Puerto Ricans Angry That U.S. Overrode Death Penalty Ban

[Theophylact]

From the New York Times (FRYYY):

By ADAM LIPTAK

SAN JUAN, P.R., July 15 — This island, it is safe to say, hates capital punishment. It has not had an execution since 1927. It outlawed the practice two years later and wrote this antipathy into its Constitution in 1952: "The death penalty shall not exist."

That is why a federal trial here, in which the Justice Department is seeking the execution of two men accused of kidnapping and murder, has left many Puerto Ricans baffled and angry.

Local politicians, members of the legal establishment, scholars and ordinary residents have denounced the trial, now in its second week. They call it a betrayal of the island's autonomy, culture and law, in particular its Constitution, which Congress approved in 1952 as part of the compact that created Puerto Rico's unusual and frequently uneasy association with the United States mainland.

I thought Ashcroft supported states' rights. Oh, wait... PR isn't a state...

[Epidemic]

I believe federal trials run under their own rules beyond state rules. This is how they work many hate crime legislations is it not?

On a side note, Personally I go for the Ship or get off the pot as far as PR goes. State or country which ever they want, it is but all or nothing IMO.