MAY 16 SOUTH CAROLINA: Court upholds dismissal of NAACP lawsuit A federal appeals court upheld the dismissal of a lawsuit that claimed York County, S.C., police and prosecutors tried to intimidate NAACP members by questioning them in their homes, following them in cars and keeping them from attending a criminal trial. A three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court unanimously ruled Monday that the civil rights group's Western York County Branch was not entitled to an injunction because it failed to show that future violations of its constitutional rights are likely. The dispute began when the NAACP met in 2002 to discuss the pending retrial of Sterling Spann, a former death row inmate whose conviction was overturned in 1999. Spann later entered an Alford plea, meaning he did not admit guilt but acknowledged that the state had enough evidence to convict him of a 1981 slaying. He was sentenced to life in prison. Authorities alleged that someone at the NAACP meeting violated a court order not to disclose information about a lie detector test Spann had taken. Police began showing up at NAACP members' homes to ask about the meeting, and some members reported being followed by police officers. The NAACP accused authorities of a "campaign of intimidation." Prosecutors and police said they were conducting a legitimate investigation into the possible violation of a court order. The prosecutor's office also placed 3 NAACP leaders on the witness list for the retrial, even though they had no personal knowledge about the case and had not been questioned by police. The NAACP claimed the move was intended solely to prevent the 3 from observing the trial. The appeals court called the action by the prosecutor's office "troubling," but said the NAACP still could not prevail because the circumstances of the case are so unusual that they are not likely to occur again. The ruling upheld a decision by U.S. District Judge Joseph F. Anderson Jr. in Rock Hill, S.C. (source: Associated Press) VIRGINIA: Could she get death sentence? Andrea Petrosky, a former Roanoker, is charged with capital murder and faces the death penalty in the April strangling and drowning of her son, Garrett, 6. By many accounts, Andrea Petrosky had everything going her way. Creative and highly organized, she balanced active involvement in her children's school activities with a full-time job at an upscale clothing and home accessory store, even as she worked toward a degree in educational technology at Radford University. Outgoing and energetic, she earned both the professional and personal admiration of friends and peers during the years her family lived in Roanoke. Now, police in Bristol, Va., say that on April 15, Petrosky drowned her 6-year-old son in a bathtub after strangling him, then called police and confessed. The 38-year-old mother of two is being held without bond in Bristol City Jail, charged with capital murder and facing the death penalty. Her case moves Virginia into relatively uncharted legal territory. She's only the 3rd person in the state to be charged under a statute that makes the killing of a child under 14 by a person over 21 a capital offense. The previous two cases involved multiple murders. Both of the accused were men, and both have been executed. Death penalty experts say that based on precedent, the odds are against Petrosky's receiving the death penalty if the case continues forward as is, and some question whether seeking the ultimate penalty is justified in a case like hers. Much depends on the cause behind the slaying - something friends who knew Petrosky say they couldn't even begin to guess. "She was a wonderful person who loved her children and loved her husband and worked hard," said Martha Hughes, who worked with Petrosky on Patrick Henry High School's After Prom gatherings. "I love Andrea. I don't know what happened. "Nobody knows but her." 'Always involved' The photo on the back of the funeral program shows a jubilant boy wearing Blues Brothers-style sunglasses, plaid shorts and giant inflatable sneakers, pretending to play an inflatable guitar. The caption below the photo reads "Goofy" in huge letters. Garrett Petrosky attended Salem Montessori School before his family moved from Roanoke to Bristol last year. Hughes, the pool manager at the Elks Club in Southwest Roanoke, remembers Garrett and his father, Tim Petrosky, coming in frequently to swim, something the boy loved. "He was just normal, a normal kid," Hughes said. Garrett loved bugs and spiders. Hughes recalled Andrea Petrosky once asking her where she could find toy spiders for Garrett's birthday party. Petrosky knew about Hughes' penchant for Halloween decoration. When the two worked together on Patrick Henry's After Prom, Petrosky would find ways to involve students, such as having them make masks to go with a Mardi Gras theme. The Petroskys' oldest daughter, Danielle, attended Patrick Henry and was popular with her peers. "Anything that came up with Danielle," her mother "was always very involved," Hughes said, including arranging a special dinner at the Elks Club for Danielle, her friends and their dates before her senior prom. Employed at Present Thyme on 23rd Street near Towers Shopping Center,, Andrea Petrosky was a fixture there for years, as admired for her home decorating ideas as she was for her prom party skills. Her husband worked as a pharmacist at Brambleton Drug and had a reputation for friendly professionalism. "Tim would help anybody in any way that he could help them," said Mark Huth, a Brambleton Drug pharmacist who was hired at the same time as Petrosky and worked side by side with him there and at the Kmart pharmacy on Franklin Road. There was nothing unusual about the Petroskys, Huth said. "The Petrosky family was a family that you would welcome into your neighborhood and into your own home." Which is why Garrett's death and the charge against Andrea Petrosky leave friends and former co-workers baffled and shaken. 