless politician who would silence those who disagree with him by any available means because that is less challenging than the real work of statesmanship.

He does this because he has unjustly extracted millions of dollars from taxpayers through legal fees awarded to his firm by politicians that the senator installed in office.

Those ill-gotten riches are far more important than a mere principle to Lesniak, whose 30+ years in office have coincided with the emergence of a horribly broken government, infected by corruption and unable to address the simplest of society's needs.

The death penalty was never used in New Jersey despite legislation to implement it that Lesniak voted to enact back in the 1980s. The abolition of NJ's capital punishment law is akin to throwing away a broken vacuum cleaner.

I have always believed that the risk of taking an innocent life made capital punishment an unwise penalty, but there may be cases -- Megan Kanka's killer Jesse Timmendequas comes to mind -- where it is appropriate.

Rather than undertaking the hard work of clearly defining justice under law, Lesniak took a shortcut to glory and he seems to enjoy basking in acclaim. Meanwhile, people in Union County and other parts of New Jersey endure persecution imposed by their government because power-broker Ray Lesniak is an apostle to expedience.

New Jersey's growing prison population is mostly black (63%) and one third are incarcerated for drug offenses. Hidden within prison walls, ruling gangs command drug distribution, the weak are routinely subjected to violent sexual abuse and there are few inquiries by such 'human rights' advocates in the Legislature as Sen. Lesniak.

Incarceration rates in the Land of the Free are greater than anywhere else in the world, including communist China.

New Jersey's incarceration rate experienced dramatic growth during Lesniak's tenure in the Legislature while vital questions about education fairness and funding have remained unresolved. The point being that education is the surest alternative to prison for the poor, which is a population group concentrated more in Lesniak's turf than any other New Jersey legislative district.

Last year in New Jersey, forty percent of all admissions to state prison were people who had been inmates before. The number of prisoners released without parole supervision, a virtual invitation to return, has been growing over the past ten years.

The death penalty is one among many harsh but ineffective policies supported by Lesniak during a time when government degenerated and justice became irrelevant, as if to demonstrate that he has no real interest in human rights.

It is good for Raymond that he is not a deep thinker in addition to being crafty and clever. If he were, he would suffer that to which life sentences are supposed to subject convicts: his own conscience.