Presidential contender Bob Graham of Florida has put his presidential run on hold while he has heart surgery.

We're opposed to Graham. Why? He's a fervent supporter of the death penalty. Per reporter David Firestone in the New York Times this past Sunday:

Mr. Graham, who came to prominence in Florida through his full-throated support for capital punishment, echoed that thought in an interview last week. "The trouble with a moratorium is that it applies to the full population of death row, where I think the focus should be on a case-by-case basis," he said. "Apparently, Illinois had some very egregious practices, but I think in Florida we have a system with adequate checks and gateposts."

It's tough to square that view with the news today about the release of Rudolph Holton, who spent 16 years on Florida's death row. From the AP article:

Holton was convicted of raping and killing 17-year-old prostitute Katrina Graddy and setting her on fire in an abandoned drug house. About 10 days before the slaying, Graddy told police another man had raped her. Holton's attorney was not given the police report. Because of that error, Florida's Supreme Court ruled in December that Holton deserved a new trial.

But prosecutor Mark Ober decided against another trial, citing the unreliability of witness testimony and a lack of physical evidence. Holton attorney Martin McClain said: "Though we are certainly pleased that the state attorney has dropped the charges, this does not change the awful fact that Rudolph Holton served over 16 years on death row for a crime that he did not commit."

McClain said that in addition to the failure to turn over the police report, were other problems with the case. A hair in Graddy's mouth that prosecutors said came from Holton was later tested and found to be her own, he said. Also, jailhouse witnesses recanted their testimony against Holton.

Between 23 and 25 innocent people have been freed from Florida's death row since 1976, according to varying tallies. The AP article above reports that Holton becomes the second person to be released from Florida's death row in about a year. Juan Melendez walked out of prison a free man last January after he won a new trial and prosecutors declined to try him again. In 2000, DNA evidence cleared death row inmate Frank Lee Smith of a 1985 murder. But it was too late for Smith, who had died of cancer 11 months earlier."

This is not " "Adequate checks and gateposts'' to us. Can Graham really think because some mistakes were caught, they've gotten them all? We wish him well with his heart surgery, but he's not our candidate.