Feb. 27 FLORIDA: Former death row inmate shares story For 17 years, 8 months and 1 day, Juan Roberto Melendez was in prison as a convicted felon on death row, but he was innocent. Melendez, a 53-year-old former farm worker, of Puerto Rico, spoke Monday at 3 p.m. at the UF Levin College of Law to share his experience in hopes of persuading the more than 50 students and faculty who attended to oppose the death penalty. Before introducing Melendez, Abe Bonowitz, director of Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, said, "The death penalty is a bad public policy. It isnt fair, or accurate." Melendez was 33 when he was convicted of 1st-degree murder and armed robbery in 1984. Melendez said he has walked many uncertain roads in his lifetime but never imagined he would end up on death row. Melendez was arrested and sentenced to the death penalty without any physical evidence linking him to the crime, the murder of Aburndale cosmetology school owner Delbert Baker, and testimony from questionable witnesses. Prosecutor Hardy Pickard hid evidence and lied to the court in order to protect the real killer, a police informant. Melendezs trial took four days and consisted of almost an all-white jury. There was only one black juror, he said. He could hardly understand the verdict because he was unable to speak any English, "except curse words," he said. "All I knew was that my heart got full of hate. I was very scared to die for a crime I did not commit." Though Melendez said he promised the jury hed be back for a retrial because he swore he was innocent, he said it seemed unlikely. Melendez said in prison he considered suicide. But by the mercy of God and prayer from his "mama" for a miracle, Melendez said God would get him out of there. "You're dead, but you're free," he said. "I was planning on doing it too. I made the rope, hung it from the bunk, but before I was ready to do it, I said, 'I better think this though again' and went to sleep." He dreamed of going to the beaches and looking at the mountain from his home in Puerto Rico. When he woke up, the bunk smelled like the beach, he said. "It was a sign of hope that one day I'd be out of there," he said. After years of losing appeals, Melendez's conviction was thrown out after a transcript of another mans confession to the crime was discovered in 1999. Law student Robert Mayes, 24, said he thought Melendez was a dynamic speaker. "It is shocking how any attorney has the capacity to do such a thing," he said, speaking of Pickard. "There should be some repercussion like being disbarred. You cant give him his life back." Melendez will speak March 1 from 7 p.m to 9 p.m. in the lounge at the St. Augustine Catholic Student Center, 1738 W University Ave. (source: The Independent Florida Alligator) NORTH CAROLINA: Haunted, Gell moves on -- A year after freedom from death row He's no longer on North Carolina's death row, but Alan Gell hasn't left prison behind. Sure, he's become a minor celebrity, meeting with lawmakers over steak and beer, speaking against the death penalty across the state, accepting good wishes from strangers at Wal-Mart. But freedom for Gell is more complicated than regained pleasures and public recognition. He has avoided making friends since his release. He compulsively tracks where he goes and with whom, so that he has an alibi for all his comings and goings. He is wary of strangers and nervous about confined spaces. One of the few places he feels safe is the home of his mother and stepfather, Jeanette and Joel Johnson. "If I didn't have the family I had, I'd be in right rough shape," Gell said. He accepts almost every invitation to speak, only turning down ones that interfere with his schoolwork. But he says he does it out of duty, not pleasure. "My eyelids were taped open for nine years, where I saw every ugly thing about the criminal justice system and about drugs," he said recently. "I have an intense desire to make a change." Ten years ago, no one could have predicted that Gell would become a spokesman for the anti-death penalty movement and a poster boy for reforming the criminal justice system. When he was arrested for murder, Gell was a skinny 155-pounder with a mullet haircut, a wispy mustache and a considerable appetite for marijuana, cocaine and Calvert Canadian. Prison chow, weightlifting and free world food have thickened him to 210 pounds. His sister, Amber, cuts his blond hair so short he can't comb it. His wire-rimmed glasses give him a studious look. His Eastern North Carolina accent remains the same, delivered in a soft baritone. Nowadays, he has a lot more to say, and a lot of people to listen. Gell gave the first public speech of his life on March 27. He has gone on to give at least a hundred more, and he has become more polished and comfortable. But that 1st time, standing before 150 people at Northeast Branch library in Wilmington, he was so scared he almost passed out. Trying to calm his nerves, he thought about his death row comrades, some who had been executed. I'm doing this for them, he thought. His voice cracked with nerves and emotion. Back in 1995, he found himself charged with a murder he had nothing to do with, set up by two 15-year-old girls who were cutting a deal with law enforcement. As he sat in jail, his mother told him not to lose faith. "My mother and family said we've got a good system," Gell told the crowd. "We've got lawyers, and we've got God." Going out of his way As it turned out, the system wasn't good to Gell. Prosecutors withheld