death penalty news June 7, 2004
MISSOURI: Man's defense aided by science Brain research may affect death penalty Christopher Simmons has hours and hours to think about the crime that put him on death row. He lies in bed, forehead pressed against the concrete block wall of his cell, replaying the night in 1993 when he burglarized Shirley Crook's house, bound and blindfolded her, drove to a railroad trestle and tossed her into the Meramec River near St. Louis. Simmons has had 11 years to ponder the crime, but he cannot explain it. ?I've tried to understand it,? he says, shaking his head slowly and fidgeting with his hands in the visiting room at the Potosi Correctional Center. ?I don't know why it happened or how it happened.? But brain researchers say they know at least one reason why Simmons killed Crook: He was only 17. In a nationally significant capital punishment case, medical groups have come to Simmons' defense, arguing that new research shows the frontal lobe of the brain where reason tempers impulse is still forming in adolescents. ?It's not really a moral, emotional or political argument we are making,? said Mark Wellek, past president of the American Society for Adolescent Psychiatry. ?This is a scientific argument with absolute scientific evidence that supports the case that these are still children.? The United States Supreme Court will hear the Simmons case in October. Several psychiatric and medical organizations plan to file briefs on Simmons' behalf. Hanging in the balance is the life of Simmons and 73 other men across the country sentenced to death for murders they committed at 16 or 17. Some executions have been put on hold pending the Simmons ruling, which also could affect the case against convicted Washington-area sniper Lee Boyd Malvo. Malvo has been sentenced to life imprisonment in some of the sniper murders, but faces additional charges on several others. Shirley Crook's sister, Pertie Mitchell, hopes to be there when the Supreme Court hears the Simmons case. Mitchell said Simmons' age was no excuse for his crime. ?What does that have to do with it?? Mitchell asked. ?Who cares if he changed later? This man was guilty of murder. He tortured her. It was not spur of the moment.? Patrick Berrigan of Kansas City, one of Simmons' attorneys, said the crime was not the issue. ?No one is denying this was a horrible crime, and we are not trying to excuse it,? Berrigan said. ?But this is about appropriate punishment.? The Missouri Supreme Court overturned Simmons' death sentence last year. The state appealed that ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court. Missouri Attorney General Jay Nixon's office will try to convince the high court that the Missouri Supreme Court had no authority to overturn Simmons' death sentence. The U.S. Supreme Court will decide whether executing Simmons is ?cruel and unusual? punishment in violation of the U.S. Constitution. Sparing Simmons because of his age would reverse a 1989 ruling allowing execution of offenders who were under 18 at the time of the crime. Since 1989, five states have outlawed the death penalty for juvenile offenders, which brings to 28 the number of states, including Kansas, with a minimum execution age of 18. Lawyers for Simmons hope the trend, coupled with polls that show growing public opposition to the death penalty for juvenile offenders, will convince the Supreme Court that its own ?evolving standards of decency? test argues in favor of banning the death penalty for youths. The court set that decency standard in 2002 when it outlawed the death penalty for mentally retarded offenders. The court said that a national consensus had formed against executing such defendants. If the court believes the same consensus has formed against executing juvenile offenders, Simmons and the others will be spared execution, said Richard Dieter of the Death Penalty Information Center in Washington. Opponents of the death penalty for juvenile offenders observe that people cannot vote until they are 18, drink until age 21 or rent a car usually until age 25. At some age a person's maturity has to be taken into account in their punishment, Dieter said. But age is not the determining factor in a person's maturity, said Michael Rushford, president of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, a victims' rights group based in California. Rushford said experience, street smarts and the ?crime dynamic? of a youth's surroundings should be taken into account in deciding culpability. ?It would be very hard, for instance, to compare downtown Los Angeles to Roanoke,? Rushford said. ?The street gang members there (in Los Angeles) are very sophisticated and would kill you in heartbeat.? States should allow juries to decide whether execution is warranted, Rushford said. ?We don't think a one-size-fits-all ruling out of the federal government is really appropriate,? Rushford said. Psychiatrist Wellek said a youth's knowledge is generally unrelated to the makeup of the prefrontal cortex of the brain that controls judgment. ?Yes, there are different circumstances, but brains are brains, and development is development,? Wellek said. Recent joint research by Harvard Medical School, the University of California-Los Angeles and the National Institute of Mental Health using advanced magnetic resonance imaging found that the prefrontal cortex is the last part of the brain to fully develop ? sometimes not until a person is in his or her early 20s. When not fully matured, that part of the brain reacts more than it reasons, Wellek said. ?It says kick, spit, bite, run, shoot, and it does not decide if it is right or wrong,? Wellek said. ?If it could, all these kids would not be on death row. Most of these murders