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A Victims-of-Law
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March 2010
FLORIDA
Loveseat to Hot Seat?: Prosecutor Faces Renewed Probe
Over Cozyness With Judge in Death Case
By
Jordana Mishory | Daily Business Review | New York Lawyer
03-05-10 --
The Florida Bar reopened a misconduct complaint against
Plantation attorney Howard Scheinberg on Thursday after the
state produced new records tying him to Broward Circuit Judge
Ana Gardiner while he was prosecuting a murder suspect facing
the death penalty. . . . The Bar found no probable cause, for
lack of evidence, against Scheinberg last May but reopened the
case a day after the state judicial ethics watchdog accused
Gardiner of starting a “close personal relationship” with
Scheinberg during the trial that resulted in a death sentence
for Omar Loureiro.
TEXAS
Judge declares death penalty unconstitutional
© 2010
The Associated Press, Houston Chronicle
03-04-10 --
A state district judge in Houston has granted a pretrial motion
declaring the death penalty unconstitutional, a decision that the
Texas attorney general called "an act of unabashed judicial
activism." . . . The motion was one of many submitted by defense
attorneys Bob Loper and Casey Keirnan arguing Texas' death penalty
is unconstitutional for their client, John Edward Green Jr., the
Houston Chronicle reported Thursday. . . . State District Judge
Kevin Fine said in his ruling that it is safe to assume innocent
people have been executed. . . . "Are you willing to have your
brother, your father, your mother be the sacrificial lamb, to be the
innocent person executed so that we can have a death penalty so that
we can execute those who are deserving of the death penalty?" he
said. "I don't think society's mindset is that way now."
KANSAS
Appeals keep executions a
long way off
By
Scott Rothschild, Lawrence Journal-World
03-01-10 --
Kansas legislators recently completed an exhaustive review of
the death penalty that resulted in a 20-20 vote in the Senate
that left capital punishment on the books. . . . But an actual
execution in Kansas of someone on Death Row won’t happen for
years, if ever. . . . “It’s impossible to determine” when an
execution will be carried out, said Rebecca Woodman, who is an
attorney with the Capital Appellate Defender Office for the
State Board of Indigents’ Defense Services. “It could be years.
It could be never,” she said. . . . Kansas reinstated the death
penalty in 1994. Since then, 12 men have been sentenced to
death. Of those, one sentence was removed at the request of the
district attorney, two have had their sentences vacated by the
Kansas Supreme Court and others remain in the early stages of
appeals. . . . The appeals process in death penalty cases is
greater than any other. . . . A death sentence triggers a
mandatory review by the Kansas Supreme Court. After that there
are other avenues of review, and then there are appeals before
the federal judiciary, all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.
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NEW
JERSEY
Accused NJ lawyer won't face death penalty
The
Associated Press, phillyBurbs.com
02-28-10 --
Federal prosecutors won't seek the death penalty for a New
Jersey defense attorney accused of arranging the murder of one
witness and trying to set up the murder of another. . . . The
decision in the case against Paul Bergrin, a former federal
prosecutor, was made by U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder.
Bergrin remains in the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn
to await trial. . . . "Obviously, he's relieved," Lawrence
Lustberg, one of Bergrin's attorneys, told the Asbury Park Press
of Neptune. "He still recognizes that while the death penalty is
off the table, his life is on the line. If he is convicted of a
number of these allegations, he could spend the rest of his life
in prison."
INTERNTIONAL
4th World Congress on the
Death Penalty Meets In Geneva
Death Penalty Information Center
02-26-10 --
Over 1,000 human rights
activists from over 100 countries gathered in Geneva,
Switzerland, for the 4th World Congress Against the Death
Penalty. Many participants hope to achieve a moratorium on the
imposition and execution of the death penalty around the world.
At present, 56 states and territories still have the death
penalty, including China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, North Korea and
the United States. In 2007, the UN General Assembly adopted a
resolution calling for a moratorium on the death penalty. In
recent years, the number of countries that have repealed
capital punishment has been accelerating. The World Congress
issued a resolution on February 26, calling for a series of
steps toward ending the death penalty: "We call, from the host
city of international organizations and a symbol of peace . .
.[for] the universal abolition of capital punishment."
TEXAS
Texas Death Sentence
Overturned, But Conflicts of Interest Remain
Death Penalty Information Center
02-25-10 --
On February 24, the Texas
Court of Criminal Appeals overturned the death sentence of
Charles Dean Hood because the jury was improperly instructed
about potentially mitigating evidence at his trial. Hood's case
more recently made national news when a prior extramarital
affair between the trial judge and the prosecutor was revealed.
In 2008, even after the judge and the prosecutor admitted to
their intimate relationship, the Court of Criminal Appeals
concluded that Hood should be executed anyway. Hood's attorneys
have recently petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to review the
conflict of interest in this case. Twenty-one former judges and
prosecutors and 30 legal ethics experts have filed amicus briefs
stating that the relationship between the judge and the
prosecutor severely undermined the integrity of the proceedings.
The Court has yet to act on the request, which could result in a
new trial on guilt, as well as on sentencing, as now required by
the Court of Criminal Appeals for other reasons.
New Voices:
Head of Rutherford Institute Cautions Against Expansion of Death
Penalty
Death Penalty Information Center
02-24-10 --
John Whitehead, president
of the conservative Rutherford Institute, recently voiced
concerns in the Huffington Post about expanding the death
penalty in Virginia. He noted, "As capital punishment studies
have shown, whether or not you are sentenced to death often has
little to do with the crime committed and everything to do with
your race, where you live, and who prosecutes your case."
Whitehead cited several reasons for not expanding the death
penalty, including the risk of executing the innocent, the
opening to prosecutorial overreach, the lack of a deterrent
effect from the death penalty and its high costs. He cited Death
Penalty Information Center data that showed the murder rate in
states without the death penalty was nearly 40% lower than in
states with the death penalty. The expansion bill was defeated
in a Virginia Senate committee
TEXAS
Appeals Court Reverses Death Sentence, Doesn’t Mention
Judge-Prosecutor Affair
By
Martha Neil, ABA Journal
02-24-10 --
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has reversed the death sentence
for a convicted double murderer who was nearly executed in 2008
before the state
ran of out time to perform the lethal injection. . . .
But in determining that Charles Dean Hood should be resentenced, the
court makes no mention of a
now-admitted affair between the judge and the prosecutor
in his case that created a legal ethics ruckus when it became known
years later, according to the
Associated Press. . . . The court finds, in a split
decision today, that mitigating evidence not presented to jurors
requires that Hood be resentenced, according to the
Dallas Morning News. That evidence includes allegations
that Hood was abused as a child.
TEXAS
Supreme Court Reinstates
Texas Death Verdict
Death Penalty Information Center
02-23-10 --
On February 22, the U.S.
Supreme Court agreed to hear, and then summarily reversed, a
federal appeals court decision that would have given a Texas
defendant a new trial based on improper jury selection. The U.S.
Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit had ruled that Anthony
Haynes should be retried or released because a prospective juror
was improperly excluded based on the juror's race. Two different
judges had presided over the jury selection; one actually
observed the juror's demeanor during questioning, and the second
listened to the prosecution's explanation for excluding this
juror. The Fifth Circuit said that the second judge's decision
was not entitled to special deference because he had not
observed the actual juror. But the U.S. Supreme Court, in a per
curiam decision, held that the lower court had misinterpreted
its prior rulings, and deference should have been accorded to
the judge's decision. The high court's ruling did not exclude a
review of the juror's exclusion under the proper standard.
KANSAS
Kansas Senators Equally
Divided on Repealing Death Penalty
Death Penalty Information Center
02-22-10 --
A bill that would have
ended the death penalty in Kansas lost by a tie vote of 20-20 in
the state Senate on February 19. The bill would have replaced
the death penalty with a sentence of life without parole.
Republican Senator Carolyn McGinn, the original sponsor of the
legislation, argued for repeal, pointing to the high cost of the
death penalty: "It costs half a million dollars, or 70 percent
more, to try a death penalty case than a non-death penalty case
and yet the state hasn’t executed anyone since 1965. We’re not
executing anybody. Can we use this money to prevent future
heinous, horrible crimes? Can we use it to solve cold cases that
are up on the shelf for those families who don’t even know who
murdered their family member?" Sen. McGinn also based her
opposition to the death penalty on her respect-for-life
position: Those who have committed even heinous murders are
still children of God, she said. "Tell me, at what point in time
did they lose that status and who made that decision," she
asked. Twelve of the 20 senators who voted for repeal were
Republicans.
Death Penalty to be Put on Trial in London
Death Penalty
Information Center
02-19-10 --
Amicus, an organization based in the United Kingdom that assists
in the legal representation of those awaiting capital trials in
the United States, will be hosting a mock trial at the Emmanuel
Centre (pictured) in Westminster, London on Tuesday, March 2,
beginning at 6:30 PM. The question is whether the death penalty
in the U.S. perverts the course of justice. The trial will be
presided over by Lord Woolf, Geoffrey Robertson, QC, and Sir
Louis Blom-Cooper, QC, and will feature prominent death penalty
experts including Prof. Paul Cassell (former federal prosecutor
and former law clerk to Justice Antonin Scalia), Prof. Robert
Blecker (NY Law School) and Kent Scheidegger (Criminal Justice
Legal Fdn.) defending the death penalty, and Prof. Julian
Killingley (Birmingham City Univ.), Rev. Cathy Harrington
(Murder Victims' Families for Reconciliation), and Nick
Trenticosta (Center for Equal Justice) prosecuting the death
penalty. The program hopes to raise awareness of issues
surrounding the application of the death penalty in the United
States. Click
here for more details about his event.
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A
Victims-of-Law Associate |
TEXAS
Both Sides Object to Special Master's Findings in Judge Sharon
Keller Case
Judge charged with failure to follow procedures related to
last-minute appeal of 2007 execution
Mary
Alice Robbins, Texas Lawyer
02-19-10 --
Prosecutors for the Texas State Commission on Judicial Conduct argue
in objections filed Wednesday that Texas Court of Criminal Appeals
Presiding Judge Sharon Keller's "willful and/or persistent conduct"
in the case of Michael Richard authorizes the commission to sanction
her. . . . Keller's conduct on the day the state executed Richard
was "clearly inconsistent with the proper performance of her duties"
and "cast public discredit on the judiciary and/or on the
administration of justice," Seana Willing, the commission's
executive director, and John J. "Mike" McKetta III, special counsel
for the commission's formal proceedings against Keller, write in
their objections. They were responding to the
findings of fact (pdf) that 37th District Judge David
Berchelmann Jr. of San Antonio, special master in In Re: Honorable
Sharon Keller,
submitted to the judicial conduct commission on Jan. 20.
TEXAS
Prominent attorneys seek Supreme Court review of
Hood death penalty case
Diane
Jennings/Reporter, Dallas Morning News (blog)
02-18-10 --
A former governor, a former district attorney, a former U.S.
attorney from North
Texas, and the former director of the FBI are among a
group of 21 lawyers who have
petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to hear a controversial
Texas death penalty case. . . . The group, which was organized by
the Constitution Project, is asking the court to hear the case of
Charles Dean Hood, who was sentenced to death for killing two people
in Collin County in 1989. Hood's case has garnered national
attention not for the horrific crime, but because the prosecutor in
the case had an intimate relationship with the judge.
GEORGIA
U.S. Supreme Court orders new look into 1993
rape-murder trial
Juror regrets racy candy that fed killer's appeal
By Bill
Torpy and Bill Rankin,
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
02-17-10 --
The U.S. Supreme Court had two options: Let killer Marcus Wellons’
execution go forward or try to get to the bottom of a bizarre
episode in American jurisprudence. . . . In 1993, after a wrenching
two-week trial, a Cobb County jury voted to sentence Wellons to
death for raping and strangling a 15-year-old girl on her way to
school. But after returning their verdict, jurors also did the
unimaginable, the high court was told in Wellons’ final appeal of
his conviction: They gave the judge a gag gift: erotic candy. . . .
In a 5-4 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court last month ordered the
federal appeals court in Atlanta to decide if Wellons had received a
fair trial in light of the “unusual events going on behind the
scenes.” . . . Capital trials “must be conducted with dignity and
respect,” the court’s majority said. “The disturbing facts of this
case raise serious questions concerning the conduct of the trial.” .
. . Among those questions: Who would send a judge — a woman to boot
— a chocolate penis after a disturbing rape/murder trial? And was it
evidence of an unseemly — and illegal — relationship between the
judge and jury, enough to warrant a new trial for a convicted
killer?
Books: Messages of Life from Death Row
Death Penalty
Information Center
02-17-10 --
Messages of Life from Death Row features
correspondence from Texas death row inmate Roger McGowen to
sociologist and writer Pierre Pradervand. McGowen’s letters
describe his life on death row and point to flaws in the
American criminal justice system, especially the arbitrary
nature of the death penalty. The publisher, BookSurge, said the
book offers a "unique juxtaposition of carefully selected texts
next to the heartfelt and memorable letters written by McGowen
... giv[ing] readers a historical, ethical and pragmatic
overview of American criminal justice as well as an inside view
of death row in Texas." Sister Helen Prejean, author of Dead
Man Walking, said, “This book of letters by a Texas death row
inmate, who for over twenty years has been claiming his
innocence, has a powerful message of unconditional love, dignity
and forgiveness. It has already touched and transformed
thousands via its French and Dutch versions. I cannot too warmly
recommend it.”
KANSAS
OP-EDS: "Kansas pretends its capital punishment system is
working"
Death Penalty
Information Center
02-16-10 --
Mike Hendricks, columnist for the Kansas City Star, recently
described how the state goes through the motions of having a
death penalty, but with no immediate prospect of its use after
16 years. Kansas reinstated the death penalty in 1994; eight
years ago, the Lansing Correctional Facility held an open house
for the media, showcasing its new death chamber. The room was
then sealed and has remained untouched. Ten prisoners await
execution, one of whom has been on death row for thirteen
years. “No one that I’m aware of is even close,” said Kansas
Department of Corrections spokesman Bill Miskell. Hendricks
wrote: "Wouldn't sentencing the worst killers to life without
chance of parole be a whole lot cheaper, simpler and - given the
cold-blooded nature of state executions - more morally
acceptable?" A bill to abolish the death penalty is currently
before the legislature. Read full text:
Read more
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SOUTH
DAKOTA
Death Penalty Repeal Bill Considered in South Dakota
Death Penalty
Information Center
02-15-10 --
A bill that would repeal the death penalty in South Dakota was
scheduled for a hearing in the House State Affairs Committee on
February 10. The bill, HB 1245, would mandate life imprisonment
without parole for people convicted of Class A felonies. South
Dakota has only executed one person in the last 50 years, and
currently has 3 people on death row. The bill is sponsored by
Rep. Gerald Lange (D-Madison), and strongly supported by the
Association of Christian Churches of South Dakota. Gene Miller,
Executive Director of the Association, said, "We don't have to
go that far back in our history to find, for example,
segregation laws. That made that legal, but it was never moral.
Our position on this would probably be similar to that: You can
make it legal, but that doesn't necessarily make it right."
(South Dakota is one of several states considering legislative
action regarding the death penalty this year. See DPIC's
Recent Legislative Activity page.)
David Dow's "The Autobiography of an Execution"
Death Penalty
Information Center
02-12-10 --
A new book by David Dow,
The Autobiography of an Execution, captures the author's
personal and legal experiences in representing over 100 inmates
on death row. The book is a personal memoir of Dow’s encounter
with the death penalty system, as he represents defendants and
witnesses their executions. Publisher’s Weekly called the book
“sobering, gripping and candid." Dahlia Lithwick of Slate said
it is "a powerful collage of the life of a death penalty
lawyer," in a NY Times book review (Feb. 14, 2010). . . . Dow, a
former death penalty supporter, is a professor of law at the
University of Houston Law Center and an internationally
recognized defense attorney. He is the founder and director of
the Texas Innocence Network.
PENNSYLVANIA
Editorials: Pennsylvania "Could Save by Ending Death
Penalty"
Death Penalty
Information Center
02-10-10 --
A recent editorial in Pennsylvania’s Patriot-News recommended
doing away with the death penalty as a way to address the state
budget crisis. "Problems are entrenched in the system and given
its high cost, Pennsylvania should definitely put the idea of
doing away with the death penalty on the table," the paper
wrote. Among the reasons cited was the fact that the death
penalty in Pennsylvania is essentially a very expensive form of
life without parole: "In Pennsylvania, with the exception of the
three prisoners who were executed, death row already means life
without parole. . . . the majority of death penalty cases in our
state that move through the appeals process end up as life
sentences or less." The editorial also noted the risk of
executing the innocent: "Of course, there is a competing reason,
or really a sounding alarm, that also is causing more states to
take a hard look at their death penalty. At least 139 death row
inmates have been released after their innocence was
established, including 6 in Pennsylvania. This should shake our
confidence."
KANSAS
Death Penalty Abolition Bill Nearing a Vote in Kansas
Death Penalty
Information Center
02-10-10 --
The Senate Judiciary
Committee in Kansas recently advanced (7-4) legislation that
would eliminate capital punishment in the state and replace it
with a sentence of life without parole. Kansas enacted its
current death penalty law in 1994, but has not executed anyone
for more than 40 years. There are currently ten men on the
state’s death row, though none are close to execution. The
abolition legislation, which was originally introduced by
Republican Sen. Carolyn McGinn to address the high costs of
capital punishment, would only apply to future cases. Senator
Tim Owens, chair of the Judiciary Committee, spoke of the bill's
importance, "This is truly life and death that we're talking
about. We need to have a vote." On January 29th, the 149th
anniversary of Kansas joining the union as a free state, Senator
David Haley (Kansas City-D) remarked in support of abolition,
“I'm reminded of what Kansas is, and what we stand for. We have
values in this chamber, and as a state, that I hope we live up
to." The bill will be voted on by the full Senate soon.
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SOUTH
CAROLINA
After 28 Years, Judge Spares Life of Inmate With Mental
Disabilities
Death Penalty
Information Center
02-09-10 --
Edward Lee Elmore, South Carolina’s longest-serving death row
inmate, was spared from execution when a state circuit court
ruled he suffered from mental retardation. The sentence
reversal came almost 28 years after Elmore was sent to death row
in 1982 for a sexual assault and murder, and 8 years after the
U.S. Supreme Court held in Atkins v. Virginia that the execution
of the mentally retarded is a cruel and unusual punishment, and
therefore violates the Eighth Amendment. The decision left
defining “mentally retarded” to individual states. Elmore failed
and repeated first grade twice, failed and completed second
grade once, and did not finish third grade until he was 12. He
then withdrew from fifth grade when he was 15. In 1971, at age
12, Elmore's IQ tested at 72 and 58 on separate tests.
Past President of Prestigious American Law Institute Says Death
Penalty "Unworkable"
Death Penalty
Information Center
02-08-10 --
Michael Traynor, President Emeritus of the prestigious American
Law Institute (ALI), called the ALI’s recent withdrawal of its
model death penalty law “a striking repudiation from the very
organization that provided the blueprint for death penalty laws
in this country.” He noted that the ALI had carefully reviewed
the death penalty process, and that "Now, after searching
analysis by our country's top legal minds, the institute has
concluded that the system it created does not work and cannot be
fixed." The ALI, with membership of more than 4,000 lawyers,
judges and law professors, is the leading independent
organization in the United States producing scholarly work to
clarify and improve the law. Its model penal code became the
prototype for death penalty laws across the United States after
the old state laws were struck down by the Supreme Court in
1972. Last fall, Traynor noted, the ALI withdrew its support for
the model death penalty law, effectively concluding that “we
cannot devise a death penalty system that will ensure fairness
in process or outcome, or even that innocent people will not be
executed.”
FLORIDA
Did Broward judge let emotions outweigh justice?
Lebow loses sight of big picture by tossing murder charge after
evidence mix-up
Michael
Mayo Sun-Sentinel News Columnist
02-08-10
-- After reading the
transcript of last week's courtroom folly that led to a first-degree
murder case getting tossed by Broward Circuit Judge Susan Lebow, two
things seem clear: . . . There were some heated exchanges between
Lebow and homicide prosecutor Gregg Rossman. . . . Lebow lost sight
of the bigger picture when she refused to grant a one-day delay
because of a snag with evidence in the case. Whatever her
frustrations with Rossman for his refusals to give an opening
statement or call a witness, and whatever scheduling issues she had,
throwing out the case seemed an abuse of her discretion. . . . "It's
not like this was a robbery," juror Mary Beth Albritton said Monday.
"This was a death-penalty murder case. I don't understand why we
couldn't have waited one more day. If it meant having to come in an
extra day, or coming back this week, I would have gladly done it." .
. . Even though defendant Jason Stone remains behind bars, possibly
for life for violating probation in a previous case, there was no
justice for victim Sheila Nieves' family. Nieves was killed and her
boyfriend was wounded in 2007, in what prosecutors say was a
marijuana deal gone bad. . . . "The judge was totally unreasonable,"
said Lydia Rodriguez, Nieves' aunt. "We've been waiting three years
for justice for my niece's death, and this is the way she gets
treated?" . . . How did Lebow let an ancillary clash — whether
procedural or personal — override a murder case that already had a
mistrial last year? It's hard to know Lebow's thinking because she
can't discuss cases outside court. . . . The State Attorney's Office
has appealed Lebow's ruling.
PENNSYLVANIA
Mumia Abu-Jamal’s Case Stuck in Legal Limbo
By
Dave Lindorff, The Public Record
02-08-10 --
The recent decision by the US Supreme Court to send convicted
police killer Mumia Abu-Jamal’s case back down to the Third
Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia, with instructions for
a three-judge panel there to reconsider its decision to uphold
the lifting of the prominent African-American journalist’s death
penalty, is only the latest in a long string of examples of how
courts at all levels have made special exceptions to precedent
in order to try and kill this particular prisoner. . . . .The
high court found on January 19, that Frank Spisak, a
self-described Nazi and killer of three in Ohio, had been
properly sentenced, because at the time the Ohio Supreme Court
affirmed his death penalty on appeal, “settled law” was that the
jury instructions given to his jury had been proper. And under
the terms of the 1995 Effective Death Penalty Act, federal
courts, including the Supreme Court, have to defer to the
judgements of state courts unless those courts’ decisions are
deemed “unreasonable.”
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CALIFORNIA
Federal judge breathes new life into 30-year-old death penalty
case from San Jose
By
Howard Mintz, mercurynews.com
02-07-10 --
Few of the nearly 700 inmates on California's death row have
awaited execution longer than Santa Clara County's Marvin Pete
Walker Jr. . . . But as he approaches three decades inside San
Quentin, Walker's long journey through the legal system has just
taken one more turn that could breathe new life into his effort
to overturn his death sentence and certainly prolong his legal
battle. . . . Last week, a federal judge ordered new hearings
into Walker's case, concluding that he has raised enough doubt
about the effectiveness of the lawyer who defended him in his
1980 trial that there must be a thorough inquiry into whether
his murder conviction and death sentence were tainted. . . .
Although state prosecutors insist Walker received a fair trial,
Oakland-based U.S. District Judge Saundra Brown Armstrong's
17-page ruling could send the case back to square one if she
concludes the defense lawyer's performance fell below
constitutional standards.