evidence that showed the murder of Allen Ray Jenkins occurred while Gell was in jail. His lawyers at his 1998 trial did little to rebut the state's case, and he was sent to death row. "All things happen for a reason," Gell said. "God had me there for a reason. This might be the reason right now." In his speeches, he talks about flaws that he sees in the legal system. Just as often, Gell talks about how he went wrong, how drugs, alcohol and the wrong crowd put him in a situation where he could be framed for murder. Most of his death row colleagues had drug or alcohol problems. These speeches and public appearances help support him. Gell works as a public educator for the Center for Death Penalty Litigation. He has also started a nonprofit group called Stay Out Inc. as a tool for speaking to middle and high school students about avoiding drugs and staying in school. A 9th-grade dropout, Gell wants a college degree in sociology or psychology. He muses about becoming a social worker or a drug counselor or both. To start off, he's a full-time student at Martin Community College, working for an associate's degree. He could have gone to school in nearby Ahoskie, but he drives the extra 10 miles to Williamston to avoid his former girlfriends and accusers, Shanna Hall and Crystal Morris. Both are out of prison now and living in the Ahoskie area. Gell has no interest in bumping into them. For months, he lived at home with his mother and stepfather. But for a 30-year-old, things were a little tight in the house. So, with their help, he bought a repossessed 1999 single-wide mobile home. He put it outside his stepfather's machine shop, a few hundred feet from his mother's house. "I'm going to keep him close until I'm ready to let him go," she said. Gell is compulsively tidy. He neatly lined the drawers and cabinets with wallpaper. He keeps six full sets of John Deere place settings on the kitchen table. He turned one bedroom into a study with a computer. But there are signs that this isn't an average mobile home in Eastern North Carolina. On the coffee table is an 18-by-24 inch homemade card, framed in hand-drawn barbed wire, signed by North Carolina's death row inmates: "ALAN THANKS! KEEP FIGHTING!" On the counter close by is a guide to the North Carolina General Assembly, with photos and phone numbers of the 50 senators and 120 representatives. In the year since he left Central Prison, Gell has spoken with many of the legislators. Gell has often teamed with Darryl Hunt, who spent 19 years in prison before DNA testing exonerated him of a notorious 1984 murder and rape. They make an unlikely pair: Hunt, a soft-spoken African-American from Winston-Salem who always wears a Muslim skullcap, and Gell, a country boy and Baptist whose taste in clothes runs to Dixie Outfitters and John Deere garb. One of Gell's guides to the ways of government has been Zeb Alley, one of Raleigh's most influential lobbyists, who is helping to push a moratorium on the state's death penalty while state officials study whether it has been applied fairly. Last year, Gell, Hunt and House Speaker Jim Black discussed the criminal justice system over filet mignon and Corona beer at Alley's house. Alley recently took Gell to Sullivan's Steak House in Raleigh to dine with several Republican legislators. Given Gell's drug use and years in prison, Alley said he was surprised by Gell's insights -- and his lack of bitterness. "If some lawyer or prosecutor had railroaded me, I'd be bitter," Alley said. "He's really an amazing person. He might have me fooled, but that's hard to do." Because of Gell's case, prosecutors must now share their entire file with defendants, a change in the law designed to prevent the misconduct that put Gell on death row. But even that change frustrates Gell. The law only applies to current and future felony cases. What about the 30,000 inmates in prison now? Wouldn't opening their prosecutorial files help the innocent ones now locked up? "It's like, 'We'll fix it in next year's model, but not in the ones on the road,'" he said. "If it was a car, we'd do a recall." Gell is often asked if the state will compensate him for the years he spent in prison. To pursue his legal options, he has retained Chapel Hill lawyer David Rudolf, most recently known for his defense of Durham novelist Michael Peterson. Gell could petition Gov. Mike Easley for a pardon of innocence, which would entitle Gell to $20,000 for each year he was wrongfully imprisoned. He could file for compensation with the N.C. Industrial Commission under a state law that would allow him to recover up to $500,000. Or he could sue the state in federal court. Whichever road he chooses, Gell said, he wants to change the system. Reminders of that time The system that Gell is working to change has left its marks on him. After leaving prison, Gell walked around with his fly open. After 9 years of wearing prison jumpsuits or pants with buttons, it took a week or 2 to reacquaint himself with zippers. He has struggled to take charge of his schedule, now that he's no longer ordered around by correctional officers 24/7. "I look at my watch and say, 'It's chow time' or 'It's time to go outside'," he said. While that has diminished, he still wakes each day at 5:30 a.m., the time the lights go on at Central Prison. Some marks run deeper than his clothes or when he rises. The volatile confines of prison forces inmates to know each other well, if only to avoid trouble. To survive, Gell learned to read each and every person around