are not premeditated; they are impulsive.? A deadly night Impulsive is not what Ed Kemp would call Shirley Crook's murder. Kemp, who worked the case as former chief homicide investigator for the Jefferson County sheriff's office, said Simmons had the time and sense to stop short of murder. ?I think he had the tools, the mental tools, the education, to make a rational, logical decision, whether he was under pressure or not,? Kemp said. The night that ended in Crook's drowning began when Simmons and another youth, Charles Benjamin, then 15, entered her house by unlocking the back door through an open window. Shirley and Steven Crook, both truck drivers, lived in a working-class neighborhood in Fenton on the southern outskirts of St. Louis. Simmons lived in a nearby neighborhood. Simmons says his home life was not happy. His father left when he was born, and his stepfather abused him, he said in state Supreme Court records. Simmons got in with a bad crowd, partied at the house of a neighborhood felon, Brian Moomey, broke into cars and houses. He had too much freedom, too much time. ?There was no home to go back to,? Simmons said in a recent interview. ?I was left to myself.? Simmons said he had not slept at his own house for a month before he and Charles Benjamin decided to meet at 2 a.m. on Sept. 9, 1993, to burglarize a house. Moomey testified that the boys bragged they planned to commit a burglary and murder and that Simmons said he could get away with it because he was a juvenile. Simmons said in the prison interview that he never talked about murdering someone or relying on his age as an excuse. Steven Crook was on the road when Simmons and Benjamin intruded. Shirley Crook, 46, was in bed. As the boys made their way through the house looking for something to steal, Crook woke up and called out ?Who's there?? court documents show. Simmons found her and forced her to the floor with Benjamin's help. Simmons found a roll of duct tape, which they used to bind her hands behind her back and to tape her mouth shut. They put Crook in her van and drove 16 miles to Castlewood State Park. They led Crook up an embankment, over sharp rocks and to the middle of the trestle about 40 feet above the Meramec River. They hoisted her over the metal railing and into the river. Then they drove back to her house and stole $6. That afternoon, fishermen found her body floating in the river. An autopsy found bruises and broken ribs. She was alive when she hit the water but then drowned. The next day, witnesses said at the trial, Simmons boasted about having killed Crook, because she had ?seen my face? and could identify him. Simmons and Benjamin were arrested at school the next day, and they were charged with murder. Although police videotaped Simmons' confession and re-enactment of the crime, he pleaded not guilty. A jury convicted him in 1994. Another jury tried Benjamin as an adult, convicted him and sentenced him to life in prison. Simmons' attorney, David Crosby, tried to convince the jury that Simmons should be spared execution because of his age. But at age 18, when he should have just graduated from high school, Simmons was sentenced to death. Through various appeals, Simmons, now 28, has escaped execution and now puts his life in the hands of the nation's highest court. Eleven years later, Mitchell still cannot live with the image of her sister being tossed, kicking and twisting, off the railroad bridge. ?They tied her up like a steer and kicked her over,? Mitchell said. Kemp said he saw few murders in his 29 years as a detective that matched Crook's. ?It's one of the most horrific I've seen in that it went on so long,? Kemp said. At many points, Simmons could have stopped his crime short of murder, Kemp said. Ninety-nine percent of burglars run out of the house when they realize someone is home, Kemp said. Simmons' youth and his problems at home should not have mattered, he said. ?How many orphans and guys with bad breaks turn out to be multimillionaires or captains of industry or cops or whatever?? Kemp said. ?How many people go right instead of left? He went to the dark side and didn't have to, didn't have to a hundred times.? Long days of regret Christopher Simmons spends all but a few hours a day in a shared cell at Potosi Correctional Center, where 57 inmates await execution. He gets out for exercise, visits, dining and to do laundry. Simmons appeared slightly nervous in his first interview since the U.S. Supreme Court decided to take his case. He said he had befriended inmates on death row over the years and could not help thinking of their somber stroll to the small room where they got lethal injections. ?Every night you think about the steps they took and what may happen to you,? Simmons said. He cried when one inmate friend, Robert Walls, was executed in 1999. Mitchell said she never saw Simmons cry at her sister's trial. Simmons showed no emotion, either, during the interview. But attorney Berrigan said Simmons had broken down many times in talking about Crook's death. ?I've seen him crying, absolutely,? Berrigan said. He has wept about the crime and about the pain he has caused his family and Crook's, Berrigan said. Simmons said he felt as if he had grown up in prison, where he has the discipline he never had at home. He has become a Christian, finished his high school education and spoken to youth groups about the consequences of crime. ?I feel like in a lot of ways, I've grown up from a kid not from anyplace to being a person who really wants to have a family and a normal life,? Simmons said. ?I want a second chance.? Berrigan said Simmons would never get out of prison and have a family, though he did marry a woman from Ohio three months ago. She read about