death penalty news June 7, 2004
VIRGINIA: Dispute continues over DNA from case of executed Virginian Gov. Mark Warner is expected to decide in the coming weeks whether to order new DNA testing on evidence that's been sitting for 14 years in a California laboratory. The evidence is about one-fifth of a drop of sperm recovered from the body of a woman who was raped and murdered in her Grundy home in 1981. The results could answer a long-lingering question: Was Roger Keith Coleman put to death in 1992 for a crime he did not commit? Warner was asked about the matter last week during a talk show on WVTF-FM public radio. He promised the caller, Jack Payden-Travers of Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, that he will make a decision shortly. The request for new testing has been sitting on the governor's desk for over a year, and he called the case a "tough issue." It could be complicated further by a dispute over who would conduct the tests. Edward Blake, the forensic scientist who has kept the remaining sample frozen since he performed initial DNA tests in 1990, told The Roanoke Times last week that he will not hand over the evidence if the governor were to order it tested by Virginia authorities. "There is no logical, rational, scientific basis for that sample to ever leave this laboratory, and if I have anything to say about it, it won't leave this laboratory," Blake said in a telephone interview from his office in Richmond, California. The most reliable tests, Blake said, would be conducted by him at his laboratory. "The state of Virginia has a vested interest" in tests that would either confirm Coleman's guilt or be inconclusive, he said. He adds that transporting it across the county could damage the 23-year-old piece of evidence. Capital punishment opponents have followed the case closely, keenly aware that it could turn public sentiment their way. Warner spokeswoman Ellen Qualls declined to comment on the question of who might do the tests because the governor has yet to decide whether they should even be conducted. "We would note that he's under a court order to return the sample," she said of Blake. That order dates back to 2001, when Buchanan County Circuit Court Judge Keary Williams refused to order DNA tests at the request of four newspapers and Centurion Ministries, a New Jersey organization that investigated Coleman's case and became convinced of his innocence. Williams ordered Blake to return the evidence to Virginia. However, the order was stayed while the case was appealed. After the Virginia Supreme Court declined to order testing in 2002, Centurion Ministries asked the governor to intervene. Blake has had the sample in cold storage since 1990, when he was selected by Coleman's attorneys to perform DNA testing. Blake found that Coleman was within 2 percent of a population that could have produced the sperm sample found at the crime scene where Coleman's sister-in-law, Wanda McCoy, was raped and murdered. Coleman was executed in 1992, maintaining his innocence from the electric chair. Since then, DNA testing more advanced than what Blake used in 1990 has emerged that could resolve the issue once and for all, Centurion Ministries has maintained in court papers. Adamant as he is that the evidence be tested, Blake said he would not be surprised if the results determine that the state had the right man all along. Another possibility, he said, is that the evidence has deteriorated to the point that tests would be inconclusive. (source: AP) ================================== OKLAHOMA: Juror loss could decide Nichols' penalty Court battles have raged for years and millions of dollars have been spent, but whether bombing conspirator Terry Nichols gets life or death could come down to the health of one juror. The penalty phase of Nichols' state murder trial was pushed to the brink of mistrial last week when Judge Steven Taylor dismissed two jurors after they had improper conversations with each other about the case. Legal experts say the loss of one more juror could endanger prosecution efforts to seek the death penalty. "If they lose another juror, I think it's over," said Andy Coats, a former prosecutor and dean of University of Oklahoma School of Law. Defense lawyers will begin arguing their case to try to spare Nichols' life when his trial resumes Monday. Prosecutors rested their sentencing case last week. Nichols, 49, is already serving life in prison on federal convictions for the deaths of eight federal law enforcement officers in the April 19, 1995, bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building. On May 26, a jury found him guilty of 161 counts of first-degree murder for the deaths of the other 160 victims and one victim's fetus. He was sentenced to life in prison without parole on the count involving the fetus. Nichols faces life in prison or death by lethal injection on the other counts. In May, Taylor excused a juror after the person suffered a heart attack. Also, two jurors and an alternate were excused in March because they are related to an attorney in the prosecutor's office. The judge criticized prosecutors for not revealing the links sooner. If a jury cannot agree on a sentence or the number of jurors falls below 12, the judge has to decide the sentence. Taylor's only option would be to sentence Nichols to life in prison. But legal experts are divided. Some believe Taylor can impanel a new jury to hear sentencing evidence and decide between life or death, similar to the way appellate courts order new sentencing trials for convicted defendants when they reverse death sentences due to an error in the first trial. "I think it's debatable," said Irven Box, an Oklahoma City defense lawyer and media analyst for Nichols' state murder trial. "It's the same facts and the same circumstances that an appellate court would use. So my opinion is they would allow it," Box said. But Jack Pointer Dempsey, past president of the Oklahoma Criminal Defense Lawyers Association, said Taylor cannot rely on appellate procedure as a trial judge. "There's no do over," Dempsey said. "If that panel goes away, that sentencing phase goes to a mistrial. He must sentence that man right then." The U.S. Supreme Court has decreed that only a jury - not a judge - can impose a death sentence on a murder defendant, Coats said. It takes a unanimous 12-member jury to make that decision. So far, Nichols' defense team has been paid