'They weren't recluses' The Petroskys lived on Stanley Avenue in South Roanoke until the spring of 2004, when they moved to Bristol to be closer to family. In Bristol, too, the child's death left residents disturbed. The Rev. David Stancil, pastor of First Baptist Church in Bristol, recalled how, soon after the tragedy, a mother with young children in his congregation came to speak to him. "She was upset because her son had asked her, 'Mommy, are you going to kill me too?'" Stancil held a counseling session at his church, and he advised about 30 who came not to be judgmental. "It was not like this was a weird family. You just didn't have any way to say, 'Well, I'm not like them,'" he said. "Lots of people knew them closely and well and were involved with them. They weren't recluses." Several Roanokers who knew the Petroskys declined to speak about them for this story. Not surprising, said Yvonne Downes, a professor of criminal justice at Hilbert College in New York. "That's partly because she's also a white middle-class woman from a good family. Nobody can be comfortable with a case like this." Women are seen as nicer and more nurturing than men, so when women commit violent crimes, they tend to be regarded with more horror than when men commit the same acts, she said. Downes, who specializes in studying women and violent crime, said Petrosky's circumstances reminded her of Andrea Yates, a Texas woman who in 2001 drowned her five children in a bathtub. Prosecutors sought the death penalty against Yates, who instead received life in prison. "She was another supermom. She seemed to feel a need to be perfect and do everything all the time," Downes said. "Women who have it all, seem to be doing it all, I believe, are at a high risk for depression." If Petrosky were to be diagnosed with depression or some other disorder, it would likely become a factor in the case, as it did in the Yates case, Downes said. Bristol Commonwealth's Attorney Jerry Wolfe declined to comment as to whether authorities know a possible motive for the slaying. David Dow, a death penalty opponent who founded the Texas Innocence Project, noted that neither Yates nor Susan Smith, the South Carolina woman who drowned her two sons in a car in 1994, received the death penalty. Juries tend to accept the notion that when mothers kill their children, and there's no scheme of financial gain involved, "They're doing it basically because they're mentally disturbed," Dow said. Annie's Law Petrosky is only the 3rd person in Virginia to be prosecuted under a relatively new capital murder statute, informally known as "Annie's Law," that makes it a capital crime for a person 21 or older to kill a child younger than 14. The law's creation was spurred by the 1997 death of 4-year-old Annie Leftwich, who was bound and gagged as a punishment for bed-wetting and suffocated. It's increasingly common for death penalty states to have statutes similar to Annie's Law, but they're more commonly applied to fathers or to strangers who abduct children, Dow said. The two previous cases in Virginia prosecuted under Annie's Law involved fathers who killed their children. Dow said that seeking the death penalty against a mother who kills her children has a lower-than-average success rate among capital cases. It's not the type of situation lawmakers have in mind when creating this sort of law, he said. "That's the problem with laws that are a response to a single case," said Steve Milani, director of the Capital Defender Office for the western region of Virginia, who will head Petrosky's defense team. He said he believes Annie's Law is unconstitutional because it creates a class of adults from ages 18 to 20 who can't be charged with capital murder if they kill a child. He compared it to a law that would make everyone death penalty eligible for killing a child unless they're Spanish. New York Law School professor Robert Blecker, a death penalty supporter, said that based on the known facts in the Petrosky case, the death penalty doesn't seem warranted. "This isn't in the same moral universe" as people who maintain torture chambers or are serial rapist-murderers. "It's very important that death penalty supporters are sensitive to moral distinctions and reserve this most serious and solemn response for the most heinous and horrible killers - not just killings, but killers - because by it, we condemn not only what you've done but who you are," he said. "We say that as a person you deserve to die." For Wolfe, seeking the death penalty in the case is a matter of law. "It clearly falls within the parameters of what the General Assembly has stated in the code as being a capital case." "My prediction is that no jury will go for it," Blecker said. A preliminary hearing in the case once scheduled for Thursday has been postponed. Virginia hasn't executed a woman since 1912, though a Pittsylvania County woman, Teresa Lewis, received a death sentence in 2003 for hiring two men to kill her husband and stepson so she could collect insurance money. She is the 1st woman on death row in Virginia since the state reinstated capital punishment in 1976. (source: The Roanoke Times) CONNECTICUT: Officials: Ross Case Shows Need for Reform Michael Ross spent the better part of 18 years on death row before being executed. He would have been there far longer had he not decided in October to end his appeals. Still, the courts spent another 7 months dealing with the issue of whether anybody else had the right to interfere with that decision. Many of his victims' relatives said the legal odyssey forced them to relive the crimes as Ross again and again took the media spotlight. "Hopefully, our judicial system has learned something from all this experience we've been through, dragged through -- the media, the people who have come forward just to get their 15 minutes of fame -- for what?" Debbie Dupris said shortly after Ross was put to death last week. Her sister, Robin Stavinsky, was one of