his case, wrote him, they became close and married in the visiting room. Simmons said prison had denied him the pleasures of life that other people took for granted. He said he never had a date, never slow-danced, never owned a car. He seems to feel sorry for himself, but he has perspective. ?I don't have a right to talk about my suffering compared with what (Crook's relatives) went through,? Simmons said. But he added, ?I've in a way killed myself.? Crook's other sister and Crook's two grown children are still taking her death hard, Mitchell said. Steven Crook died in 1996. Simmons said that he tried to express his remorse in a letter to Crook's family some years ago but that they did not accept it. ?I don't want anything from Christopher Simmons besides his death, and I would love to see him suffer the way Shirley did,? Mitchell said. ?I will never change my mind.? (source: The Kansas City Star) =============================== TEXAS: For mentally ill, a criminal neglect The case of Kelsey Patterson reveals that Texas is failing to help the mentally ill. The most recent Texas execution, Patterson was put to death May 18 for killing Dorothy Harris and Louis Oates in 1992. After committing the crime, he was found pacing up and down the street, shouting incoherently, wearing only his socks. Had the state intervened when Patterson's half-brother requested aid, Harris, Oates and Patterson would still be alive. These homicides would not have occurred if the state had intervened when Patterson's half-brother requested it. Amnesty International reports that Patterson's family "would seek help, only to be told that there was nothing the authorities could do unless Patterson turned violent and became a threat to himself or others." However, aid was refused, even though Patterson had wounded people on two previous occasions. He had been ruled mentally incompetent to stand trial both times, something that should have further highlighted his illness to authorities. Patterson suffered from paranoid schizophrenia, an illness that causes delusions, auditory hallucinations and, as a result, a distorted perception of reality. He was first diagnosed in 1981, and his illness caused him to believe there was a conspiracy against him. This paranoia prevented him from working with his attorneys. The fact that Patterson's family was denied help indicates that the system needs to be reevaluated. According to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, the cost of keeping an individual on death row is on average $61.58 per day, combined with the average time of 10.43 years spent on death row per prisoner. This, combined with the legal fees from numerous appeals, indicates that the state could have saved money by providing medication and adequate medical care for Patterson. The state could save lives. Patterson's family was not the first to be denied aid before a relative committed a crime. Larry Robinson and James Colburn, executed in 2000 and 2003, respectively, were paranoid schizophrenics. Both of their families sought help from the state before their crimes and were denied aid. According to a report by the State of Texas Criminal Justice Policy Council, Texas had 25,227 individuals under criminal justice supervision in 1998 who were receiving treatment for mental illness. Statistics on how many people in jail are suffering from mental illness are not available, as a 2000 survey taken by the policy council states that most Texas jails do not have computerized data on mental illness. The state should remain especially alert to families who report signs of mental illness, as psychosis renders deterrents, such as capital punishment, ineffective. Often, family intervention is the way schizophrenics are diagnosed, as they experience their altered perceptions as reality and therefore do not see a reason to seek help. This makes it very important for the state to attend to family concerns. Texas has taken a step in the right direction by adding a new parole status: Medically Recommended Intensive Supervision. This program is designed to help mentally ill criminals receive parole that they might otherwise be denied due to their psychosis. This system even has an allowance for long-term parole, which will help state officials follow previous offenders. This system only takes into account criminals currently in jail. Parole is not an option for those found unfit for trial. Another flaw is that this supervision and treatment is only available to criminals. It does not help families whose relative has not committed a crime. The state of Texas needs better medical care for people with mental illnesses. It should be easier for families to receive assistance before there is a problem of criminal proportion. (source: Opinion, The Daily Texan) ============================= OHIO: Five Butler cases could bring death sentences 'Gruesome, strange' homicides one cause Butler County leads the region in the number of pending murder cases in which an accused killer could face death. Five men, including one whose case goes to trial today, remain jailed in Butler capital-punishment cases. "For a county of that size, that's pretty active," said Ohio Public Defender David Bodiker. Seven other counties in Greater Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky each have two or fewer death-penalty cases pending, including Hamilton County - despite having sent more killers to death row than any other Ohio county. "For many years, Cincinnati led the free world in (death-penalty) indictments. But in the past several years, they've only had a few," Bodiker said. On Tuesday, William Zuern, 45, convicted of killing a Hamilton County jailer 20 years ago, is set to die by lethal injection