Jan. 13 CONNECTICUT: Defense attorneys call for abolition of death penalty Contending that the death penalty is unconstitutional and a waste of taxpayers' money, a statewide association of defense attorneys urged Gov. M. Jodi Rell and the state legislature on Thursday to stop this month's execution of serial killer Michael Ross. The 300-member Connecticut Criminal Defense Lawyers Association wants the legislature to abolish the death penalty. The group also is asking state residents to contact their lawmakers to act before the scheduled Jan. 26 execution. "The system is broken. It makes mistakes ... This is what's going to happen when we start killing people," New Haven attorney Hugh Keefe said. Keefe said defense attorneys know firsthand about the mistakes made in Connecticut's criminal justice system. Nearly every one of the 50 lawyers at the state Capitol news conference raised their hand when Keefe asked whether they've had an innocent client wrongly arrested or convicted. But Rell is standing by her Dec. 7 decision to not grant Ross a reprieve and give the legislature time to debate Connecticut's death penalty statute. "The governor has made her stand on this issue very clear. She believes in the death penalty for the most heinous crimes," said a Rell spokesman, Rich Harris. "The Michael Ross case certainly fits that decision." Legislative leaders have said there is not enough time or support to pass a bill abolishing the death penalty before the execution. Ross, 45, has admitted killing 8 women in Connecticut and New York, and is on death row for the murders of 4 young women in eastern Connecticut in the 1980s. He also raped some of the women. His execution by lethal injection is scheduled for 2 a.m. on Jan. 26 at Osborn Correctional Institution in Somers. His would be the 1st execution in New England since 1960. Ross has said he wants to forgo further appeals to spare the families of his victims more pain. However, his former lawyers believe the killer is not mentally competent to make such a decision, suffers from depression and wants to commit "state-assisted suicide." The defense attorneys, who have yet to meet with Rell or legislative leaders, passed a resolution on Jan. 13 that renews the group's call for the abolition of the death penalty. They include a list of criticisms, claiming the death penalty "does not comport with evolving standards of decency," "is excessive and serves no legislative purpose," is arbitrary and racially discriminatory and risks execution of the innocent. "The death penalty in Connecticut is more like a game of roulette than a rational review," said Hubert Santos, a Hartford defense attorney. He said the 13 state's attorneys in Connecticut can make their own decision on whether to pursue the death penalty against those who commit capital crimes. He said statistics show that people living in Hartford and Waterbury are more likely to face death sentences than people living elsewhere. Thomas Ullmann, a New Haven public defender, said a death sentence is costly on taxpayers. He said it can cost about $2.5 million to $8 million to try and put someone to death, while it costs $1.5 million to keep someone in prison for 40 years. This comes at a time when the state's judicial system is strapped for cash, Ullmann said. "For this, we have a blank check," he said of the death penalty. ************************ Forum sheds religious light on execution Dozens of people were drawn to a forum Thursday night that examined the use of the death penalty through the ages and across various faiths. Sponsored by the Charter Oak Cultural Center, the event also included a discussion of a report by the Death Penalty Information Center, which tracks national trends in capital punishment. The center's most recent report identified flaws in death penalty cases that suggest there are innocent people on death row. Serial killer Michael Ross admittedly is not among them. He is on Connecticut's death row for the murders of four young women in the eastern part of the state in the 1980s and has admitted killing eight women in Connecticut and New York. Ross has decided to forgo any remaining appeals he has and accept his Jan. 26 execution date. His willingness to be put to death raises other concerns, said Richard Dieter, executive director of the Washington, D.C.