May 5 NORTH CAROLINA----impending execution Supreme Court refuses to halt execution; Easley denies clemency The nation's highest court declined Thursday to stop the looming execution of a former Army drill sergeant convicted in the slayings of 4 people, including a pair of children. Earl Richmond Jr., 43, is scheduled to be executed at 2 a.m. Friday at the state's Central Prison in Raleigh. His attorneys had urged the U.S. Supreme Court to stop the execution because they believed that improper testimony was allowed during his trial. The court declined to hear the appeal Thursday evening, and Gov. Mike Easley later denied clemency for Richmond, allowing the execution to move forward. "Given the facts and circumstances of this case, I find no compelling reason to invalidate the sentence recommended by the jury and affirmed by the courts," Easley said in a statement. Richmond was sentenced to death by a Cumberland County jury in 1995 for the killings of 27-year-old Helisa Stewart Hayes, her 8-year-old son, Phillip, and her 7-year-old daughter, Darien. After his arrest in North Carolina, Richmond was charged in the April 5, 1991, slaying of Army Spec. Lisa Ann Nadeau at Fort Dix, N.J. Nadeau, 24, of Plainfield, Conn., was found bound, beaten, stabbed and strangled in her Army base residence. Both she and Hayes had been sexually assaulted, authorities said. Richmond's lawyers argue the trial court erred by allowing Nadeau's father, Arthur Nadeau, to testify about his daughter's injuries and the position of her body after her death, even though he wasn't present when she was found. He also described autopsy photos taken of his daughter. The state Supreme Court rejected a petition Wednesday asking for a review of the same issue. A federal appeals court also rejected arguments in July that Richmond was denied adequate legal representation. His lawyers argued his trial attorneys failed to present expert evidence that he couldn't form intent to kill his victims because he had consumed 20 beers, a fifth of liquor and smoked crack cocaine on the night of the slayings in November 1991. Attorneys also asked Easley to commute the sentence to life in prison. Richmond was moved to the prison's death watch area Wednesday afternoon. He spent the day meeting with family members and his lawyers, state Corrections Department spokeswoman Pamela Walker said Thursday evening. He didn't request the customary last meal. Testimony at Richmond's trial indicated he raped and strangled Hayes, the ex-wife of his longtime best friend, Wayne Hayes, after an argument. Phillip witnessed the attack and Richmond dragged him to a bathroom, where he strangled him with the cord to a hair curler and stabbed him more than 20 times with a pair of scissors. He then went into Darien's room and strangled her with an electrical cord as she slept. A few days later, he was a volunteer pallbearer at the 3 funerals and rode in a limousine with Wayne Hayes to the services. Richmond would be the 2nd person executed in North Carolina this year and the 36th since capital punishment was reinstated in 1977. (source: Associated Press) VIRGINIA: US, Moussaoui lawyers seek trial on death penalty Lawyers for convicted Sept. 11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui and U.S. prosecutors on Thursday asked a judge to set a January start date for the trial to determine whether he gets the death penalty. In a joint filing to U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema, the lawyers suggested jury selection begin on Jan. 9, 2006, with opening statements beginning on Feb. 6, 2006. Moussaoui, 36, pleaded guilty last month to all six conspiracy charges against him in connection with the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States. 4 of the charges carry the death penalty. He faces life imprisonment if he does not get the death penalty. Moussaoui, a French citizen of Moroccan descent, has said he was chosen by Osama bin Laden to fly a plane into the White House as part of a broader conspiracy to fly hijacked airplanes into American buildings. The government wants to seek the death sentence for Moussaoui, the only person charged in the United States over the Sept. 11 attacks. (source: Reuters) VERMONT----federal death penalty trial Death Penalty Opinions Limit Jurors In Fell Case----Trial To Begin This Summer One by one, a federal judge in Burlington questioned the first 14 jurors who could decide the Donald Fell capital murder case. By the end of the day on Wednesday, only 6 of the 14 qualified to stay. For many, the sticking point turned out to be their opinions on capital punishment, and whether they could put those aside and make a decision based solely on the law. Fell, 24, is charged with the 2000 carjacking, kidnapping and murder of Terry King -- a supermarket clerk from North Clarendon. Fell's alleged accomplice, Robert Lee, from Rutland, killed himself in prison in 2001. The U.S. attorney general decided to pursue the death penalty against Fell. The trial won't get under way until this summer. (source: The Champlain Channel) GEORGIA: Georgia will seek death penalty for indicted courthouse shooter A man accused