Death Penalty, the case of Clinton Young

Since 1983 the death penalty has been officially abolished in the Netherlands, as is the case for all European countries with the exception of Belarus. However, 60 per cent of the world’s population lives in countries – as for example the USA, China and Egypt - that retain capital punishment: death.

Especially in the case of wrongful sentencing to death, the death penalty raises a lot of questions. In this lecture, Merel Pontier of the Clinton Young Foundation talks about the complexities and injustices in death penalty cases. The lecture will elaborate on the case of Clinton Young, a case about a man that the foundation believes have been wrongfully sentenced to death in Texas, The United States. Clinton Young has been convicted to for two capital murders, which occurred in November 2001. Since then he has been on Death Row for more than 16 years. In 2017 his execution was halted a week before he was set to die after new scientific evidence and witness statements were presented.

Merel Pontier studied criminal law at the Erasmus School of Law and works for the prosecutor’s office in The Netherlands. After working at a law firm specialized in capital punishment in The United States, working on numerous capital cases and visiting clients on death row, she entered the Clinton Young Foundation in 2017 as a board member. The goal of this foundation is to raise awareness of injustices in death penalty cases and to prevent the execution of death row inmates in The United States by offering and spreading relevant information, doing research, and providing financial resources and legal assistance.

The program will be moderated by Dr Jolande uit Beijerse (Associate Professor Criminal Law and Criminal Procedure). After the lecture, there will be room for discussion.

This program is a collaboration between the JFR (Juridical Study Association Rotterdam) and Studium Generale. The programme will be in English and reservations are recommended via this link.