Feb. 3 MARYLAND: Prisoner proves an unlikely teacher----As execution nears, students reflect on correspondence with a death row inmate Sarah Pilisz, a young college student from northeastern Pennsylvania, began her correspondence with death row inmate and convicted killer Vernon Lee Evans Jr. a little more than a year ago as something of a community service project. "I originally thought, 'This will be awesome. It's a great way to serve God by serving other people. It will be good for me to do that for him, to help him,'" the 21-year-old Mount St. Mary's University student said recently. But as the pair continued to swap letters - Pilisz from her dorm room amid the hills of Western Maryland and Evans from a cell in a maximum-security prison in downtown Baltimore - the college senior was surprised to find that the inmate became as much, if not more, of a comfort to her than she was to him. "He offers wonderful, perfect advice," Pilisz said. "So he was serving God by serving me. It ended up being really reciprocal." Students and faculty at Mount St. Mary's say that Evans, 56, who is scheduled to be executed next week for the 1983 contract killings of two Pikesville motel clerks, has become a class participant and even a mentor and teacher to a small group of students, even while incarcerated on death row and despite never having set foot on the Emmitsburg campus. Philosophy professor Trudy Conway characterized Evans as a "participating member of our campus" and credits him with being a positive force in the moral development of young people. Students describe him as a friend, an inspiration and an adviser, offering an uncommon perspective on everything from the importance of their education to a never-dimming faith in the Orioles. And the Rev. Richard B. Hilgartner, a campus chaplain, said Evans has had such a profound influence on the college that "to terminate his life undoes a lot of the lessons we've taught on campus about compassion and redemption and conversion." All have lent their voices to the effort to stop Evans' execution, which could occur as soon as Monday. Evans was sentenced to death in the shootings of David Scott Piechowicz and his sister-in-law, Susan Kennedy, who were gunned down in April 1983 with a MAC-11 machine pistol in the lobby of the Warren House Motel. Another death row inmate, drug kingpin Anthony Grandison, also was sentenced to death in the case, convicted of offering Evans $9,000 to kill 2 witnesses scheduled to testify against him. Evans' attorneys are fighting the scheduled execution on many fronts. They have legal challenges pending with the Maryland Court of Appeals, as well as several requests for review before the U.S. Supreme Court. The attorneys plan to file appeals today with the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals and the Maryland Court of Special Appeals, asking the courts to overturn rulings this week from federal and state judges who rejected Evans' challenges to the state's lethal injection procedure. And the defense has submitted to Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. a clemency petition and an accompanying documentary-style video. Pilisz and Conway appear on that video. The relationship between Evans and Mount St. Mary's, which describes itself as the nation's oldest independent Catholic college, began in fall 2004 when Conway met one of Evans' sisters in Chicago at a national convention of the Campaign to End the Death Penalty. Gwendolyn Bates, a minister, mentioned that her brother was on Maryland's death row and might benefit from receiving mail from the professor and her students. Conway began writing Evans immediately. When about 30 students signed up for her Perspectives on the Death Penalty class last spring, the course material became an obvious topic between the professor and the prisoner. Soon, Conway was mailing Evans copies of the reading materials she assigned her students - dense writings that focused on the philosophical, sociological, political and ethical arguments, both for and against the death penalty. Just as quickly, Evans returned what the professor characterized as "essays of reflection" on the readings - many of which she read in her class. "He was living some of the issues being addressed in the texts," Conway said. "Sometimes it was like he was a student, and sometimes he was a teacher because he discloses things that we don't have any knowledge of." When Evans requested more books from the university's curriculum, other Mount St. Mary's faculty members answered the call, sending volumes about history, religion and morality. "He just became a voracious reader. He stays up all night reading," Conway said. "I guess he was getting the education he never had." And still, the letters to the students continued. Many of the dozen or