TEXAS
Texas Inmate Facing Execution
Denied DNA Testing
Death Penalty
Information Center
02-05-10 --
Henry Skinner is scheduled for execution in Texas on February 24
despite the lack of DNA testing of critical evidence from the
crime scene that could lead to his exoneration. Skinner has
always maintained his innocence of the 1993 murder of his
girlfriend and her two grown sons in Tampa, Texas. At his
trial, the prosecution presented the results of selective DNA
testing on some of the crime evidence that tended to prove
Skinner's presence at the scene, which was his place of
residence, a fact he has never disputed. But the state has
repeatedly refused his request to test other evidence, including
material found on the victim, that could point to another
suspect. In addition, an investigation by journalism students
from Northwestern University in 1999 and 2000 revealed that a
key witness from the trial had recanted her testimony linking
Skinner to the crime. Texas has already executed a number of
individuals who may have been
innocent, leaving
a cloud of doubt on the fairness of the criminal justice
system. By conducting relatively routine DNA tests before his
execution, the doubts surrounding Skinner's case could be
resolved one way or the other.
NEW
JERSEY
Medical Society of New Jersey
Urges AMA to Oppose Death Penalty
Death Penalty
Information Center
02-04-10 --
The Medical Society of New Jersey recently approved a resolution
calling upon the American Medical Association (AMA) to advocate
for the "abolition of capital punishment by each jurisdiction in
the United States of America ... and replace it with life in
prison without the possibility of parole." Among the stated
rationales for the resolution, the society noted that "Numerous
reports document pernicious and recurring errors and other
fallibilities associated with the judicial process of capital
punishment as currently imposed that include flawed testimony
provided by medical scientists." The Society also pointed to the
fact that New Jersey had recently abolished the death penalty.
Currently, the American Medical Association Code of Medical
Ethics states: "A physician, as a member of a profession
dedicated to preserving life when there is hope of doing so,
should not be a participant in a legally authorized execution."
The New Jersey delegation is scheduled to speak for the
resolution at the AMA's annual meeting in June 2010.
TEXAS
Prosecutors in Texas Cite
High Costs and Uncertainty as Reasons for Less Use of Death
Penalty
Death Penalty
Information Center
02-03-10 --
More prosecutors in Texas are opting not to seek the death
penalty, according to Randall County District Attorney James
Farren, a trend that has been evident over the last decade and
will likely continue. Many prosecutors weigh the uncertainty in
securing a death sentence against the high litigation costs as
reasons for opting for other alternative sentences even when the
death penalty is available. "The facts of the case are a
tremendous factor in the decision on whether to pursue a death
penalty or not," said District Attorney Randall Sims of the 47th
judicial district. "You need to have a dead-bang cinch
guilt-innocence case and one that you'll prove very easily the
person on trial is the person who did it." . . . Farren points
to the case of Levi King as the "quintessential example" of why
district attorneys do not seek the death penalty in some cases.
District Attorney Lynn Switzer of the 31st judicial district
opted to pursue a death sentence against King, who was accused
of killing three people in 2005. Even though he pleaded guilty
to the crimes, the jury did not impose the death penalty.
Switzer's office spent over $750,000 to bring King to trial,
about 10% of the county's annual budget. The cost of the trial
was a reason why county commissioners were forced to raise taxes
and withhold employee raises last year.
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Resources on the
Death Penalty for Communities of Faith
Death
Penalty Information Center
02-02-10 --
The Death Penalty Information Center has recently
updated its information packet entitled "Death
Penalty Resources for Communities of Faith."
This packet was initially developed to help a wide
spectrum of religious groups address the death penalty
by providing information, discussion questions, and
multi-media resources. These materials offer a framework
useful for any discussion of capital punishment and do
not directly involve religious or moral instructions.
Each packet contains a CD with statements on the death
penalty from various religious denominations, death
penalty fact sheets in English and Spanish, and answers
to questions about the death penalty. It also includes
video clips, bulletin inserts, and discussion guides on
four key death penalty issues: Innocence, Race, Victims
and Costs. . . . The packet has been praised by such
religious leaders as Bill Mefford of the United
Methodist Church, Rabbi Leonard Beerman, and Sister
Helen Prejean, who said, "The death penalty is one of
the most critical issues of our time, and people of all
faiths should contribute to the dialogue. The Death
Penalty Information Center has rendered a wonderful
service by offering religious leaders the key tools they
need for raising this issue with their congregations.”
|
DELAWARE
Court upholds state's death penalty
After three-year delay, judges allows executions to resume
By Sean
O'Sullivan • The News Journal of Wilmington
02-02-10 --
Delaware's death penalty was upheld as constitutional on Monday,
paving the way for executions -- on hold since May 2006 -- to
resume. . . . Delaware Attorney General Beau Biden said Monday he
was pleased the court ruled that Delaware is meeting its
constitutional obligations and that his office will be working with
Superior Court to begin "scheduling executions as appropriate." . .
. Biden said the three-year delay "caused uncertainty, and I'm glad
this has resolved that uncertainty." . . . In its 47-page opinion,
the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals warned Delaware about "the
worrisome course it appears to have taken at times" in executions.
TEXAS
No Further Punishment
Recommended for Presiding Judge Who Closed Door on Death
Penalty Appeal
Death
Penalty Information Center
02-01-10 --
On January 20, a special master appointed to review the
conduct of an appeals court judge who would not order
her court to stay open late to receive a death penalty
appeal, concluded that her conduct did not merit removal
from office. Special Master David Berchelmann of San
Antonio found that the action of Judge Sharon Keller,
Presiding Judge of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals,
"does not warrant removal from office or further
reprimand beyond the public humiliation she has surely
suffered." Partly as a result of Judge Keller's refusal
to keep the court open beyond 5 pm, Michael Richard's
appeal was not filed and he was executed the same day.
Richard's attorneys had asked that the court stay open
late to receive their appeal that had been delayed by
computer problems. The appeal challenged Texas' lethal
injection process in light of an announcement by the
U.S. Supreme Court that same day. All other inmates
around the country were routinely granted stays of
execution after that day while the Supreme Court
considered the constitutionality of lethal injection.
Judge Berchelmann's findings will be sent to the
judicial conduct commission to decide whether any
further action is warranted. |
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January 2010
Parade Magazine: The Cost of Capital Punishment
Death Penalty Information Center
01-29-10 --
A recent article in Parade magazine looked at the cost of the
death penalty, especially in light of the budgetary crises
confronting most states in today's economy. New Mexico and New
Jersey recently abolished the death penalty, and costs played a
significant role in their decisions. New Mexico State Rep. Gail
Chasey (D., Albuquerque) noted, “We can put that money toward
enhancing law enforcement, public works, you name it." In New
Jersey a commission found that using the alternative sentence of
life without parole would save the state $1.3 million per inmate
in incarceration costs alone because a death row facility
requires more personnel to operate. Finally, a recent study in
North Carolina found that the state could save at least $11
million a year by repealing the death penalty. . . . In 2009, 52
prisoners (out of the total 3,279 on death row across the
country) were executed. “People tend to think, ‘Oh, you get the
death penalty, then there’s an execution,’” said Richard Dieter,
executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center in
Washington, D.C. “But more often than not, the death penalty
turns out to be a very expensive form of life imprisonment."
Read full text below.
Read more
Books: "Capital Punishment On Trial"
Death Penalty Information Center
01-28-10 --
A new book by David
Oshinsky entitled "Capital Punishment on Trial: Furman v.
Georgia and the Death Penalty in Modern America" takes a
closer look at the groundbreaking Supreme Court case that
stopped the death penalty in 1972. The author, a Pulitzer
Prize-winning historian who is the holder of the Jack S. Blanton
Chair at the University of Texas and a visiting professor at New
York University, discusses the debates and controversy
surrounding the case of Furman v. Georgia, including a focus on
the issues of racial prejudice and arbitrariness. Austin Sarat
called the book "A meticulously researched and elegantly written
account by a masterful storyteller.... Filled with striking
insights." The book will be published by University Press of
Kansas on April 14, 2010.
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NORTH
CAROLINA
Declining Use of Death Penalty in North Carolina Challenges
Wisdom of Retaining Costly Practice
Death Penalty Information Center
01-27-10 --
In an opinion piece in the News & Observer, Professor Frank
Baumgartner of the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill,
recently wrote that the declining use and high costs of the
death penalty in the state put into question the wisdom of
retaining the punishment in North Carolina. Baumgartner noted
that while murder rates in the state have remained relatively
unchanged, the number of capital punishment trials and death
sentences have declined sharply. Prosecutors formerly sought the
death penalty in 10%-12% of all murders but now seek it in less
than 2% of the cases. Juries have likewise moved away from
imposing death sentences. In 1996, 57% of all death penalty
trials ended with the death penalty, a stark difference from the
8% in 2008. . . . Baumgartner cited a recent report by Duke
University economist Philip Cook that estimated a statewide
savings of $11 million annually if North Carolina abolished the
death penalty. Baumgartner wrote, "Considering that prosecutors
have been requesting death less and less, and that juries have
been even more sparing in their willingness to impose it, Cook's
estimate takes on additional meaning. If we can save that much
money by making such a small change from current practices, why
not?" Read full text below.
Read more
UTAH
House committee passes bill
that would limit death-row appeals
By
Pamela Manson, The Salt Lake Tribune
01-27-10 --
A proposed change in state law designed to reduce appeals in
criminal cases, especially those filed by death-row inmates, got
a favorable recommendation Wednesday by the House Law
Enforcement and Criminal Justice Committee. . . . The 10-0 vote
moves the measure to the full House. . . . House Bill 19 tweaks
the Post-Conviction Remedies Act, which limits the claims that
defendants can raise after they have been convicted and lost an
initial appeal. . . . The bill would allow a state court judge
to dismiss a petition for post-conviction relief on a procedural
basis, such as missing a filing deadline, without assessing the
merits of the appeal. Both the act and the bill's proposed
change allow an exemption for defendants claiming their lawyers
provided ineffective assistance.
New Voices: Conservative Leaders Call for End to Death
Penalty
Death Penalty Information Center
01-26-10 --
Roy Brown, state senator and 2008 Republican nominee for
governor of Montana, said that opposition to capital punishment
aligns well with his conservative ideology. He is reaching out
to social and fiscal conservatives, hoping to create a
bipartisan movement against capital punishment. Brown noted, "I
believe that life is precious from the womb to a natural death."
He continued, "Criminals should be prosecuted. I want it to be
life without parole. In the long run, that's much cheaper."
Richard Viguerie, a fundraiser and activist considered by some
to be the father of the modern conservative movement, recently
wrote an article for Sojourners magazine noting that flaws in
the criminal justice system show the risk that an innocent
person has been put to death. He said, "[D]eath row inmates have
been exonerated by DNA evidence, raising the prospect that
prosecutors and juries made mistakes in cases without scientific
evidence and in cases that predate the science."
INDIANA
New Voices: Indiana Prosecutors Seeking Death Penalty Less
Death Penalty Information Center
01-25-10 --
Higher costs, the exoneration of innocent death row inmates and
jurors’ expectation of DNA proof are all being cited as reasons
for prosecutors deciding not to seek the death penalty in
Indiana. Recently, a high profile death penalty case cost the
state $800,000 before it dropped the death penalty in exchange
for a guilty plea and life-without-parole sentence. "It's the
taxpayer dollars, stupid, when it comes to the death penalty,"
said Indiana defense attorney Bob Hammerle. "We've got a
governor who says we don't have enough money to pay for higher
education. What sense does it make to spend millions of dollars
trying to execute someone when it's cheaper to keep someone in
jail for the rest of their life?" Adding to the decline in the
use of the death penalty, Steve Johnson, Executive Director of
the Indiana Prosecuting Attorney’s Council, pointed to jurors’
reluctance to hand down death sentences. "I think there's a
greater hesitancy to pursue it and file it by prosecutors," said
Johnson. "I think among our group we talk about the CSI effect
and if we don't have the DNA--if we don't have the physical
evidence--I think juries tend to think that given the higher
standard of proof that may apply anyway, that maybe this isn't
the strongest case of the death penalty." See video below.
Read more
PENNSYLVANIA
Death row inmates stay indefinitely
No
one has been executed in Pennsylvania since 1999
By
Torsten Ove, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
01-25-10 --
Richard Baumhammers and Ronald Taylor have a lot in common. . . .
Both are racially motivated mass killers who slaughtered innocents
within a month of each other a decade ago, Mr. Baumhammers targeting
minorities and Mr. Taylor targeting whites. . . . Both are on death
row. . . . And neither is likely to be executed for many years, if
ever. . . . Gov. Ed Rendell signed a death warrant for Mr.
Baumhammers, 44, last week, but he admitted the execution isn't
likely to happen on March 18, the scheduled date for lethal
injection. . . . That's because the state has what the governor
calls a "de facto" moratorium on executions.
Supreme Court Upholds Death Sentence Despite Unexplored Evidence
of Mental Retardation
Death Penalty Information Center
01-22-10 --
On January 20, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed the death
sentence for Holly Wood for the 1993 shooting of his former
girlfriend in Alabama, despite the fact that the attorney
working on the penalty phase of the case failed to investigate
or tell the jury about Wood's borderline mental retardation. A
federal District Court had overturned his death sentence because
of the inadequate performance of the inexperienced lawyer,
although other lawyers working on the case had seen a report on
Wood's mental status and did not use it. There was ample other
evidence indicating Wood had an IQ of less than 70 and had been
classified as mentally retarded that was not pursued by any of
the attorneys. The Supreme Court opinion, written by Justice
Sonia Sotomayor, agreed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the
Eleventh Circuit that Wood failed to show that the lawyers were
constitutionally ineffective. The Court stated, "[T]he state
court’s conclusion that Wood’s counsel made a strategic decision
not to pursue or present evidence of his mental deficiencies was
not an unreasonable determination of the facts." Justice John
Paul Stevens, in a dissenting opinion joined by Justice Anthony
Kennedy, noted, "There is a world of difference between a
decision not to introduce evidence at the guilt phase of a trial
and a failure to investigate mitigating evidence that might be
admissible at the penalty phase… the only reasonable factual
conclusion I can draw from this record is that counsel’s
decision to do so was the result of inattention and neglect."
Supreme Court Underscores the Need for "Dignity and Respect" in
Capital Cases--Reverses Judgment
Death Penalty Information Center
01-21-10 --
On January 19, the U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari and
reversed the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit in
Wellons v. Hall, ordering the lower court to re-examine the
appeal of Marcus Wellons, who received the death penalty for a
1989 rape and murder in Georgia. The Court's per curiam opinion
described "unusual events going on behind the scenes" at Wellons'
trial, including contacts outside the courtroom between the jury
and the judge, and the fact that some jury members gave the
trial judge and bailiff provocative gifts. The Supreme Court
rejected the 11th Circuit's opinion that Wellons's claims of
misconduct were merely speculation. The Court's opinion stated,
"From beginning to end, judicial proceedings conducted for the
purpose of deciding whether a defendant shall be put to death
must be conducted with dignity and respect. The disturbing facts
of this case raise serious questions concerning the conduct of
the trial, and this petition raises a serious question about
whether the Court of Appeals carefully reviewed those facts
before addressing petitioner’s constitutional claims." (emphasis
added).
FLORIDA
After Almost 30 Years, Florida Supreme Court Overturns Death
Sentence in Case "Rife with Misconduct"
Death Penalty Information Center
01-20-10 --
On January 14, and almost 30 years after the crime, the Florida
Supreme Court criticized the state for "lawless conduct" and
vacated the death sentence of Paul Beasley Johnson because "the
record here is so rife with evidence of previously undisclosed
prosecutorial misconduct that we have no choice but to grant
relief." Because of popular sentiment and the notoriety of the
crime, Governor Charlie Crist signed a death warrant for Johnson
in 2009 even though Johnson's legal issues were still pending on
appeal. The Florida Court said that the governor's action put
them in a difficult position. Johnson was found guilty of the
murder of a Polk County sheriff's deputy and two others in
January of 1981. The state induced Johnson to make incriminating
statements to a jailhouse informant, then used the testimony at
his trial, even though they knew it was inadmissible. Former
assistant state attorney Hardy Pickard, who was the original
prosecutor in Johnson's case, was aware that the informant was
acting on behalf of the sheriff's investigator despite the claim
that the informant acted on his own. Even though the informant's
testimony was initially suppressed, Pickard used false testimony
and misleading argument to allow the informant to testify.
Commenting on the state's behavior, the Florida Court wrote, "It
must be emphasized that in our American legal system there is no
room for such misconduct, no matter how disturbing a crime may
be or how unsympathetic a defendant is. Lawlessness by a
defendant never justifies lawless conduct at trial."
UNITED
STATES SUPREME COURT
High court ruling in Mumia case
By
Michael Hinkelman, Philadelphia Daily News
01-20-10 --
The U.S. Supreme Court yesterday tossed out a 2008 ruling by the
U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals that death-row inmate Mumia
Abu-Jamal deserved a new sentencing hearing. . . . Abu-Jamal, 55,
has been on Pennsylvania's death row since his 1982 conviction in
the killing of Philadelphia Police Officer Daniel Faulkner on Dec.
9, 1981. . . . The high court said in a one-paragraph order that
they were sending the case back to the appeals court "for further
consideration" in light of a ruling last week in an Ohio
death-penalty case. . . . That case - which involved convicted
murderer and neo-Nazi Frank Spisak - raised similar sentencing
issues that were cited by the appeals court in the Abu-Jamal case in
2008.
ALABAMA
Court upholds death sentence for Ala. man
The
Associated Press, Atlanta Journal Constitution
01-20-10 --
The Supreme Court on Wednesday upheld the death sentence of a
mentally impaired Alabama man who killed his former lover. . . .
The court, in a 7-2 vote, refused to overturn the death sentence
of Holly Wood, who was convicted in the shooting death of his
former girlfriend, Ruby Lois Gosha, in 1993. She was killed by a
shotgun blast to her head as she slept in her home in Troy, Ala.
. . . A federal judge had tossed out the death sentence on the
basis of the poor performance of Wood's lawyer in the sentencing
phase of his trial. The lawyer, described in court papers as
lacking criminal law experience, failed to tell jurors that Wood
had an IQ of less than 70 and had been classified as mentally
retarded.
ARKANSAS
Judge overturns death penalty of man in Jonesboro
By
Keith Inman, Pine Bluff Commercial
01-20-10 --
A Craighead County Circuit Court judge has overturned the death
penalty of a man convicted of killing his ex-girlfriend in
Jonesboro and sentenced him to life in prison. . . . Judge David
Burnett ruled that Robert Robbins' request for post-conviction
relief was without merit but indicated is own misgivings about
the sentence. . . . Robbins, now 30, was 18 when he received the
death sentence. . . . "However, the court is persuaded that the
interest of justice would warrant a reduction of the death
sentence to a sentence of life without the possibility of parole
due to the age of the defendant and the lack of mitigation in
the sentencing phase of the trial," Burnett wrote in his order.
. . . Burnett said there was no doubt that Robbins was guilty of
the murder.
Defense attorney's death
penalty book a compelling read for opponents and supporters
Diane Jennings/Reporter
01-19-10 --
I've never met David Dow, a University of Houston law professor
who serves as litigation director for the Texas Defender
Service. But I've known him as a voice on the phone for more
than a decade, listening to him talk passionately about the
death penalty in Texas. . . . In February everyone will have a
chance to know him through his intensely personal memoir,
The Autobiography of an Execution. . . . Dow has written
books about capital punishment before but his previous efforts
were clinical. The Autobiography of an Execution, published by
Twelve Books to be in bookstores next month, is startlingly
revealing, offering insight how the legal system works, and into
the personal toll it takes to represent the worst of the worst.
. . . For instance, Dow writes about missing Halloween with his
young son one year because an execution was delayed. How do you
tell your son he missed going to the haunted house in his Thomas
the Tank costume because you were trying to stop a lethal
injection?
NEVADA
Federal judge grants stay of execution of Nevada inmate who also
was spared in 2005
Ken
Ritter Associated Press Writer, Los Angeles Times
01-18-10 --
The upcoming execution of a condemned Nevada inmate has been
stayed for a second time while he appeals to a federal court to
overturn state rulings in his case. . . . Robert Lee McConnell,
37, had been scheduled to die Feb. 1 after pleading guilty in
Washoe County District Court to the 2002 murder of Brian Pierce,
25, his ex-girlfriend's fiance. . . . McConnell's appeal was
expected after he was moved recently from the state's
maximum-security prison in Ely to death row at the Nevada State
Prison in Carson City, state corrections chief Howard Skolnik
said Monday. . . . McConnell came within 34 minutes of being
executed in 2005 after declaring he was ready to die then filing
an appeal that won him an immediate stay.
TEXAS
Editorials: A Decade of Progress on Death Penalty Justice
Death Penalty Information Center
01-18-10 --
A recent editorial in the Dallas Morning News recalled that the
paper had reversed its position in support of the death penalty
in April 2007. Since then, the editorial noted, Texas has
accounted for an even larger percentage of the country's
executions, but also that there are signs the use of the death
penalty is declining even in Texas. The paper highlighted the
55 exonerations from death row in this decade as a 25% increase
from last decade, and the sharp decline in the number of death
sentences compared to ten years ago. "These are all signs that
courts, prosecutors, politicians and the public are recognizing
the problems in our imperfect system of justice," the editorial
states. "This newspaper feels more strongly than ever that those
flaws are sufficiently widespread that the justice system cannot
be trusted to impose irreversible sentences of death." Read the
full editorial:
Read more
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CALIFORNIA
The Next Phase in California's Lethal Injection Protocol Review
Death Penalty Information Center
01-15-10 --
California recently released its revised lethal injection
guidelines, following a June public hearing on the protocol.
The 25-page document indicates small revisions, outlining such
items as to when the curtains remain open in the execution
chamber to definitions of the term “chaplain” and “lethal
injection room.” Natasha Minsker, the Death Penalty Policy
Director of the ACLU of Northern California called the revisions
superficial. Minsker added, "In the current state of the state,
we are still wasting money tinkering with the death penalty
system." Minsker suggested that by turning death sentences to
life in prison without parole, the state could save $1 billion
over five years. Terry Thorton, a California Department of
Corrections and Rehabilitation spokesperson, explained that the
public review process of the protocol still has several more
steps before actually being adopted. "If during the next comment
period it requires more changes, we have to put it out again,"
she said. The public has until January 20, 2010 to comment on
the changes, and the state has until May 1, 2010, to complete
its public review process. For links to the revisions and full
text of the protocol, see below.
Read more
FLORIDA
Court vacates Polk killer's death sentences due to
prosecutor's misconduct
By
Colleen Jenkins, Tampabay.com Staff Writer
01-15-10 --
Citing a prosecutor's misconduct, the Florida Supreme Court took the
unusual step Thursday of vacating the death sentences of a triple
murderer whose death warrant Gov. Charlie Crist signed last year. .
. . Two separate juries found Paul Beasley Johnson guilty of gunning
down a Polk County sheriff's deputy and two other people during a
drug-fueled crime rampage in January 1981. . . . But in a harshly
worded opinion, the court's 4-1 majority ordered a new penalty
phase, finding that "the record here is so rife with evidence of
previously undisclosed prosecutorial misconduct that we have no
choice but to grant relief." . . . Justices ruled that the state
induced Johnson to make incriminating statements to a jailhouse
informant in violation of his right to counsel, then used that
testimony at his trial despite knowing it was inadmissible.
New Resources: Bureau of Justice Statistics Releases
Capital Punishment, 2008
Death Penalty Information Center
01-14-10 --
The Bureau of Justice Statistics released the 2008 version of
its annual report on the death penalty in the U.S. in December
2009. Information drawn from the report includes: / The number
of people on death row declined from 3,215 in 2007 to 3,207 in
2008. / 50% of those on death row had not graduated from high
school; only 9% had any college education. / 91% of those on
death row had no prior homicide conviction. / 13.2% of those on
death row at the end of 2008 were Hispanic. / 22% of those on
death row were married. / 1,122 of those on death row were under
the age of 25 at the time of their arrest. / The average time
between sentencing and execution for all those executed in 2008
was 11.75 years.