Ross' victims. The serial killer's execution became New England's 1st in 45 years. There was never any doubt that Ross was guilty; he admitted killing 8 women in Connecticut and New York, and raping most of them. "The root of the problem is not so much whether an inmate can exercise their rights to appeal," Chief State's Attorney Christopher Morano said recently. "The problem we have is in the process and the incredible numbers of post-conviction actions that can be undertaken in a capital case, despite the fact that guilt and non-guilt is not an issue." Edwin Shelley, whose daughter, Leslie, was also killed by Ross, said he'd like to see lawyers and others who attempt to intervene in executions held personally liable if their cases are deemed frivolous. "They should be made to repay the state of Connecticut for the money wasted defending against them," he said. Attorney General Richard Blumenthal believes the courts can move faster. Last week's attempt by Ross' sister to file appeals on his behalf made its way from the Superior Court to the U.S. Supreme Court in 4 days. "There is no reason that appeals should last for years on a docket when they can be addressed more quickly in a death penalty case," he said. Death penalty opponents contend Michael Ross would have been forgotten long ago if capital punishment wasn't allowed. "He would have joined the other anonymous killers who don't get their names in the paper and their faces on TV all of the time," said State Rep. Michael Lawlor, co-chairman of the legislature's Judiciary Committee. (source: Hartford Courant) TENNESSEE: Review of Holton case set today A 44-year-old man, convicted 6 years ago and condemned to die June 8 for killing his 4 children, was scheduled to have his case reviewed in Bedford County Circuit Court today by a senior judge from Williamson County. Daryl Keith Holton, who's been on death row at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution, is the subject of the hearing request by Donald E. Dawson, an attorney with the Post Conviction Defense Office created by the Legislature in 1995. Post conviction relief hearings are a last step by the state to be sure indigent, death sentenced inmates' rights are assured. An appointment of attorneys from the state office is mandatory. Dawson's reasons for the hearing include claims of insufficient evidence, that the death penalty would deny the condemned man's right to life and inadequate legal representation. "Due to counsel's heavy caseload and limited ability to give attention to this matter, it only recently came to its attention that counsel may have missed the deadline" to request a hearing for Holton, according to the petition filed by Dawson. Senior Judge Don Harris of Brentwood was appointed by the Administrative Office of the Courts to preside over the hearing for Holton after Bedford County Circuit Court Judge Lee Russell wrote to the courts' office noting his sister, Ann Filer, is a state prosecutor and newly-appointed Judge Robert Crigler is her former colleague. They served together under District Attorney Mike McCown, who has been the prosecutor since before Holton was tried. Dawson described the 4 murders in Bedford County which led to Holton's conviction. He was working for his uncle and living at a garage where he took his children the day of their deaths. Saying he had a surprise for them, he took the youngest 2 into one room and made them close their eyes and stand together, one in front of the other. Then, he shot them both in the back with one bullet. He killed the older 2 children in substantially the same fashion, tricking them into believing he had a surprise for them. Holton and his wife were separated and he had the children for visitation, but was to return them to her at the Rutherford County Sheriff's Department that night. He took a homemade bomb with him for the trip to Murfreesboro where he planned to kill his wife's boyfriend, his child and the woman. Thereafter, he planned to commit suicide. But Holton didn't get to Murfreesboro. He decided that if he killed himself, then nobody would know why he killed his children. Therefore, he went to the Shelbyville Police Department, surrendered and told his story. As for why Holton killed his children, Dawson explained he returned to the United States after serving in the Army during the Gulf War. He'd been a dental technician. Holton's wife had abandoned the children, Dawson continued, and Holton came back to care for them. However, there was an altercation between the two and the wife was awarded custody of the children. "He decided the children would have a terrible life, so he killed them," Dawson said. "It has to go back to the fact that his parents divorced when he was 3. "There has to be some mental issue that has not come out," Dawson said. "That he loved his children is in the record." Why he killed them is not, Dawson said. A psychologist testifying at Holton's trial said his depression was relieved when there was no reason to worry about his children, even though he killed them. "It's an extremely complicated explanation that has not come out," Dawson said. Another factor in Holton's case is a case before the state Supreme Court claiming the lethal mixture used during executions in Tennessee is unconstitutional. The high court is to consider the issue next month, Dawson said. It's claimed that one drug used to relax the condemned prevents any physical expressions, or signs of pain from the poison used to cause death. If the court rules before June 8, or if his hearing causes delay, then Holton's execution could be postponed if not prevented. In more than 2 dozen pages filed for Holton, Dawson provides the following reasons for the hearing that was scheduled for today: The death penalty system is so fraught with errors and inequities that it's unconstitutional; lethal injection is marked by human errors such as the serums being injected in the wrong order; execution is wrong because Holton is mentally