-based Death Penalty Information Center. "I think in a state like this where there is a lot of uncertainty about the death penalty, it might make sense to look at some of the objections being raised," Dieter said. "It shouldn't ride on what the inmate wants. That should not be who controls our criminal justice system." The advent of DNA technology has had a marked effect on capital punishment, the report states. That science, coupled with reinvestigations of many cases, has led to the discovery of a growing number of mistaken convictions and freed inmates, according to the report. Ross, 45, would be the first person executed in New England since 1960, when Connecticut sent Joseph Taborsky to the electric chair for a series of murders and robberies. Ross is scheduled to die by lethal injection. Dieter said that long stretch without an execution can be attributed in part to much ambivalence about the death penalty in this region over the years. "This is a region of the country with the lowest murder rate, and in a way, it's the system without executions that has worked well so there's been no rush to expand it," Dieter said. "But occasionally if you have it on the books, you will have an execution. You'll have somebody who maybe volunteers as you do in this case." Dieter was joined by panel of religious leaders who represented Judaism, Christianity and Islam and offered historical religious interpretations of capital punishment. Rabbi Herbert Brockman, spiritual leader at a Hamden synagogue, said state-sanctioned executions would drag society back to the "savagery of an earlier age." "Tonight is a night we should be praying for ourselves and our state," Brockman said. Sairah Sandhu, a Muslim, said Islam does subscribe to the death penalty but offers the families of victims the opportunity to spare the condemned individual. And if the family is merciful then "the blessings in the afterlife of letting that person live are beyond imagination," she said. Alex Mikulich, an assistant professor of religious studies at St. Joseph College, said capital punishment is skewed against poor people and minorities. "You know what the poor people say, 'Them without the capital gets the punishment,"' Mikulich told the gathering. "Amen," came a voice from the crowd. (source for both: Associated Press) MISSOURI: 4 WEEKS AFTER STINNETT MURDER, MONTGOMERY INDICTED BY GRAND JURY----Murder suspect will enter plea soon, U.S. Attorney says 4 weeks ago today, Lisa Montgomery strangled Bobbie Jo Stinnett with a rope and cut the baby out of her womb with a kitchen knife, according to allegations made in a federal grand jury indictment issued Wednesday. The indictment was a critical step in what could be a long legal battle against Montgomery, 36, who is charged with kindapping resulting in the death of Stinnett, who was 23 at the time of the crime. The charge carries a maximum penalty of death or life in prison. On Wednesday, U.S. Attorney Todd Graves said the prosecutors have not made the decision whether to pursue the death penalty, but said the indictment makes execution a possibility. "It'll take months to go through that process," Graves said. "That is a decision that will be made by the Department of Justice as a whole, and at the highest levels of the Department of Justice.... The nature of these charging documents is to protect our opportunity and our option to seek the death penalty." In the indictment, the suspect is referred to as "Lisa M. Montgomery, a/k/a Darlene Fischer, a/k/a/ Fischer4kids." According to information released by investigators, Montgomery had been lying for months that she was pregnant. She allegedly used the Fischer alias to lure eight-months-pregnant Stinnett into a face-to-face meeting, although the two knew each other from attending the same rat terrier dog shows. When Montgomery arrived at Stinnett's house in Skidmore, she allegedly strangled Stinnett and cut the baby out of her womb. She then took the baby back to her hometown of Melvern, Kan., told her husband Kevin Montgomery it was hers, and the couple showed the child off around town. The day after the murder, investigators found and arrested Lisa Montgomery and returned the baby to its father, Zeb Stinnett. Graves said Thursday that charges against other defendants, but not specifically Kevin Montgomery, are possible. "The investigation is ongoing," he said. "I do not anticipate any other charges against this defendant, but I will not rule out charges against other potential defendants." The indictment states that Mongtomery allegedly "strangled Bobbie Jo Stinnett with a rope and then took a kitchen knife and cut her infant daughter from her womb." On Thursday Graves would not say whether the rope or the kitchen knife would be used as evidence in the case against Montgomery. He also would not say whether Montgomery brought the rope and knife with her, or if they were items found at Stinnett's home. But he did point out the section of the indictment which said the crime was committed "after substantial planning and premeditation." The next step in the process is an arraignment, which could take place within a week. "The arraignment will be the 1st time that the defendant is asked to plead guilty or not guilty," Graves said. After that, the U.S. Attorney's office will either proceed to a sentencing phase, if