GENERAL
Common distrust of judiciary should end death penalty
Opinion
of Pastor Roger Ray, News-Leader.com
01-13-10 --
Can conservatives and liberals agree on anything? The track record
in recent history is pretty bleak but there may be a way to move the
conversation onto some mutually agreeable territory. Imagine a
meeting hall filled with equal parts of conservatives and liberals
and the speaker simply asks the gathered assembly, "Do you trust the
government?" The rafters might shake from the unison shout of "No
way!" . . . Conservatives don't trust the government to run health
care and liberals don't trust the government to run warrantless
wiretaps or grant military contracts. But neither conservatives nor
liberals trust the judiciary. I'm not quite ready to sign on with
the cynic who says that it is 99 percent of lawyers who give the
rest of them a bad name but I am willing to assert that our judicial
system favors the wealthy and, I believe, it shows outrageous
deference to other members of the legal community. The "good ol'
boy" system in the courthouse has never been more alive and well. .
. . Liberals and conservatives should be able to come to easy
agreement on the fact that you cannot rely on the judicial system to
render a fair and balanced decision in 100 percent of their cases.
When it comes to making the decision to send a convicted murderer to
his or her death, is anything less than near 100 percent accuracy
acceptable? If one in 10 of the executed were innocent, is that
acceptable to our society? Do you really believe that our court
system is right more than 90 percent of the time?
U.S. Supreme Court: Smith v. Spisak
Death Penalty Information Center
01-13-10 --
On January 12, the U.S. Supreme Court reversed the U.S. Court of
Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in Smith v. Spisak. After
Frank Spisak was sentenced to death in Ohio and his initial
appeals were denied, he filed a habeas corpus petition claiming
that: 1) the jury instructions and verdict forms used at his
trial unconstitutionally required the jury to be unanimous in
choosing any mitigating factors; and 2) his attorney's closing
argument was so inadequate as to deprive him of effective
assistance of counsel. The Sixth Circuit had granted him
relief. In reversing this decision, the Supreme Court held that
there was no "reasonable probability that, but for counsel’s
unprofessional errors, the result of the proceeding would have
been different.” Justice John Paul Stevens, who concurred in
the outcome of the case, nevertheless wrote separately,
criticizing the "catastrophe of [defense] counsel's failed
strategy." He added, "Indeed, the argument was so outrageous
that it would have rightly subjected a prosecutor to charges of
misconduct." Justice Stevens, however, agreed that the
defendant would probably still have been sentenced to death.
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LOUISIANA
Death Penalty Use in Louisiana Has Sharply Declined
Death Penalty Information Center
01-12-10 --
Louisiana has seen a steep decline in executions compared to
previous decades, with only three executions in the last ten
years. This is in stark contrast to the eight men who were
electrocuted within the span of 11 weeks in 1987, and it follows
a nationwide trend of declining executions and imposition of
death sentences. The state's most recent execution was on
January 7, the first since since 2002. The execution occurred
only because the defendant, Gerard Bordelon, waived appeals that
may have taken many more years to complete. Although there are
concerns in the state over the time between sentencing and
execution, many cases are reversed because they were not
conducted properly in the first place. About half of the
state's cases considered by federal judges since 2000 have been
sent back to the state court for new trials. First Assistant
District Attorney Cynthia Killingsworth of Calcasieu Parish said
that her office has sought fewer capital charges over years,
partially because of the burden it can put on victims' families
when a case is reversed and needs to be retried.
OHIO
Execution for Nazi-loving Cleveland murderer can move forward,
despite his lawyer's 'outrageous' representation
By
Stephen Koff, Cleveland Plain Dealer
01-12-10 --
U.S. Supreme Court justices made clear Tuesday that they unanimously
agree with the collective judgment of the Cleveland community: Frank
Spisak, the Hitler-loving triple murderer who terrorized Cleveland
State University, was one demented guy -- one whose attempted legal
defenses have finally failed. . . . The high court overruled
appellate judges who had saved Spisak, a former cross-dresser who
fashioned himself as a modern-day Nazi, from death for his 1982
killing spree. The Cuyahoga County prosecutor's office says it will
soon ask Ohio to impose the capital sentence that has been delayed
by appeals ever since a Cleveland jury recommended it in 1983.
Editorials: "Death Penalty System 'Irretrievably Broken'"
Death Penalty Information Center
01-11-10 --
A recent editorial in the Charlotte Observer in North Carolina
cited the American Law Institute's decision in 2009 to separate
itself from the death penalty system as another reason for the
state to abolish the practice. The ALI, whose model death
penalty standards were instrumental in the U.S. Supreme Court's
decision to allow the reinstatement of capital punishment in
1976, has recently disavowed its own recommendations because the
many problems of the system had rendered it unworkable. The
editorial also cited a recently published study by Duke
University Professor Philip Cook that concluded North Carolina
could save $11 million annually over the costs of life
imprisonment if it abolished the death penalty. In concluding
that the time had come to end the death penalty, the paper
stated, "We now know more about human fallibility and the
justice system's ability to charge, try and convict the wrong
person while allowing the real criminal to go free. The number
of inmates convicted of murder but later exonerated increases
every year, revealing capital punishment as a system incapable
of being administered in accord with the U.S. Constitution."
Read full editorial below.
Read more
CALIFORNIA
California proposes new
lethal injection procedures
The changes mark a first step
toward resuming executions after a four-year moratorium. A
federal judge had deemed the previous three-drug method
unconstitutional.
By
Carol J. Williams, The Los Angeles Times
01-06-10 --
State corrections officials Tuesday proposed new lethal
injection procedures, a first step toward resuming executions in
California after a four-year halt. . . . The proposals involve
only minor changes to the three-drug method used on 11 of the 13
men put to death in the state since capital punishment was
reinstated in 1976. . . . But the revisions appear to address
the concerns of a federal judge who deemed the previous lethal
injection practices unconstitutional for their risk of
inflicting cruel and unusual punishment. . . . The California
Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation issued the proposed
changes in a 25-page draft and announced a 15-day period for
public comment. Once any additional revisions are made and the
new protocols adopted, the execution procedures must pass
judicial review for their conformance with state law and the
U.S. Constitution. . . . California has the nation's largest
death row, with 697 inmates sentenced to die. The last execution
was in January 2006, when convicted killer Clarence Allen was
put to death by lethal injection at San Quentin State Prison.
NEVADA
Appeals court bars death penalty for Las Vegas killer
By
Cy Ryan, The Las Vegas Sun
01-05-10 --
In a 2-1 decision, a federal appeals court has ruled that Las
Vegas killer James Harrison cannot receive the death penalty as
punishment for his fatal 2002 stabbing of a Las Vegas driving
instructor. . . . Harrison was convicted of first-degree murder
in the death of Daniel Miller, 58, who owned American Driver
Education in Las Vegas at the time of his death. . . . Harrison
stabbed Miller 128 times and carved a swastika into his back.
The prosecution sought the death penalty but the jury could not
reach a decision on the penalty. . . . Defense lawyers asked
District Judge Valerie Adair to question the jury to determine
if the members had decided whether aggravating factors
outweighed the mitigating material. . . . To merit the death
penalty the aggravators must outweigh the mitigators. . . .
Adair refused to allow the questions and declared a mistrial.
You can access the ruling at
this link.
|

A
Victims-of-Law Advertiser |
December 2009
TENNESSEE
Arbitrariness: Different Outcomes in Similar Murder Cases
in Tennessee
Death Penalty Information Center
12-31-09
-- Gaile Owens
(pictured) and Mary Winkler are two women who committed similar
crimes under similar circumstances in Tennessee. Both women
suffered from abuse from the spouses they killed, and both were
examined by the same psychologist, twenty years apart. The
psychologist said both women suffered from battered woman's
syndrome. Mary Winkler confronted her husband with a shotgun and
shot him in the back in 2006. Gaile Owens hired a stranger to
kill her husband. Winkler was indicted for first-degree murder,
convicted of voluntary manslaughter and served about two months
in a mental health facility. She is now free and has custody of
her children. Owens is on death row, awaiting execution by
lethal injection. . . . According to an article by John
Seigenthaler in the Tennessean, "The dramatic difference in the
sentences received by Winkler and Owens relates directly to the
manner in which the two cases were tried, how their separate
teams of lawyers handled their cases and how two different
judges dealt with their 'battered woman' defenses." Winkler
testified on her own behalf regarding the abuse she suffered,
while Owens did not take the stand in order to protect her
children from hearing the details of her abuse. Winkler was
represented by experienced criminal lawyers, whose expenses were
paid by her friends. Owens, on the other hand, had trouble
finding legal representation. Her first lawyer withdrew from the
case because she could not pay him. Perhaps the starkest
difference between the two cases were the women's pleas.
Studies: Researchers Find
"No Empirical Support" for Deterrence Theory
12-31-09 --
Researchers from the University of Texas at Dallas recently
published a study on whether executions deter homicides using
state panel date and employing well-known econometric procedures
for panel analysis. The authors found "no empirical support for
the argument that the existence or application of the death
penalty deters prospective offenders from committing homicide."
The study was published in the journal of Criminology and Public
Policy and authored by Tomislav V. Kovandzic, Lynne M. Vieraitis
and Denise Paquette Boots, all professors of criminology. The
study concluded, "In sum, our finding of no deterrent effect of
the DP (death penalty) on homicide suggests the risk of
execution does not enhance the level of deterrence. Therefore,
we conclude that although policy makers and the public may
continue to support the use of the death penalty based on
retribution, religious grounds, or other justifications,
defending its use based on deterrence is inconsistent with our
findings. At a minimum, policy makers should refrain from
justifying its use by claiming that it is a deterrent to
homicide and explore less costly, more effective ways of
addressing crime."
NORTH
CAROLINA
Studies: Death Penalty Costs
North Carolina Nearly $11 Million a Year
Death Penalty Information Center
12-30-09
-- A recent study
published by a Duke University economist revealed North Carolina
could save $11 million annually if it dropped the death penalty.
Philip J. Cook, a professor at Duke University's Sanford School
of Public Policy, calculated the extra state costs of the death
penalty during fiscal years 2005 and 2006. He calculated over
$21 million worth of expenses that would have been saved if the
death penalty had been repealed. The total included extra
defense costs for capital cases in the trial phase, extra
payments to jurors, post-conviction costs, resentencing
hearings, and the extra costs to the prison system. This
conservative estimate did not include resources that would have
been freed up in the Office of the Appellate Defender and the
North Carolina Supreme Court, the extra time spent by
prosecutors in capital cases, and the costs to taxpayers for
federal appeals. Cook concluded that costs are not the only
concern, but relevant to the discussion of whether the death
penalty should be retained, "The bottom line is that the death
penalty is a financial burden on the state and a
resource-absorbing burden on the trial courts. That conclusion
is relevant to the debate over whether preserving the death
penalty is in the public interest…." He also commented, "It's
not an ideal use of resources to have so much time devoted to
such a small number of cases if your goal is to reduce crime
rates."
3rd Circuit Upholds Ruling Overturning Death
Sentence for Failure to Disclose Evidence
Shannon
P. Duffy, The Legal Intelligencer
12-28-09 --
Persuading the federal courts to overturn a murder conviction is no
simple matter, but lawyers for Zachary Wilson have now done it twice
-- in two unrelated murder cases -- and the
latest decision also throws out a death sentence. . . .
Both rulings are victories for defense teams led by Assistant
Federal Defender Michael Wiseman, who successfully argued Wilson's
habeas petition before U.S. District Judge John R. Padova and then
defended Padova's rulings in appeals to the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court
of Appeals. . . . In the first case, Wiseman argued that prosecutors
improperly struck blacks from the jury when Wilson was tried for the
February 1982 shooting of David Smith following a dispute over a
game of craps.
Costs: Death Penalty Costs in Texas Outweigh Life
Imprisonment
Death Penalty
Information Center
12-23-09 --
County estimates in Texas
indicate that the death penalty system is much more expensive
than sentencing inmates to life imprisonment. Gray County spent
nearly $1 million seeking the death penalty against Levi King,
even though he pleaded guilty to murder. Moreover, these costs
do not include the cost of appeals, which will further increase
the cost of the capital case, nor the costs of cases in which
the death penalty is sought but not given. By comparison, a
non-death penalty murder case in nearby Lubbock County typically
costs about $3,000, court officials estimate. The average cost
to house an inmate in Texas prisons is $47.50 per day, according
to Michelle Lyons, spokeswoman for the Texas Department of
Criminal Justice. Thus it would cost about $17,340 to house an
inmate for a year and $693,500 for 40 years, far less than even
part of the death penalty costs. The regional public defender's
office estimates that just the legal costs for a death penalty
case from indictment to execution are $1.2 million. Lubbock
County Criminal District Attorney Matt Powell said, “I don’t
dispute that it’s more expensive,” but said he never takes cost
into account when deciding whether to seek the death penalty.
New Evidence in Troy Davis Case
Death Penalty
Information Center
12-22-09 --
New evidence in the Troy Davis
case in Georgia has recently emerged, further implicating
another suspect in the murder of off-duty police officer Mark
Allen MacPhail. In 1991, Davis was sentenced to death for
officer MacPhail's murder. Davis became the primary suspect
after Sylvester "Redd" Coles told the police about Davis's
presence at the crime scene. During his 1991 trial, nine
prosecution eyewitnesses testified against Davis. All but two of
the witnesses (one of whom is Coles) have recanted their
testimony. The new testimony was provided by Quiana Glover, who
was at a friend's house when she said Coles admitted to killing
MacPhail. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution quoted her affidavit
as stating that Coles knew the murder was being falsely
attributed to Davis instead of himself. In August 2009, the
U.S. Supreme Court issued an historic order, continuing Davis's
stay of execution and instructing a federal District Court judge
in Savannah to hold an evidentiary hearing to decide whether
Davis's new evidence clearly establishes his innocence.
Editorial: "There is No 'Humane' Execution"
Death Penalty
Information Center
12-21-09 --
A recent New York Times
editorial commented on the new one-drug lethal injection
protocol used in Ohio for the first time on December 8, but
concluded that "the execution only reinforced that any form of
capital punishment is legally suspect and morally wrong." The
Times agreed with the late Justice Harry Blackmun who called
such manipulations “tinker[ing] with the machinery of death.”
The editorial also noted the risks of exeucting the innocent:
"It has also become clear — particularly since DNA evidence has
become more common — how unreliable the system is. Since 1973,
139 people have been released from death row because of evidence
that they were innocent, according to the Death Penalty
Information Center." The editors ended by saying that repealing
the death penalty "is the way to eliminate the inevitable
problems with executions." Read the full editorial below.
Read more
|
 
A Victims-of-Law
Advertiser |
GEORGIA
Troy Davis case raising novel legal issues
By Bill
Rankin, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
12-20-09 --
Condemned inmate Troy Anthony Davis filed the legal equivalent of a
Hail Mary when he petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court for a hearing on
his innocence claims. . . . But in August, for the first time in
nearly half a century, the nation’s highest court took a case filed
directly to its docket that had not come up from a lower court on
appeal. Once again, Davis, who sits on death row for killing an
off-duty Savannah police officer in 1989, was spared execution. And
since the reprieve, Davis’ lawyers say a new witness has come
forward on his behalf. . . . “It was just stunning,” said U.S.
Supreme Court historian Lucas A. “Scot” Powe, a professor of law and
government at the University of Texas at Austin. “But I understand
why the court did it. It was Davis’ last chance. He had exhausted
all other possible appeals.”
DPIC's 2009 Year End Report Released
Death Penalty Information Center

12-18-09 --
The Death Penalty Information
Center released the
“The Death Penalty in 2009: Year End Report” on
December 18, noting that the country is expected to finish 2009
with the fewest death sentences since the U.S. Supreme Court
reinstated the death penalty in 1976. Eleven states considered
abolishing the death penalty this year, a significant increase
in legislative activity from previous years, as the high costs
and lack of measurable benefits associated with this punishment
troubled lawmakers. . . . “The annual number of death sentences
in the U.S. has dropped for seven straight years and is 60% less
than in the 1990s,” said Richard Dieter, the report’s author and
DPIC’s executive director. “In the last two years, three states
have abolished capital punishment and a growing number of states
are asking whether it's worth keeping. This entire decade has
been marked by a declining use of the death penalty." There
were 106 death sentences in 2009 compared with a high of 328 in
1994. . . . New Mexico became the 15th state to abolish the
death penalty, and 9 men who were sentenced to death were
exonerated in 2009, the second highest number of exonerations
since the death penalty was reinstated. The total number of
exonerations since 1973 has now reached 139. . . . (Read “The
Death Penalty in 2009: Year End Report”
here, Dec. 18, 2009. DPIC's press release may be
read
here. See also
previous DPIC Reports.
Read more
International: UN High Commissioner for Human Rights
Calls for an End to the Death Penalty
Death Penalty Information Center
12-17-09 --
On December 15 the United
Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights marked the 20th
anniversary of an international death penalty treaty by calling
for the universal abolition of capital punishment. Navi Pillay,
the top UN human rights official, urged all states to adopt the
Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and
Political Rights. The protocol, which bars the death penalty,
was introduced in 1989. “Abolishing the death penalty is a
difficult process for many societies," she said. "[A]nd
ratification of the Optional Protocol can often only come about
after a period of national debate. Until they reach that point,
I urge those States still employing the death penalty to place a
formal moratorium on its use, with the aim of ultimately
ratifying the Optional Protocol and abolishing the punishment
altogether everywhere.” In her statement, she enumerated a
number of issues with the death penalty, including "the
fundamental nature of the right to life; the unacceptable risk
of executing innocent people by mistake; the absence of proof
that the death penalty serves as a deterrent; and what is, to my
mind, the inappropriately vengeful character of the sentence."
To date, 140 countries no longer carry out the death penalty,
and 72 countries have ratified the Optional Protocol on ending
the death penalty. Read the full statement below. . . .
Read more
|
 
A
Victims-of-Law Advertiser |
Death Sentences Dropped, but
Executions Rose in ’09
By
John Schwartz, The New York Times
12-17-09 --
More death row convicts were executed in the United States this
year than last, but juries continue to grow more wary of capital
punishment, according to a new report. . . . Death sentences
handed down by judges and juries in 2009 continued a trend of
decline for seven years in a row, with 106 projected for the
year. That level is down two-thirds from a peak of 328 in 1994,
according to the report being released Friday by the
Death Penalty Information
Center, a
research organization that opposes capital punishment. . . .
“This entire decade has been marked by a declining use of the
death penalty,” said Richard Dieter, the executive director of
the group. . . . The sentencing drop was most striking in Texas,
which averaged 34 death sentences a year in the 1990s and had 9
this year. Vic Wisner, a former assistant district attorney in
Houston, said a “constant media drumbeat” about suspect
convictions and exonerations “has really changed the attitude of
jurors.”
Editorials: Is An Execution Worth the Price?
Death Penalty Information Center
12-16-09 --
A recent editorial in the
Virginian-Pilot called for eliminating the death penalty as a
good way to address the $3.5 billion gap in the state's budget.
"Doing away with the option of a death sentence makes sense on
several levels," the editors wrote. "It would save the state
from having to pay fees associated with lengthy trials and years
of appeals. It would end the agony of repeated court hearings
for the families of victims. It would eliminate the four
perpetually understaffed capital defender's offices, whose
attorneys handle appeals automatically generated when people are
sentenced to death row." The paper suggests that the $2 million
spent per execution could be better put toward education, public
safety and crime prevention efforts. "Is the cost of an
execution really worth it when, for less than half the price, we
could put a killer in a prison cell, locked away from society
for life?" Read the full editorial below. . . . Read
more
Costs: Indiana Death Penalty Cases Can Cost $1 Million
Death Penalty Information Center
12-15-09 -- A
single death penalty case in Indiana can cost taxpayers as much
as $1 million. In Marion County, the costs of preparation for
three potential death penalty trials have reached $659,000 this
year alone, according to the Public Defender Agency. A
high-profile death penalty case in the same county has cost
nearly $850,000 and not all the bills are in. Pursuing a life
sentence costs less than the death penalty, even considering the
expense of a convict's longer incarceration, according to
Indiana studies. Representation is more expensive for death
penalty defendants because each must have two qualified
attorneys. "Every dollar we spend attempting to do this, that's
money we could have spent elsewhere," said Chief Public Defender
Robert Hill. "(But) we have a constitutional mandate to defend
our clients." Since 2000, Hill's agency reports, defense bills
in Marion County death penalty cases have totaled $3.9 million.
Statewide, costs to taxpayers for the defense in trials and
appeals have been nearly $20 million since 1990, according to
the Indiana Public Defender Commission.
|
 
A
Victims-of-Law Advertiser |
New Voices: Veterans and the Death Penalty
Death Penalty Information Center
12-14-09 --
Two former military
servicemen raised concerns about the use of the death penalty
for war veterans who have endured traumatic experiences while
serving in the United States military. Karl Keys, a former
Marine, and Bill Pelke, a former sergeant in the First Air
Cavalry, cited the examples of James Floyd Davis and Manny
Babbitt, veterans who received Purple Hearts for their service
in the Vietnam War but were sentenced to death nevertheless.
Davis and Babbitt were both suffering from post-traumatic stress
disorder when they committed the crimes that resulted in their
death sentences. Babbitt was executed in 1999 in California
shortly after he received his Purple Heart. Davis currently
resides on North Carolina's death row. Keys and Pelke wrote,
"Soldiers are coming home traumatized by the carnage they've
seen. As veterans, we believe those who commit crimes due to
severe mental problems should be treated, not killed." They go
on to say, "Capital punishment's costs to states drain our tax
dollars away from smarter and more effective approaches to law
enforcement and crime prevention and from additional quality,
affordable mental health services." Read the entire article:
Read more
CALIFORNIA
When California denies a murderer parole, should it need a
reason?
Eligible prisoners can't be
refused early release just because of the gravity of their
crimes -- 'some evidence' has to show the inmate would pose a
threat to public safety, some judges have ruled.
By
Carol J. Williams, The Los Angeles Times
12-13-09 --
Reporting from Vacaville, Calif. - During the 26 years that
James Alexander has spent in prison for killing a fellow drug
dealer, he has maintained a spotless behavior record and devoted
himself to helping other inmates shake addictions. . . . He's
been such a model prisoner that state parole commissioners -- on
three occasions -- recommended that he be released. All three
times, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger overruled them. . . .
Alexander, 47, is among the hundreds of so-called lifers whom
state parole boards have deemed rehabilitated and ready to
rejoin society, but who sit behind bars because their crime was
murder. In recent years, some judges have sided with lifers,
ruling that the state can't deny an inmate parole solely because
of the gravity of his original offense but rather must provide
"some evidence" that he would pose a threat to public safety if
released.
Books: Angel of Death Row
Death Penalty Information Center
12-11-09 --
Renowned death penalty
defense attorney Andrea Lyon's forthcoming book,
Angel of Death Row: My Life as a
Death Penalty Defense Lawyer,
chronicles her 30 years of experience representing clients in
capital murder cases. In all of the 19 cases where she
represented defendants who were found guilty of capital murder,
jurors spared her clients’ lives. Lyon, who was featured in
the PBS documentary Race to Execution and was called the "angel
of death row" by the Chicago Tribune, gives readers an inside
look at what motivates her during these difficult cases and
offers behind-the-scene glimpses into many dramatic courtroom
battles. Lyon is the founder of the Center for Justice in
Capital Cases based in Illinois and a professor of law at DePaul
University College of Law. The book includes a foreword by Alan
Dershowitz, who calls Lyon "a storyteller par excellence."