ill; and he was denied a fair trial because the court denied his request to have his lawyer investigated. Dawson has written to Holton about the hearing but the prisoner has not replied, according to the court record. (source: Shelbyville Times-Gazette) FLORIDA: 3rd penalty phase starts today in '95 killing of Belle Isle man----Jermaine 'Bugsy' LeBron, now 30, faces the death sentence or life behind bars. For nearly 10 years, convicted murderer Jermaine "Bugsy" LeBron has visited death row, unsure whether he was a guest or a lifelong resident. A new sentencing hearing begins today in Osceola County to determine whether LeBron will receive the death sentence or life in prison for the 1995 killing of a 22-year-old man for his customized red pickup. This will be the third time the sentencing phase has been held before Chief Circuit Judge Belvin Perry, whose errors have been cited in appellate and Florida Supreme Court rulings on the case. Some say it's through no fault of the judge, while others say it's the nature of the capital beast. "So someone gets four trials, five trials. It's got to be done right," said Roger Maas, executive director of the Commission on Capital Cases. "The Supreme Court is willing to make unpopular decisions to ensure a fair process." The Legislature established the Tallahassee-based commission in 1997 to offer guidance to the governor, Legislature and Supreme Court on issues surrounding appeals from death-row inmates. Maas suggested that the Supreme Court's diligence to the law is the reason some of these cases drag on, forcing the court to send cases back to court again and again. This is one of those cases. In 1998, a jury convicted LeBron of the murder and armed robbery of Larry Neal Oliver Jr. The case had been moved to Pinellas County because of pretrial publicity. But in a special finding, the jury found that someone other than LeBron killed the Belle Isle man. The Florida Supreme Court ruled in 2001 that Perry erred in telling jurors LeBron killed Oliver despite their finding to the contrary, as well as telling the jury that LeBron was on probation in a separate cocaine case. A year later, evidence was presented to a new jury in another sentencing hearing, this time in Osceola County. Both juriesvoted 7-5to recommend that Perry sentence LeBron to death. On Jan. 13, the Florida Supreme Court sent the case back yet again because it found testimony about an unrelated case inadmissible. "This case has taken a somewhat unusual and complex twist," justices wrote in their opinion. "To ensure that the circuit court has proper guidance on resentencing, we will also address the scope and nature of the testimony and evidence that may be admitted during the new penalty phase." The court's opinion was detailed in what the judge may allow to be introduced in the new hearing. Excluded will be any testimony that LeBron, now 30, was the shooter. According to trial testimony, LeBron admitted to several people that he was the shooter, but the high court said that information is inadmissible in court because of the original jury's finding otherwise. The prosecutor, Jeffrey Ashton, who has worked on the case from the beginning, said last week that he could not comment about how the opinion will affect his presentation of the state's side of the case, because jurors had not been selected. "I think the Supreme Court, in its last opinion, acknowledged that Judge Perry -- because of its unusual circumstances of this case -- was placed in a position where there was no law to guide him," Ashton said. Repeated calls to LeBron's attorney, Robert Norgard, were not returned. Regardless of whether LeBron pulled the trigger, Florida's death-penalty law states that a defendant does not have be the shooter to be found guilty of murder. Chris White, chief prosecutor in Seminole County, has given lectures about the success of conviction rates when retrying death-penalty cases. "I think the prosecution has perhaps as good or better chance of getting the death penalty again," he said. "But there are certainly exceptions." After reviewing the state Supreme Court's opinion, he said the jury's findings made the case confusing and difficult for the prosecution to fully portray LeBron's role in the slaying. Both sides will have a chance to state their case during opening statements, which probably will start Tuesday. (source: Orlando Sentinel) OHIO: Flawed Data Hinders Death Penalty Analysis While state law requires the collection of data about Ohio's capital punishment system, the records are incomplete and often wrong, according to a review by The Associated Press. The result is information that makes analysis of that system difficult, countering a goal of lawmakers who hoped to use the data to make the system as fair as possible. "You can't mix apples and oranges and expect to get some sort of conclusion," said State Public Defender David Bodiker. Ohio Supreme Court files contain documents relating to 2,543 capital indictments submitted by county clerks from 1981 through 2002. But a 2-year study by the AP found that more than 600 of those were not for death penalty cases, and that at least 18 capital indictments were not reported to the court. In the 1,936 capital indictments reviewed by the AP, defendants were more than twice as likely to receive a death sentence for killing a white victim than for killing a black victim. The study also found discrepancies in death sentences based on the county where the crime was committed. Nearly 1/2 the capital punishment cases ended with a plea bargain. In sending records for non-death penalty cases to the Supreme Court, clerks were likely playing it safe, said Mark Lime, director of the Cuyahoga County Clerk's criminal division. "It's always safer to send paperwork and let them discard it or throw it out," Lime said. He added the burden of accuracy should be on the Supreme Court to ensure its figures are accurate. Chief Justice Thomas Moyer said he wasn't aware of the wrongly