Montgomery pleads guilty, or a trial phase if she pleads not guilty or not guilty by reason of insanity. Previous charging documents said Montgomery confessed to the crime, which the indictment called "especially heinous, cruel and depraved." (source: Maryville Daily Forum) CALIFORNIA: ACLU Says Californias Use of Paralytic Drug During Executions is Unconstitutional FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE -- Contact: [email protected] ACLU and Death Penalty Focus File Court Brief in Support of Donald Beardslee Days Before Scheduled Execution The public and the media have the First Amendment right to meaningfull witness and gather accurate information about Californias execution procedure, said the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California and Death Penalty Focus in a court brief filed today in the civil case challenging the states method of lethal injection. Attorneys for Donald Beardslee, who is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection on January 19, filed a motion last month asking for a temporary restraining order to halt the scheduled execution because one of the drugs used during lethal injection paralyzes the condemned man and would leave him unable to signal if he were in pain. The motion was denied on January 7 and an appeal is now before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal. In their friend-of-the-court brief, Death Penalty Focus and the ACLU of Northern California state that the use of the paralytic drug Pavulon can mask a prisoners expression of pain by inhibiting all voluntary muscle movement. Most states have banned Pavulon in the euthanization of animals because it prevents the individual performing the euthanasia from knowing whether the animal was properly anesthetized. "Our concern is that the drug Pavulon acts as a 'chemical curtain,' to prevent those witnessing the execution from knowing whether the condemned inmate is suffering excruciating pain," Alan Schlosser, Legal Director of the ACLU of Northern California said. "It would interfere with the publics right to know and could conceal cruel or unusual punishment by the state, which is forbidden by the Constitution." The use of a drug like Pavulon implicates the First Amendment right recognized by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal in an earlier case, California First Amendment Coalition v. Woodford, in which the court held that the media and the public have a First Amendment right to witness an entire execution from the moment the condemned inmate enters the execution chamber until his life is extinguished. Since 1996, when the 1st lethal injection procedure was used in California, the state has administered 3 chemicals to execute condemned inmates. First, the inmate is administered sodium pentothal, a fast-acting barbiturate; 2nd, pancuronium bromide ("Pavulon"), a chemical paralytic agent; and 3rd, potassium chloride, a compound that causes cardiac arrest. "The First Amendment precludes the state from sanitizing the execution process by administering a drug that appears to have no purpose other than to prevent the public and the press from seeing whether the use of lethal injection causes pain," Schlosser said. The case is Beardslee v. Woodford. (source: ACLU) *********************** Execution drug is challenged in court---Ban paralyzing agent that could mask pain, ACLU and others say. A week before California plans to execute Donald Beardslee, a federal appeals court on Wednesday weighed a request to bar use of a chemical that would render the condemned man incapable of crying out in pain. Two of three judges sitting in an emergency session of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals expressed concern over the state's refusal to explain its use of a paralyzing chemical called Pavulon, the 2nd of 3 drugs administered in the lethal-injection process. "You're putting us in an awkward position," Judge Sidney Thomas of Billings, Mont., told the state's lawyer, Senior Assistant Attorney General Dane Gillette. "Some other states don't use it." Gillette said no explanation was necessary, but Judge Wallace Tashima of Pasadena joined Thomas in pressing for one, while the third judge, Richard Paez, also of Pasadena, focused on the state's refusal to divulge how it administers the sedative used at the start of the lethal-injection procedure. It's supposed to render the prisoner unconscious but, argued lawyers on Beardslee's side of the case, it may not do so. A conscious inmate would experience asphyxiation from the Pavulon and then a searing sensation throughout his veins from the last chemical in the series, potassium chloride. Defense lawyers, the anti-capital punishment group Death Penalty Focus and the American Civil Liberties Union argued that the purpose of including Pavulon was to keep