CALIFORNIA
Death Row Inmate Sues Prosecutor, Seeks DNA Test
Mary
Alice Robbins, Texas Lawyer
12-10-09 --
A Texas death row inmate facing execution next year has sued a
Panhandle prosecutor, alleging she is denying him access to DNA
evidence that has never been tested and could prove he is innocent
of murdering three people in 1993. . . . Henry Watkins Skinner
alleges in his original complaint in Skinner v. Switzer that the
refusal by Lynn Switzer, district attorney for the 31st and 223rd
Judicial Districts, to release the biological evidence for testing
violates Skinner's 14th Amendment right to due process and his
Eighth Amendment right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment.
Skinner sued Switzer on Nov. 27 in the U.S. District Court for the
Northern District of Texas in Amarillo. . . . In the complaint,
Skinner asks the court to declare that continued withholding of the
DNA evidence violates his constitutional rights. He seeks an
injunction requiring Switzer to release certain biological evidence
to him -- including vaginal swabs and fingernail clippings from the
female victim, any biological material on two knives found at the
murder scene, and blood and hairs on a jacket found next to the
female victim's body -- so Skinner can test it at his own expense.
Court Tosses Death Sentence in Tarzana Double Murder
By
Steven M. Ellis, Metropolitan News-Enterprise Staff Writer
12-10-09 --
The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals yesterday threw out the
death sentence of a former Van Nuys resident who killed two men with
a knife during the botched burglary of a Tarzana home in 1982. . . .
The court, sitting en banc, voted 8-3 to affirm a district court’s
ruling granting Scott Lynn Pinholster habeas relief due to
ineffective assistance of counsel at the penalty phase of his 1984
trial and remanded for a new penalty trial. . . . U.S. District
Judge Gary L. Taylor of the Central District of California ruled in
2003 that Pinholster received ineffective assistance from appointed
trial lawyers Harry Brainard and Wilbur Dettmar, both now deceased,
but a divided Ninth Circuit panel reinstated the death penalty in
July 2008. . . . The panel ruled that while Dettmar and Brainard
might have conducted an inadequate investigation and failed to
present available mitigating evidence, a better defense would
probably not have resulted in a lesser sentence. . . . Judge Milan
D. Smith Jr., however, wrote yesterday that the California Supreme
Court was objectively unreasonable when it concluded that not a
single juror would have voted against the death penalty if counsel
had investigated and introduced readily available mitigating
evidence other than “inaccurate, damaging” testimony from
Pinholster’s mother.
OHIO
Judge seeks opinions on 2nd execution attempt
He
says old method no longer an issue
By John
Futty, The Columbus Dispatch
12-10-09 --
A federal judge in Columbus wants lawyers to provide written
opinions about whether the state can try a second time to execute a
convicted killer. . . . U.S. District Judge Gregory L. Frost made it
clear in a hearing yesterday that his decision in the case of
53-year-old Romell Broom won't be based on the change in the way the
state carries out lethal injections. . . . He said a ruling Monday
by the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that upheld the new method
makes questions about the old way -- used unsuccessfully on Broom in
September -- irrelevant. . . . "It seems to me that all that's left
is a legal argument as to whether the state can attempt to execute
Mr. Broom twice," Frost told attorneys for the state and Broom, who
was in court wearing an orange prison jumpsuit and shackles on his
wrists and ankles. . . . Broom's attorneys had suggested calling
witnesses to testify about the suffering he endured in the first
attempt, but Frost decided that written statements will be
sufficient.
UNITED STATES
SUPREME COURT
Supreme Court rules against
Philly killer, who might now face death sentence
By
Kitty Caparella, Philadelphia Daily News
12-09-09 --
Joseph Kindler, a notorious Northeast Philadelphia man convicted
of kidnapping and bashing an accomplice with a baseball bat and
drowning him in 1982, may die by injection after all. . . .
Yesterday, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned a lower-court
ruling that had thrown out the death sentence for Kindler, who
escaped from the Philadelphia Detention Center in 1984, was
caught in Quebec, and while awaiting extradition, escaped again
from a Montreal prison a year later. . . . On Sept. 6, 1988,
Kindler, then 30, was captured in St. John, New Brunswick, three
days after he was featured on "America's Most Wanted." . . . At
issue before the high court was whether a federal appellate
judge could disregard state procedural rules in a review of the
case. Attorneys general in Pennsylvania and 25 other states
joined the lawsuit.
NEW
HAMPSHIRE
New Hampshire Commission Studies Cost of the Death Penalty
Death Penalty Information Center
12-08-09 --
On December 4, the New Hampshire Commission to Study the Death
Penalty held a hearing in Concord to examine the cost of the
death penaty in the state. The twenty-two member Commission, led
by retired Judge Walter Murphy, has been charged with
considering several issues, including whether the death penalty
is a deterrent, if it is arbitrarily applied, and if it covers
the appropriate crimes. The Commission is considering
alternatives to capital punishment and the related question of
whether the state spends more on a death penalty case than on a
first-degree homicide case resulting in a life sentence. The
state spent more than $5.3 million on two capital cases last
year, and has not had an execution since 1939. Deputy Attorney
General Orville Fitch told the committee that his office spent
$1.6 million while prosecuting Michael Addison, who was
ultimately sentenced to death. The state spent an additional
$1.2 million for the public defender who represented Addison, a
large sum when compared to the $70,000-$100,000 it costs to
defend a typical first-degree case. Fitch also testified that
his office spent $2.4 million prosecuting another defendant in a
murder-for-hire case, in which a life sentence was returned.
OHIO
Killer Biros executed; says 'peace be with you'
Ohio first to use 1-drug method;
'no problems' reported
By
Alan Johnson, The Columbus Dispatch
12-08-09
-- Trumbull County killer
Kenneth Biros this morning became the first person in the United
States to be executed using a one-drug lethal injection
protocol. . . . With his victim's family looking on, Biros, 51,
died at 11:47 a.m. in the Death House at the Southern Ohio
Correctional Facility near Lucasville following the intravenous
injection of single, large dose of thiopental sodium, a powerful
anesthetic. . . . "Now I am paroled to my Father in heaven, and
I will spend all my holidays with my Lord and Savior," Biros
said. "Peace be with you." . . . He said he was "sorry from the
bottom of my heart."
Legal Scholar Calls Withdrawal of Model Penal Code a
"Quiet Blockbuster"
Death Penalty Information Center
12-08-09 --
Franklin E. Zimring is a distinguished professor of law and
scholar at the Berkeley School of Law who has followed the
development of the modern death penalty over many decades.
Writing recently in the National Law Journal, Prof. Zimring said
the recent action by the American Law Institute to withdraw the
death penalty provisions from its Model Penal Code deprives the
punishment of any legal legitimacy. "[T]he institute has pulled
the intellectual rug out from under the current system of
deciding between life and death," he wrote. Recalling that when
the Supreme Court stopped the death penalty in Furman v. Georgia
in 1972, he noted many states turned to the Model Penal Code to
fashion new death penalty laws that the Court would accept. But
that model has now been discredited. "Now that the creators of
the modern system of death penalty sentencing have disowned that
system, there is no support for distinguishing the current death
penalty lottery from the lawless system that Furman condemned.
The apparatus that the Supreme Court rushed to embrace in 1976
has been exposed as a conspicuous failure."
UNITED STATES
SUPREME COURT
A veteran's legal battle
The Supreme Court reverses a war
hero's death sentence.
Washington Post Editorial
 
12-07-09 --
INMATES COMMONLY challenge convictions or sentences based on
claims that they were saddled with bad lawyers. Just as common
are decisions by judges to deny such claims. So it is
extraordinary that last week a unanimous Supreme Court tossed
out a death sentence against a Florida inmate who made such an
argument. And no wonder. . . . George Porter Jr., a Korean War
veteran with two Purple Hearts, pleaded guilty to the murder of
a former girlfriend and her new boyfriend and was sentenced to
death in 1988. . . . The justices did not overturn the
convictions but lambasted the defense lawyer's failure to
introduce mitigating evidence -- including military service and
possible post-traumatic stress -- that could have led to a
reduced sentence. . . . Had Mr. Porter's counsel been
"effective," the justices wrote in the unsigned Nov. 30
opinion, the trial judge and jury would have learned
about the kind of "troubled history" that the court has
"declared relevant to assessing a defendant's moral culpability.
. . . They would have heard about (1) Porter's heroic military
service in two of the most critical -- and horrific -- battles
of the Korean War, (2) his struggles to regain normality upon
his return from war, (3) his childhood history of physical
abuse, and (4) his brain abnormality, difficulty reading and
writing, and limited schooling."
|
 
A
Victims-of-Law Advertiser |
UNITED
STATES SUPREME COURT
Justices Thomas, Stevens
Clash Over Death Row Appeal
Marcia Coyle, The National Law Journal
12-3-09 --
In the wake of the Supreme Court's refusal early Wednesday
morning to hear the last-minute appeal of a Tennessee death row
inmate, two justices clashed -- one with some bite -- over
whether execution after lengthy delay is cruel and unusual
punishment under the Eighth Amendment. . . . Tennessee executed
Cecil Johnson at 1:34 a.m. Wednesday. Johnson had spent nearly
29 years on death row for three murders committed during a
robbery of a Nashville convenience store. He was convicted in
1981. . . . A high court majority rejected his application for a
stay of execution and his petition for review in which he raised
the Eighth Amendment challenge. . . . Justice John Paul Stevens,
joined by Justice Stephen Breyer,
dissented
(pdf), saying Johnson's situation was "as compelling a case" as
he had encountered raising the constitutional concerns that
Stevens himself raised in a 1995 dissent from another denial of
certiorari: Lackey v. Texas.
ILLINOIS
Dugan jury originally opted
for life sentence
Art
Barnum, Chicago Tribune
12-2-09 --
The original discarded verdict form signed by a 12-person DuPage
County jury called for Brian Dugan to be sentenced to life
imprisonment, not the death sentence he ultimately received. . .
. DuPage Judge George Bakalis told Dugan's defense attorneys
today that he had the original verdict form in his possession
and would give it to Illinois Supreme Court during the mandated
appeal of Dugan's death sentence if asked for it. . . . Dugan
defense attorney Steven Greenberg said the original verdict form
could form the basis for an appeal, and that the issue will
probably be brought up again when Dugan is formally sentenced
Dec. 16. . . . Last month's sentencing hearing was thrown into
some confusion when it was announced that jurors had reached a
decision. But the jury then restarted deliberations and
ultimately came back with a sentence of death. . . . Bakalis'
disclosure about the original signed form came in response to
questions from Greenberg, who filed a motion seeking
clarification as to what occurred after it was announced the
evening of Nov. 10 that the jury had reached a verdict after six
weeks of testimony.
TEXAS
Jurors, Lawyer Still Believe
Executed Texas Dad Guilty Despite Report Questioning Arson Probe
Jeff
Carlton, The Associated Press, Law.com
12-2-09 --
David Martin is sickened by the suggestion that Texas executed
an innocent man when
Cameron Todd Willingham
was put to death for setting a fire that killed his three
children. . . . The veteran defense attorney represented
Willingham at trial. He looked at all the evidence. And he has
no doubt that his client deserved to die. . . . "I never think
about him, but I do think about those year-old babies crawling
around in an inferno with their flesh melting off their bodies,"
Martin said. "I think that he was guilty, that he deserved death
and that he got death." . . . The 2004 execution, however,
didn't end questions about the case. Fire investigator experts
hired first by
The Innocence Project
and later by the
Texas Forensic Science
Commission
concluded the original finding of arson was seriously flawed.
A Second Late Appeal Puts
Death Penalty Lawyer on the Hot Seat
By
Debra Cassens Weiss, ABA Journal
12-2-09 --
The chief judge of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals
faced mounting criticism
and ethics charges over her refusal to accept a late emergency
death-penalty appeal two years ago. Now the lawyer who wanted to
keep the courthouse open to file the documents is facing
scrutiny for a second late appeal. . . . Lawyer David Dow
criticized the chief judge,
Sharon Keller, in an op-ed written two years ago. Keller’s
decision was “typical of the arbitrariness and brazen disregard
for legal principle that characterizes most death penalty
cases,” he wrote. Keller is
facing ethics charges
as a result of her refusal to accept the filing. . . . Now Dow
is in the news for a late filing in a different case,
Texas Lawyer
reports. He was ordered to appear today with co-counsel
Katherine Black to explain an “untimely filing.” Dow and Black
work for the Texas Defender Service.
TEXAS
'Equal justice under the law’
just a dream in Texas
By
Cory D. Session Sr., Opinion Special to the Star-Telegram
12-1-09 --
One of the most infamous days in the history of the Texas
judicial system occurred 10 years ago today. Timothy Cole died
an innocent man in a Texas prison cell. . . . An Army veteran
and college student who was pursuing the American dream ended up
living — and dying — an American nightmare. . . . This year, he
became the first person to be posthumously exonerated, thanks to
state District Judge Charlie Baird. . . . In many of the letters
Tim wrote from prison after being convicted of a rape he didn’t
commit, he mentioned three things that he longed for —
vindication, exoneration and a full pardon from the governor. .
. . The quest for the pardon continues. . . . On July 1, 2009,
Tim’s 49th birthday, Gov. Rick Perry said that he does not have
the power to pardon the dead. Perry said he needed a
constitutional amendment because of a several-decades-old
opinion from former state Attorney General Waggoner Carr that
prevents him from doing so. We await a modern opinion from the
current attorney general, Greg Abbott.
November 2009
UNITED STATES SUPREME COURT
Supreme Court Sides With Florida Inmate on Ineffective Assistance
Tony
Mauro, The National Law Journal
11-30-09 --
Returning from its Thanksgiving
break, the Supreme Court on Monday issued a powerful unsigned "per
curiam" opinion agreeing that the ineffective assistance of counsel
for Florida death row inmate George Porter Jr. prejudiced the
sentence he received after his murder trial in 1988. He was
convicted in the murder of a former girlfriend and her boyfriend.
The Florida Supreme Court and the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals
previously rejected his ineffective assistance claim. . . . Ruling
in Porter v. McCollum, available
here, the Court extensively detailed Porter's "horrible
family life" and his trying Korean War experiences that earned him
two Purple Hearts and other decorations -- none of which was told to
the trial court as mitigating evidence during sentencing. The trial
lawyer's failure to introduce the evidence "did not reflect
reasonable professional judgment" and could well have affected the
outcome of the case, the Court said.
Repeat Offender Judges
By Karen
Lee Torre, Connecticut Law Tribune
11-30-09 --
Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court
issued a notable opinion in
Wong v. Belmontes, summarily reversing a divided panel
of (big surprise) the Ninth Circuit. . . . It’s notable for the sole
reason that this was the third time the Supreme Court had to take up
this case. Belmontes brutally bludgeoned a woman to death. His
reason? To steal and sell her stereo for the $100 he needed for beer
and drugs that night. . . . Justly sentenced to death, Belmontes has
been continually mollycoddled by “arch activist” Judge Stephen
Reinhardt. . . . Remarkably, Belmontes had coldly killed before, and
bragged about it. This third trip to the Supreme Court had to do
with his counsel’s successful efforts to keep that history from the
jury, and Reinhardt’s decision to recast the lawyer (for the first
time on a second remand), as somehow fatally ineffective for his
success. . . . Another case of an overturned judge conjuring into
being a new basis on remand to achieve his desired outcome. What do
you do with such a judge? Let him have his way lest he consume an
unfair share of your working life? Thankfully, the justices are
unwilling to allow that. Good for them. . . . The court rejected
Reinhardt’s latest freshly conceived and ridiculous basis for
granting Belmontes habeas relief—that trial counsel could have done
more to “humanize” that animal.
Studies: A Review of the Florida Death Penalty
Death Penalty Information Org.
11-27-09 --
Christopher Slobogin, Professor of Law and Psychiatry at
Vanderbilt University, has written an evaluation of Florida's
death penalty to be published in a forthcoming edition of the
Elon University Law Review. The evaluation is based on a study
by an assessment team sponsored by the American Bar Association.
Florida is one of the leading states in sentencing people to
death, but it also has the most death row exonerations of any
state in the country. Florida was chosen by the ABA to be one
of eight death penalty states reviewed under its Death Penalty
Moratorium Implementation Project. The purpose of this project
was to allow states to identity and eliminate flaws in their
death penalty system. The Florida Assessment Team was led by
Prof. Slobogin and was instructed to investigate the following
aspects of death penalty administration: "police investigation
procedures; the use of DNA evidence; crime laboratories and
medical examiners; prosecutorial discretion; defense services;
jury instructions; the judicial role; the direct appeal process;
state post-conviction and federal habeas proceedings; clemency
proceedings; the treatment of racial and ethnic minorities; and
the treatment of people with mental illness and mental
retardation."
FEDERAL
COURTS
Way cleared for man's execution by new method
6th
Circuit Court of Appeals
By Alan
Johnson, The Columbus Dispatch
11-26-09 --
Kenneth Biros, who could become the first person in the United
States put to death using an untested lethal-injection method,
should not be subjected to state "experimentation," his attorney
says. . . . But the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals yesterday
cleared the way for his execution at 10 a.m. Dec. 8 in the Southern
Ohio Correctional Facility near Lucasville. . . . Biros, 51, of
Trumbull County, would be the first person put to death under a new
procedure using a single, large dose of thiopental sodium, a
powerful anesthetic. The successor to the old three-drug protocol
was announced Nov. 13 by Terry Collins, director of the Ohio
Department of Rehabilitation and Correction. . . . The one-drug
procedure is similar to the method used in euthanizing animals. . .
. Timothy Sweeney, Biros' Cleveland attorney, told The Dispatch that
the state should not make his client a guinea pig." . . . "There are
concerns," Sweeney said. "The protocol is new. It is completely
untested. It does not address … in any satisfactory way the issues
that arose during Romell Broom's execution using intravenous
needles. That hasn't changed.
KENTUCKY
High court rules regulation needed for lethal injection
By Tom
Loftus • courier-journal.com
11-25-09 --
In a decision that puts executions on hold, the Kentucky Supreme
Court ruled Wednesday that the state’s lethal injection procedure
must be spelled out in a regulation. . . . Among other things, that
process requires public comment. . . . The high court, in a 4-3
decision, held that that in certain instances — including
the protocol for the death penalty — a state agency must issue a
regulation in implementing a new law. . . . “This court cannot
ignore the publication and public hearing requirements set forth in
Kentucky statutes,” the majority opinion said. . . . The decision,
authored by Justice Lisabeth Hughes Abramson, directed the Kentucky
Department of Corrections “to adopt as an administrative regulation
all portions of the protocol implementing the lethal injection
statute. ...”
New Voices: Kentucky Public Defenders Call for Moratorium
on Executions
Death Penalty Information Org.
11-24-09 --
On November 23, Kentucky Public Advocate Ed Monahan and
Louisville Metro Chief Public Defender Dan Goyette called on the
governor and the state's Attorney General to stay all executions
until an assessment team formed by the American Bar Association
can objectively review the state's death penalty. Monahan and
Goyette wrote letters asking Attorney General Jack Conway not to
request any further execution warrants and asking Governor
Steven Beshear not to sign execution warrants until the ABA
Assessment Team has concluded its study and issued a final
report. . . . “There are serious and disturbing questions about
the convictions of a number of inmates facing execution,
particularly in those cases that were tried years ago by
unqualified lawyers lacking adequate resources,” Dan Goyette
said. “We should not proceed with executions until this
independent evaluation is completed and we are assured that due
process has been fully and properly provided in each and every
case. To do otherwise would cast significant doubt on the
fairness and propriety of imposing the ultimate punishment. We
all have a fundamental responsibility to avoid at all costs the
possibility of making an unjust and irreversible mistake.”
Subject of Famous Supreme Court Decision Has Made a New Life
Death Penalty Information Org.
11-23-09
--
James Tyrone Woodson's death
sentence was overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1976
because the jury had not been allowed to consider any mitigating
factors in his life or about his peripheral role in the crime.
The Court not only rejected Woodson's death sentence, but held
that a mandatory death penalty system was unconstitutional.
Woodson had been convicted in 1974 of first-degree murder, which
was automatically punishable by the death penalty under North
Carolina law. Woodson had been in a car during the robbery and
murder, and he maintained that he was threatened to assist with
the robbery. Woodson and 120 other death row inmates' lives
were spared because of the Supreme Court ruling. He eventually
became eligible for parole and was released in 1993. Since his
release, Woodson has led a crime-free life. He used to be the
kitchen manager at the Raleigh Rescue Mission. He now has a job
in Raleigh and preaches at Wake Correctional Center. "You have
to want to change. Nobody can make you change," he said recently
about his work helping others. He continued, "There's a choice
in the matter in life itself. Do you want to live? Do you want
to be helpful to another individual because you've been helped?"
Books: The Last Lawyer--The Fight to Save Death Row
Inmates
Death Penalty Information Org.
11-20-09 --
The Last Lawyer: The Fight to Save Death Row Inmates is a book
by John Temple about the courageous work of a death penalty
defense attorney in the south. Ken Rose is an attorney at the
Center for Death Penalty Litigation in North Carolina. He has
handled many capital cases, but the focus of this book is his
defense of Bo Jones, a mentally handicapped farmhand convicted
of a murder that occurred in 1987 and sentenced to death. The
case highlights issues such as inadequate defense, mental
retardation, mental illness and witness testimony. Based on over
four years of behind-the-scenes reporting, The Last Lawyer tells
the story of how Rose's work eventually led to the dismissal of
all charges against Jones in 2008.
VIRGINIA
Death Sentences Have Become Rare in Virginia
Death Penalty Information Org.
11-19-09 --
Virginia has not had a death verdict from a jury since March
2008, the longest stretch of time without a death verdict since
the death penalty was reinstated in the 1970s. Nationally,
there has also been a decline in death sentences: according to
the Bureau of Justice Statistics, there were 115 death sentences
in 2007, 65% less than the 326 that were handed down in 1995. In
Virginia, part of this decline might be attributed to a change
in state law made effective in 1995 that eliminated the
possibility of parole with a life sentence. Scott Sunby,
professor of law at Washington and Lee University, said he
believes that this decline can also be attributed to the rising
cost of winning death sentences, more effective defense lawyers,
and a dwindling public desire for capital punishment. (There are
currently 14 prisoners on Virginia's death row; in 1995 there
were 55 inmates on the row. Virginia is second to Texas in the
number of executions carried out since 1976.)
TEXAS
Death Sentences Declining in Texas
Death Penalty Information Org.
11-18-09 --
Death sentences have dropped significantly over the last few
years in Texas according to a study by the Fort Worth
Star-Telegram. The number of death sentences is at a 35-year low
as prosecutors have pushed for fewer death sentences and juries
have become less willing to impose them. Since 2005, defendants
may receive a sentence of life without parole instead of the
death penalty. Before this change, the only alternative to the
death penalty in Texas was a life sentence with eligiblity for
parole after 40 years, or even less in earlier years. Since the
introduction of life without parole, death sentences in Texas
have dropped 40 percent compared with the four years prior.
Texas had 13 death sentences in 2008, and 9 so far this year.
Ten years ago, Texas sentenced 47 defendants to death. . . . "With life without parole being
a viable option now, [juries] feel a lot more comfortable that
that person is not going to be let out back into society," said
Tarrant County District Attorney Joe Shannon. "We are probably
waiving the death penalty more times than we used to because
we’re trying to forecast the outcome of the case. . . .It
doesn’t translate to dollar bills. It translates into uses of
limited resources."
|

A
Victims-of-Law Associate |
U.S.
