Oct. 25
PENNSYLVANIA:
Death penalty jury chosen
A visual and graphics designer from Telford reported Monday to the
Montgomery County Court House in Norristown for jury duty.
He had never before been called for jury duty but, he said, friends
advised him that, if he were selected, it would be "something simple."
"I never thought it would be a matter of life or death," said the man, who
was one of a pool of 30 prospective jurors questioned to determine their
suitability to sit on a jury that will decide whether accused serial
killer John Charles Eichinger lives or dies.
Eichinger, 33, of Somers Point, N.J., last week was convicted on 4
1st-degree murder charges involving 3 women in their 20s and a 3-year-old
girl.
Eichinger, a former supermarket clerk, offered no defense in the killings
at a brief, non-jury trial held before county Judge William R. Carpenter.
Carpenter found Eichinger guilty of the 1999 stabbing death of 20-year-old
Jennifer Still in her Bridgeport apartment and the Good Friday stabbing
deaths of 27-year-old Heather Greaves, her 23-year-old sister Lisa Greaves
and Heather's toddler daughter Avery Johnson at the Greaves family
residence in the 500 block of Kingwood Road, King of Prussia.
The only issue that remains is whether Eichinger, who has been held in the
county prison without bail since his arrest on March 26, should receive
life imprisonment or the death penalty for the slayings.
County District Attorney Bruce L. Castor Jr., who is personally
prosecuting the case with co-counsel Assistant District Attorney Carolyn
Flannery, is seeking the death sentence for the three Greaves murders,
using the Still murder as an aggravating circumstance to bolster that
request.
Eichinger, who is represented by defense attorneys William McElroy and
Paul A. Bauer III, wants a jury rather than just the judge to decide his
fate. At the conclusion of Monday's session, 5 jurors - 4 women and 1 man
- had been selected.
Many of those questioned were like the graphic designer who had never
really given much serious thought as to their positions on the death
penalty or whether they could issue that sentence even if the law requires
it in cases where the aggravating circumstances outweigh the mitigating
circumstances or cases in which there are no mitigating circumstances.
"Well...," said a Schwenksville man whose job involves relocating
businesses to Mexico as he delayed giving a response when asked whether he
could render a verdict of death.
"I guess so . . .yes," he finally said.
Others were more opinionated.
Asked about his views on the death penalty, an Upper Pottsgrove
electrician responded, "Sometimes it is not carried out quickly enough.
Why waste everyone's time and taxpayers' money by delaying year after year
in carrying out the death penalty."
A Telford mother of 2 pre-school children said, "I believe in the death
penalty. If you murder someone, I believe in an eye for an eye."
Given the fact that Eichinger offered no defense to the murders of 4
people, she said, "I believe the death penalty is the right thing for
him."
The jury selection process will continue today.
The death penalty hearing is slated to get under way on Nov. 1.
(source: The Times Herald)
CALIFORNIA:
Execution Closer for 'a Model of Humanity'
Lawyers and religious figures on Monday launched what is expected to be a
vigorous battle to save the life of Stanley "Tookie" Williams, the reputed
co-founder of the Crips street gang, after a judge set Dec. 13 as his
execution date.
Because he has lost all his appeals, it appears that only a grant of
clemency from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger could save Williams, 51,
convicted 24 years ago of 4 Los Angeles murders - the shootings of Albert
Owens, who was killed in the robbery of a 7-Eleven store on Feb. 27, 1979,
and of motel owners Yen-I Yang and Thsai-Shaic Yang and their daughter,
Yee Chen Lin, at the Brookhaven Motel on South Vermont Avenue 12 days
later.
No California governor since Ronald Reagan has granted clemency in a death
penalty case.
But a coalition of religious leaders and opponents of the death penalty
argue that Williams' case is exceptional. Over the last decade, he has
published several children's books urging disadvantaged youths to avoid
gangs and violence. He has been nominated for a Nobel Prize and last year
was the subject of a favorable television movie "Redemption: The Stan
'Tookie' Williams Story."
Williams has "spent his life in jail . turning people away from crime,
turning them away from deeds that tear at the fabric of society," said
Rabbi Steven B. Jacobs of Temple Kol Tikvah in Woodland Hills.
"This man has been rehabilitated. We are asking the governor to commute
his sentence.. He is a model of humanity, especially for the black man."