the public in the dark about whether the state's lethal-injection method is humane. "What we're dealing with here is an attempt to sanitize the process and an attempt to distort the debate," ACLU lawyer Alan Schlosser argued. Gillette said no explanation should be required from the state until Beardslee proves that an unconstitutionally painful execution is likely - a possibility that Gillette minimized but his opponents called hard to predict because of the state's secrecy. They presented evidence suggesting some lethal-injection executions have been botched. Gillette, however, termed predictions of errors "at best speculative." He said the drug administered before the Pavulon, the sedative, would render "virtually all persons" unconscious within a minute. "He's going to be unconscious," argued the lawyer. "The Pavulon is not going to do anything" with respect to suffering. Tashima, who presided, said the court would issue its decision soon, but there was no indication what it would be. The judges must factor in other considerations, including their own court's rejection of an earlier challenge to the state's lethal-injection process. Also, although Thomas clearly was bothered by the state's secrecy, he was bothered, too, by a fear of what he called "unintended consequences" if the court tinkers with the mix of chemicals and allows the execution to proceed. Beardslee, 61, was sentenced to death in San Mateo County in 1983 for the revenge murder of two women suspected of cheating in a drug deal. The same 3 9th Circuit judges have upheld his death sentence, which is being appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court. A separate bid for the governor's clemency will be the subject of a hearing Friday before the state parole board. (source: Sacramento Bee) KENTUCKY: Supreme Court hears appeal for new trial for killer Victor Dewayne Taylor, on Death Row since 1986 for murdering 2 lost high school students, deserves a new trial because the prime witness against him has changed his story, an attorney told the Kentucky Supreme Court Thursday. Justices, as well as the prosecutor, seemed skeptical of the most recent version of events from George Ellis Wade, who was sentenced to life in prison for his part in the murders. "Wonder who he'll blame this time?" asked Justice William Cooper. "He's testified under oath two completely different ways in this case." Assistant Attorney General David Smith also noted Wade's story changed only after the parole board decided he should never be released from prison. "George Wade has a credibility that is zero," Smith said. The case became known as the Trinity murders. The night of Sept. 29, 1984, Scott Nelson and Richard Stephenson, both 17, were seeking directions to a high school football game involving Trinity High School at a school stadium in the city. Taylor was convicted of assaulting and robbing the teens, binding and gagging them and shooting each in the head. The case was so notorious, it was moved to Fayette County for trial. Wade told police that it was Taylor who pulled the trigger, though he did not testify at trial. Wade told a similar version at other court proceedings, but assistant public defender Thomas Ransdell said Wade now would testify that Taylor was not even present at the killings. "Victor Taylor has maintained his innocence from the very first day," Ransdell said. Taylor's conviction and death sentence for the murders have been upheld at least 4 times during the lengthy appeals. Death sentences for kidnapping for the same crime were overturned by a court that said it amounted to double jeopardy. The hearing Thursday was the most recent attempt by Taylor's attorneys to seek a new trial as the appeals possibilities run out. The justices routinely take several weeks or months to render a decision after oral arguments and there is no set timetable. Taylor is 1 of 34 people sentenced to death in Kentucky, according to the Corrections Department. Kentucky's last execution was May 25, 1999, when Eddie Lee Harper was put to death by lethal injection for shooting his adoptive parents to death in Louisville in 1982. Harper had waived further appeals and asked to be put to death. (source: Associated Press) OHIO: Man Faces Death Penalty In Price Hill Shooting----Man Indicted On Aggravated Murder Charges A man faces the death penalty on charges stemming from a fatal shooting in Price Hill. Andre Bell, 32, was indicted Thursday on counts of aggravated murder, attempted aggravated murder and having a weapon under disability. Investigators believe Bell shot and killed Stephanie Bowling, 20, and wounded another woman. Police speculated the shooting may have originated as a domestic dispute. The shootings occurred in the 3700 block of Westmont Drive in October. A court date has not been set. (source: WLWT News)