SUPREME COURT
Supreme Court Decides One Capital Case and Agrees to Hear
Another
Death Penalty Information Org.
11-17-09 --
On November 16, the United States Supreme Court accepted for
review and handed down a per curiam decision in Wong v.
Belmontes (No. 08-1263). The Court reinstated Fernando
Belmontes' death sentence and overturned the decision of the
Ninth Circuit granting relief because of ineffectiveness of
counsel. Belmontes was sentenced to death for murdering a woman
during a robbery in 1981 in California. The appeals court ruled
in 2008 that Belmontes' lawyer had represented him incompetently
by neglecting to introduce evidence of family strife and
depression that would have likely led to a different sentence.
The Supreme Court assumed that the attorney should have
presented more evidence but concluded it would not have made any
difference in sentencing. Justice Stevens issued a concurring
opinion stating that he believed the Supreme Court had erred in
a previous consideration of this same case.
On the same day, the Court agreed to hear Magwood v. Culliver
(No. 09-158). Billy Joe Magwood received a death sentence for
killing a sheriff in 1979 in Alabama. At the time, Alabama law
required two conditions before the state could sentence a
defendant to death, only one of which was satisfied by Magwood's
crime. Magwood's death sentence was overturned on other grounds
in 1985, and he was resentenced to death the next year.
However, it was not until 1997 that Magwood's lawyers challenged
whether his crime was death-eligible under Alabama law. Alabama
claims Magwood took too long to raise this argument and his
appeal is barred by the Anti-terrorism and Effective Death
Penalty Act, which imposes strict limits on successive federal
habeas corpus petitions. The Eleventh Circuit agreed. Magwood
claims that he is bringing his claim under his new death
sentence and therefore is not barred by AEDPA.
TEXAS
Texas Death Row Inmate Gets
Last Minute Reprieve
Associated Press, FOXNews
11-17-09 --
A condemned killer who
prosecutors said had been faking mental illness to avoid
execution won a reprieve from a federal judge less than two
hours before he could have been taken to the Texas death chamber
Tuesday evening. . . . Gerald Eldridge, 45, was condemned for
the fatal shooting of his ex-girlfriend and her daughter nearly
17 years ago in Houston. Attorneys contended he was too mentally
ill to receive lethal injection and made those arguments in an
appeal to the courts. . . . U.S. District Judge Lee Rosenthal in
Houston agreed to delay the scheduled punishment for 90 days
after the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals had rejected the
appeal Monday. . . . Rosenthal said Eldridge's lawyers made a
"substantial threshold showing of insanity" and should be given
a hearing. The Supreme Court has ruled in previous cases that
mentally ill prisoners may be executed if they are aware of why
they are facing the punishment.
UNITED
STATES SUPREME COURT
Supreme Court restores, for the third time, death sentence for
California murderer
The
justices reverse an appeals court ruling, saying jurists wouldn't
have been swayed by Fernando Belmontes' tough childhood. Belmontes
beat a woman to death with a dumbbell to steal her stereo.
By David
G. Savage, Los Angeles Times
11-16-09 --
Reporting from Washington - The Supreme Court today for the third
time reversed the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals and restored a
death sentence for a California murderer who bludgeoned and killed a
young woman in 1981 to steal a stereo from her house. . . . In a
unanimous opinion, the justices rejected the notion that the
defendant's rights were violated by his lawyer's "ineffective
assistance of counsel." The appeals court ruled that the lawyer had
failed to stress that Fernando Belmontes had had a very difficult
childhood. . . . However, the justices said such testimony would not
likely have swayed the jury to spare Belmontes. They also said they
"simply cannot comprehend the assertion by the Court of Appeals that
this case did not involve 'needless suffering.' " The victim, Steacy
McConnell, had "her skull crushed by 15 to 20 blows from a steel
dumbbell bar" at the hands of Fernando Belmontes, the defendant. She
fought "a desperate struggle for life" but died hours later, the
court said.
The flaws of lethal injection
It's a preferred method of
executing inmates, but so much can -- and has -- gone wrong that
states need to take a hard look at their procedures.
By
Miriam Aroni Krinsky, Los Angeles Times Opinion
11-16-09 --
It has been a year and a half since the Supreme Court ended the
nationwide moratorium on lethal injections, finding that
Kentucky's three-drug protocol had adequate safeguards to
protect inmates from "cruel and unusual" punishment. But in
California, executions remain on hold, as they have been for
more than three years. Some have urged the governor and others
to move things along. They point to executions without incident,
like Tuesday's of John Allen Muhammad in Virginia. But other
recent executions compel a contrary conclusion: We still haven't
found a way to get it right. . . . . The latest debacle came in
September, when Ohio botched its third lethal injection
execution in as many years. The saga began when corrections
officials could not find a vein during the execution of Romell
Broom. They tried for two hours, sticking Broom at least 18
times. The process got more macabre when the condemned man tried
to help his executioners, pumping his arm and pointing out
potential veins. The team of corrections officials finally gave
up, and Broom returned to death row.
WASHINGTON
New Voices: Washington State Law Enforcement Officials
Express Doubts About Death Penalty
Death Penalty Information Org.
11-16-09 --
Walla Walla County (Washington) Sheriff Mike Humphreys said the
death penalty does not deter homicides, and it may be time for
the public to reconsider the law: "At the time, (perpetrators do
not) think about [the death penalty]. They don't believe they're
going to get caught. And if they do get caught, there are a lot
of court proceedings making it likely (execution is) not going
to happen. . . . It's costing us this much money. Let the people
make that decision," he said. Humphreys agreed with a recent
(Death Penalty Information Center) survey of police chiefs who
rated reducing drug abuse as a better way of reducing crime. "If
we're going to reduce the drug abuse, we're going to reduce all
crimes. From theft to murder," he said. Police Chief Chuck
Fulton agreed with Humphreys that the death penalty is not a
deterrent and would prefer to see the practice abolished through
legislation. Fulton said the death penalty creates more victims
and the system results in a "'carnival atmosphere' that
adversely affects penitentiary workers, law enforcement officers
responsible for maintaining security, and every one else
involved." He said he understands the anger toward those who
commit murder but doubts that the death penalty is the answer
for society.
Sept. 11 Mastermind, Four Other Detainees to Face Death Penalty in
New York Trial
Devlin
Barrett, The Associated Press, Law.com
11-13-09 --
Self-proclaimed Sept. 11 mastermind
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other Guantanamo Bay
detainees will be brought to trial in a civilian U.S. courthouse in
New York, near the site of the devastating 2001 terror attacks.
Prosecutors expect to seek the death penalty. . . . Attorney General
Eric Holder
announced the long-awaited and politically fraught decision
at a news conference Friday. He also said five other Guantanamo
detainees, including a major suspect in the bombing of the USS Cole,
Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, will be tried through the
military commission process. . . . Holder said the Sept. 11
defendants should be tried where their crimes occurred. Nearly 3,000
people died when the World Trade Center towers were brought down by
two hijacked jetliners, another hijacked jet hit the Pentagon and a
fourth crashed in the state of Pennsylvania.
OHIO
Ohio Proposes Major Change to Its Execution Process
Death Penalty Information Org.
11-13-09 --
On November 13, Ohio announced that it was adopting a
single-drug protocol for lethal injection, making it the first
state to embrace this change. Ohio will inject inmates with a
large dose of an anesthetic, thiopental sodium, which is
supposed to both render the inmate unconscious and eventually
cause death. The state also said it will employ a back-up method
of execution involving the injection of two anesthetic drugs
into the muscle of the defendant. In September, Ohio failed in
its execution of Romell Broom, halting the process after two
hours when guards could not find a suitable vein for the
injection. Subsequent executions were placed on hold as state
officials sought more effective ways of administering lethal
injection. The state had been having a hard time finding medical
personnel to consult with about lethal injection procedures
because of professional and ethical rules that generally
prohibit doctors, nurses and others from being involved in
capital punishment. Read the Associated Press article about this
development here:
Read more
|

A
Victims-of-Law Associate |
KENTUCKY
Former Kentucky Officials Rethinking the Wisdom of High Death
Penalty Expenditures
Death Penalty Information Org.
11-12-09 --
The former director of Kentucky's courts recently recommended
that the state stop wasting money on the death penalty and
direct those resources where they are needed more. "We've got a
system in Kentucky where there's not enough money for public
advocates, for prosecutors, for drug courts, family courts, for
juvenile services, for rehabilitation programs, and we're using
the money we have in a way I think is unwise," said Jason Nemes,
former director of the state Administrative Office of the
Courts. "Every dollar that goes to our ineffective capital
punishment system is a dollar taken away from other needs. . .
The benefit to public safety is low. Are we really protecting
the public?" he asked. . . . In over 30 years, Kentucky has
carried out three executions. The state spends about $8 million
a year prosecuting, defending and incarcerating death row
inmates, according to an estimate by the state Department of
Public Advocacy. Critics of the death penalty question whether
this ineffective system is one the state can afford, especially
as state-ordered budget cuts are already affecting many aspects
of its judicial branch. Former Kentucky Supreme Court Chief
Justice Joseph Lambert agreed that death-penalty cases often
become "legal monsters," and that "it's impossible to streamline
death-penalty litigation to justify the cost, because doing so
would dramatically increase the risk of wrongful executions."
UNITED
STATES SUPREME COURT
A Justice's Curious Comment About ABA Guidelines for Death Penalty
Lawyers
Marcia Coyle, The National Law
Journal
11-11-09 --
The Supreme Court this week, in an unsigned opinion, reversed relief
granted by the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to a death row
inmate because of his lawyer's ineffective assistance. But Justice
Samuel Alito wrote separately -- and curiously -- to emphasize his
view that no "special relevance" should be given to the
American Bar Association's guidelines on the appointment
and performance of defense counsel in death penalty cases. . . . In
Bobby v. Van Hook, the justices found that, among the
6th Circuit panel's errors, was its reliance on ABA guidelines
announced 18 years after Robert Van Hook went to trial. . . . The
per curiam opinion said the Sixth Amendment entitled defendants to
representation that does not fall below an "objective standard of
reasonableness." Restatements of professional standards, the Court
added, can be useful guides as to what reasonableness entails, "but
only to the extent they describe the professional norms prevailing
when the representation took place."
GEORGIA
Case could decide whether Georgia can afford the death penalty
By Bill
Rankin, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
11-11-09 --
An accused killer from Pike County has sat in jail for nearly four
years without a trial -- not because of any problems with the
evidence but because the state is seeking the death penalty and
cannot pay for the man's defense. . . . The case, argued Tuesday
before the Georgia Supreme Court, could determine whether Georgia
can afford the death penalty. . . . Jamie Ryan Weis, charged with
killing a Pike County woman during a 2006 house burglary, did not
have lawyers to defend him for more than two years because of money
woes plaguing the state public defender system.
MISSOURI
Appeals court rejects MO death row inmates’ appeal
By
Robert Patrick, St. Louis Post-Dispatch
11-10-09 --
A federal appeals court on Tuesday rejected another challenge to
Missouri’s execution procedures. . . . The challenge was filed by
eight death row inmates who accused the state of having a
“well-documented history of employing incompetent and unqualified
personnel” overseeing executions and insufficiently anesthetizing
inmates before their executions. The inmates claimed that Missouri’s
history would likely continue in the future. . . . U.S. District
Court Judge Fernando J. Gaitan Jr. granted Missouri’s motion for
summary judgment in the case in July of 2008. The prisoners
appealed. . . . On Tuesday a three-judge panel of the 8th U.S. Court
of Appeals said that Gaitan’s ruling was correct.
You
can access the ruling at
this link.
VIRGINIA
Sniper Who Killed 10 Is Executed in Virginia
By
Ian Urbina, The New York Times
11-10-09 --
John A. Muhammad, whose murderous shooting spree in the fall of
2002 left at least 10 dead, was executed at a Virginia state
prison on Tuesday night. . . . The execution closed a case that
fixated the region ever since local residents were gunned down
while doing the most mundane tasks, like shopping or pumping
gas. . . . Mr. Muhammad, 48, was executed at the Greensville
Correctional Center. He offered no final words as he entered the
death chamber, and Larry Traylor, a prison official, said the
process had gone smoothly. Mr. Muhammad’s retained a calm
demeanor throughout, and once he was strapped to a gurney to
receive a lethal injection, he closed his eyes, Mr. Taylor said.
He was pronounced dead at 9:11 pm. . . . On Monday, the Supreme
Court refused to intervene in the case of Mr. Muhammad, 48, who
was sentenced to die for the killing of Dean H. Meyers, an
engineer who was shot in the head at a gasoline station in
Manassas, Va.
WASHINGTON
The Death Penalty in the State of Washington
Death Penalty Information Org.
11-10-09 --
The Walla-Walla Union Bulletin is focusing on the state's death
penalty in a 4-part series entitled, "Executing Justice." The
series examines issues such as the costs of the death penalty,
arbitrariness, and the appeals process. Washington currently has
eight men on death row, and has not had an execution since 2001.
In almost 30 years, there has been only one non-consensual
execution. Four defendants have been executed since the death
penalty was reinstated in 1981, but three of the four defendants
waived their appeals. The paper cites a Washington State Bar
Association report noting that of the 270 convictions for
aggravated murder since 1981, the death penalty was sought 79
times, resulting in 30 death sentences. The majority of those
cases were overturned on appeal, and most of those reversals
resulted in life without parole sentences. The Bar Association
estimates that a death penalty case costs $754,000 more than
other murder cases, not including the $100,000 associated with
preparing for an execution.
UNITED
STATES SUPREME COURT
Supreme court denies request to stay D.C. sniper's execution
By
Robert Barnes, Washington Post Staff Writer
11-9-09 --
The Supreme Court Monday denied John Allen Muhammad's request to
stay his execution, clearing the way for Virginia to put to death
the man who terrorized the Washington region as the Beltway Sniper.
. . . Justices John Paul Stevens, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia
Sotomayor objected to the court's haste, saying it "highlights once
again the perversity of executing inmates before their appeals
process have been fully concluded." . . . Stevens, writing for the
three, said Virginia had short-circuited the process by scheduling
Muhammad's execution for Tuesday night, earlier than the court would
normally have reviewed his petition for the court to take his case.
. . . "By denying Muhammad's stay application, we have allowed
Virginia to truncate our deliberative process on a matter --
involving a death row inmate -- that demands the most careful
attention," Stevens wrote.
Supreme Court Says ABA Counsel Guidelines Can’t Help Ohio Death Row
Inmate
By Debra
Cassens Weiss, ABA Journal
11-9-09 --
In a summary disposition, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled a federal
appeals court should not have judged a murder defendant’s
representation based on ABA standards enacted 18 years after his
trial. . . . The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the case of Robert Van
Hook, convicted of finding his murder victim at a Cincinnati bar
catering to gay men. Prosecutors had accused Van Hook of luring the
victim to his home, then strangling him and killing him with a
kitchen knife. Van Hook was convicted and sentenced to death. . . .
The Cincinnati-based 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had ruled
that Van Hook’s lawyers were ineffective in their investigation and
presentation of mitigation evidence during the sentencing phase of
his trial. The 6th Circuit relied on ABA guidelines for capital
cases passed in 2003 that expanded on 1980 standards broadly
outlining defense counsel’s duties in all criminal cases.
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Victims-of-Law Advertiser |
KENTUCKY
Kentucky's troubled death-penalty system lets cases languish for
decades
By R. G.
Dunlop • The Louisville Courier-Journal
11-7-09 --
Kentucky is spending millions of dollars each year on a
capital-punishment system so ineffective that more death-row inmates
are dying of natural causes than are being executed. . . . Since the
death penalty was reinstated nationwide in 1976, Kentucky's trial
courts have sentenced 92 defendants to death. Only three have been
executed, compared to the five inmates who have died while their
cases were being appealed. . . . In fact, because of Kentucky's
ponderous system, more than one-third of the state's 36 current
death-row inmates — 13 in all — have been there at least two
decades. That's a higher percentage than in every other state except
Tennessee, Nevada and Idaho, according to an analysis of information
compiled by the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics.
Studies: Disparate Administration of the Military Death
Penalty
Death Penalty Information Org.
11-6-09 --
A recent study of the military death penalty by Professor David
Baldus revealed disparities depending on whether the victim in
the underlying crime was also a member of the military or was a
civilian. The paper was co-authored by Professors Catherine
Grosso and George Woodworth and was published by the Michigan
State University College of Law. The authors note that despite
a 1984 executive order that "defined death eligible murder in
the armed forces principally in terms of civilian murder modeled
after state law systems," the military death penalty has been
implemented in such a way that shows a large disparity between
military murder and civilian murder. The study concluded that
soldiers who are accused of civilian murder were less likely to
face a capital court martial, to receive a capital conviction,
and to be sentenced to death than soldiers who were accused of a
military murder (murder of a commissioned or non-commissioned
officer). "In this process," the report said, "the military
death penalty has come to be used almost exclusively as a
disciplinary vehicle to protect the authority and effectiveness
of military command."
TENNESSEE
Law Reviews: The Past, Present, and Future of the Death
Penalty
Death Penalty Information Org.
11-5-09 --
The Tennessee Law Review recently published a compilation of
articles and essays from its colloquium, "The Past, Present, and
Future of the Death Penalty," held in February 2009.
Contributors focused on issues that have influenced capital
punishment throughout the course of history. An article by Hugo
Adam Bedau, a prominent death penalty scholar, addresses the
issues of innocence and racial bias in the application of the
death penalty. Lyn Entzeroth focuses on whether mentally ill
defendants should be excluded from the death penalty, and asks
whether states should be allowed to forcibly medicate mentally
ill defendants in order to make them competent for execution.
The colloquium included a keynote address by Stephen Bright of
the Southern Center for Human Rights on representation, and
papers by Dwight Aarons, David Baldus, Julie Brain, Neil Weiner,
George Woodworth, John Blume, Sheri Lynn Johnson, Christopher
Seeds, Bradley MacLean, Judge Gilbert Merritt, Penny White, and
Pamela Wilkins.
MISSISSIPPI
Editorials: "Death penalty just too costly"
Death Penalty Information Org.
11-4-09 --
A recent opinion piece by the Editorial Director of the
Clarion-Ledger in Mississippi points to the high costs of the
death penalty as a way in which arbitrariness enters into the
application of capital punishment: “When is a crime a crime
deserving of death?," David Hampton asks. "When the county can
afford it, of course.” The paper supports the death penalty but
the Editorial Director offered the example of Hinds County
District Attorney Robert Shuler Smith, who said his county
cannot afford to prosecute death penalty cases. The author
noted, “It's a matter of how much ‘justice‘ the county can
afford. But if one county can ‘afford‘ to send someone to death
row and another can't, isn't that another example of how
inequitable the death penalty can be?“ Hampton also cited
geographical location as contributing to the death penalty’s
arbitrary nature. “Ironically, it is very difficult to get a
death penalty jury sentence in Hinds County anyway. Prosecutors
have avoided seeking death for that reason. Yet, another jury in
a different county with a different racial or gender makeup
might not hesitate." The author concludes: "The death penalty
costs too much, literally and in many, many other ways." Read
in full by clicking here:
Read more
GEORGIA
Georgia Supreme Court to Consider Effects of Delayed and
Unfunded Representation in Death Penalty Case
Death Penalty Information Org.
11-3-09 --
On November 10, the Georgia Supreme Court will hear arguments
from attorneys for a capital defendant, Jamie Weis, and from the
state concerning a three-and-a-half year delay in bringing his
case to trial. For two years of that delay, the Weis defense
team had no funding, and for 14 months he was completely without
representation. During this entire time, the state was staffed
and funded to prepare its prosecution of Weis. The Court will
decide whether Weis's constitutional right to a speedy trial was
violated and whether that requires a dismissal of charges, or at
least prevents the state from seeking the death penalty. Weis
was arrested and charged with murder in 2006. He was assigned
two attorneys, but because of a crisis in the state's indigent
defense system, they were forced to resign and were not
reassigned with pay until close to the trial date. Weis suffers
from psychosis, depression and anxiety, and has been detained in
a county jail. He has attempted suicide three times while
awaiting trial.
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Victims-of-Law Advertiser |
October 2009
Law Review: Death Penalty Stories
Death Penalty Information Org.
10-23-09 --
The University of Missouri-Kansas City Law Review recently
published a symposium issue of Death Penalty Stories,
highlighting the role of the narrative in the defense of death
penalty cases. The compilation includes contributions from
litigators who have used persuasive narrative in support of a
life sentence. Russell Stetler’s The Unknown Story of a
Motherless Child chronicles the case of Edgar H., who was
convicted of killing four men in California. Edgar’s traumatic
childhood was influential in negotiating a sentence of life
instead of death. Dr. Craig Haney’s article, On Mitigation as
Counter-Narrative: A Case Study of the Hidden Context of Prison
Violence, introduces the concept of the "master narrative," the
official story--often laden with inflammatory rhetoric--that
public officials supply to the media and that sets the stage for
a capital trial ending in a death sentence. Haney argues that
“more accurate information about the role of adverse social
histories and powerful social conditions" might lead to more
informed public debate over the utility of capital punishment.
ARIZONA
Court Pressure in Arizona Leads to Settlements in Death Cases
Death Penalty Information Org.
10-22-09 --
A growing backlog of death penalty cases and delays in starting
trials in Arizona’s Maricopa County has forced Superior Court
judges to apply pressure on both sides by refusing to postpone
trial dates and demanding that attorneys discuss settlements.
The backlog came as a result of County Attorney Andrew Thomas’s
aggressive pursuit of death sentences in more than 120 cases
since taking office in 2005. The number of death penalty
defendants grew faster than the courts could handle them. Over
100 death penalty defendants are still awaiting trial in
Maricopa County, most of whom are beyond the 18-month time
period in which they are supposed to be tried. “I think firm
trial dates settle cases,” said Presiding Criminal Judge Gary
Donahoe. The pressure is apparently working. This year, Thomas
has allowed 27 defendants who faced the death penalty to plead
to life sentences or less – nearly twice as many as last year,
and eight times as many as in the year Thomas first took office.
There is a schedule to try to settle more than 20 cases before
the end of 2009. Thomas has also filed fewer notices of intent
to seek the death penalty.
TEXAS
Former Texas Governor Now Expresses Doubts About Death Penalty
Death Penalty Information Org.
10-21-09 --
Mark White, a former governor of Texas and strong supporter of
the death penalty, recently expressed serious reservations about
the practice in Texas. "There is a very strong case to be made
for a review of our death penalty statutes and even look at the
possibility of having life without parole so we don’t look up
one day and determine that we as the State of Texas have
executed someone who is in fact innocent," he said. White was
responding to concerns about the case of Cameron Willingham who
was executed in Texas in 2004 despite new evidence indicating
that the arson investigation that led to his conviction was
flawed. Texas' present governor, Rick Perry, recently dismissed
the chair and two members of a State Forensic Science Commission
that was scheduled to hear evidence regarding the case. Former
governor White said the case is one example “of why I think the
system is so unreliable.”
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TEXAS
Studies: Disparities in Legal Representation in Harris
County, Texas
Death Penalty Information Org.
10-20-09 --
Scott Phillips, a professor in the Department of Sociology and
Criminology at the University of Denver, recently published a
study that revealed disparities in who receives the death
penalty inTexas. Phillips studied the 504 death penalty cases
that occurred between 1992 and 1999 in Harris County (Houston
and surrounding areas). Harris County is the largest
jurisdiction in the United States to use a court-appointment
system for selecting lawyers to defend indigent defendants.
