AUDIO: ARKANSAS CAN'T FIND ENOUGH PEOPLE WHO WANT TO WITNESS EIGHT UPCOMING EXECUTIONS
Arkansas lawmakers are struggling to find enough volunteers to watch eight death row inmate executions scheduled in April. State law requires 6 to 12 witnesses per execution to ensure that it’s carried out, but there’s a shortage of people willing to watch. The Director of the Arkansas Department of Correction even hosted a presentation at a Little Rock Rotary Club meeting Tuesday evening, and then casually asked the audience to volunteer as citizen witnesses. There was a little laugh from the audience because they thought she might be kidding, but, said one Rotarian, “it quickly became obvious that she was not kidding.”
* She was dead serious.
* Come on, there’s cookies and fruit punch afterwards, I bet.
* “This sounds like a job for … Craigslist!”
* Rotary club? They should be talking to biker gangs. Or the Young Republicans Club. Groups like that.
* They should hold an essay contest for applicants.
* Meh. Wear sunglasses and close your eyes.
* 8 executions in one month? What got into Arkansas?
* Who do they think they are? Texas?
* Man, how unpopular are you if they can’t even get anybody to care that you’re dying?
* Not a smart move announcing this. Every morbid sicko in the world is heading to Arkansas now.
CLIP: Ben Stein from “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” looks for volunteers.