of opening fire at a downtown courthouse where he was on trial for rape and killing a judge and three others during and after a furious escape was indicted Thursday on murder charges. Prosecutors said they will seek the death penalty against Brian Nichols, 33, who was unshackled when police say he overpowered a sheriff's deputy at the Fulton County Courthouse on March 11, stole her gun and went on a shooting spree. He was recaptured the following day. After three hours of hearing evidence and deliberating, a grand jury handed down a 54-count indictment against Nichols that includes charges of murder, kidnapping, robbery and escape from authorities. District Attorney Paul Howard said Nichols would face a possible death sentence if convicted. No trial date has been set. An arraignment likely will be held within two weeks, prosecution spokesman Erik Friedly said. The grand jury met behind closed doors inside a district attorney's office, five floors below the courtroom where police say Nichols fatally shot a judge and a court reporter. Outside the courthouse, police say, Nichols killed a sheriff's deputy and later killed a federal agent a few miles north of the courthouse. Charges include four counts of murder, four counts of felony murder, 7 counts of kidnapping and five counts of hijacking a motor vehicle. Before the grand jury hearing, Superior Court Judge Hilton Fuller ruled that some of the proceedings would be recorded and that a defense lawyer could be present while Fuller questioned the panel members about their ability to be fair in light of intense pretrial publicity. Defense lawyers had asked that the entire proceeding be recorded and that they be allowed to question the grand jurors themselves. But the judge ruled that only he would get to ask the questions about potential bias, which he said would be limited in scope. Only prosecutors got to ask questions during the testimony portion of the hearing. Prosecutors said last month that they would wait until the May grand jury term to seek charges against Nichols because the previous grand jury was sworn in by the judge slain in the attack. Thursday's hearing was a special session. Grand jurors in Fulton County usually only meet on Tuesdays and Fridays to consider cases. Nichols is accused of fatally shooting Superior Court Judge Rowland Barnes and his court reporter, Julie Brandau, inside the court. Authorities said he then killed sheriff's deputy Sgt. Hoyt Teasley outside the courthouse and later in the day killed federal agent David Wilhelm, who was working on a new house he planned to move into. Nichols was being retried for rape and other charges when he escaped from a deputy and allegedly killed the 4 people. After the shootings, the rape case was declared a mistrial at the request of Nichols' attorney, the prosecutor's office said. Nichols' 1st trial was a mistrial as well. Friedly, the prosecution spokesman, said his office is ready for trial on the murder charges anytime. Defense lawyers declined to comment as they left the district attorney's office before the indictment was announced. (source: Associated Press) ********************** Rush of death penalty cases could lead to fund shortage The Office of the Georgia Capital Defender, which offers assistance in death penalty cases, has been flooded with death penalty cases from around the state and says it is in danger of running out of money. That is because of an increase in cases since January that came on the heels of a new law. The law allows counties to shift the costs of defending capital cases to the state. Prosecutors had held off filing notices they would seek the death penalty in cases in their counties until this year, when the state would take over payment of lawyers for defendants who cannot afford to hire their own. Cherokee Circuit District Attorney Joseph Campbell filed notice in March that he would seek the death penalty against Jerry William Jones for the quadruple murder and triple kidnapping in the Ranger community early in 2004. Jones will be defended by attorneys from the Capital Defender office, which has already taken on 21 death penalty cases this year. The office is on track to surpass the 47 cases it has budgeted for this year. "It's a very precarious situation for them," said Stephen Bright, director of the Southern Center for Human Rights in Atlanta and a death penalty expert. And the Capital Defender office also plans to represent courthouse shooting suspect Brian Nichols if prosecutors seek the death penalty against him. If the rate remains steady, the Capital Defender office could have more than 60 cases by the end of the year. It had only 27 death penalty cases in 2004. In the past decade, the offices busiest year was 1996, with 50 cases. "We were funded based on the number of cases in which the death penalty was sought in the past," said Chris Adams, the agencys director. "Based on the way the DAs have held back on death notices, we could very well end up running out of money." The office received $7 million this year, which includes salaries for 5 attorneys, investigators and other staffers. Officials do not know how much money is needed. The