March 23
TEXAS----stay of impending execution
Set to die, killer is given stay
Prosecutors will ask a federal appeals court to reinstate theexecution
date for a man who killed a manager at a Steak and Ale in Fort Worth in
1989.
Steven Kenneth Staley, scheduled to die today for the October 1989 killing
of a Fort Worth restaurant manager during a botched robbery attempt, won a
stay of execution from a federal judge Tuesday.
The Texas attorney general's office served notice that it would ask the
5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to reinstate the execution date. But the
order by U.S. District Judge Terry Means was hailed by the condemned man's
lawyer, who is seeking to show that his client is too mentally ill to be
executed.
"Hopefully, this will at least give me time to get some evidence before
the court showing that this guy is psychotic," Fort Worth lawyer Jack
Strickland said. "He's been in and out of the prison psych ward; he's been
on and off medications. He's even been in a catatonic state."
Jim Gibson, a Tarrant County assistant district attorney, said tests
conducted last week have already shown that Staley is competent to be
executed for killing Robert Read more than 15 years ago.
Gibson said the tests showed that Staley, now 42, understands the nature
of his crimes and of the death sentence. He may suffer some mental
illness, but not to the extent the law requires to set aside his execution
date, Gibson said.
"He was even able to tell the doctor what chemicals will be used in the
lethal injection," the prosecutor said.
The facts surrounding Staley's case are largely undisputed. According to
court testimony and news accounts, Staley, along with friends Tracey Duke
and Brenda Rayburn, arrived at the Steak and Ale restaurant in far west
Fort Worth for a meal on Oct. 14, 1989.
But instead of paying the check after finishing their dinner, they pulled
semiautomatic weapons from Rayburn's handbag and demanded access to the
restaurant's cash registers and safe.
Diners and employees were ordered to the rear of the restaurant, but an
assistant manager was able to slip away to call police. As law officers
set up a perimeter around the restaurant, Read, 35, offered himself as a
hostage so that his customers might be spared.
The robbers accepted Read's offer and left the restaurant holding him at
gunpoint. They then hijacked a car and attempted to force Read into the
back seat.
He was shot and killed in the struggle. The robbers then began firing at
onrushing police officers before speeding away in what would become a
20-mile chase that ended with the robbers trying to escape on foot. Police
later tied the robbers to a strings of robberies and at least one other
killing during a spree that covered 4 states. The spree began after Staley
escaped from a Denver halfway house.
Duke, now 38, is serving 3 life sentences in Texas and has a 30-year
sentence in Colorado for murder and armed robbery. Rayburn, now 38, took
30 years in a plea bargain.
In the days after the killing in west Fort Worth, Read's family recalled
him as a gutsy former football player at the University of Texas at Austin
who had worked himself up from waiter to manager at the restaurant chain.
"It was just his nature," his widow, Darlene Read, told the Star-Telegram
at the time. "He was very protective of his co-workers and his family and
anybody he cared about."
Darlene was left with 3 children -- ages 6, 2 and 10 months -- when her
husband was gunned down.
Strickland said Staley was the product of an abusive upbringing at the
hands of his psychotic mother, who had more than once tried to kill him.
"The fact is, he is quite delusional," Strickland said. "He understands
that he is to be executed, but to hear him tell it, it's part of a
government plot. He's being silenced by the government because he knows
too much about their secrets. It's pretty bad."
If Means' order for a stay is overturned, Staley would become the 5th
inmate this year to be executed in the nation's busiest death chamber. He
would become the 341st inmate to die by lethal injection in Huntsville
since executions resumed in Texas in 1982.
(source: Fort Worth Star-Telegram)
*******************************
Consular notification
The Senate Criminal Justice Committee approved legislation Tuesday to
ensure the rights of foreign nationals are protected when they are
arrested.
The measure, Senate Bill 603 by Houston Democrat Rodney Ellis, was
approved 5-0 and now goes to the full Senate. The bill would require that
when foreign nationals are arrested or detained, they must be advised of
their right to have their consular officials notified.