Phillips’s research showed stark differences between the
defendants who were represented by hired counsel and those who
were not, regardless of their socio-economic status. His study
revealed that “those who can hire counsel for the entire case,
or even a portion of the case, appear to be treated in a
fundamentally different manner than those who cannot.” For the
504 death penalty cases examined, hiring counsel for the entire
case eliminated the chance of a death sentence and resulted in
more acquittals, and hiring counsel for at least a portion of
the case substantially reduced the chance of a death sentence.
ALABAMA
Death sentence for killer
‘freakish’
By
Bill Rankin, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
10-19-09 --
In 1994, Mark McClain shot and killed the manager of a Domino’s
Pizza outlet in Augusta in a 2 a.m. robbery that yielded little
more than $100. . . . The next year, McClain was one of 55
people convicted in Georgia of committing a murder during an
armed robbery. . . . Prosecutors sought the death penalty
against 16 of those 55 killers and declined to seek it against
the rest. McClain was the only one sentenced to die. Friday, the
state Board of Pardons and Parole denied McClain clemency, and
he is scheduled for execution at 7 p.m. Tuesday. . . . In their
final appeals, McClain’s lawyers contend the condemned inmate’s
sentence was out of line when compared with those in similar
armed-robbery murders. . . . “Since Mr. McClain’s death sentence
was imposed, literally hundreds of defendants in similar cases —
and for the most part cases involving far more horrendous facts
— have escaped even the prospect of being sentenced to death
because prosecutors don’t seek it,” said Brian Kammer, one of
McClain’s lawyers.
TEXAS
Review death penalty law,
ex-governor urges
White worries about execution of
the innocent
By
R.G. Ratcliffe, Austin Bureau
10-18-09 --
Former Gov. Mark White, who was involved in the executions of 20
condemned criminals, says it may be time for Texas to do away
with the death penalty. . . . The death penalty is no longer a
deterrent to murder, and long stays for the condemned on death
row shows justice is not swift, White said. . . . More than
anything, he said, he has grown concerned that the system is not
administered fairly and that there are too many risks of
executing innocent people. . . . White said the state needs to
take a serious look at replacing the death penalty with life
without parole. . . . “There is a very strong case to be made
for a review of our death penalty statutes and even look at the
possibility of having life without parole so we don't look up
one day and determined that we as the state of Texas have
executed someone who is in fact innocent,” said White.
Perry uses clemency sparingly
on death row
Governor has never called off an
execution on a claim of innocence
By
Lise Olsen, Houston Chronicle
10-18-09 --
In nearly nine years as Texas governor, Rick Perry has never
spared a life based on a claim of innocence and only once
delayed an execution in such a case, according to a Chronicle
review of public records, clemency statistics and information
from the governor's office. . . . During that same period,
officials in other death penalty states granted clemency for
humanitarian reasons at least 200 times — 171 based on questions
of innocence in Illinois alone. . . . Texas has executed 200
convicts under Perry's watch, but he has spared just one
condemned man's life in a case in which he was not compelled to
do so by the U.S. Supreme Court. In that case, the inmate Perry
saved in 2007 was not a killer but the admitted driver of a
getaway car, condemned alongside the triggerman in a joint trial
under Texas' tough “law of parties.”
ARIZONA
Woman on Death Row May Get
New Trial
By
The Associated Press, New York Times
10-17-09 --
Debra Jean Milke has been sitting on Arizona’s death row for
nearly 20 years, largely because a police detective said she
confessed to plotting her 4-year-old son’s murder. . . . Now Ms.
Milke could get a new trial, and even her freedom, because the
detective skipped one of the most basic steps when officers
interview suspects — getting them to sign a Miranda waiver,
giving up their right to remain silent. . . . “You know, I have
never seen a case where there has been no signed Miranda
waiver,” said Judge Alex Kozinski of the United States Court of
Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in San Francisco, at a hearing on
the case in August 2008.
Judge Says Death Penalty
"too fraught with variables to survive"
Death Penalty Information Org.
10-16-09
-- Retired Federal
Appeals Court Judge H. Lee Sarokin recently offered a harsh
critique of the death penalty, especially challenging the
botched execution attempt of Romell Broom in Ohio in September.
Citing morality, arbitrariness, and the dim prospects of closure
for the murder victims’ families, Judge Sarokin called the
imposition of the death penalty an erratic and flawed process
that should not be permitted to continue. “The system is too
fraught with variables to survive. Whether or not one receives
the death penalty depends upon the discretion of the prosecutor
who initiates the proceeding, the competence of counsel who
represents the defendant, the race of the victim, the race of
the defendant, the make-up of the jury, the attitude of the
judge, and the attitude and make-up of the appellate courts that
review the verdict.“ . . . Regarding Ohio's lethal injection
process, Judge Sarokin said it would be unconstitutional to
subject the defendant to a second execution attempt: “It is
impossible to imagine what it must be like to know that you are
going to be put to death, have numerous efforts fail, and then
have to face the prospect again at a later date! If that isn't
cruel and unusual punishment, I do not know what is!“ He
continued, “Double jeopardy prohibits a person from being tried
twice for the same crime. Should it not protect a person from
being subjected to execution twice for the same crime?“ . . .
Click to read the entire article:
Read more
Gallup Poll: Support for Death Penalty Remains
Near 25-Year Low
Death Penalty Information Org.
10-15-09 --
The latest Gallup Poll on the death penalty shows 65% of
Americans support the death penalty, significantly lower than
the 80% support recorded in 1994 and near the lowest support of
64% in the past 25 years recorded last year. Only 57% believe
the death penalty is fairly applied, and 59% of Americans
believe that an innocent person has been executed in the last
five years. Gallup reported that support for the death penalty
is lower if Americans are offered an explicit alternative, such
as life imprisonment with absolutely no possibility of parole.
The last time that Gallup offered such alternatives in 2006,
only 47% preferred the death penalty, while 48% supported life
imprisonment with no parole.
UNITED
STATES SUPREME COURT
Mumia Abu-Jamal's Life May Hinge on Case of
Neo-Nazi Triple Murderer
Shannon P. Duffy, The Legal Intelligencer
10-14-09 --
In a bizarre twist of fate, Mumia Abu-Jamal -- the convicted cop
killer whose quarter century on death row in Pennsylvania has
made him internationally famous -- may find that his very life
hinges on the outcome of a U.S. Supreme Court argument on
Tuesday in the case of a neo-Nazi triple murderer who wore a
Hitler mustache at trial as he testified proudly about his
desire to kill blacks, Jews and gays. . . . For Abu-Jamal, the
stakes couldn't be higher. And the worst-case scenario is that
the decision in the Ohio case, Smith v. Spisak, could directly
lead to a reinstatement of Abu-Jamal's death sentence. . . . But
the justices may never reach the legal issues that Abu-Jamal
shares with Frank Spisak, the neo-Nazi convicted in that case.
That could happen if the high court instead focuses entirely on
issues relating to whether Spisak's defense lawyer at trial
did such a poor job in
delivering his closing argument
in the death penalty phase that his death sentence cannot stand.
Supreme Court to Review Effect of "Gross Negligence"
by Death Penalty Attorney
Death Penalty Information Org.
10-14-09 --
On October 13, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear Holland v.
Florida, a case raising the question of "whether 'gross
negligence' by a state-appointed defense attorney in a death
penalty case provides a basis for extending the time to file a
federal habeas challenge, in a case where the habeas plea was
filed late despite repeated instructions from the client." (scotusblog.com).
In his petition for certiorari to the Court, the defendant
stated, "Despite the State of Florida's promise to Petitioner
that he have counsel to competently and effectively represent
him in both his state and federal postconviction litigation, a
promise that would be purportedly enforced by judicial
monitoring, Petitioner's state collateral attorney, Mr. Collins,
failed to timely file a (habeas corpus) §2254 petition on behalf
of Petitioner." The defendant then filed his own petition for
habeas corpus and, while admitting it was filed late, asked that
the deadline be extended because of the serious error by his
appointed attorney.
UNITED
STATES SUPREME COURT
Ohio Death Penalty Case Might
Determine Abu-Jamal's Fate
Shannon P. Duffy, The Legal Intelligencer
10-12-09 --
Lawyers for convicted cop-killer Mumia Abu-Jamal will be
watching closely on Tuesday when the U.S. Supreme Court takes up
an Ohio death penalty case because its outcome may very well
decide whether Abu-Jamal's death sentence will be reinstated. .
. . In April, Abu-Jamal lost his final appeal seeking a new
trial for the December 1981 murder of Philadelphia Police
Officer Daniel Faulkner when the justices
refused to take up the issue
of whether blacks were unfairly excluded from the jury.
. . . But, at the time, the justices took no action on a
companion petition filed by the Philadelphia district attorney's
office demanding reinstatement of Abu-Jamal's death sentence
despite having discussed it weeks before. . . . Now it appears
certain that the high court has decided to hold the Philadelphia
prosecutors' petition in abeyance pending the outcome of
Smith v. Spisak -- an Ohio case that raises strikingly
similar issues to those in Abu-Jamal's case.
ARIZONA
Questions of justice in court
changes
Death-penalty-case backlog spurs
hastening of process
by
Michael Kiefer The Arizona Republic
10-11-09 --
Since Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas took office in
2005, he has asked for death sentences in murder cases more than
120 times - more than any other top prosecutor in Arizona
history. . . . His support of the death penalty is unwavering:
He has run for election and re-election on the pledge he will
continue to seek capital sentences. . . . Consequently, the
number of death-penalty defendants swelled faster than the court
system could handle. There just weren't enough judges,
prosecutors and qualified defense attorneys available. . . . At
the beginning of 2009, there were 129 defendants awaiting trial
in capital cases in Maricopa County, most of them years beyond
the 18-month time period in which, under court rules, they are
supposed to be tried. . . . But now, the number of capital cases
is being whittled down rapidly.
FLORIDA
Opinion: Florida’s Death Penalty System Still
‘Fraught with Problems’
Death Penalty Information Org.
10-7-09 --
A recent op-ed in the Florida Times-Union pointed to continuing
problems in Florida’s death penalty system despite prior
recommendations for change in an American Bar Association report
three years ago. The article was written by Raoul Cantero III, a
former Florida Supreme Court justice appointed by Gov. Jeb Bush,
and Mark Schlakman, a senior program director for Florida State
University's Center for the Advancement of Human Rights. The
authors state that little has been done by either the state
government or the Florida Bar Association in response to the
ABA's findings. The ABA report addressed the often abysmal legal
representation of defendants in post-conviction proceedings,
socioeconomic and geographic bias in seeking the death penalty
versus a life sentence, and lack of fairness and accuracy in the
system. The authors note that these problems remain, but there
is a chance that new political leaders could still bring about
change: "The challenge for those who hold and aspire to elected
office is to ensure that personal perspectives pertaining to
capital punishment, and the public outrage arising out of
heinous crimes, do not overshadow the fact that Florida's death
penalty process is fraught with problems. Floridians expect a
system of justice that engenders confidence based upon fairness
and accuracy. With regard to the state's death penalty process,
in many respects that standard has proven to be elusive."
OHIO
Ohio Executions Put on Hold; Governor Concurs
Death Penalty Information Org.
10-5-09 --
Lawrence Reynolds, who was scheduled to be executed on October 8
in Ohio, received a stay today (Oct. 5) from the U.S. Court of
Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. The court's stay was based on
unresolved issues in Ohio's lethal injection protocol that were
brought to the surface by the unsuccessful execution of Romell
Broom on September 15. The majority wrote: "These disturbing
issues give rise to at least two questions: first, whether Ohio
is fully and competently adhering to the Ohio lethal injection
protocol given (a) their failure to have a contingency plan in
place should peripheral vein access be impossible, (b) issues
related to the competence of the lethal injection team, and (c)
other potential deficiencies; and second, whether these
instances present sufficient new, additional factors to revive
Reynolds’ Eighth Amendment claims otherwise extinguished by
Cooey II (an earlier lethal injection challenge).”
Ohio presses on for execution
of inmate from Cuyahoga Falls
By
Phil Trexler, Beacon Journal staff writer
10-5-09 --
The Ohio Attorney General's Office will ask the U.S. Supreme
Court to overturn today's appellate court ruling that placed a
stay on Thursday's scheduled execution of Lawrence Reynolds. . .
. The Cincinnati-based 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, in a
2-1 decision, ordered the stay while citing last month's aborted
execution of an inmate from Cleveland. . . . Reynolds, from
Cuyahoga Falls, was sentenced to die for the 1994 robbery and
strangulation death of his neighbor, Loretta Mae Foster, 67. . .
. His attorneys had filed appeals in recent weeks, arguing that
Ohio's lethal injection process is flawed.
TEXAS
Texas Governor Replaces Members of Commission Examining Possible
Wrongful Execution
Death Penalty Information Org.
10-1-09 --
On September 30, Texas Governor Rick Perry replaced the chairman
and two members of a state commission that is investigating
whether inaccurate evidence of arson was presented at the trial
of Cameron Todd Willingham, who was executed in 2004. The
state’s Forensic Science Commission was scheduled to conduct a
public hearing in two days and receive testimony from Craig
Beyler, a nationally known expert who called the Willingham
investigation “slipshod,” and concluded that “almost all of the
evidence presented [w]as based on junk science.” Beyler's report
for the Commission concluded that “no credible evidence existed
to believe that the fire, that killed three children, was caused
by arson.”
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Victims-of-Law Advertiser |
September 2009
New Resources: Death Row Database Now Available
Death Penalty Information Org.
9-30-09 --
A new database of death row prisoners in the U.S. is now
available on DPIC's Web site. The database contains current
sortable and searchable information on death row inmates in each
state, including their name, race, county, and date of birth.
The information in the database is also editable, meaning that
individuals with knowledge of death row inmates may change or
add new information. This new database may be a useful tool in
exploring how the death penalty is applied. Click
here to access the database.
INDIANA
'Zachary's Law' Case Settles with a Life Sentence;
Victim's Family Given Finality
Posted: September 29, 2009
9-29-09 --
Todd Snider, the father of Zachary Snider, who was killed at age
10 by Christopher Stevens in Indiana, accepted final resolution
of the case against Stevens when a settlement was reached for a
sentence of life without parole. “Our family has suffered enough
and would like for this to be resolved once and for all," Mr.
Snider said about the life sentence. "This will give our family
finality. Chris Stevens will die in prison and will never have
the opportunity to destroy people's lives again." The 1993
murder led to the passage of Zachary’s Law, creating Indiana's
sex offender registry. Stevens was originally sentenced to
death, but the sentence was overturned in 2007 because Stevens'
attorneys had not adequately presented evidence of the
defendant's mental illness. Putnam County Prosecutor Tim
Bookwalter said he “believe[s] it was probable that another jury
would have given Mr. Stevens the death penalty, but it would
have caused the Sniders to go through a lengthy jury trial, and
then if convicted, a new set of appeals could have gone on
another 10 years. With the plea, this case is over. There are no
more appeals and the Sniders should never have to deal with
Stevens again." .
Editorials: "High Cost of Death Row"
Death Penalty Information Org.
9-28-09 --
In an editorial on September 28 in the New York Times, the paper
called the death penalty "an economic drain on governments with
already badly depleted budgets." Citing figures from the Death
Penalty Information Center, the Times noted that "States waste
millions of dollars on winning death penalty verdicts, which
require an expensive second trial, new witnesses and long jury
selections. Death rows require extra security and maintenance
costs." The editors remarked that some states have begun
reconsidering whether the death penalty is worth its exorbitant
costs, especially since the money spent could be used instead on
“police officers, courts, public defenders, legal service
agencies and prison cells.” The editorial was discussed on
Daily Kos. The entire editorial can be read below:
INTERNATIONAL
Use of Death Penalty May Sharply Decline in Japan
Death Penalty Information Org.
9-27-09 --
Japan, the only other industrialized democracy apart from the
United States that still practices the death penalty, may see a
halt to executions with the recent appointment of Keiko Chiba as
justice minister. Chiba, a lawyer and active death penalty
abolitionist for the past 20 years, would have to provide the
final signature for an execution to occur.
CALIFORNIA
Opinion: San Francisco Chronicle Addresses
"The High Cost of
Vengeance"
Death Penalty Information Org.
9-25-09 --
John Diaz, the editorial page editor of the San Francisco
Chronicle, recently questioned the wisdom of spending hundreds
of millions of dollars on the death penalty in California. Diaz
pointed to the enormous expense of maintaining capital
punishment in the state: "Today, California has nearly 700
inmates on death row, more than any other state, with their
cases in varying levels of appeal. The housing of an inmate on
death row is more than triple the $40,000 annual cost of
incarcerating others. This state is contemplating a new, $400
million death row. And none of this includes the legal bills for
the trials and appeals that are - by constitutional right - more
exhaustive in capital cases." He called for an open debate, “At
some point, California needs to have a forthright debate about
the cost and efficacy of the death penalty. That moment,” he
wrote alluding to upcoming elections, “maybe coming in 2010.” He
noted that executions are too rare in California to be a
plausible deterrent. The percentage of Californians who believe
the death penalty is a deterrent has dropped from 79% to 44% in
the last twenty years.
NEW
MEXICO
Republican Gubernatorial Candidate Ready to Close Door on New
Mexico's Death Penalty
Death Penalty Information Org.
9-23-09 --
In March of this year, New Mexico repealed the death penalty,
becoming the fifteenth state to abolish the practice. The law,
however, is not retroactive, and does not affect two inmates
currently on death row as well as any defendant sentenced to
death for crimes committed before the law was to take effect in
July 2009. One of the legislators who voted to end the death
penalty, partly because of its high costs, was Republican
gubernatorial candidate Rep. Janice Arnold-Jones, who also voted
to repeal the death penalty in 2007. Arnold-Jones recently said
she “would consider commuting sentences of the two men on death
row and any others who may join them.” She continued, “[T]he
biggest reason that I couldn't sustain the death penalty any
longer is it's not working. It is fraught with so many issues,
so much cost and it bogs down our system. It's just not
working.“
OHIO
Is a second execution attempt
cruel and unusual?
A lethal-injection team tried for
about two hours to find a usable vein, then gave up. Romell
Broom, a convicted rapist-murderer, says another try would be
unconstitutional.
By
Carol J. Williams, Los Angeles Times
9-19-09 --
As executioners poked his limbs with an IV needle, Romell Broom
initially tried to speed along his own demise, flexing his arm
and tugging on a rubber tourniquet to better expose a vein on
the inside of his elbow. . . . But as prison workers repeatedly
failed to find a vein strong enough to take the lethal
injections, the convicted rapist-murderer began to despair over
his protracted end. Witnesses and the execution-team log from
Tuesday describe how the 53-year-old winced and cried as a shunt
inserted in his leg also failed to open a pathway for the fatal
drugs. . . . Two hours and 23 minutes after it started, Ohio
Gov. Ted Strickland halted the execution and scheduled a second
attempt for a week later. . . . The aborted execution has
renewed concerns about lethal injection, and raises the question
of whether a second execution attempt would violate the 8th
Amendment prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment.
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Victims-of-Law Advertiser |
TEXAS
Woman on Texas death row
loses federal appeal
Inmate who killed Houston mom,
kidnapped baby may turn to Supreme Court
By
Peggy O'Hare, Houston Chronicle
9-18-09 --
A federal appellate court has rejected condemned inmate Linda
Anita Carty's bid for a new trial, keeping her on Texas' death
row for killing a Houston mother and kidnapping the slain
woman's 4-day-old baby. . . . The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of
Appeals ruled late Thursday that a district court did not err in
denying a new trial for Carty, a 50-year-old grandmother and a
native of the British Virgin Islands. . . . Carty's attorneys,
who handled her appeal for free at the request of the British
government, argued her former lawyers provided ineffective
counsel at her trial and said the Harris County jury that
convicted her might have sentenced her to life in prison had
they been given a more complete portrait of her character. . . .
The Texas Attorney General's Office disagreed. A Harris County
prosecutor applauded the higher court's decision.
OHIO
Chronology of A Failed Execution
Death Penalty Information Org.
9-17-09 --
In The partial timeline below of the attempted execution of
Romell Broom in Ohio on Sept. 15 was compiled by the Cleveland
Plain Dealer, Sept. 17, 2009; reporter Peter Krouse. The entire
timeline can found by clicking
here.
CALIFORNIA
Retired attorney uses
"pamphlet power" to fight death penalty
By
Gus Thomson, Journal Staff Writer
9-16-09 --
Newcastle’s Paul Comiskey is hoping a small pamphlet will have a
big impact on people’s views regarding the death penalty. . . .
The retired defense attorney and former Jesuit priest authored
“A Taxpayers Guide to the California Death Penalty” and has
co-published an initial print run of 10,000 copies. . . .
Comiskey has been handing the pamphlets out over the summer and
encouraging people to read them. . . . Sometimes, he noted, they
hand them back. . . . Comiskey is an unabashed death penalty
opponent – something he says he has been since he was old enough
to formulate an opinion on capital punishment. It’s expensive
for taxpayers during a time when government spending is being
questioned, it hurts rather than helps the families of victims
and it perpetuates prejudices against blacks, he said.
OHIO
New Revelations of Inmate's Struggles During Ohio Execution
Attempt
Death Penalty Information Org.
9-16-09 --
More information is being reported about the botched
execution-attempt of Romell Broom yesterday (Sept. 15) in Ohio.
According to the Associated Press, the correctional officers
encountered so much difficulty in finding a suitable vein for
the lethal injection that, after an hour, Broom attempted to
assist them by moving on his side, sliding the rubber tubing up
and down his arm, and flexing his fingers. A vein was found,
but it collapsed as the technicians inserted a saline solution.
Broom’s assistance did not help, and he turned on his back and
covered his face with both hands. He appeared to be in distress
and wiped his eyes. One of the execution team handed him a roll
of toilet paper, which he used. The executioners attempted to
use the veins in his legs and he grimaced. One of the team
patted him on his back. Finally, the executions gave up their
attempts, indicating they needed a break.
OHIO
Can Ohio Execute the Same Man
Twice?
Posted by Andrew Cohen, CBS News
9-16-09 --
For two hours Tuesday afternoon at a prison in Lucasville, Ohio,
while the rest of us were at work or school or home, Romell
Broom's team of executioners worked to find a usable vein which
would deliver the lethal injections designed to stop his heart
and end his life. First they tried his arms. Then they tried his
legs. Broom himself, a convicted rapist and murderer, even tried
to help at one point, flexing his hand and fingers while lying
on his side. He grimaced. He wiped his brow. Nothing worked. His
veins simply wouldn't hold up. . . . Eventually, long after
Broom was supposed to be dead, the prison director and execution
team gave up. They called the governor and asked for a reprieve.
The governor relented and now Broom sits in legal limbo, waiting
evidently not just for some medical procedure that would free
him up to be put to death but also for
some guidance
from the state and federal courts about whether it now would
amount to "cruel and unusual" punishment to execute him at all
under Ohio's evolving (but clearly still troubled) lethal
injection protocols. . . . The
grisly details
surrounding Broom's failed execution—which read like an outtake
from the movie "The
Green Mile" or a
transcript from a torture probe-- remind us that the United
States Supreme Court did not come remotely close last year to
fixing the many problems that still surround lethal injection in
America. It's true that the Justices
upheld
Kentucky's lethal injection procedures. But those measures are
different from the procedures in place in Ohio, a state that
consistently
has had problems
over the past few years ensuring that its executions are swift
and humane.