filed reports and hasn't decided whether the reporting requirement should be changed. He said lawmakers should probably examine the problem. On the Net: Ohio Supreme Court: http://www.sconet.state.oh.us/ Death Penalty Information Center: http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/ (source: Associated Press) VIRGINIA: Justice Under the Microscope Television viewers relishing crime-show denouements based on airtight DNA evidence had best get a grip on reality: DNA is only as reliable as the humans testing it. Virginia's once highly touted crime lab has starkly demonstrated this in an error-ridden death-row case that was propped up repeatedly by botched DNA studies from the state's supposed experts. Gov. Mark Warner has wisely ordered a review of more than 150 capital murder convictions involving DNA evidence. He acted in the face of an independent panel's finding that bad science and political intrusion underpinned the 17-year imprisonment of Earl Washington Jr., a mentally retarded man who came within days of execution for a vicious rape-murder. After years of controversy and defensive denials by police and statehouse officials, independent DNA testing forced by outside critics from the Innocence Project not only cleared Mr. Washington, but also positively identified another suspect now in prison as the source of DNA evidence at the murder scene. As doubts and real evidence mounted, state officials reluctantly pardoned Mr. Washington in 2000, but they did so seven years later than they should have if the state lab had done a proper job with the latest technology. Even now, some officials ludicrously theorize that Mr. Washington could have killed the woman, despite the proof of someone else's DNA. Behind a veneer of official expertise, the lab director refused an outside review, but Governor Warner ordered one. Specialists from the American Society of Crime Laboratory Directors faulted the lab in a searing critique that should serve as a nationwide warning about the often shoddy and unprofessional standards that can afflict the criminal justice system via the crime labs of America. For openers, the labs must be kept truly independent and subject to credible review by scientific peers. They should be insulated by law from the sort of political pressures found to have been exerted in the Washington case by officials intent on defending the capital punishment system as error-free. More than political careers, lives are at stake - 23 of them right now on Virginia's busy death row. As Virginia was once hailed as a role model by other state crime labs, so its dangerous flaws must serve as a recipe for badly needed improvements. And producers of television's crime lab heroics might want to consider the tortured Earl Washington case for a plot-line leap into reality. (source: Editorial, New York Times) CALIFORNIA----new death sentence Jury recommends death for killer of Orange County 5-year-old Factory worker Alejandro Avila should receive the death penalty for kidnapping and killing Samantha Runnion, the curly haired 5-year-old seized kicking and screaming from outside her home in a case that provoked a massive outpouring of sorrow and outrage, jurors decided Monday. Jurors, who convicted Avila of kidnapping, sexual assault and murder on April 28, made their decision on the penalty after deliberating for about seven hours over 2 days. Jurors, who could recommend only the death penalty or life in prison without parole, had just returned from a 3-day weekend when they announced they were ready. Avila, 30, showed no emotion as the decision was announced. Orange County Superior Court Judge William Froeberg set sentencing for July 22. Defense attorneys had urged jurors to spare Avila's life, arguing that the abduction of Samantha was an impulsive act prompted by a brutal childhood in which he was beaten by his father, raped by an uncle and neglected by his mother. Prosecutor David Brent, displaying photos of a smiling Samantha to buttress his argument, reminded jurors of the "horrendous" nature of the crime and its effect on the girl's family. "It's just as bad a crime as any human can commit," he said. During the trial, prosecutors used DNA evidence, cell phone and bank records, and eyewitness testimony from one of Samantha's playmates to link Avila to the crime. Investigators recovered DNA that matched Samantha's from material that the prosecutor said was consistent with tears or mucous from the inside of Avila's car and they found genetic material that matched the defendant underneath the girl's fingernails, suggesting she tried to fight off her attacker. During the trial, the defense challenged the accuracy of the DNA analysis and collection methods and suggested that the material found inside Avila's car had been planted. Samantha was abducted, kicking and screaming, from outside her Stanton home July 15, 2002. Her nude body was found the following day in mountains some 50 miles away, left on the ground as if it had been posed. So many were moved by the young girl's murder that more than 4,000 people attended her funeral. (source: Associated Press) NEBRASKA: Judges in Neb. Give Convicted Killer Death A 3-judge panel unanimously agreed to the death penalty for a man who killed a 15-year-old newspaper carrier in Nebraska 2 years ago. Jeffrey Hessler, 26, was found guilty last December in the February 2003 abduction, sexual assault and slaying of Heather Guerrero. Her body was found the next day by two family members at an abandoned house. Hessler represented himself in the hearing before the judges assigned to decide his fate, submitting a written statement but offering no oral arguments. In the statement, Hessler said he had "mental conditions that may or may not explain" his actions, that he was remorseful and that it was God's purpose that he die. Hessler also said in the statement that he did not want an appeal, which is automatic for death penalty cases. Hessler nodded in agreement when he