at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility in Lucasville. One reason for the increase in Butler Counter, Bodiker said, is that the area has been hit with a string of "very, very gruesome, strange sorts of homicides" that could fit legal criteria for prosecutors to seek the death penalty. Of Butler County's pending cases: Two involve double homicides; one victim was stabbed dozens of times during a robbery; another victim was dismembered; and another was shot execution-style. Ohio law specifies circumstances that can carry the death penalty, including murder-for-hire, multiple slayings, homicides of victims under age 13, and killings during certain other felonies. But, Bodiker said, "Indictments in capital cases have more to do with the attitude of the prosecutor than they do with the number of homicides." Robin Piper, prosecutor in Butler County, said: "Some murderers forfeit their right to exist because their crimes are so heinous ... If you don't like the death penalty, then get the law changed - and I won't seek it anymore." Since Piper took office in 2001, Butler grand juries have returned 12 death-penalty indictments, nearly twice as many as in 1998-2000. "These violent, horrific deaths cause such trauma and devastation," Piper said. "When you see this up close, you can't help but go for the death penalty when it's appropriate." Hamilton County Prosecutor Mike Allen said most of his county's recent killings have been "your basic drug-dealer-shoots-drug-dealer - and that's not eligible for the death penalty." What families want While Piper said victims' families usually ask him to seek the death penalty, Allen said he has received emotional pleas from families who urge him to avoid seeking execution because they want to avoid feeling re-victimized during years of appeals. A change in state law several years ago gives juries and judges the option to sentence convicted killers to stay in prison without possibility of parole. Allen thinks the life-without-parole option has made it harder to persuade some jurors to recommend death sentences. Earlier this year, a Hamilton County jury spared the life of Eric Robinson, 34, after he was convicted of beating an elderly man to death. He was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Among seven completed capital cases in Butler County since 2001, only Donald J. Ketterer is on death row. A three-judge panel condemned him after he pleaded guilty in the death of an elderly man who was beaten with a skillet and stabbed with knives, forks and scissors. Two other Butler County killers are serving life imprisonment without parole. Four others pleaded guilty and are serving parole-eligible sentences. Many jurors are reluctant to pass death sentences, Bodiker said, after hearing about cases in which DNA tests have freed innocent people, or about cases in which authorities lied, bent the rules or hid evidence. Bodiker also thinks more people are becoming aware that capital cases tie up the system and are costly. Warren County Prosecutor Rachel Hutzel, whose county currently has no pending capital-punishment cases, says such cases "probably triple the amount of work." This year, Butler County budgeted $67,000 for the prosecution of capital cases. But with five cases pending, county commissioners set aside an additional $150,000. Piper said he doesn't like the price tag. "But I'm not going to short-change the administration of justice because someone's worried about how much it's going to cost," he said. "People talk about Texas being a tough place for death-penalty cases, and Georgia," said Noah Powers, a Middletown lawyer. "I put Butler County right up with the rest of them. It's not that I advocate against the death penalty. I just think you have to be choosy about what cases are indicted as death penalty cases." Pending death-penalty cases in Butler County ? Jason Sam Campbell, 22, formerly of Middletown, is accused of killing Donald Riley, 44, and his wife, Helen, 55, in their Hamilton home on Feb. 23, 2003, hours after he escaped from a low-security Warren County lockup. Riley had been beaten and strangled; his wife bled to death from multiple knife wounds. Campbell fled to Florida, authorities say, where he was captured six months after the slayings. His trial begins today. ? Tom West, 50, described as a drifter who stayed in the Chicago and Las Vegas areas, is accused of a Nov. 6 shooting rampage at a West Chester Township trucking company. West faces two counts of aggravated murder in the deaths of Donald Haury, 50, of Beavercreek, and Bob Lines, 65, of Springfield Township; and four counts of attempted aggravated murder. A July 19 trial date is set but a judge first must determine whether he is competent to stand trial. ? Cardale A. Goens, 36, of Hamilton, is accused of shooting his friend, Jeffrey Glenn Watson, 41, of Hamilton, to death and mutilating the victim's remains with the help of two accomplices who face lesser charges. Watson's burned torso was found New Year's Eve near a Milford Township cornfield. No trial date has been set. ? Craig R. Anderson, 36, of Liberty Township, is accused in what authorities say was an "execution-style" shooting of Chad Re, a 25-year-old mortgage broker also of Liberty Township. Four others face charges alleging they helped with the crime or its subsequent cover-up. Police found Re sitting alone in his car in Monroe, suffering from a gunshot wound to the head on May 11. Re died the next day. No trial date for Anderson has been set. ? Richard W. Miller, 20, of Hamilton, was indicted last month in the 2002 stabbing of Paul W. Brown, 33, of Hamilton, following more than two years of police investigation. No trial date has been set. (source: The Cincinnati Enquirer)