him. He kept tabs on the moods and problems of the men on his block. Did they receive mail today? Did they expect mail and not get it? Were they in debt to other inmates? How had their last visits gone? What was happening in their case? All this information was needed to answer the critical prison question: Can you safely turn your back on this person? "You have to know it all or you're slipping," Gell said. Gell expects this wariness to stick with him for a long time. He doesn't expect his circle of trusted people -- his family and his lawyers -- to expand anytime soon. He harbors a distrust of women that he attributes to being set up by two girls who said they were his friends. Out of prison, he started a series of affairs -- almost always with married women, he says -- as if to reinforce a belief that women can't be trusted. He says the sleeping around ended in the fall, when Gell started seeing Shannon Schwab, a friend of his younger sister. The 2 are almost inseparable, taking the same classes, often coordinating their John Deere or N.C. State garb. One measure of his trust in her is their classroom choreography. Schwab takes a seat next to the wall and Gell sits next to her, eyes on the door and other students. "I read the faces, to make sure they're normal," he said. "If I don't feel they're normal, I keep an eye on them. I'll turn my back to my girlfriend. ... It's a prison habit." (source: The News & Observer) VIRGINIA: Coleman case still unsettled in many minds----Gov. Warner still has not decided whether to order a DNA test that might prove Coleman's innocence. Jack Payden-Travers didn't have to say what he was calling about. All he had to say was, "This is Jack." "I can tell you what Jack's question is going to be," Gov. Mark Warner said last Tuesday during a call-in show on WVTF public radio. Sure enough, the head of Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty was calling - again - to ask the governor to order DNA testing that could determine whether the state executed an innocent man. For the past 2 years, Warner has been considering the request from Centurion Ministries, a group that believes Roger Keith Coleman was executed in 1992 for a rape and murder he did not commit. Warner promised last week that he will make a decision "very soon." Although DNA has been used to exonerate 13 people on death row since 1993 nationwide, there has never been a case in which posthumous testing proved the innocence of an executed man, according to the Death Penalty Information Center in Washington D.C. With public support for capital punishment weakening, scientific proof that the system is not fail-safe "would be more than just a blip" in the process, said Richard Dieter, executive director of the group. "Those who don't want to see an innocent person executed would realize this is a distinct possibility," Dieter said. "It's not just a theoretical problem." Well aware of the potential for Coleman's case to shape that debate, people such as Payden-Travers have followed the matter closely. Payden-Travers said he has asked Warner about the case at least 5 times during radio call-in shows over the past 2 years. His group also plans to send the governor one postcard a day for the rest of his term, each signed by a different state resident who supports the testing. "We are committed to bird-dogging Gov. Warner until such time as he orders the tests," Payden-Travers said. "The more he delays, the more it looks like Virginia has something to hide." 2 years ago today, Centurion Ministries turned to Warner as a last resort after state courts refused to resurrect Coleman's case by ordering the tests. The New Jersey-based group, which investigates possible wrongful convictions, is not affiliated with Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty. The governor is clearly in no rush. Many people familiar with Coleman's case say they believe additional DNA tests would only confirm his guilt. But the mere chance of a different result is enough to give a politician pause - especially in a pro-capital punishment state like Virginia. Political observers said most governors would rather not deal with that kind of fallout. Warner is under no legal obligation to act. And unlike most capital cases, the life of a condemned man is no longer at stake. So sitting on a request like the one from Centurion Ministries is "a no-brainer," said Larry Sabato, a University of Virginia political scientist. Sabato said he suspects that if Warner were to order the tests, he might wait until late in the year. That way, the next governor would inherit whatever controversy might follow. Virginia's attorney general's office has strongly objected to the testing, saying there is no need to reopen a case that was decided beyond a reasonable doubt more than two decades ago. Coleman was convicted in 1982 of raping and murdering his sister-in-law in her home on the banks of Slate Creek, which runs through the town of Grundy in far Southwest Virginia. The former coal miner was executed 10 years later, proclaiming his innocence from the electric chair, in a case that attracted national publicity. At issue today is a 24-year-old piece of evidence - a sperm sample taken from Wanda McCoy's body - that still exists in the freezer of a California scientist. Because DNA testing did not exist at the time of Coleman's trial, authorities could only use blood typing on the sample to narrow a pool of suspects to include Coleman. Since then, Centurion Ministries has argued, advances