But Lora Owens, the stepmother of Albert Owens, said the execution should
go forward. She said Williams has not accepted responsibility for his
murders and has done nothing to redeem himself.
"To be redeemed means to accept responsibility or assume responsibility
and not use it as a means of getting out of just punishment," Owens said.
"He chose to be judge, jury and executioner in a matter of seconds, and
yet it has taken years for him to come to justice," she said.
Asked whether she was convinced that Williams murdered her stepson, Owens
said: "From the facts given to me, I have no doubts." Then she added, "I
was not the one who convicted him; I am not the one who sentenced him; I
am trying to keep the memory of Albert alive because he is the one who was
done wrong."
Owens was working at the 7-Eleven store, which Williams and 3 others
robbed of $120, according to court records.
Williams has denied committing the 4 killings. On Monday, Verna Wefald,
his current appellate attorney, said, "The evidence against him is very
weak," adding that it was based on unreliable testimony from "informants
and longtime con men." She said the defense is "continuing to explore"
options.
Alfred Coward, an immunized government witness, testified at trial that
he, Williams, and 2 other men smoked cigarettes laced with PCP before the
robbery. Coward testified that Williams shot out the store's television
monitor before shooting Owens in the head.
Four witnesses provided testimony identifying Williams as the perpetrator
of the Yang killings, according to court records.
On Monday, Superior Court Judge William R. Pounders rejected a request by
defense attorneys to delay the execution date to Dec. 22 to give them more
time to prepare their clemency papers, which are due Nov. 8.
"This case has taken over 24 years to get to this point," Pounders said.
"That is a long delay in itself, and I would hate to add to that delay."
Neither state nor local officials would comment on the looming clemency
battle, but they are expected to argue that Williams has never formally
accepted responsibility for his crimes.
In California and the 36 other states that have the death penalty, an
individual facing execution has a right to apply to the governor for
clemency, but there are virtually no rules on how to respond. In
California and most other states, the governor has complete discretion.
Since becoming governor, Schwarzenegger has rejected 2 clemency requests
from death row inmates - Donald Beardslee, who was executed early this
year, and Kevin Cooper, who won a last-minute reprieve from a federal
appeals court last year. Cooper's appeals are pending.
Earlier this month, Andrea Hoch, the governor's legal affairs secretary,
sent a letter informing attorneys involved in the case that materials
submitted to the governor's office regarding clemency would be sent to the
Board of Parole Hearings "as a matter of course." Hoch also said the
governor may call for a hearing on the clemency request.
In the last detailed ruling on the case, in September 2002, a 3-judge
panel of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld Williams' death
sentence but suggested, in a rare move, that then-Gov. Gray Davis consider
commuting the sentence because of Williams' "laudable" anti-gang efforts
while in prison. Davis did not commute the sentence.
In February of this year, over objections from 9 of its 24 active judges,
the 9th Circuit refused to grant Williams another hearing based on his
claim that he was a victim of racially biased jury selection. The
prosecutor rejected all three blacks who might have served on the jury.
Judge Johnnie Rawlinson, writing for the dissenting judges, said, "A
prosecutor publicly castigated by the Supreme Court of California for his
pattern of racially motivated peremptory jury challenges removed all
blacks from Williams' jury. In declining to [rehear] this case, our court
bestows an implicit imprimatur upon the trial court's denial of a
constitutionally mandated jury selection process."
Nathan Barankin, a spokesman for Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer, said last
February that the trial prosecutor had "good reasons not related to race"
for dismissing the black jurors. One was excused because of a work
hardship, another because she said she would require prosecutors to meet a
higher standard of proof than normal and the 3rd out of concern that he
would be guided by his background as a psychologist rather than the
evidence, Barankin said.
In early October, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear Williams' case.
Because that denial appeared to be the last realistic chance for Williams
to have his sentence reversed in court, his lawyers and supporters are
concentrating on clemency arguments.
"He went through a personal metamorphosis 15 years ago and since then has
reached out to young people," said Peter Fleming, the New York lawyer who
is leading Williams' clemency team. "He has made extraordinary efforts to
reach out to young people to dissuade them from engaging in the kind of
[gang] activity he did," Fleming said in an interview.
