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ADP marked the organization’s 45th anniversary October 27, 2007 with an award banquet at the Catholic Pastoral Center in Des Moines. Dennis Fritz, author of Journey Toward Justice. Exonerated from a life-sentence for a rape and murder he did not commit, Fritz shared his story – made famous by John Grisham in The Innocent Man – with more than 150 people at the IADP banquet and also with groups at the University of Iowa College of Law, the Drake
University Law School, St. Catherine of Sienna Catholic Student Center in Des Moines and at the Coralville and West Des Moines Barnes and Noble
Booksellers.

The event honored four individuals with the second Gov Harold E. Hughes Award for their advocacy work in helping maintain Iowa’s position as a non-death penalty state. The recipients were Gov. Tom Vilsack, University of Iowa law professor David Baldus, Des Moines attorney James Benzoni, and the late Sen. John Ely.

“Each of these individuals has worked valiantly to keep Iowa from reinstating the death penalty and they deserve our recognition,” said IADP president, Dennis Barnum of Gowrie, Iowa.

On October 18, 2009 Rev. Carroll Pickett, a retired Texas death row chaplain spoke to a gathering at First Christian Church in Des Moines. The event was co-sponsored by IADP and Amnesty International 277.

Rev. Carroll Pickett spent fifteen years as the death house chaplain at “The Walls,” the Huntsville unit of the Texas prison system. There he ministered to 95 men before they were put to death by lethal injection. Rev. Pickett was featured in the award-winning documentary At the Death House Door and is the author of the acclaimed memoir, Within These Walls, an eloquent, unflinching look at his intensely personal exposure to capital punishment. This firsthand experience gave him unique insight to write an impassioned statement on the realities of capital punishment in America and about the dark world of prison society. Rev. Pickett is today an outspoken anti-death penalty activist. He is retired from the Department of Corrections but still preaches near Huntsville, Texas.

On day following his IADP/AI appearance, Rev. Pickett spent 90 minutes in a lively debate of the death penalty with Jan Mickelson on his WHO radio call in show. While not fully “converting” Mr. Mickelson, Rev. Pickett did get him to agree that executing innocent people was not acceptable. Following the interview, Mr. Mickelson was interested enough in the topic to ask for and obtain a copy of Rev. Pickett’s book Within These Walls and a copy of the video “At the Death House Door.”

Following his radio appearance, Rev. Pickett was the guest speaker for three senior and two sophomore religion classes at Dowling Catholic High School in West Des Moines. He said that he really enjoyed his interactions with the students. One of the more compelling things he did was to ask how many in his audience were seventeen. After seeing the hands go up, Rev. Pickett then proceeded to tell the classes that the second person he accompanied to the death chamber was a young man who committed his crime at age seventeen, but that the US Supreme Court has since outlawed the death penalty for juveniles. This appeared to make the topic much more relevant and real to the young people listening to his presentation.

Iowans Against the Death Penalty (IADP) is an independent, non-partisan, non-sectarian, grass-roots organization committed to preventing reinstatement of the death penalty in Iowa through public education and political activism.

IADP publishes an occasional newsletter, The Watch; sponsors public events around Iowa; and engages in active lobbying when death penalty legislation is pending in the Legislature.

IADP was founded in 1962 and was instrumental in promoting the repeal of Iowa’s death penalty in 1965. In 1990 the organization was reconstituted in response to an initiative in the Iowa Legislature to reinstate the death penalty in Iowa. Since that time IADP has worked to bring together the voices of Iowans from all walks of life and religious and secular traditions who stand in opposition to the death penalty. Legislative proposals to reinstate the death penalty in Iowa were defeated in 1991, 1995, 1997, and 1998.

Iowans Against the Death Penalty Fund (IADPF) was formed in 1990 as a non-profit organization eligible to receive tax-exempt contributions that can be spent only on educational and charitable projects. In 1997 IADPF was granted exemption from federal income tax under section 501(c)(3). The Fund supports educational material associated with the death penalty and has reimbursed IADP for a portion of its newsletter costs.