in technology make it possible to either confirm his guilt or exonerate him with one final test of the evidence. Warner said last week on the radio show that his office has been in discussions with Centurion Ministries. The group investigated the case after Coleman's conviction and became convinced of his innocence. "I know that there are concerns that Jack and others have had that for some time this has been dragging on," Warner said. "I'd rather take the criticism that I'm taking my time, because I want to make the right choice." (source: The Roanoke Times) *********************** Victims' Relative Corners Suspect In 2 days, Daniel Beverly did what Prince George's County police had failed to do in nearly a year and a half: track down the man wanted in the homicides of Beverly's aunt and uncle. The couple were slain in August 2003 in their brick rambler in Camp Springs, and an arrest warrant was soon issued for Lonzo Dion Shafer, the victims' nephew and Beverly's cousin. But Shafer remained at large, and family members felt police were not aggressively pursuing the case. Then, on Feb. 10, Beverly coincidentally pulled up next to Shafer at a traffic light in the District, the 1st time he had seen his cousin since the slayings. Shafer didn't notice him. Beverly was able to trace the license plate of the car Shafer was driving to a Hyattsville rowhouse, where Shafer's former girlfriend lives with her two children. Beverly said his family had previously given the woman's name to police, along with other possible leads to capturing Shafer. But investigators had not contacted her. At 6 a.m. Feb. 12, Beverly and 2 of his relatives walked into Prince George's police headquarters in Palmer Park. They told officers that Shafer was staying at his former girlfriend's house, just 3 blocks away. Even then, getting police to the house wasn't easy. First, the officers told the family to come back a few hours later because no homicide detectives were available, Beverly said. Then, a robbery detective said it might be better if the family returned Monday, two days later, when more detectives would be available, recalled Garikai Beverly, a son of the victims. So Daniel Beverly resorted to some trickery. "That's when I went up to the house and called 911 on my cell phone and said, 'Shots fired' at the address," he said. "I thought it was the only way to get the police to come and arrest Dion. Then a cop responded, and I told him shots had not been fired but that a guy wanted for murder was in the house. Soon, more cops and police dogs showed up." Shafer was arrested in the back yard of the house as he tried to escape. Prince George's police spokeswoman Barbara Hamm said the department is conducting a preliminary inquiry into how police handled information from the family. She said she did not know why Shafer's former girlfriend, Jeannette Forde, was not interviewed by police until the day of the arrest. Hamm said that at 1:30 p.m. Feb. 12, authorities received a 911 call about a fugitive and gunshots at the Hyattsville address. She said officers arrived at the house in the 7600 block of Allendale Circle within 5 minutes and arrested Shafer about an hour later. Regarding the family's conversations with police earlier that day, Hamm said the department has determined that a family member told an officer at 10 a.m. that he had new information about the case. She said the officer contacted the detective handling the investigation, who was in the District at the time, and told the officer that he would return shortly and that the relative should wait. 2 or 3 hours later, Hamm said, another family member told a detective that he knew where Shafer was. "That detective took down the information and then supervisors started putting into place procedures we use to apprehend fugitives," Hamm said. "But in the end, we responded to the 911 call itself with a different team." Shafer, 35, could face the death penalty if he is convicted of killing Daniel L. Beverly Jr., 55, and Valerie A. Dorsey, 53. Their bodies were found inside their home in the 6600 block of Napoli Road on Aug. 16, 2003. Beverly had been shot in the upper body, and Dorsey apparently was smothered. A hearing is scheduled for next month. According to court documents, a witness who was in the house at the time of the slayings overheard Shafer talking to his uncle moments before a gunshot rang out. Another witness heard a male voice demanding money and keys. When the witnesses searched the house, they discovered that Shafer had fled and that the uncle's 1994 Infiniti Q45 was missing, the documents say. The car was found abandoned and burning in the District. The beginning of the end of Shafer's status as a fugitive came about 4 p.m. Feb. 10 at a red light at Florida Avenue and Fifth Street NW. Daniel Beverly was driving a green Audi station wagon, and Shafer was behind the wheel of a white Nissan Sentra. Shafer was laughing with 3 other people in the vehicle. "It was fate. I looked over at him once and didn't look at him anymore, because I knew I couldn't let him see me," said Beverly, 30. He followed Shafer for about 20 minutes, and by the time they had reached Minnesota Avenue in Southeast Washington, Beverly had jotted down the car's license plate number. "He was dipping in and out of traffic, and I called 911 and said that I was behind Lonzo Dion Shafer and that he is wanted for murder," Beverly remembered. "But the dispatcher said to call back when he got to an address and that they were not going to follow