August 13
TEXAS:
Dallas man to get new trial in case overturned on race questions
A Supreme Court decision citing racial discrimination during trial
provided murder convict Thomas Miller-El an opportunity to leave Texas'
death row after 20 years, but Dallas prosecutors will try to prevent that
by retrying him.
Dallas District Attorney Bill Hill says the high court's decision in June
doesn't question the guilt of Miller-El, a black defendant accused of
killing a white hotel clerk and wounding another during a robbery. His
office says the state will again seek the death penalty.
Prosecutors have until late November to set a new trial date for
Miller-El, or risk his release, a federal appeals court ruled in July.
Miller-El's attorney Jim Marcus said his client retains the presumption of
innocence "until proven guilty in a constitutionally fair trial."
Miller-El was sentenced to death row in 1986 by a 12-member jury that
included 1 black. Prosecutors struck 10 of the 11 blacks eligible to
serve.
The Supreme Court overturned Miller-El's conviction, citing a manual,
written in 1969 and used until at least 1980, that instructed prosecutors
on how to exclude minorities from Texas juries. Supreme Court Justice
David H. Souter called racial discrimination in Dallas County's jury
selection process unquestionable.
"If anything more is needed for an undeniable explanation of what was
going on, history supplies it," Souter wrote in the 6-3 decision. "The
prosecutors took their cues from a 20-year-old manual of tips on jury
selection, as shown by their notes of the race of each potential juror."
The manual, written by Jon Sparling, a top assistant to longtime Dallas
District Attorney Henry Wade, included such instructions as:
- "You are not looking for any member of a minority group which may
subject him to oppression - they almost always empathize with the
accused."
- "Look for physical afflictions. These people usually sympathize with the
accused."
- "Extremely overweight people, especially women and young women, indicate
a lack of self-discipline and often times instability. I like the lean and
hungry look."
While racial discrimination in selecting jurors has long been federally
prohibited, it was harder to prove before the 1986 Batson v. Kentucky
ruling, which was bolstered by Miller-El. Before Batson, no reasons had be
provided for using preemptory strikes.
The ruling was not retroactive, so it could not have been used to appeal
the earlier cases of three black Dallas County defendants sentenced to
death while the manual was in circulation. All 3 won appeals over other
issues, were convicted in subsequent retrials and executed.
Another black Dallas County inmate on death row, Ronald C. Chambers, got
his conviction overturned in 1989 by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals,
which cited issues similar to Miller-El's.
In his 3rd trial, Chambers was re-convicted in the 1975 shooting and
beating death of a white man. He's now the longest serving inmate on Texas
death row.
Sparling, now retired, did not return a phone call from The Associated
Press seeking comment on the manual. He told The New York Times in 2002
that he wrote the instructions informally and quickly, without being
careful of his words.
Wade, whose name is on the landmark Roe v. Wade abortion case, died in
2001.
Hill, who took office in 1999, declined to be interviewed by The
Associated Press. He said in an earlier written statement that his office
does not tolerate illegal discrimination from prosecutors or opposing
jurors.
"His guilt of this heinous crime is not in question," Hill said.
Miller-El was convicted of murdering Holiday Inn clerk Douglas Walker
during a robbery. Walker and co-worker Donald Ray Hall were bound, gagged
and shot. Hall, who was paralyzed in the shooting, identified Miller-El as
the triggerman.
Former assistant district attorney Paul Macaluso, who helped prosecute
both Chambers and Miller-El, said he never practiced racial discrimination
in jury selection.
Macaluso, now a Dallas federal prosecutor, said he was aware of the manual
before he joined Wade's office in 1973, but no one instructed the staff to
follow it.
Concerns about the manual are not new, however.
A Time Magazine article about the guidelines in 1973 appeared under the
headline: "Women, Gimps, Blacks, Hippies Need Not Apply." Excerpts were
placed under a cartoon depicting a jury of hooded Klansmen, according to
Miller-El's clemency appeal.
In 1986, The Dallas Morning News reported that it found that county
prosecutors routinely manipulated the racial makeup of juries through
legal challenges, excluding up to 90 % of qualified black candidates from
felony juries.
Wade said then that the newspaper's study, based on computer analysis of
court records of 100 randomly selected felony jury trials in 1983 and
1984, did not convince him that prosecutors engaged in systematic
exclusion of blacks.
Wade and his assistants maintained at the time that Sparling's
recommendations never were followed blindly and that most prosecutors had
not read the manual.
But Larry Baraka, a former state district judge, said it was routine to
keep blacks off the jury when he worked for the district attorney's office
from 1976-78 - the only black prosecutor during most of that period.
"I didn't like it at the time, and I had a few run-ins about it because I
instructed the prosecutor picking my juries that I didn't want them
striking black folk," Baraka said.
On the Net: Thomas Miller-El Information site:
http://www.thomasmillerel.com
Death Penalty Information Center: http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org
Supreme Court: http://www.supremecourtus
(source: Associated Press)
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Atascosa mother held in meth death
An Atascosa County woman was charged with capital murder Friday following
a lengthy investigation into the June 2004 death of her 3-month-old
daughter.