more than $3.6 million in the state case. Coats said it may be legal for Taylor to seat another jury and start another sentencing trial for Nichols, but he doubts Taylor would. "I think he's had enough of it," Coats said. "You'd have to go through the jury process again. I would be surprised if he did that." (source: AP / Seattle Post-Intelligencer) =============================== WASHINGTON: Democrats pledge to stand firm for 2004 campaigns A 75-foot-long puppet -- in the form of a backbone -- illustrated the state Democrats' scrappy theme for the fall campaigns. Delegates at the state Democratic Convention jumped to their feet on Saturday, cheering as puppeteers danced through the aisles and speakers urged the party to boldly advocate for change, rather than cooperating with Republicans at the state and national levels. The delegates debated but did not pass a resolution to have the United States cut off aid to Israel or any other country perceived to have violated international law. But they did pass a platform that calls for opposition to renewal of the Patriot Act, which some see as restricting civil right; calling for an end to what it calls "America's gulag" at the military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and saying the detainees should be turned over to an international body; supporting decriminalization of possession of less than 10 grams of marijuana by adults; public financing of campaigns; and abandonment of the doctrine of preemptive warfare. "Non-violence should be the primary organizing principle of foreign policy," the platform said. The platform did not satisfy all. "Are there any Democrats out there?" roared gubernatorial candidate Ron Sims. The King County executive suggested that Democrats fight the tax-cutting initiatives of Tim Eyman and work for a state income tax, coupled with lower sales and property taxes and elimination of the state business tax. He also advocated for "full civil rights for every single person," an apparent reference to same-sex marriage. "I'm gonna be a fearless governor," rather than kowtow to Eyman, he said. "There's a new sheriff in town." Attorney General Christine Gregoire, Sims' rival for the nomination to succeed retiring Gov. Gary Locke, said: "We need to stand up as proud Democrats with an agenda of progress, a vision of hope and the resolve to get things done." She talked about bold steps to create 250,000 jobs and to improve education and health care. She said she would bring the same zeal to office that she used to defeat the tobacco industry and to pursue cleanup of Hanford nuclear waste. Former gubernatorial contender Phil Talmadge implicitly criticized both candidates and Democrats at both the state and national level for running vague campaigns and not taking tough stands. "It's time we start talking about issues and our ideas to solve them," he said in a fiery speech to the convention that drew sustained applause. "So far, this campaign has been about nothing, at the national and state level. We have to change that." The party must fight for universal health coverage, tax reform and public financing of campaigns, said Talmadge, who withdrew from the race for governor in April because of a kidney tumor. So far campaigns and the government are about nothing but "money, money, money." State GOP Chairman Chris Vance laughed over reports out of the convention. "The Democratic party today is divided and they don't have a message. The candidates are saying nothing. John Kerry is the perfect candidate for them -- he has no message, he doesn't know what he believes. "The Democratic party has completely lost its way. The only thing they know is they hate George W. Bush. They have no positive message for America." Vance also said many grass-roots activists are "very, very liberal" and are at odds with the more moderate governor and state party leadership. In recent years, the party has been dominated by centrists, including Locke and other members of the Democratic Leadership Council. Congressman Adam Smith, D-Wash., state chairman for the party's presumptive presidential nominee, John Kerry, is a leader in the national organization. However, state Democratic Chairman Paul Berendt described the party's ideas as specific and bold. He decided to broaden the convention's appeal to include liberal activists who fueled the campaigns of Howard Dean and Dennis Kucinich in the presidential primaries and caucuses. "I'm trying to honor the left," he said in an interview. "The point of the backbone puppet, from a national grass-roots group called the Backbone Campaign (from Vashon Island), is that politicians should stand up for Democratic principles. There are fundamental differences in the parties." And so the "backbone" puppet paraded through the hall. The previous evening, former Vice President Al Gore lit a fire under the delegates, blistering President Bush as the tool of fat cats and criticizing him on the economy, environmental protection, domestic spending and Iraq and foreign policy. Berendt told the convention Saturday that activists need to take time off work this summer and fall to fight for Democratic candidates. "Do more for your party, for your candidates, than ever before," Berendt exhorted the Democratic faithful. "The stakes have never been so high -- it's really the future of our nation. So let's adopt a good, liberal platform, and let us fight for all that is within us to beat George Bush." U.S. Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., who's seeking a third-term, said Democrats need to speak out on everything from misadventures abroad to mounting domestic problems. "It's about speaking up and speaking out," she said in a keynote address. "Everything we as Democrats want for our country is at stake." Democratic spokeswoman Kirstin Brost said all of the "backbone" talk can help the party. "It's about Democrats being strong and focused and not apologizing for our principles," she said in an interview. Both Sims and Gregoire show passion and vision, she said. The convention was adopting a liberal platform, including abortion rights, support for same-sex marriage and opposition to the administration's handling of the war. The platform also opposes capital punishment, prison terms for drug-related crimes, charter schools and outsourcing of jobs. It calls for public financing of all campaigns and automatic registration of all eligible voters. (source: AP)