Ellis first filed legislation requiring consular notification in 2001.
This month, President Bush informed the U.S. Supreme Court that he would
order states, including Texas, to review such cases to investigate whether
foreign nationals' rights were violated under the Vienna Convention on
Consular Relations when local consulates were not notified of their
arrests.
(source: Fort Worth Star-Telegram)
********************
Senate panel OKs bill that compensates wrongfully imprisoned
The Senate Criminal Justice Committee approved legislation Tuesday to make
it easier for people who were wrongfully imprisoned to receive
compensation from the state. Senate Bill 87 by Sen. Rodney Ellis,
D-Houston, would remove a requirement that those petitioning for
compensation obtain a letter certifying actual innocence from the local
district attorney. Several prosecutors have been reluctant to provide such
certification, Ellis said. Testifying for Ellis' bill were Josiah Sutton
and Anthony Robinson, who both spent years in prison for crimes they
didn't commit. DNA evidence exonerated Sutton 2 years ago of a rape
conviction, but he has yet to be compensated.
(source: Houston Chronicle)
*********************************
The man accused in the murder of a TSU student will be in court for
arraignment today.
Police believe Alex Morris was aiming for someone else when he allegedly
shot Ashley Sloan last December.
Ashley Sloan was talking to friends when a bullet ended her life.
Her mother says that Ashley was actually getting ready to transfer schools
last December because she was homesick and wanted to be closer to her
family in Dallas.
Before she had made that move, she was killed when she was shot in the
head, allegedly fired by Morris.
Morris is the son of a prominent theater family in Houston.
The gunshot that killed Ashley came as she was in a parking lot, talking
to friends. The shot was apparently the last retort in an argument that
had started earlier at a different apartment.
Morris allegedly told police that he regretted shooting that night, and
was apparently in tears when he was arrested.
Ashley Sloan's mother says she doesn't want Morris to face the death
penalty.
(source: KHOU News)
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Trucker found guilty, may avoid death penalty
A federal judge today declared a mistrial in 20 of the counts against
truck driver Tyrone Williams and said she believes jurors "have taken the
death penalty off the table" while convicting him of the other counts.
The lead prosecutor questioned that assessment, however, and U.S. District
Judge Vanessa Gilmore ordered a brief recess in the trial.
Jurors had informed Gilmore this morning that they were deadlocked on
counts 1 through 20, but she told them to resume deliberations.
She polled them individually this afternoon, however, and nine jurors said
they remained "hopelessly deadlocked."
The judge then declared a mistrial on those counts and said a guilty
verdict will be entered on counts 21 through 58.
It remains unclear whether a punishment phase will be held. The jury would
decide Williams' sentence if the death penalty were an option, but Gilmore
indicated that it is not.
If that is the case, the jury will be dismissed and she will decide
Williams' sentence.
Although jurors found Williams guilty of counts 40 through 58, which carry
a possible death sentence, Gilmore said they could not decide whether
Williams was a principal figure in the crime or just an "aider and
abettor."
As a result, she said, she believes "they have taken the death penalty off
the table."
Assistant U.S. Attorney Daniel Rodriguez said he isn't sure that's true,
however.
Gilmore told the jurors earlier to continue deliberations, saying the
trial had been costly and that if another trial were needed, 12 more
jurors would not be able to do a better job.
Williams' attorney, Craig Washington, objected to the instructions. He
called them "coercive'' and said they suggest that holdout jurors change
their minds.
Williams, 34, of Schenectady, N.Y., is accused in the deaths of 19 illegal
immigrants riding in the trailer of his semi-tractor truck for at least
four hours during a botched smuggling operation in South Texas in May
2003. Prosecutors claim at least 75 illegal immigrants were packed into
his sealed trailer.