so students and staff who have maintained a correspondence with Evans or visited him in prison say they believe his assertion that he was involved in the Warren House killings but did not pull the trigger. Others say that even if he did, their religious beliefs are so strong that they believe in redemption and still would not advocate executing him. Like her friends, Jamie Bergin, 21, was unsure of what to expect from Evans. She says she didn't want to "use him for information about his life." So she started out by sending a Christmas card, writing a note similar to those that she sent to friends. But to Bergin's amazement, there seemed to be no limit to the subjects that she, a Hampden native, and Evans, born and raised in West Baltimore, discussed. "We write about what we've seen - our frustrations with teen pregnancy, drug use and other problems in the neighborhoods where we grew up. Things that we both can relate to," she said. "He even writes about the Orioles. He says he's pessimistic about the Orioles but he still has faith." Laura Robinson, 21, of Springfield, Va., has written Evans about the mentoring program through which she, Bergin and other college women work with middle school girls. "He believes that mentors are such powerful influences," Robinson said. "And he's kind of been our mentor, so we know about that." Evans' influence on Pilisz, from Scranton, Pa., has been so profound that after years of not knowing what to do with her life, she now intends to seek a teaching job in an inner-city school after graduation. "Knowing Vernon and some of the things that have happened in his life has inspired me to work with kids to keep them from getting into things like that," she said. Reflecting on the impact that Evans has had on her students, Conway remembered a prayer that he told her he repeats often - that God would grant him a period of time when he would know what it means to be a good man. "Being in prison, and the period of reflection that that has afforded him, he has figured out a way to be the person he wanted to be," Conway said softly. "I told him that I thought in many ways his prayer has now been answered." (source: The Baltimore Sun) ILLINOIS: Prosecutor won't seek death penalty in Bloomington slayings McLean County State's Attorney Bill Yoder says he won't seek the death penalty for a man accused of killing 2 women in Bloomington in 2004. Yoder says the victims' families asked him not to seek the death penalty for Leo Guider Junior. Guider is slated to stand trial in July in the December 2004 stabbings of 41-year-old Lorraine Fields and 26-year-old La Keisha Tyus. Both women were from Normal. Guider is accused of killing the women at his Bloomington apartment and hiding their bodies in a car in a nearby parking lot. He's charged with 6 counts of murder and 2 counts of concealing a homicide. (source: Associated Press) MISSOURI: Missouri asks for speedy resolution----Sides map strategies in Taylors legal case The blizzard of legal paperwork that blew from Missouri to Washington, D.C., on Wednesday bought extra time for condemned killer Michael Taylor. Just how much time remained unclear Thursday. Taylor was hours from being executed Wednesday when nine judges of the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reversed an earlier ruling by a three-judge panel, which had denied a stay of execution. On appeal, the U.S. Supreme Court then voted 6-3 to let the stay of execution stand, pending further legal action in lower courts. Taylor, 39, is on Missouris death row in the 1989 kidnapping, rape and murder of Kansas City teenager Ann Harrison. Roderick Nunley, the other man convicted in the case, is expected to have an execution date set soon. Anns parents declined to comment Thursday. "Let's just wait and see whats going to happen," Bob Harrison said. Taylors father told reporters Wednesday evening that "justice is being served" with the 8th Circuits stay of execution. After weeks of legal sparring between Taylors lawyers and state prosecutors, lawyers took a moment Thursday to assess the situation and plot their next moves. State authorities are concerned that the Taylor delay could slow action in Nunleys case and those of other death row inmates. The Missouri Attorney Generals Office asked appeals judges for a quick resolution. "We have filed a motion to expedite - Taylors appeal," said John Fougiere, a spokesman for Missouri Attorney General Jay Nixon. John Simon, a St. Louis lawyer representing Taylor, said he would file a motion by today opposing the states request. "It will be a very substantial response," Simon said. Procedurally, the merits of Taylor's appeal - whether death by lethal injection is unconstitutionally "cruel and unusual" - still rest with the 3-judge panel that voted 2-1 to deny Taylors