General Assembly created the office in 2003 as part of a new public defender system to provide legal defense for people who cannot afford it. Under Georgia law, a defendant facing the death penalty must have 2 attorneys who are court-certified for capital defense. (source: Calhoun Times) MISSOURI: Kingery bill seeks moratorium on the death penalty Missouri's new death chamber at the Bonne Terre Prison would go silent for 3 years if the Missouri House of Representatives passes a bill calling for a state moratorium on executions until Jan. 1, 2009. District 154 Rep. Gayle Kingery, R-Poplar Bluff, has co-sponsored the bill along with 15 other representatives from around the state. "The moratorium is to put a stay on the executions in Missouri until we have a better handle on making sure that we're executing people who have actually committed a crime," Kingery said. The proposal calls for a 10-member death penalty commission that would consist of a state representative from each political party, a state senator from each party, a criminal defense attorney, a county prosecutor, the state public defender, the attorney general, a family member of a murder victim and a family member of a death row inmate. The commission will then begin work on studying the use of the death penalty in capital cases around the state, paying close attention to statistics regarding the accuracy of guilt, the resources available to defendants, the consistency with which prosecutors seek the death penalty and whether or not race plays a role in convicted killers receiving capital punishment. The commission would issue its report of findings and recommendations by the first day of 2009, at which time the moratorium would be lifted. During those 3 years, prosecutors would still have the option of seeking the death penalty in capital cases. Kingery said ensuring that current death row inmates are actually guilty is also important, a concern that has arisen in recent years with advances in forensic evidence collection in criminal investigations. "Supposedly people have been executed that probably weren't guilty of the crime," Kingery said. "This moratorium would let us make sure that if we're going to execute a person, that we were doing the right thing and that they were actually guilty of the crime." But with the end of the current legislative session looming next week and no calendar date set for the bill, it is not likely to be voted on this year. Kingery, who supports the death penalty, said although capital punishment opponents may be trying to use the proposed moratorium as a stepping stone to abolishing the death penalty in Missouri, he didn't think that was likely to happen. "I don't think our state will get rid of the death penalty," Kingery said. "I think what they'll do is study it and make sure that all facts and evidence are corroborated. All the moratorium would do is put everything on hold until we can review the cases and until evidence can be gathered to determine if the people have been adjudicated as guilty." The average amount of time a convicted killer spends on death row averages well over a decade, so many of those currently going through the appeals process or waiting for an execution date were likely convicted before the advances in forensic evidence gathering. But Butler County Prosecuting Attorney Kevin Barbour said he doesn't believe any such death penalty commission would find any problems with the use of capital punishment. "I can only speak for Southeast Missouri and what I've seen, but I think it has been appropriate," Barbour said. "I can't speak for the rest of the state." When a potential capital case arises in Butler County, Barbour said he very carefully reviews whether or not the death penalty should be sought with several of his colleagues. "When I've been confronted with it, I always consult with at least 3 or 4 other prosecutors that have been involved with it," he said. Conflicting reports have been released in Missouri regarding a racial disparity in the application of the death penalty. One recent survey shows that it may be the racial majority that is more likely to be sentenced to die. Last summer, the Missouri Sentencing Advisory Commission released a report that considered both the percent of convicted capital murderers that receive the death penalty as well as the percentage of murder suspects that are convicted of capital murder. The study found that from 1985 to 2003, less than 7 % of African Americans convicted of capital murder received the death penalty, while 12.6 % of convicted murderers that belonged to other races were sentenced to die. The study also showed that prosecutors sought capital murder charges in murder cases less frequently with African American suspects than with suspected murderers of other races. But other reports have shown that the death penalty may be applied unfairly in some cases, with claims of racial and geographic differences common. The proposed death penalty commission, if approved, would look closely at such claims. "Sometimes the people doing these surveys have an agenda. Sometimes they don't," Barbour said. (source: Daily American Republic)