us. Then I lost Dion." Everett Lott, deputy director for the District's Office of Unified Communications, which oversees the city's 911 system, said he could not comment on Beverly's account because the agency had not reviewed the tape of the call. Beverly said it was a "police friend in another jurisdiction" who checked the license plate and traced it to Forde's address in Hyattsville. "When I tracked it on a map, I couldn't believe it was so close to police headquarters," he said. On the evening of Feb. 11, Beverly and a cousin went to Forde's home to survey the situation. They saw the Nissan parked in front. Beverly said he had become so disillusioned by the police's handling of the case that he was not sure he wanted to call them at that point. "We said, 'We'll sleep on it tonight,'" he said. "I thought it would be better to try to capture him early in the morning because he would be most vulnerable, just getting out of bed or still not fully woken up." Forde, a hotel worker from Panama, said in an interview later that she knew nothing about Shafer's alleged role in the homicides until he was arrested. She said that she met Shafer 16 years ago at a nightclub in the District and that the two were romantically involved for a while. They remained friends over the years, she said, and she occasionally gave him money to help him. Forde said he rarely stayed at her home. Daniel Beverly said that although Shafer's arrest has closed one painful chapter for the family, he and his relatives are still struggling. "How excited can you be? Nobody is celebrating," he said. "There is probably even more pain now, but it is something that had to be done. He was a danger to society." (source: Washington Post) CALIFORNIA: THE PETERSON TRIAL -- Judge puts Peterson sentencing on hold -- Defense source says a jail tape tells of Laci and burglars John Guinasso came to court in Redwood City on Friday looking for closure. The former Scott Peterson juror, the one reporters called "the Teamster" before they knew his real name, said he just wanted to see the infamous double- murder case through to its conclusion. He wanted to see whether Judge Alfred Delucchi would follow the jury's recommendation and condemn Peterson, the 32- year-old former Modesto fertilizer salesman, to die for murdering his wife, Laci, and the couple's unborn child. But Guinasso, and the two other former jurors who attended the brief hearing, will have to wait. Peterson's sentencing date, originally scheduled for Friday and delayed until March 11, was continued yet again to give the prosecution and defense more time to prepare. Defense attorneys Mark Geragos and Pat Harris filed a 122-page motion asking for a new trial. Delucchi sealed the documents, saying he wouldn't make them public until the prosecution filed its response March 9. But Michael Cardoza, a local lawyer who has been helping the defense, said Geragos had uncovered new evidence. He said a prison inmate had been caught on tape talking to his brother about a burglary at the Petersons' house in which Laci Peterson confronted the robbers. Geragos may argue that authorities withheld evidence that could have been helpful in proving that Scott Peterson was not the killer. "Law enforcement did not turn (the recording) over," Cardoza said. "By not turning it over, they opened a Pandora's box." Delucchi also sealed a note that Lee Peterson, Scott's father, sent to the court. Presumably, the San Diego man begs for leniency for his son. In addition, the judge is keeping under wraps 153 more letters sent by people who followed the trial -- some critical of how the case was handled and others supportive. "Right now, I don't want to poison the atmosphere by allowing the letters to become public," Delucchi said. For 5 months, as the world watched the case from afar while the cable networks reported its every twist and turn, Guinasso and his 11 fellow jurors had a front-row seat to the macabre soap opera. And it took its toll. "There's not a day that I don't think about the case," said the 43-year- old parking garage supervisor and member of the Teamsters union, who lives in Pacifica. "The autopsy pictures were pretty horrific, and how the victims' bodies were found was terrible." Laci Peterson's headless corpse was discovered on the Richmond shoreline four months after she was reported missing from her Modesto home on Dec. 24, 2002. The body of her unborn baby was found a day earlier in the same area. Guinasso said the panel's deliberations in the penalty phase of the case were so emotionally draining that by the end, one of the jurors, a Roman Catholic, walked to a corner of the room and began praying. Another, according to Guinasso, was so traumatized that she confessed to the group that she had accidentally killed her own child by backing over him in her driveway. Coming to the final hearings, Guinasso said, is like therapy. "It's a stepping-stone toward closure," he said. So was the dinner that Guinasso and nine other former jurors had last month at the Canyon Inn in Redwood City with members of Laci Peterson's family and the prosecutors. The family thanked them profusely for their service and recapped some of the case with the jurors. Guinasso said he planned to be there until the very end. Other members of the panel told the former juror that they planned to be there, too. But no matter what happens to Peterson, Guinasso doubts he will ever know the answer to his biggest question about the case -- "why?" (source: San Francisco Chronicle)