stay of execution Wednesday. The panel could order briefs from lawyers and hold a hearing. Following a ruling, the losing party then could ask the panel to reconsider, appeal to the full 8th Circuit and then, again, ask the Supreme Court to decide the case. The 3-judge panel also could send the case back to the district court judge in Kansas City who originally ruled on it for further consideration. U.S. District Judge Fernando Gaitan issued a nine-page order Tuesday, denying Taylor's claim that lethal injection was "cruel and unusual" punishment. Typically, a full appeals process takes several months without an expedited schedule. The Supreme Court's decision in the Taylor case marked the 1st public decision for Justice Samuel Alito, who was sworn in Tuesday after his confirmation by the U.S. Senate. Alito split with the court's conservatives, joining the 6-3 majority to uphold the 8th Circuits stay of execution. Death row opponents praised Alitos handling of the case. "It's a reasonable, cautionary vote," said Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center. "It doesn't necessarily indicate leanings toward death penalty defendants. But at least he's going to be his own person." Taylor probably will be moved back to his previous prison, in Potosi, Mo., until a new execution date is set, prison officials said late Wednesday. Missouri's executions take place in Bonne Terre, about a 15-mile drive east of Potosi. First glance - A lawyer for Taylor said he would file a motion by today opposing a state request to expedite the appeal. ************** Death row could use a time limit 17 years ago next month, Ann Harrison was snatched from her driveway by 2 crack-addled thugs as she waited for the school bus. They raped her, stabbed her with butcher knives, then left the pretty honor roll student to die alone in the trunk of a stolen car. Whats nearly as disgusting is that only now are her confessed killers running out of the appeals that they hope will keep them from the death chamber. Michael A. Taylor and Roderick Nunley have been on death row longer than their victim lived on this Earth. A system that allows such a travesty is in need of an overhaul. You can reach that conclusion whether youre for or against the death penalty in this, the 30th anniversary year since the Supreme Court reinstated capital punishment. Justice dealt swiftly used to be the norm. A mere 81 days passed between the 1953 kidnap-killing of Bobby Greenlease and the execution of his murderers in the Missouri gas chamber. Nebraska sent Charlie Starkweather to the electric chair in 1959 - only 18 months after his arrest for 11 murders. And 5 years passed after the Clutter family was massacred before the Kansas executioner hung the killers at the prison in Lansing. The wait practically destroyed Truman Capote, as the movie chronicling the birth of "In Cold Blood" dramatizes. The author simply needed an ending for his book about the Clutter familys murderers, Perry Smith and Dick Hickock. Theirs. Perhaps the death penalty wouldnt seem like such cruel and unusual punishment for all concerned if 5 years on death row was more the norm nowadays. And please dont misunderstand. If any crime deserves a death sentence, it was the killing of Ann Harrison. Evil does not begin to describe what was done to that poor girl. But something is wrong here. As a nation we either should shorten the time between sentencing and execution. Or we should get rid of capital punishment entirely. Just for now, lets set aside the whole question of whether the system is flawless or fair, and many of us are convinced it is neither. Too many people on death row have later turned out to be innocent. Defendants with money are less likely to face death than those who are not so well off. Blacks more often get a death sentence than whites. Though, anyone who says Harrisons killers are somehow victims because they, two black men, killed a white girl, have it all upside down. The victim here was a young innocent set upon by two male predators; race unimportant, period. Yes, forget, for a moment, the other arguments for and against capital punishment. Simply look at how perverse the process has become. After 17 years people can and do change. Thats true even in 10 years, the national average that someone is on death row. Which means that, in a sense, the people we execute are not the same ones who committed the crimes they are being put to death for. So, too, the victims families are transformed. First by the terrible loss of their loved ones. Then by the long wait for todays judicial process to run its course. Thus, when and if Taylor and Nunley finally are put to death, it wont seem so much like the culmination of justice. More like the end to a wrenching ordeal. (source for both: Kansas City Star)