In addition to Jacobs, the clergymen supporting Williams' bid for life
include the Rev. James Lawson, a longtime civil rights leader; Catholic
priest Christopher Ponnet; and Rabbi Leonard Beerman, the founding rabbi
of Leo Baeck Temple in West Los Angeles.
"When the 1st case of murder in all of human history was confronted by
God, God decided not to execute the murderer by stoning or hanging or by
laying him on a gurney," Beerman said. "God ordained that [Cain] not be
executed, but that a mark be placed on his head and no one else was to
kill him. If this decision was good enough for God, is it not good enough
for the governor of California?"
(sources: Associated Press & Los Angeles Times)
***********************
Witness: Camacho followed and shot the wounded officer
Laura Pallos heard the gunshots, then quickly turned and saw an Oceanside
policeman stagger out from between two cars and fall to his knees.
Then, the woman testified on Monday, she saw a man with a gun emerge from
between the two cars, and she watched as the gunman followed and
repeatedly shot the wounded officer as he tried to crawl away.
Pallos' testimony is the most complete eyewitness account jurors have
heard about the 2003 gun battle that left rookie officer Tony Zeppetella
dead and his accused killer facing the death penalty.
Also on Monday, jurors in the murder trial of the alleged gunman, Adrian
George Camacho, heard a medical examiner testify that 13 bullets hit
Zeppetella during the gunfight. 2 of them were fatal.
Camacho is accused of gunning down Zeppetella on June 13, 2003, during
what witnesses said appeared to be a routine traffic stop in a busy credit
union parking lot at the corner of College Boulevard and Avenida De La
Plata in Oceanside.
Camacho's defense attorneys admit Camacho shot the officer, but they argue
that the shooting was the result of a drug-fueled psychotic break for the
now 30-year-old Camacho.
Camacho has pleaded not guilty to murder charges. He faces the death
penalty if he is convicted of 1st-degree murder and any of the attached
special circumstances, which include the slaying of a police officer.
The prosecution contends the shooting came because Camacho, an ex-convict,
allegedly had drugs and a loaded gun in his car and wanted to avoid
capture.
Florida resident Pallos testified Monday that she called 911 as soon as
she heard the gunfire erupt in the crowded bank parking lot.
"The very first thing I see is the officer stumbling out from between 2
cars," Pallos said. "He wasn't fully upright."
Then, she said, a gunman emerged behind Zeppetella. Pallos said the
wounded officer tried to crawl away from the gunman, who she said
continued to shoot the officer.
Pallos said the gunman grabbed Zeppetella by the collar and pistol-whipped
him with the butt of the gun 4 times. Zeppetella, she said, raised his
hands to his head and laced his fingers to try to protect himself from the
onslaught.
"After he finished hitting him, he threw him down on the asphalt," Pallos
said. Later, on cross examination, she described the gunman as appearing
to be "outrageously angry" during the attack, and noted that "his lips
were contorted" and he had a "twisted mouth."
Pallos said that after the pistol-whipping, the gunman patted down
Zeppetella and began to back away.
"The officer tried to get up," she said. "He was lifting his chest and
trying to get his elbows underneath him. (The gunman) stepped in those
last 2 steps and shot him again."
The prosecution contends Camacho shot Zeppetella with Zeppetella's own gun
during that last volley of bullets.
Jurors on Monday also heard from the pathologist who performed
Zeppetella's autopsy.
Deputy Medical Examiner Bethann Schaver testified that of the 13 bullets
that hit Zeppetella, 2 were fatal. At least 1 of the deadly shots, she
said, tore through the officer's protective vest.
One of the bullets that killed Zeppetella sliced his jugular vein and an
artery, cutting off some of the blood to his brain; the other fatal bullet
tore through his diaphragm and spleen, Schaver said.
Red and green rods riddled a life-size foam mannikin Monday as Schaver
showed the jury the paths the bullets took as they hit ---- and in some
cases, also exited ---- the rookie officer during a gun battle in June
2003.
Schaver said Zeppetella suffered 5 shots to his back, 1 to his neck, 6 to
his arms, and 1 direct hit to the chest. Also, 1 of the bullets hit his
arm and traveled into his chest, she said.
Zeppetella had 4 blunt-force wounds to his head, the deputy medical
examiner said. None of those hits cracked the officer's skull or injured
his brain, she said.
None of the gunshots hit Zeppetella in the head, Schaver acknowledged on
cross examination.
(source: North County Times)