Gilda Casarez, 31, of Lytle reportedly admitted to Atascosa County
sheriff's investigators that she fed her baby a bottle of formula spiked
with a heavy dose of methamphetamine.
"She admitted to knowingly making that bottle from the can that contained
methamphetamines, and giving that bottle to the baby," said Chief Deputy
David Soward.
"She has not given us a motive, but we feel the intent was clear," he
said. "We feel from the evidence there was no accident."
Soward said an autopsy last year showed the baby, Ariella Perez, had
enough of the drug in her system to kill an adult, and that the baby's
bottle also contained methamphetamines.
Initially, Casarez said Ariella died in her sleep, but the mother's
subsequent statements were inconsistent, Soward said. Ultimately, she
acknowledged accidentally mixing the drug, in its crystalline form, known
as "ice," with the formula, he said.
"She was in the car, and when she saw a police officer, she hid a bag of
ice in the formula can," he said. "When she later removed the bag, she
noticed that a majority of it had come out, but she never bothered to
throw it away."
Soward said a baby born to Casarez this summer was removed by Child
Protective Services and is living with a relative.
An Atascosa County grand jury indicted Casarez on Wednesday. She is being
held on $225,000 bond in the Atascosa County Jail.
"This is a case where she could have gotten away with it if not for the
persistent detective work," said Sheriff Tommy Williams.
(source: San Antonio Express-News)
*********************
WIFE JAILED FOR CONTACTING DEFENDANT WARREN
The wife of a capital murder defendant was ordered jailed Friday after a
judge revoked her bond for having contact with her husband, Jamarcus
Warren.
Lakeshia Jones, 26, pleaded guilty Aug. 1 to hindering Warren's
apprehension and was released on a personal recognizance bond because of
her ailing mother and her agreement to testify against Warren in his death
penalty case.
Prosecutors played a taped telephone conversation that Ms. Jones had with
Warren about 2 hours after she was released. As part of her bond
conditions, she was ordered to have no contact with Warren directly, by
phone, letter, a 3rd party or any other means.
Judge Jack Skeen Jr., of the 241st District Court, revoked her bond Friday
and ordered she be jailed on a $150,000 surety bond.
Warren, 28, made a collect call, which she accepted, to Ms. Jones' home.
During the 15-minute conversation, Ms. Jones referred to her court
proceeding earlier that day.
The couple, often crying throughout the conversation, talked of the hard
times they were in and how much they loved each other.
"We're all we got," Ms. Jones said, adding that "it's going to be hard."
She encouraged Warren to be focused and ready and to stay positive.
Warren said he talked to no one but her and didn't have anyone else. He is
held in an isolated cell in the Smith County jail awaiting his capital
murder case set for Oct. 3.
"I just need some time to be with my mother. If it wasn't for that, it
wouldn't matter," Ms. Jones told Warren, referring to her mother who
apparently has terminal cancer.
"You're like my wife; I love you," a crying Warren said. "I understand
what you did (pleading guilty) ... As for me, I can't see my life without
you."
He said he had been jailed for 11 months but had been with Ms. Jones for
28 years, adding that he hated not being able to talk to her.
Smith County District Attorney Matt Bingham requested Ms. Jones' bond be
revoked because of her contact with the capital murder defendant whom
Bingham is seeking the death penalty against. He said as part of the plea
agreement, Ms. Jones expressed her intent to testify against Warren
truthfully. Bingham asked the judge to set her new bond at $150,000.
Defense attorney Hunter Brush asked Skeen to let her remain out of jail
and amend the conditions of her bond, allowing her to have contact with
Warren.
He said there appeared to be no justification for the imposition of
prohibiting the young wife from talking to her husband. He said there was
no content in the conversation that could undermine or adversely affect
Warren's prosecution.
Brush said the phone call was "one of the most heartbreaking things" he's
listened to in court.
"There was no harm done," he said, adding that she spent a lot of time in
jail before she was granted the PR bond.
Skeen said the woman was initially arrested on $250,000 bond and was later
released on a PR bond with conditions of release. Her bond was revoked
that time for drug violations.
But after she pleaded guilty to hindering the apprehension of a felon, she
was again released on a PR bond pending her sentencing hearing, which will
take place after she testifies in Warren's trial.
Skeen said she not only violated her conditions he expected her to abide
by, she did it only a few hours after her release.
"This court expects its conditions of bond set to be abided by," he said.
"I believe this court had done everything possible to be fair."
Ms. Jones was arrested by U.S. marshals Dec. 17 in Houston along with
Warren, who had been on the lam for about 7 months. He awaits trial for
the capital murder of Shaun Pickens, who was shot to death in January
2004.
Officials have said they believe Warren was on his way to Mexico when
caught.
Pickens, of New Chapel Hill, was found gunned down in the driveway of a
Smith County home off County Road 2209.
(source: Tyler Morning Telegraph)