TEXAS
No new trial for Texas death
row inmate despite Collin County prosecutor's affair with judge
By
Diane Jennings / The Dallas Morning News
9-16-09 --
The question of whether a romantic relationship between a judge
and prosecutor is unfair won’t be decided by the Texas Court of
Criminal Appeals. . . . The issue in the capital case of Charles
Dean Hood roiled the legal community last summer, but the Court
ruled Wednesday it would not consider the issue because defense
attorneys did not raise it initially. . . . Defense attorney
David Dow called the decision by Texas’ highest criminal court
“gutless.” . . . “The question of whether there is a fundamental
taint to this trial is, at this point, going to be decided by a
federal court — if it’s going to be decided by any court at all
— because what the state court has said is, ‘We don’t care,’”
said Dow, litigation director for the Texas Defender Service.
CALIFORNIA
Prosecutor Decries Judge
Overturning Deadhead Murder Conviction
KTVU.com and Bay City News
9-15-09 --
A former prosecutor said Tuesday that a federal judge's decision
to overturn the conviction and death penalty of a man who was
found guilty of murdering two followers of the Grateful Dead
band at a homeless encampment in Berkeley in 1985 was "an abuse
of judicial discretion." . . . Former Alameda County Assistant
District Attorney James Anderson, who prosecuted Ralph
International Thomas in 1986 for the August 1985 murders of Mary
Gioia, 22, and Greg Kniffin, 18, said the Sept. 9 ruling by U.S.
District Court Judge Marilyn Patel was "an outrageous bit of
judicial jokery." . . . But Thomas's appellate lawyer, A. J.
Kutchins, said, "It is wonderful that after all of these years,
the court has recognized that Mr. Thomas did not get a fair
trial." . . . Patel ruled that Thomas was denied a fair trial
because his defense lawyer was incompetent and failed to locate
witnesses who would have pointed to another resident of the
encampment as a possible suspect.
NORTH
CAROLINA
Vietnam Vet on Death Row Receives His Medals and Waits for
Execution
Death Penalty Information Org.
9-9-09 --A
recent article in the Fayetteville Observer in North Carolina
captures the poignant story of one man's life on death row.
James Floyd Davis is a Vietnam veteran who lashed out with a
burst of violence fourteen years ago, killing three people
including his boss who had fired him a few days before. He
suffers from mental illness and post-traumatic stress disorder.
Through the intervention of a therapist who also served in
Vietnam, it was learned that Davis was entitled to a Purple
Heart and other medals earned during his service. The army
agreed to award him the medals and the prison eventually agreed
to let him receive them. The reporter, Chick Jacobs, sums up
the story this way: "This is a story of how one veteran, wounded
in body and spirit, reached into the demon-filled darkness of a
fellow veteran who lost his way long ago. It's the unlikely tale
of how a medal earned in one horror helped bring a touch of
humanity to another."
TEXAS
Arson Cases in Texas Under Broader Review
Death Penalty Information Org.
9-8-09 --
In 2004
Cameron Todd Willingham was executed in Texas for
murdering his children by arson. Since then, numerous forensic
fire experts have concluded that the evidence of arson presented
at Willingham's trial could not support the conclusion that he
caused the fire. That same year,
Ernest Willis was freed from death row in Texas after
the prosecution concluded that his conviction and death sentence
for arson were mistaken. Texas has 742 offenders in state
prisons for arson, and about 275 more defendants are convicted
of the crime each year. Sen. Rodney Ellis, D-Houston, who has
pushed to create a commission in Texas to explore questionable
convictions, noted, "As scientific methods improve," he said,
"it's a distinct possibility that we're going to find more
problems in the criminal justice system." One of the experts
who examined the evidence in the Willingham case and disputes
the claims of arson is Gerald Hurst, a Cambridge-educated
chemist, who said, "Accidental fires being turned into arsons is
going on all the time." He believes the core of the problem is
that investigators – most of whom began as police officers and
firefighters – have no science background.
Books:
No Human Way to Kill
Death Penalty Information Org.
9-4-09 --
Acclaimed artist Robert Priseman
has assembled some of his drawings of execution chambers with
essays on the death penalty into a new book entitled "No
Human Way to Kill." The essays include the story of a
mother whose daughter was murdered, a death row inmate's diary,
and an interview with Jim Willett, former warden of the prison
where Texas executions are held. Death penalty attorney Clive
Stafford Smith writes in review, "The etchings and accounts
offer up a strange and original contemplation on a subject which
stretches back far, far too long."
TEXAS
Texas Inmate Freed From Death
Row With Charges Dismissed
Death Penalty Information Org.
9-3-09 --
Former death row inmate Michael
Toney was freed from prison in Texas on September 2 after the
state's Attorney General asked that his death sentence and
criminal charges be dismissed. Toney was sentenced to death for
a fatal bombing in 1985 that occurred at a trailer park in Lake
Worth. He has always maintained his innocence, and there was no
physical evidence leading to his conviction. His conviction and
death sentence were overturned by the Texas Court of Criminal
Appeals nine months ago after it was revealed that the state had
withheld critical evidence that might have led the jury to a
different conclusion at his trial in 1999. The attorney general
took over the case after the Tarrant County district attorney's
office recused itself in January because of the withheld
evidence.
Reaction to Execution of a
Probably Innocent Man Grows
Death Penalty Information Org.
9-3-09 --
Recent scientific reports
indicating that Texas likely executed an innocent man have
spurred wide coverage and commentary. Cameron Todd Willingham
was executed in 2004 for the arson murder of his three
children. Fire experts now say the blaze was likely an
accident. Excerpts from coverage: . . . New York Times
Editorial, August 31, 2009, "Questions About an
Execution": . . . People should have no illusions about the
brutal injustice of the death penalty after all of the
exonerations in recent years from DNA evidence, but the case of
Cameron Todd Willingham is still shocking. . . . Mr. Willingham
was executed for setting a fire that killed his 2-year-old
daughter and 1-year-old twins, but a fire expert hired by the
State of Texas has issued a report casting enormous doubt on
whether the fire was arson at all. The Willingham investigation,
which is continuing, is further evidence that the criminal
justice system is far too flawed to justify imposing a death
penalty. . . . . . .The commission is to be commended for
conducting this inquiry, but it is outrageous that Texas is
conducting its careful, highly skilled investigation after Mr.
Willingham has been executed, rather than before.
CALIFORNIA
Californians' support for
death penalty waning
A survey shows public support has
dropped from 79% to 66%, as fears of executing the wrongly
convicted escalate.
By
Carol J. Williams, The Los Angeles Times
9-2-09 --
A majority of Californians still favor the death penalty, but
their support has waned from 79% to 66% over the last two
decades as fears of executing the wrongly convicted escalate, a
researcher reported Tuesday. . . . The survey conducted by Craig
Haney, a UC Santa Cruz psychology professor and lawyer, also
showed that most Californians erroneously believe that it costs
taxpayers less to execute condemned prisoners than to keep them
locked up for life. . . . In California, it costs $138,000 a
year to incarcerate each of San Quentin State Prison's 685 death
row inmates, nearly three times the non-capital inmate cost,
according to the state Department of Corrections and
Rehabilitation. The average stay on death row is 25 years and
growing as legal challenges have kept executions on hold for 3
1/2 years and limited the number to 13 since capital punishment
was restored in 1976. . . . "My sense is that the whole issue of
the death penalty is much more unsettled now than it has been in
the past 20 or so years," said Haney, citing growing public
discomfort with incidents in which innocent prisoners have been
spared at the last minute -- or not at all.
August 2009
TEXAS
Innocence:
"Trial by Fire: Did Texas Execute an Innocent Man?"

Death Penalty Information Org.
8-31-09 --
In a thorough and penetrating
article published in The New Yorker on August 31, David Grann
offers further evidence that Texas probably executed an innocent
man in 2004. Grann carefully examines all the evidence that was
used in the two-day trial in 1992 to convict Cameron Todd
Willingham of murder by arson of his three young children. It
is now well established through a series of investigations by
other fire experts that the forensic evidence of arson presented
at trial had no scientific basis and should not have led to
Willingham's conviction. Another piece of evidence used at
trial was the testimony of a jailhouse informant who said that
Willingham had confessed to the crime, despite the fact that he
had always maintained his innocence and even refused a plea
bargain to avoid the death penalty. The informer eventually
received early release, tried to recant his testimony, and is
now no longer sure what he heard. He also suffers from mental
disorders. Willingham's lawyers thought he was 100% guilty and
offered no rebuttal expert to question the finding of arson. At
the sentencing hearing, the prosecution put on a psychiatrist,
Dr. James Grigson, who made a living helping to send defendants
to death row by testifying to their future dangerousness without
even interviewing them. Dr. Grigson said that Willingham was an
"extremely severe sociopath," words similar to those he used to
describe Randall Dale Adams, who was eventually exonerated
following an investigation by documentary filmmaker Errol
Morris, portrayed in the film "A Thin Blue Line."
MISSISSIPPI
Analysis:
Mississippi lawyer's death-row work criticized
Attorney failed to represent
properly
By
Jack Elliott Jr., Associated Press, DeSoto Appeal
8-31-09 --
In granting a death row inmate a second mental disability
hearing, the Mississippi Supreme Court made clear that it
thought the inmate's former attorney failed to provide proper
representation. . . . In 2003, Howard Dean Goodin persuaded the
Supreme Court that his mental disability claims and his
attorney's failure to pursue competency issues justified further
judicial review. . . . Circuit Judge Marcus Gordon, after a
hearing in Newton County, denied Goodin's post-conviction
petition. . . . In a post-conviction petition, an inmate argues
he has found new evidence -- or a possible constitutional issue
-- that could persuade a court to order a new trial. . . .
Goodin was being represented by the Mississippi Office of
Capital Post-Conviction Counsel and its director, Robert Ryan.
Between the time Gordon heard the mental disability arguments
and the case got back to the Supreme Court, Ryan was gone, the
Office of Capital Post-Conviction Counsel had reorganized and
Goodin had a new lawyer.
Resources:
Legacy of Watt Espy's Research Lives on After His Death
Death Penalty Information Org.
8-28-09 --
Probably the most complete
collection of information on executions carried out in the
United States from colonial times to the modern era was
assembled by Watt Espy of Headland, Alabama. Espy died on
August 13, 2009 at age 76, but his files and catalog of
executions was preserved and transformed over the years into a
searchable database by friends and scholars who appreciated his
work. Much of his archive is now located at the State
University of New York at Albany. DPIC has information from this
database on our
Espy File
page. In addition to a downloadable Excel file of Espy's
catalog of executions, DPIC offers three pdf files that can be
viewed online, containing information on over 15,000 executions
sorted by date of execution, state, and alphabetically by
defendant's name.
New Resources:
State Instructions for Juries Regarding Life Without Parole
Sentences in Capital Cases
Death Penalty Information Org.
8-26-09 --
In all states that use the death
penalty, there are provisions for sentencing inmates to the
alternative sentence of life without parole (LWOP). Prior to
the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Simmons v. South Carolina
(1994), some states with LWOP did not inform the jury of this
alternative even when so requested by the defense. Today,
states apply a variety of conditions and use differing
instructions to inform the jury about this alternative
sentence. Opinion polls and surveys of capital jurors have
shown how important this alternative is in death penalty cases.
Thanks to the research of Emma Reynolds of Drexel Law School and
Intern at the Philadelphia Federal Defender, Capital Habeas
Unit, we are able to offer a summary of how states handle this
key issue. Her paper, "Survey of Life Without Parole
Instructions in Death Penalty States," provides the relevant
statute and information about jury instructions in each death
penalty state. As with any legal research, it would be
important to research any changes in the law before using this
information (e.g., New Mexico has now abolished the death
penalty and replaced the sentence with LWOP). The table of
statutes and instructions is provided in both pdf and Excel
format:
Survey of Life Without Parole
Instructions in Death Penalty States
(pdf)
Survey of Life Without Parole
Instructions in Death Penalty States
(Excel).
Read more
Ongoing Investigation of
Texas Execution Throws New Doubt on Defendant's Guilt
Death Penalty Information Org.
8-25-09 --
According to the Chicago
Tribune, the Texas Forensic Science Commission has received a
report from a nationally known fire scientist that casts doubt
on the guilt of Cameron Todd Willingham (pictured) who was
executed in Texas in February 2004. Craig Beyler of Hughes
Associates conducted a review for the Commission of the evidence
used to convict Willingham of murder by arson, which led to his
death sentence. Beyler concluded the Texas fire investigators
had no basis to rule that a deadly house fire that killed
Willingham's children was an arson. His report mirrors what
other renowned experts have found over the past several years
and is one step in a more thorough review being conducted by the
Science Commission. Experts for the Chicago Tribune and the
Innocence Project in New York have similarly concluded that the
original investigators relied on outdated theories in calling
the fire an arson.
New Voices: Former Death Row Warden Discusses the Impact
of Executions on Correctional Officers
Death Penalty Information Org.
8-19-09 --
Dr. Allen Ault was the warden at
the maximum security prison in Georgia where executions were
carried out. He also served as Commissioner of Corrections
during a lifetime career in the field. He is currently the Dean
of the College of Justice & Safety at Eastern Kentucky
University. In the
video accompanying this note, Dean Ault discusses the
tremendous drain that carrying out executions had, and continues
to have, on his life. He added, "I know I'm not the only one
who has administered executions that felt the way I do. They
all have shed a lot of tears." He questions the value of the
death penalty, and recognizes the difficulty that many
politicians have in challenging this punishment, despite its
obvious flaws. With respect to deterrence, he said, "I have a
hard time believing that using pre-meditated murder and violence
(executions), is a way to model behavior that would deter
somebody else from doing it." The video was made at the end of
a six-week course on the death penalty at EKU and contains
answers to questions that the students raised. To view the
video (21 minutes),
click here.
Books: A Life for a Life--The American Debate Over the
Death Penalty
Death Penalty Information Org.
8-18-09 --
In the book,
A Life for a Life: The American
Debate Over the Death Penalty,
author Michael Dow Burkhead, a psychologist who has worked with
criminal offenders for 25 years, explores the various trends in
public opinion that influence crime prevention efforts, create
public policy, and reform criminal law. He examines eight core
issues about the use of executions: cruel and unusual
punishment, discrimination, deterrence, due process,
culpability, scripture, innocence, and justice. The book
provides a brief history of capital punishment in the United
States from the earliest known execution in1608 to the present
time. Additional topics include the regionalization of capital
punishment sentences, the spiritual and scriptural debate over
the death penalty, the role of DNA evidence in modern death
sentences, and the ongoing effects recent court rulings. The
appendix includes recent state commission reports on the death
penalty from Maryland, California, New Jersey, and Tennessee.
UNITED
STATES SUPREME COURT
U.S. Supreme Court Orders Historic Hearing on Innocence Claim in
Troy Davis Case
Death Penalty Information Org.

8-17-09 --
On August 17 the United States
Supreme Court ordered a new evidentiary hearing for Georgia
death row inmate Troy Davis, whose case has drawn worldwide
attention because of new evidence of his possible innocence. For
the first time in nearly 50 years, the Court has favorably
responded to a petition directed to them, rather than as an
appeal from other courts. With only two Justices writing in
dissent, the Court ordered the lower federal court to hear
Davis' evidence: "The District Court should receive testimony
and make findings of fact as to whether evidence that could not
have been obtained at the time of trial clearly establishes
petitioner’s innocence." . . . Since Davis' initial conviction
in 1991, seven of nine eyewitnesses against him have recanted
their testimony. Justice Stevens, concurring with Justices
Breyer and Ginsburg, wrote, "The substantial risk of putting an
innocent man to death clearly provides an adequate justification
for holding an evidentiary hearing." He further responded to
Justice Scalia's dissent, which would have denied Davis' request
on narrow legal grounds, by strongly rejecting the notion that
the law allows the execution of an innocent person: "[I]magine a
petitioner in Davis’s situation who possesses new evidence
conclusively and definitively proving, beyond any scintilla of
doubt, that he is an innocent man. The dissent’s reasoning would
allow such a petitioner to be put to death nonetheless. The
Court correctly refuses to endorse such reasoning." An amicus
brief had been filed on behalf of Davis by former members of the
judiciary and law enforcement officials, including former
Georgia Congressman Bob Barr and the former director of the FBI
William S. Sessions.
Supreme Court Orders Hearing
on Death-Row Inmate’s Innocence Claim
By
Debra Cassens Weiss, ABA Journal
8-17-09 --
A death-row inmate who claims the Eighth Amendment bars his
execution because he is innocent of the crime will get a hearing
before a federal district judge, thanks to intervention by the
U.S. Supreme Court. . . . In an unusual order issued today, the
U.S. Supreme Court told a Georgia federal judge to hear the
claim of actual innocence by Troy Anthony Davis,
SCOTUSblog reports. The
U.S. Supreme Court had
denied cert
in Davis’ case in October. Seven of nine witnesses at Davis’
trial for killing a police officer have recanted their
testimony, and the case has attracted international attention. .
. . Justices Antonin Scalia and John Paul Stevens issued dueling
opinions on the propriety of the order, the
Atlanta Journal-Constitution
reports. Scalia, joined by Justice Clarence Thomas, argued in a
dissent that the federal judge won’t be able to grant relief
under a 1996 law restricting habeas review of state convictions.
CALIFORNIA
Judges’ Dissents for Death Row Inmates Are Rising
By
John Schwartz, The New York Times
8-13-09 -- It took just 80
words for a federal appeals court to deny Kevin Cooper’s most
recent plea to avoid execution. But attached to that order was a
forceful 101-page
dissent
by a judge, all but pleading to spare Mr. Cooper’s life. . . .
The State of California may be about to execute an innocent
man,” it began. . . . The judge who wrote the dissent, William
A. Fletcher of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth
Circuit, in San Francisco, argued that the police and
prosecutors had withheld and tampered with evidence in the case
for decades; Judge Fletcher even accused the district court of
having sabotaged the case. . . . Compared with the dry, mannerly
prose found in many opinions, Judge Fletcher’s passion in Cooper
v. Brown is startling. But these kinds of fervent, lonely
dissents, urging that a prisoner’s life be spared, have
noticeably increased in the last decade, compared with previous
years, according to a review of death penalty opinions by The
New York Times, as confirmed by experts in the field.
NORTH
CAROLINA
Gov. Perdue Signs North Carolina's Racial Justice Act--NAACP
Commends Passage
Death Penalty Information Org.
8-11-09 --
Governor Beverly Purdue of North
Carolina signed the state's Racial Justice Act into law on
August 11, concluding a long period of legislative action
surrounding this death penalty statute. Gov. Purdue said in a
news release, "I have always been a supporter of death penalty,
but I have always believed it must be carried out fairly. The
Racial Justice Act ensures that when North Carolina hands down
our state’s harshest punishment to our most heinous criminals –
the decision is based on the facts and the law, not racial
prejudice.” The law allows pre-trial defendants and death-row
inmates to challenge racial bias in the death penalty system
through the use of statistical studies. Prosecutors would then
have the opportunity to rebut the claim that the statistical
disparities indicate racial bias. If proven, a judge could
overturn the death sentence or prevent prosecutors from seeking
the death penalty. . . . The state conference of the NAACP
issued a statement, commending the sponsors of the bill and the
governor. They cautioned, "This law does not assure racial
justice, but it can help bring it about. The law is one of the
most powerful legitimate weapons we can use to rid our state of
the criminal justice practice of racial bias. It does not
address the roots of the problem – stereotypes, fear and even
racism – but it is a start."
OHIO
Executions are coming too fast, Ohio Public Defender Tim Young
says
Posted by Reginald Fields / Plain Dealer Bureau Chief
8-10-09 -The state of Ohio
is lining up death-row inmates for execution at a feverish pace
not seen here since capital punishment was reinstated a decade
ago. . . . Having already carried out three executions since
June, the state has scheduled at least one lethal injection
every month through the end of the year. . . . That could mean
that by year's end, Ohio will have executed eight men in the
final seven months of 2009. The previous high was seven in all
of 2004. . . . They are coming too fast, argues Ohio Public
Defender Tim Young, who worries that the burdens on state
officials to carry out the tasks in rapid-fire succession could
lead to careless mistakes.
NEW
JERSEY
Murders Drop in New Jersey Following Moratorium and Abolition of
Death Penalty
Death Penalty Information Org.
8-5-09
-- The number of murders
in New Jersey declined 24% in the first six months of 2009
compared to the same period last year. Murders declined in
2008, the year after the state abolished the death penalty,
marking the first time since 1999 that New Jersey has seen a
drop in murders for two consecutive years. Murders dropped 11%
in 2007, the year following a state-imposed moratorium on
executions, which was instituted in 2006. Governor Jon Corzine,
who signed the bill abolishing the death penalty, was encouraged
by the statistics and attributed the decline to aggressive
crime-fighting measures: "The release of these crime report
statistics shows that we are winning important battles in the
war against violent criminals and gangs," said the Governor.
"Thanks to the efforts of Attorney General Milgram and the New
Jersey law enforcement community, county task forces, police
departments, and partner agencies, more than 4,200 offenders
have been arrested for crimes including murder, assault with a
firearm, armed robbery, and gun and drug trafficking. We know
more work remains. Even one act of violence against a New
Jersey citizen is one too many."
Read more
July 2009
RACE: Research Experts Say Racial Bias Still Exists in
Death Penalty
Death Penalty Information Org.
7-31-09 --
Renowned researchers David Baldus, Professor of Law at the
University of Iowa, and George Woodworth, a fellow of the
American Statistical Association, recently wrote about the
ongoing problem of racial disparities in capital cases.
Professors Baldus and Woodworth were responsible for the
acclaimed study on race and the death penalty in Georgia that
was brought before the U.S. Supreme Court in 1987 in McCleskey
v. Kemp. In response to claims that North Carolina does not
need to pass the Racial Justice Act, the researchers pointed to
"several studies, including one done at UNC-Chapel Hill several
years ago, that found that a defendant's odds of getting the
death penalty in North Carolina increased by 3.5 times if the
victim is white." They wrote further: "Our published review of
all studies completed up to 2003 reaches the same conclusion. No
one who has read the research literature could claim that
white-victim cases more frequently result in death sentences
because they are more heinous and aggravated than black-victim
cases. Studies that provide the strongest evidence that those
who murder whites are substantially more likely to receive death
sentences than those who murder blacks use well-accepted
statistical tools to filter out the effects of these various
non-racial factors." Their entire op-ed may be read below:
Read more
TEXAS
Recent Legislation:
Texas to Open First Capital Defense Office for Death Penalty
Appeals
Death Penalty Info Org
7-28-09 --
Following recently passed
legislation, Texas will open an office with nine attorneys to
manage post-conviction appeals in death penalty cases. In the
past, appointed attorneys sometimes missed filing deadlines or
filed inadequate briefs, thereby jeopardizing their clients'
cases. The Office of Capital Writs will be funded by
redirecting money already in the state budget: $500,000 formerly
used to pay private attorneys for appeals and $494,520 from the
state's Fair Defense account. The office will oversee the part
of the appeals process known as state habeas corpus where
constitutional issues outside the trial can be raised. This
important phase can address issues such as new evidence of
innocence, prosecutorial misconduct, and inadequate
representation. Eventually, this office will handle most state
habeas appeals, which currently number about 10 a year. "I
think that everyone agrees (death row inmates) deserve one fair
shot at presenting their issues," said Andrea Marsh, executive
director of the Texas Fair Defense Project. "We saw too many
cases where poor state habeas representation forced people to
lose appeals."
GEORGIA
Decision to Seek the Death Penalty in One Case Costs Georgia
More Than $3 Million
Death Penalty Information Org.