was sentenced to death. Irene Guerrero, the victim's mother, said Monday the family doubted Hessler's remorse, and that she'd pray to be able to someday forgive him. "I don't have to forgive him today. I will someday, but today is not his day," Guerrero said. Nebraska law requires juries to decide if the death penalty is warranted. A panel of 3 judges then decides if the defendant should be executed. The judges ruled death would not be excessive considering the crime and that no mitigating factors applied, such as the lack of a criminal history or his age. 3 people have been put to death in Nebraska since executions were resumed in 1994. Nebraska is the only state left that uses the electric chair as its sole means of execution. (source: Associated Press) TEXAS: On death row for 16 years, Anibal Rousseau not only says he's innocent - he accuses courts of conspiring to delay his appeal----At 64, inmate fears the state is just waiting for him to die Of the 444 prisoners on Texas' death row, only 3 are older than Anibal Rousseau and only seven have been there longer. Now, at age 64 and after almost 16 years as a condemned man, he suspects - as do his attorneys - that criminal justice officials may be content to simply let him spend the rest of his life in prison rather than deal with facts that suggest his innocence. They contend that law enforcement officials concealed ballistics evidence during his Harris County trial. "At the rate this is going, he will die of old age while still incarcerated," said James G. Rytting, one of Rousseau's attorneys. "It's just been a failing of the criminal justice system from top to bottom." The notion that the courts are conspiring to allow Rousseau to linger in prison without acting on his appeal may be a stretch. However, district and appellate court records indicate that the last document filed in the case was an order by the Court of Criminal Appeals in December, giving the court where he was convicted 30 days to answer several procedural questions. Those answers still haven't come. The appeals court allowed 30 days for Judge Michael McCormick of Lockhart, who was appointed to the case after two other judges were recused, to respond. While defense attorneys did receive an unsigned, undated communique from McCormick indicating that he sees a lack of merit in Rousseau's appeal, he has yet to file his official responses. McCormick declined to comment Friday. However, prosecutor Roe Wilson, in charge of the Harris County District Attorney's Office response to the appeal, sees nothing out of the ordinary. "Different judges take different lengths of time," she said. But Rousseau's attorneys say the delay has paralyzed the appeal process. "The situation is much worse than disheartening," Philip H. Hilder, one of the attorneys, wrote to the Court of Criminal Appeals. Hilder asked the appeals court to immediately grant Rousseau a new trial. Admits bank robbery A native of Cuba, Rousseau was sentenced to 13 years in a Texas prison in 1977 for delivery of heroin. Paroled in 1982, he returned to prison two years later on another narcotics conviction, then was released in 1986. This time, he turned to bank robbery to finance his drug habit. He admits that he and another man robbed a Houston bank in August 1988. He says he was on the run after that heist when he learned he was suspected of murdering a federal agent. Environmental Protection Agency agent David Delitta was shot to death in October 1988 during a robbery. Police named Rousseau as the prime suspect, and he surrendered about a month later. He was convicted of capital murder in May 1989 and sentenced to death. Key to his conviction was the eyewitness testimony of David Sullivan, one of the slain agent's co-workers. Although the defense presented 2 witnesses who said Rousseau was not the man they saw shoot Delitta, Sullivan testified that Rousseau was the killer and that he had used a large-caliber, shiny revolver. Twelve years later, however, Rousseau's appellate attorneys discovered during research that, about one month before the conviction, the Houston Police Department's ballistics lab determined that the bullet that killed Delitta had been fired by a gun used in a murder after Rousseau's arrest. That gun - a black, .38-caliber revolver - was found on Juan Guerrero, who was convicted of the second murder and sentenced to 12 years in prison. A defense team investigator says that, just before Guerrero was deported to his native Dominican Republic after his release from prison, he admitted to killing Delitta. Informed that Delitta was a federal agent, however, Guerrero backed off his admission, the investigator says. Neither the police nor prosecutors ever informed Rousseau's attorneys, as required by law, about the ballistics evidence supporting his claim of innocence. The defense, however, has not determined exactly when prosecutors learned about the evidence. The prosecutors in Rousseau's trial were Assistant District Attorneys Chuck Rosenthal and Lorraine Parker. Rosenthal is the current district attorney, and Parker practices civil litigation in Colorado. Parker acknowledged to the Houston Chronicle in 2001 that the new evidence troubled her. "I'm terribly afraid the wrong guy may be in jail," she said. Rosenthal, who became district attorney in 2001, maintains that there was no suppression of evidence. He also is satisfied there are a number of ways in which the gun could have been in Rousseau's hand when Delitta was killed, and later in Guerrero's possession. Still, say Rousseau's attorneys, the ballistics evidence should have been available to the defense during the trial. Since it was not, they say he deserves a second hearing. Claims innocence During the interview last week, the bespectacled, graying and wiry Rousseau fiddled with the remains of a wooden-bead rosary, minus the cross. He sticks to his claim of innocence and his befuddlement over the delays in his appeal process. "I know I committed a crime, and