Today's deadlock message came about 10:15 a.m., after the jury had
deliberated for about 2 hours this morning. This is the third day of
deliberations after jurors heard almost two weeks of testimony.
Williams remained calm while the judge read the note. Washington appeared
to be feeling the tension and left the courtroom quickly to get a drink of
water.
If jurors decide, on any of the counts that carry a possible death
sentence, that Williams is responsible for an illegal immigrant's death,
they will decide in a 2nd phase of the trial whether to recommend that he
receive the death penalty.
The jury reported that it is deadlocked on counts 1 through 20 but has
reached guilt/innocence verdicts on counts 21 through 58. Count 1 carries
a possible death sentence, as do counts 40 through 58.
********************
Limp leads to new trial for man on death row
A federal judge on Tuesday ordered a new trial for a Houston man sentenced
to death in 1999 for killing a convenience store clerk during a robbery.
Johnny Ray Conner must receive the new trial within 120 days, said U.S.
District Judge Vanessa Gilmore, who ruled that his trial attorneys failed
to pursue medical evidence showing he had a severe limp that witnesses
would have noticed as he ran from the store.
The Texas Attorney General's Office was considering whether to appeal,
spokesman Jerry Strickland said.
Conner was convicted of the May 17, 1998, slaying of Kathyanna Nguyen, 49,
owner of a store in the 5900 block of Fulton. Nguyen was shot in the head
3 times.
Kenneth Williams, one of Conner's attorneys in his appeal, said the trial
attorneys "dropped the ball" by not investigating Conner's foot injury.
Gilmore agreed. She noted that witnesses "agreed that the gunman ran fast
for several blocks."
But lead trial attorney Ricardo Rodriguez said Conner never mentioned the
foot problem.
"He told us he had broken his leg and that it had fully healed," Rodriguez
said. "I never saw him limp or complain about his leg at any time during
any stage of the proceedings."
Attorney Jonathan Munier, who assisted Rodriguez, said he does not believe
he was ineffective.
He said the jury was swayed by testimony from a witness who reported
seeing Conner at close range before being shot in the chest.
"That witness just absolutely slammed him," Munier said.
Rodriquez added: "Mr. Munier and I were not ineffective in any stretch of
that word."
(source for both: Houston Chronicle)
*****************
Hearing for Cobb postponed
A pretrial hearing was postponed today for capital murder defendant
Christopher Cobb - accused in the Aug. 29 deaths of his
great-grandparents. The 22-year-old Cobb, handcuffed and wearing an orange
Lamar County Jail jumpsuit, was in 62nd state district court this morning
when court officials got word that a postponement was necessary because of
an illness in the family of defense attorney Steven Miears of Sherman.
District Attorney Gary Young said the hearing will be rescheduled.
The hearing was to address Miears request to state District Judge Jim
Lovett to suppress a written statement Cobb gave police on Aug. 30. On
that morning, the bodies of Charley Smith, 89, and Ruth Smith, 88, were
found in their residence at 3715 Smallwood Road, which is in the Reno city
limits, north of Elk Hollow Golf Club.
Miears also was seeking to suppress physical items seiz-ed during the day.
Police officers from Paris and Reno were on hand to testify as to items
seized and statements made.
Cobb was arrested after it was discovered he had pawned jewelry belonging
to his parents without their knowledge. Police got permission to search
his room at his parents house next door and found "several articles ...
that had blood stains."
Reno Police Chief Jess Wilson wrote in a report that when Paris Police
Chief Karl Louis first questioned Cobb about the deaths, he denied knowing
what happened, but then confessed in detail to both murders.
"He advised he killed them on Sunday night late and said he stabbed and
shot his great-granddad and then shot his great-grandmother. Cobb gave
specific detail as to how the offense occurred and where the weapons were
left, which all match evidence found during the investigation," Wilson
reported.
Its alleged that Cobb killed his great-grandparents for money to buy
drugs. Police said a bag containing marijuana was found in his room, and a
plastic bag containing cocaine was found on his person.