7-27-09 --
There never was any question that Brian Nichols was guilty of
the courthouse shooting of a judge and three other victims in
2005. He had offered to plead guilty if the death penalty was
not pursued, but the state insisted on a full death penalty
trial that ended up being the most expensive capital case in
Georgia's history. In 2008, the case concluded with Nichols
being sentenced to life without parole. Recently, the defense
costs were revealed to be more than $3 million, with the state
paying $2.3 million, and Fulton County paying about $625,000.
The costs of the prosecution and other trial-related expenses
have not been revealed, though state officials estimated it cost
an additional $300,000 for state-supplied staff and other
expenses.
Read more
PENNSYLVANIA
Reality Check: Death Penalty in Pennsylvania Most Often
Results in Life Sentences
Death Penalty Information Org.
7-27-09
-- In Pennsylvania, the
state goes through the expensive and time-consuming process of
trying many death penalty cases and fighting appeals, but almost
all cases end with a life sentence. According to a recent
Associated Press study of what happens in capital cases in the
state, 124 death sentences have been overturned and
resentenced. When these cases went through the justice system a
second time with the original errors corrected, 95% (118)
resulted in life sentences or less. Only 6 inmates were
resentenced to death. Pennsylvania has the fourth largest death
row in the country, but the only people who have been executed
were three inmates who waived their appeals. The last execution
in a fully contested case was 47 years ago. Twenty-one inmates
on death row have died of natural causes or suicide since 1983.
Six inmates have been exonerated when their convictions were
reversed and they were freed following acquittals or dismissal
of all charges.
Read more
OHIO
Ohio Parole Board Recommends Clemency for Death Row Inmate
Death Penalty Information Org.
7-21-09 --
The Ohio Parole Board made a rare recommendation of clemency on
July 17, voting 5-2 that Jason Getsy's death sentence should be
reduced to life without parole. Getsy is scheduled to be
executed on August 18 for the murder of Ann Serafino in 1995. A
co-defendant who initiated and organized the crime received a
lesser sentence of 35 years to life. "In imposing a death
sentence, it is imperative that we have consistency and similar
penalties imposed upon similarly situated co-defendants," the
Parole Board said. Since Ohio resumed executions in 1999, the
Parole Board has only recommended clemency two other times, and
in both cases the governor followed the recommendations.
New Voices: Former State Department Official Urges
President to Implement Ruling of World Court
Death Penalty Information Org.
7-20-09 --
John Bellinger, who served as legal adviser to the State
Department from 2005 to 2009, has called on President Obama to
assist in the review of the death penalty cases of foreign
nationals who were denied rights under the Vienna Convention on
Consular Relations. The U.S. has ratified the Vienna Convention
and the Protocol that provides for resolution of disputes in the
International Court of Justice in the Hague (ICJ). Mexico
brought a suit to this court on behalf of its citizens on death
row in various states because the U.S. had not provided the
defendants with access to their consulates at the time of their
arrest. The ICJ held that the cases of the Mexican nationals
should be reviewed before any executions went forward.
President George W. Bush ordered state courts to review the
cases, but this order was ultimately blocked in the U.S. Supreme
Court. Mr. Bellinger said that President Obama could comply
with our obligations under the treaty through legislation: "The
Obama administration's best option would be to seek narrowly
tailored legislation that would authorize the president to order
review of these cases and override, if necessary, any state
criminal laws limiting further appeals, in order to comply with
the United Nations Charter," he wrote recently in the N.Y.
Times.
WASHINGTON
Judge affirms Wash. lethal injection method
Attorney General Rob McKenna will
ask the Washington state Supreme Court to lift the stay of
execution of a death row inmate after a judge ruled Friday that
the state's lethal injection procedures were constitutional.
By
Rachel La Corte, Associated Press Writer, Seattle Times
7-10-09 -- Attorney
General Rob McKenna will ask the Washington state Supreme Court
to lift the stay of execution of a death row inmate after a
judge ruled Friday that the state's lethal injection procedures
were constitutional. . . . Assistant Attorney General John
Samson said that they will file a motion with the court next
week to vacate the stay of execution of Cal Coburn Brown after
Friday morning's ruling by Thurston County Superior Court Judge
Chris Wickham. . . . Brown was one of three death-row inmates
who argued that Washington's preferred method of execution
needed a major overhaul to satisfy constitutional bans on cruel
punishment. . . . But Wickham ruled that the inmates presented
no evidence that the state "intended to impose punishment that
was 'cruel.'" He said the method was constitutional under both
the state and U.S. Constitutions.
LOUISIANA
Death row inmate, ACLU win fight to have Catholic Masses shown
in cells
by
Gwen Filosa, The Times-Picayune
7-6-09 -- Many convicted
killers seek solace in the Lord in their final days, and Donald
Lee Leger is among them. Further, he insists on the Catholic
interpretation -- not a Baptist version that blared on the TV
sets for all death-row prisoners at the Louisiana State
Penitentiary at Angola. . . . So he sought help from the
American Civil Liberties Union. Though the ACLU has fought for
separation of church and state in the public square -- Nativity
scenes, Ten Commandments, crosses -- in Leger's case it defended
a particular brand of worship in a taxpayer-financed cage for
the state's most evil men. . . . "If you are behind bars and you
have limited contact with the outside world, the only thing you
have is your spirituality, " said Katie Schwartzmann, an
attorney for the ACLU, which sued on behalf of Leger. "Baptists
had access to services that Catholic prisoners didn't have." . .
. The prison relented in a settlement effective this month. So
Leger -- awaiting death for murdering a stranger in St. Mary
Parish while chasing his girlfriend, who escaped his kidnapping
attempt -- will now have viewings of Catholic Mass and have
private confessions with a priest. He will also receive the Holy
Eucharist.
TENNESSEE
Tennessee Wins Ruling on Execution
By
John Schwartz, New York Times
7-2-09 -- A federal
appeals court on Thursday overturned a lower court’s finding
that Tennessee’s lethal injection procedure is unconstitutional.
. . . The case concerns Edward J. Harbison, who was sentenced to
death for the 1983 murder of an elderly woman. . . . In 2007, as
a result of Mr. Harbison’s appeals, the Federal District Court
in Nashville found that Tennessee’s procedures for execution
were unconstitutional, in part because of the potential that the
process would cause unnecessary pain to the condemned. . . .
After that decision, however, the Supreme Court issued an
opinion that largely supported lethal injection. The opinion,
written by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., was one of several
in a fractured decision and approved Kentucky’s process, which
uses a sequence of three drugs. The opinion said a state with
procedures “substantially similar to the protocol we uphold
today” would pass muster.
June 2009
VIRGINIA
Va. Bar Wants AG to Stop Sending Cautionary Letter to Death
Penalty Jurors
By
Molly McDonough, ABA Journal
6-22-09 --
For years, the state attorney
general's office in Virginia has distributed letters to former
jurors in capital cases, cautioning them against talking to
defense lawyers working on appeals. . . . And the Virginia State
Bar wants to put a stop to the letters. . . . The form letter,
which is supplied to local prosecutors, advises jurors that they
may be contacted by someone representing the convicted killer
who "may try to give the false impression that they are working
on behalf" of the prosecution or the courts, the
Washington Post reports. . . . The state bar, which
considers the letter to be "offensive," has launched
disciplinary proceedings to stop the state from sending out the
letter. This is the second such attempt since the letter first
became public in 2004.
TEXAS
Hearing on judge in death row case to be held in S.A.
By
Craig Kapitan - San Antonio Express-News
6-19-09 --
A hearing to decide the fate of one of Texas' highest judges
accused of judicial misconduct is now scheduled to be in a San
Antonio courtroom in August. . . . The State Commission on
Judicial Conduct is accusing Court of Criminal Appeals Presiding
Judge Sharon Keller of discrediting the judiciary after she
refused to accept a last-minute appeal from death row inmate
Michael Wayne Richard on the day of his execution Sept. 25,
2007. . . . Keller's hearing was expected to be in Austin, but
the judge whom the Texas Supreme Court appointed as special
master in the case ordered it be held in his newly renovated
courtroom in San Antonio. . . . State District Judge David
Berchelmann Jr. is tasked with determining if any disciplinary
action is necessary against Keller. He'll submit a report of his
findings to the Judicial Conduct Commission, which will then
have the option of dismissing the case, issuing a public censure
or recommending that Keller be removed from office.
BOOKS--The Ride: A Shocking Murder and
a Bereaved Father’s Journey from Rage to Redemption
6-1-09 --The Ride: A Shocking Murder and a Bereaved Father’s Journey
from Rage to Redemption is a new book by Brian MacQuarrie that
explores a parent's grief and subsequent transformation through
the story of Robert Curley in Massachusetts. Curley's 10-year-old son, Jeffrey, was a victim of
abduction and murder in 1997. The murder shocked and outraged
the community of East Cambridge outside of Boston.
MacQuarrie explores the father's evolution “from grief to anger
to activism against predators,” and from being an outraged
father demanding the death penalty for his son’s murderer to an
outspoken critic of capital punishment. Delving deeper into the
issue, the author looks at the struggle of Massachusetts
residents as they decide whether to reinstate capital
punishment. Senator John Kerry calls the book, a “compelling
and deeply moving…story of Bob Curley’s journey to hell and
back.” Sister Helen Prejean said "Robert Curley's radical
transformation is a lesson for us all."
Experts
In Study Say Death Penalty Is No Deterrent
By:Ted
Gest at Criminal Justice Journalists
6-17-09 --
Eighty-eight percent of the country's top criminologists do not
believe the death penalty acts as a deterrent to homicide,
according to a study published in Northwestern University School
of Law's Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology. The authors
say the study, "Do Executions Lower Homicide Rates? The Views of
Leading Criminologists," undermines the idea of deterrence as a
rationale for maintaining the punishment.
The study was written by Michael
Radelet, sociology department chair at the University of
Colorado-Boulder, and Traci Lacock, an attorney and sociology
graduate student in Boulder. They said 87 percent of the expert
criminologists believe that abolition of the death penalty would
not have any significant effect on murder rates. In addition, 75
percent of the respondents agree that "debates about the death
penalty distract Congress and state legislatures from focusing
on real solutions to crime problems." (The weblink below
connects to a pdf version of the study.) /
Crime & Justice News
GEORGIA
Death penalty reinstated in beating death
Construction worker robbed,
killed boss in 1985.
By
Bill Rankin, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
6-13-09 --
The federal appeals court on Friday reinstated the death
sentence against a Marietta man for beating his supervisor to
death with a tree trunk near Lake Allatoona in 1985. . . . In a
2-1 decision, the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta
overturned a federal judge’s ruling that found Lawrence Joseph
Jefferson’s lawyers provided ineffective legal assistance at
trial. . . . In 1986, a Cobb County jury sentenced Jefferson to death for killing and robbing 37-year-old Edward Taulbee, his
drinking buddy and his boss at a construction site. After
bludgeoning Taulbee to death,
Jefferson took his wallet and
car. . . . Ed Carnes, an 11th Circuit judge, issued a strong
dissent in a rare vote to overturn a death sentence. He wrote
that Jefferson’s lawyers should have had their client examined
for neurological damage that occurred when Jefferson’s head was run over by a car when he was 2 years old.
ALABAMA
Death Penalty Case Reveals Failings in Alabama
Sidebar, By Adam
Liptak, New York Times
6-8-09 --
Kenneth B. Trotter had been practicing law for less than a year
when an Alabama judge appointed him to assist two more seasoned
lawyers in defending Holly Wood, who was facing the death
penalty. . . . After Mr. Wood was convicted in 1994 of murdering
his former girlfriend, Mr. Trotter led the effort to persuade
the jury to spare his life. The young lawyer came up just short:
the jury recommended death by a vote of 10-to-2, the minimum
allowed under Alabama law. . . . Mr. Trotter failed to pursue or
present evidence that his client was mentally retarded, though
he had a competency report in hand that said as much. In
September, a divided three-judge panel of the federal appeals
court in Atlanta
ruled that he had made a strategic decision, not a
grave error. . . . Judge Rosemary Barkett, the dissenting judge,
saw it differently. . . . “An inexperienced and overwhelmed
attorney,” Judge Barkett wrote of Mr. Trotter, “realized too
late what any reasonably prepared attorney would have known:
that evidence of Wood’s mental impairments could have served as
mitigating evidence and deserved investigation so that it could
properly be presented before sentencing.” . . . “An
inexperienced and overwhelmed attorney,” Judge Barkett wrote of
Mr. Trotter, “realized too late what any reasonably prepared
attorney would have known: that evidence of Wood’s mental
impairments could have served as mitigating evidence and
deserved investigation so that it could properly be presented
before sentencing.”
CALIFORNIA
Death Sentence Affirmed for Polly Klaas' Killer
Mike
McKee, The Recorder
6-2-09 --
Richard Allen Davis, who made national news in 1993 for
murdering 12-year-old Polly Klaas, got no sympathy from the
California Supreme Court on Monday. . . . By a unanimous vote,
the court upheld the death sentence Davis got from San Jose
jurors in 1996. The court shot down all of
the reviled inmate's arguments, including that Davis
didn't get a fair trial because he was tried in the Bay Area's
hostile media market. . . . Davis' lawyer, Visalia, Calif., solo Phillip Cherney,
had argued his client didn't get a true venue change because the
trial was only moved from Sonoma County at the far northern end
of the Bay Area to Santa Clara County at the southern end. . . .
The Supreme Court rejected that plea, noting that at the time of
trial Santa Clara County was the fifth largest in the state with
more than 1.6 million residents.
May 2009
Death Penalty Disgrace
By
Bob Barr, The New York Times Op-Ed Contributor
5-31-09 --
THERE is no abuse of government power more egregious than
executing an innocent man. But that is exactly what may happen
if the United States Supreme Court fails to intervene on behalf
of Troy Davis. . . . Mr. Davis is facing execution for the 1989
murder of an off-duty police officer in Savannah, Ga., even though seven of the
nine witnesses have recanted their testimony against him. Many
of these witnesses now say they were pressured into testifying
falsely against him by police officers who were understandably
eager to convict someone for killing a comrade. No court has
ever heard the evidence of Mr. Davis’s innocence. . . . After
the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit barred
Mr. Davis from raising his claims of innocence, his attorneys
last month petitioned the Supreme Court for an original writ of
habeas corpus. This would be an extraordinary procedure —
provided for by the Constitution but granted only a handful of
times since 1900. However, absent this, Mr. Davis faces an
extraordinary and obviously final injustice. . . . This threat
of injustice has come about because the lower courts have
misread the Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of
1996, a law I helped write when I was in Congress. As a member
of the House Judiciary Committee in the 1990s, I wanted to stop
the unfounded and abusive delays in capital cases that tend to
undermine our criminal justice system.
UNITED
STATES SUPREME COURT
Former judges push for hearing on Troy Davis innocence claim
Group asks Supreme Court to send
death row case back to federal court
By Bill
Rankin, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
5-20-09 --
Twenty-seven former judges, justices and prosecutors are asking the
U.S. Supreme Court to allow death-row inmate Troy Davis’ innocence
claims to be heard in federal court. . . . The filing comes a day
after Davis’ lawyers filed their final legal bid. They are asking
the nation’s highest court to send Davis’ case back so a judge can
consider the recantation testimony of a number of key witnesses who
testified for the state at the 1991 trial. . . . Davis sits on death
row for the killing of off-duty Savannah Police Officer Mark Allen
MacPhail in 1989. MacPhail, a 27-year-old father of two and former
U.S. Army ranger, was shot before he could draw his weapon. . . .
Davis can make “an extraordinary showing through new, never reviewed
evidence that strongly points to his innocence,” the judges’ and
prosecutors’ filing said. To allow Davis’ execution without
appropriate legal review is “a plain constitutional injustice,” the
filing said.
Death Row Foes See Newsroom Cuts as Blow
By
Tim Arango, New York Times
5-20-09 --
Opponents of the death penalty looking to exonerate wrongly
accused prisoners say their efforts have been hobbled by the
dwindling size of America’s newsrooms, and particularly the
disappearance of investigative reporting at many regional
papers. . . . In the past, lawyers opposed to the death penalty
often provided the broad outlines of cases to reporters, who
then pursued witnesses and unearthed evidence. . . . Now, the
lawyers complain, they have to do more of the work themselves
and that means it often doesn’t get done. They say many fewer
cases are being pursued by journalists, after a spate of
exonerations several years ago based on the work of reporters. .
. . The decline in newsroom resources has also hampered efforts
by death-penalty opponents to search for irrefutable DNA evidence that an innocent person has been executed in
America. . . . Because judges and
prosecutors are usually reluctant to reopen
GEORGIA
Death row's revolving door
Post-trial evidence in Ga. case
resonates
By
Kevin Johnson, USA TODAY
5-18-09 --
The timeline of Troy Davis' 18 years on death row reads like
most other condemned prisoners' slow shuffle to the execution
chamber. . . . His appeals chart a legal marathon from a
courtroom in Savannah, Ga., to the U.S. Supreme Court. The
execution date for Davis, convicted of killing a police officer,
has been set three times — and three times the courts or Georgia
officials have granted extensions. . . . What doesn't exist in
the docket entries or trial transcripts is a formal airing of
evidence discovered after Davis' conviction that, his lawyers
say, could win his freedom. Seven of nine prosecution witnesses
have recanted their testimony implicating him since his 1991
trial. . . . Davis' attorneys and advocates for the wrongfully
convicted say his case, set for another U.S. Supreme Court
appeal this week, represents one of possibly dozens in which
courts are reluctant to consider evidence discovered after
conviction that might exonerate inmates on death row.
MISSOURI
Executions Debated as Missouri Plans One
By
Monica Davey, The New York Times
5-18-09 --
Officials in this state are preparing to execute a prisoner for
the first time since 2005, when criticisms about the state’s
lethal injection method emerged and one doctor who carried out
executions acknowledged being dyslexic and sometimes
“improvising” when it came to the amounts of chemicals he
administered. . . . That doctor will no longer take part, and a
United States Supreme Court ruling last year upheld a lethal
injection procedure similar to the one Missouri will use, but
some lawmakers, including some prominent Republicans, say they
have lingering questions about the state’s system of capital
punishment. . . . The focus of those questions has shifted some,
no longer centering on the method of execution but turning
toward which prisoners are condemned and which are not, and
whether those choices make sense.
NORTH
CAROLINA
Ruling backs death penalty
Inmates' lawsuit was also
undercut in Senate
By
James Romoser | Winston-Salem Journal Reporter
5-15-09 --
North Carolina's procedure for lethal injections was approved
through the proper channels, according to a judge's ruling
released yesterday. . . . The ruling is the second court
decision this month that upholds the death penalty in the state,
and it came on the same day that state legislators, in a
separate action, voted to amend state law to try to clear the
way for executions to resume in North Carolina. . . . For nearly
three years, several lawsuits have created a de facto moratorium
on the death penalty in the state, but the recent developments
show that both the judiciary and the legislature are trying to
resolve the legal uncertainty after a long standstill. . . .
"There's a lot of things that have been gumming up the works,"
said Mark Kleinschmidt, the executive director of the Fair Trial
Initiative in Durham. . . . In his decision yesterday, Judge
Donald Stephens of Wake Superior Court ruled that a court did
not have to review the Council of State's decision in February
2007 to approve a new procedure for how North Carolina carries
out lethal injections. Five death-row prisoners argued last
October that a court review was required, and that the council
should have heard from inmates before issuing its approval. . .
. A state administrative-law judge ordered the council last year
to revise the protocol, saying that the method for executing
prisoners doesn't ensure that they won't feel pain. The council,
made up of the governor and nine other statewide elected
officials, declined.
NEW
JERSEY
Court applies updated law to'94 murder
By
Mary Fuchs, Statehouse Bureau
5-13-09 --
The state Supreme Court ruled yesterday that a murderer whose
case was proceeding as New Jersey abolished the death penalty
can be sentenced to life without parole, even though the state
had no such punishment when he was convicted. . . . A jury will
now decide the punishment for Steven Fortin, a Carteret handyman who was convicted in 2007 of raping and murdering a
Woodbridge woman and was
sentenced to death. . . . Before New Jersey abolished capital
punishment in January 2008, convicted murderers who were not
sentenced to death were automatically sentenced to 30 years in
prison before being eligible for parole. The law that revoked
the death penalty, however, toughened the prison term to life
without parole. . . . But the law did not explain what to do
with someone like Fortin, who committed his crime in 1994, while
the old law was in effect, and was still going through the trial
process when it was changed. At least 22 such cases were ongoing
when the death penalty was repealed.
CALIFORNIA
Court denies rehearing for killer
By
Richard K. De Atley, The Press-Enterprise
5-11-09 --
Condemned prisoner Kevin Cooper was denied a rehearing Monday by
a federal appellate panel in a 114-page order that bristled with
dissents, one of them claiming that "the state of California may
be about to execute an innocent man." . . . Another judge
defended the decision, saying evidence and post-conviction
forensic tests only point to Cooper, now 51, as the 1983
knife-and-hatchet slayer of three family members and a
houseguest in a Chino Hills home. . . . With the denial of an
"en banc" rehearing before an 11-judge judicial panel of the 9th
U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Cooper has 90 days to ask the
United States Supreme Court to review his case, the first step
toward getting an appeal. . . . He has applied for relief nine
times previously to the nation's high court. . . . Up to 28 of
the 9th Circuit's judges can vote on an en banc hearing
application. Published dissents indicate at least 11 were in
favor of rehearing the case. One judge said the vote was closer
than that.
The new case against the death penalty
The bittersweet reality is that money, rather than morality, has
become the tipping point for abolishing it.
By
Corinna Barrett Lain, Christian Science Monitor Editorial
5-11-09 --
This year, state budgetary crises have given death penalty
opponents their most successful argument yet – money. . . .Just
two states have abolished the death penalty in the past 40
years, New Jersey in 2007 and New Mexico in March. The cost of
capital punishment played a key role in both decisions, and is
driving current legislative attempts to repeal the death penalty
in a number of other states. . . . The bittersweet reality is
that money, rather than morality, has become the tipping point
for saving lives. Why? . . . Administering the death penalty is
breathtakingly expensive. Contrary to popular opinion, it costs
substantially more to execute people than to send them to prison
for the rest of their lives. . . . In California, which houses
the nation's largest death row, it costs about $137 million
annually to maintain the state's death penalty system. The state
has conducted only 11 executions since reinstating the death
penalty in 1978, bringing the average cost per execution to $250
million. That's right – a quarter of a billion dollars per
execution. . . . California's estimated cost of administering a
system without capital punishment (imposing instead a maximum
sentence of life without the possibility of parole) is $11
million annually, which means the state could save $126 million
per year if it rescinded a penalty that it almost never uses.
That's big money – money that could be allocated to healthcare
and to education, money that could put more police officers on
the streets and take more killers off them.
ALABAMA
Alabama Murderer's Death Row Sentence Overturned
Associated Press, FOXNews
5-10-09 --
The death row sentence for a man convicted of the 1984 murder of
an elderly woman has been overturned after he was ruled mentally
retarded. . . . Limestone County District Attorney Kristi Valls
says Kenneth Glen Thomas will head to court May 27 to be
re-sentenced to life in prison without parole. He has been on
death row since his 1986 murder conviction. . . . Authorities
say Thomas killed 82-year-old Flossie McLemore, his neighbor,
and then tried to conceal the murder by setting McLemore's house
on fire.
TEXAS
Not The End Of The Affair
CourtWatch: Capital Case In Texas
Marred By Romantic Relationship Between Judge And Prosecutor
by
Andrew Cohen CBS News
5-3-09 --
The
last time we checked in on law a |