I did things I was not supposed to do. But I didn't kill nobody," he said. "I understand that these judges want to be tough on crime. But they got me locked up in here, and the guilty person is outside." His attorney agrees. "I don't know if there's a concerted effort to let Mr. Rousseau die in prison," said Hilder. "But the Court of Criminal Appeals, when it comes to speeding up the (appellate) process for defendants who have a weak case, does not drag its feet. Here we have an actual innocence claim, and the process has completely mired down." (source: Houston Chronicle) MISSOURI: Assault charge for stabbing tacked onto murder count against Harris Already facing murder charges for the beating death of Moreland Jefferson, Christopher Harris now also faces an additional felony charge in connection with the March 19 stabbing of his former girlfriend. Cole County Prosecuting Attorney Bill Tackett Saturday filed a charge of first degree assault against Harris, 31, saying the victim was now willing to cooperate with prosecution and testify against Harris. "Based on statements to police by Harris, we re-interviewed (the victim) and she is now going to assist in the prosecution of this case," said Tackett. "The willingness of the victim to testify and the statements made by the defendant were the determining factors in the decision to file this charge." Harris was arrested in his Jefferson City apartment at 812 Broadway St. during the early morning of March 19 after police found his girlfriend stabbed in the chest in the front yard of 812 Broadway St. The incident was believed to have stemmed from a domestic dispute. Police had requested Harris be charged with first degree assault but no charges were filed because the victim would not testify. According to Tackett, the victim continued her relationship with Harris after being released from University Hospital in Columbia from her injuries and initially refused to cooperate with authorities. First degree assault is a class A felony, and Harris could face a minimum of 10 years in prison or a maximum of 30 years to life if convicted. Harris is being held in jail on $1 million bond for last weeks' brutal slaying of neighbor Moreland Jefferson, who was found dead in the doorway of his apartment at 812 Broadway St. An autopsy performed by medical examiners Monday revealed "blunt force trauma" as the cause of Jefferson's death. The report showed there were "numerous" strikes to the face and head with a blunt object and at least one continuous slash to Jefferson's throat. The incident allegedly stemmed from an argument outside the apartment both were having. Police say Jefferson may have suspected Harris in a burglary of his apartment earlier this year. A preliminary hearing date for the murder case is scheduled for May 23 at 1:30 p.m. (source: News Tribune) VIRGINIA: Could she get death sentence? Andrea Petrosky, a former Roanoker, is charged with capital murder and faces the death penalty in the April strangling and drowning of her son, Garrett, 6. By many accounts, Andrea Petrosky had everything going her way. Creative and highly organized, she balanced active involvement in her children's school activities with a full-time job at an upscale clothing and home accessory store, even as she worked toward a degree in educational technology at Radford University. Outgoing and energetic, she earned both the professional and personal admiration of friends and peers during the years her family lived in Roanoke. Now, police in Bristol, Va., say that on April 15, Petrosky drowned her 6-year-old son in a bathtub after strangling him, then called police and confessed. The 38-year-old mother of two is being held without bond in Bristol City Jail, charged with capital murder and facing the death penalty. Her case moves Virginia into relatively uncharted legal territory. She's only the 3rd person in the state to be charged under a statute that makes the killing of a child under 14 by a person over 21 a capital offense. The previous 2 cases involved multiple murders. Both of the accused were men, and both have been executed. Death penalty experts say that based on precedent, the odds are against Petrosky's receiving the death penalty if the case continues forward as is, and some question whether seeking the ultimate penalty is justified in a case like hers. Much depends on the cause behind the slaying - something friends who knew Petrosky say they couldn't even begin to guess. "She was a wonderful person who loved her children and loved her husband and worked hard," said Martha Hughes, who worked with Petrosky on Patrick Henry High School's After Prom gatherings. "I love Andrea. I don't know what happened. "Nobody knows but her." 'Always involved' The photo on the back of the funeral program shows a jubilant boy wearing Blues Brothers-style sunglasses, plaid shorts and giant inflatable sneakers, pretending to play an inflatable guitar. The caption below the photo reads "Goofy" in huge letters. Garrett Petrosky attended Salem Montessori School before his family moved from Roanoke to Bristol last year. Hughes, the pool manager at the Elks Club in Southwest Roanoke, remembers Garrett and his father, Tim Petrosky, coming in frequently to swim, something the boy loved. "He was just normal, a normal kid," Hughes said. Garrett loved bugs and spiders. Hughes recalled Andrea Petrosky once asking her where she could find toy spiders for Garrett's birthday party. Petrosky knew about Hughes' penchant for Halloween decoration. When the two worked together on Patrick Henry's After Prom, Petrosky would find ways to involve students, such as having them make masks to go with a Mardi Gras theme. The Petroskys' oldest daughter, Danielle, attended Patrick Henry and was popular with her peers. "Anything that came up with Danielle," her mother "was always very involved," Hughes said, including arranging a special dinner at the Elks Club for Danielle, her friends and their dates before her senior prom. Employed at Present Thyme on 23rd Street near Towers Shopping Center, Andrea Petrosky was a fixture there for years, as admired for her home decorating ideas as she was for her prom party skills. Her husband worked as a pharmacist at Brambleton Drug and had a reputation for friendly professionalism. "Tim would help anybody in any way that he could help them," said Mark Huth, a Brambleton Drug pharmacist who was hired at the same time as Petrosky and worked side by side with him there and at the Kmart pharmacy on Franklin Road. There was nothing unusual about the Petroskys, Huth said. "The Petrosky family was a family that you would welcome into your neighborhood and into your own home." Which is why Garrett's death and the charge against Andrea Petrosky leave friends and former co-workers baffled and shaken. 