No date for a trial has been set, but the district attorneys office said
the trial likely will be the first one held in the new Lamar County
Courthouse, which is scheduled to reopen in July after extensive
renovation.
2 other high profile trials are scheduled in coming weeks in the interim
district courtroom on the 2nd floor of the old post office, which has been
serving as the courthouse.
Jury selection is scheduled to begin Monday in the trial of Tramaine
Jarrod Kellum, 19, of Paris, who was shot in the leg by Paris police last
September.
The shots were fired after Kellum pointed a gun at officers before
attempting to drive away from the vicinity of Seventh N.W. and Graham
streets late one Friday night last September. Kellum is charged with
aggravated robbery and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon against a
public servant.
A capital murder trial involving defendant Michael Davis, 38, of Paris is
scheduled for next month, starting with jury selection on April 25.
Miears also represents Davis, who is accused in the slaying of Marvin
Davis, 79, no relation, who was found dead on Jan. 8, 2004, in his trailer
at Genes Flea Market in Paris.
An indictment alleges that the defendant beat or strangled his victim
during a burglary in which he also robbed him.
Youngs office announced on Feb. 23 that a plea bargain had been worked out
in that case, but assistant prosecutor Lloyd Whelchel said later in the
day: "It fell through. Just didn't happen - one of those things that
happen sometimes." He declined to elaborate.
Miears said later, in an e-mail to The Paris News, the negotiations
collapsed because of Whelchels demand that, as a condition for pleading
guilty, Davis "sign an agreement authorizing the police to destroy
forensic evidence in the case, specifically any DNA."
"This was a highly unusual request by a prosecutor. I have practiced
criminal law across Texas, and I have never seen it made a part of any
plea bargain agreement in any form. I could not, and will never, be a
party to any intentional destruction of evidence, especially in a capital
murder case," Miears said.
Whelchel also asked Davis to agree never to file a writ of habeas corpus,
which Miears called "a convicted person's only chance to challenge whether
he was provided a reasonably competent trial lawyer, or to raise claims of
illegal behavior by a prosecutor."
Miears said the district attorney had provided him with plea documents
weeks earlier for Davis to sign that contained "standard language used in
every plea agreement I have done in Lamar County." Miears said he advised
Young that Davis would accept the plea bargain "in order to avoid the
potential of a possible death penalty based upon the evidence" that police
had collected.
"The new and unacceptable plea papers were thrust on me and my client only
hours before his plea hearing was set," Miears said.
As the prosecution and defense wrangled during a court session at Lamar
County Jail, Lovett interrupted and ordered the case to proceed to trial
as scheduled.
(source: The Paris News)
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Edinburg massacre organizer convicted of capital murder
A jury took 6 hours to decide that Humberto "Gallo" Garza, a captain of
the local Tri-City Bombers gang, was responsible for a January 2003
robbery-turned-homicide that killed 6 people.
Jurors in Garzas capital murder trial began deliberating about 5 p.m.
Tuesday. Shortly before 11 p.m., they came back with an answer: guilty of
1 count of capital murder, guilty of 1 count of murder.
Capital murder is the crime of murder committed in the same act as another
felony or the murder of more than one person. There are 2 options for
those convicted of capital murder: Life in prison or the death penalty.
The jury will decide Garzas fate today as the sentencing phase of the
trial begins at 9 a.m. Garza, 30, had pleaded not guilty to 2 counts of
capital murder that allege he, as the gangs local leader, helped plan a
raid on the 2 homes at 2915 E. Monte Cristo Rd., recruited other gang
members to participate and drove the men to the property.
The 12-member jury began deliberating after 370th state District Judge Noe
Gonzalez read the jury the charges against Garza and instructed them to
consider only the evidence presented in the trial. The jurors were to
decide whether to convict Garza of 2 counts of capital murder or lesser
crimes of murder or aggravated robbery.
(source: The Monitor)