'They weren't recluses' The Petroskys lived on Stanley Avenue in South Roanoke until the spring of 2004, when they moved to Bristol to be closer to family. In Bristol, too, the child's death left residents disturbed. The Rev. David Stancil, pastor of First Baptist Church in Bristol, recalled how, soon after the tragedy, a mother with young children in his congregation came to speak to him. "She was upset because her son had asked her, 'Mommy, are you going to kill me too?'" Stancil held a counseling session at his church, and he advised about 30 who came not to be judgmental. "It was not like this was a weird family. You just didn't have any way to say, 'Well, I'm not like them,'" he said. "Lots of people knew them closely and well and were involved with them. They weren't recluses." Several Roanokers who knew the Petroskys declined to speak about them for this story. Not surprising, said Yvonne Downes, a professor of criminal justice at Hilbert College in New York. "That's partly because she's also a white middle-class woman from a good family. Nobody can be comfortable with a case like this." Women are seen as nicer and more nurturing than men, so when women commit violent crimes, they tend to be regarded with more horror than when men commit the same acts, she said. Downes, who specializes in studying women and violent crime, said Petrosky's circumstances reminded her of Andrea Yates, a Texas woman who in 2001 drowned her five children in a bathtub. Prosecutors sought the death penalty against Yates, who instead received life in prison. "She was another supermom. She seemed to feel a need to be perfect and do everything all the time," Downes said. "Women who have it all, seem to be doing it all, I believe, are at a high risk for depression." If Petrosky were to be diagnosed with depression or some other disorder, it would likely become a factor in the case, as it did in the Yates case, Downes said. Bristol Commonwealth's Attorney Jerry Wolfe declined to comment as to whether authorities know a possible motive for the slaying. David Dow, a death penalty opponent who founded the Texas Innocence Project, noted that neither Yates nor Susan Smith, the South Carolina woman who drowned her two sons in a car in 1994, received the death penalty. Juries tend to accept the notion that when mothers kill their children, and there's no scheme of financial gain involved, "They're doing it basically because they're mentally disturbed," Dow said. Annie's Law Petrosky is only the third person in Virginia to be prosecuted under a relatively new capital murder statute, informally known as "Annie's Law," that makes it a capital crime for a person 21 or older to kill a child younger than 14. The law's creation was spurred by the 1997 death of 4-year-old Annie Leftwich, who was bound and gagged as a punishment for bed-wetting and suffocated. It's increasingly common for death penalty states to have statutes similar to Annie's Law, but they're more commonly applied to fathers or to strangers who abduct children, Dow said. The two previous cases in Virginia prosecuted under Annie's Law involved fathers who killed their children. Dow said that seeking the death penalty against a mother who kills her children has a lower-than-average success rate among capital cases. It's not the type of situation lawmakers have in mind when creating this sort of law, he said. "That's the problem with laws that are a response to a single case," said Steve Milani, director of the Capital Defender Office for the western region of Virginia, who will head Petrosky's defense team. He said he believes Annie's Law is unconstitutional because it creates a class of adults from ages 18 to 20 who can't be charged with capital murder if they kill a child. He compared it to a law that would make everyone death penalty eligible for killing a child unless they're Spanish. New York Law School professor Robert Blecker, a death penalty supporter, said that based on the known facts in the Petrosky case, the death penalty doesn't seem warranted. "This isn't in the same moral universe" as people who maintain torture chambers or are serial rapist-murderers. "It's very important that death penalty supporters are sensitive to moral distinctions and reserve this most serious and solemn response for the most heinous and horrible killers - not just killings, but killers - because by it, we condemn not only what you've done but who you are," he said. "We say that as a person you deserve to die." For Wolfe, seeking the death penalty in the case is a matter of law. "It clearly falls within the parameters of what the General Assembly has stated in the code as being a capital case." "My prediction is that no jury will go for it," Blecker said. A preliminary hearing in the case once scheduled for Thursday has been postponed. Virginia hasn't executed a woman since 1912, though a Pittsylvania County woman, Teresa Lewis, received a death sentence in 2003 for hiring two men to kill her husband and stepson so she could collect insurance money. She is the first woman on death row in Virginia since the state reinstated capital punishment in 1976. (source: Roanoke Times)
