Feb. 14 TEXAS: Convicted killer of taxi driver scheduled to die Wednesday Houston taxi driver David Jacobs carried a Bible with him in his cab. "He would witness to people in his taxi if the conversation came up," Joe Owmby, a Harris County district attorney, recalled. The holy book provided little defense when he was shot 4 times in the head and robbed of about $110 almost 14 years ago. The man convicted of killing him, Clyde Smith, also linked to the fatal shooting of another Houston cab driver, was set to die Wednesday night in Huntsville. Smith, 32, who once worked as a security guard, would be the 4th prisoner put to death this year in Texas and the 2nd of 3 scheduled to die this month in the nation's busiest capital punishment state. "I wasn't there when he was killed," Smith said in a recent interview at the Texas Department of Criminal Justice Polunsky Unit, home to the state's death row. "I got there afterward." Lawyers for Smith filed a clemency petition with the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles in hopes of stopping the punishment. In earlier appeals, lawyers pointed out federal judges agreed Smith may have had poor legal help during his trial and that he suffered significant abuse as a child, which they said was not pursued by his trial defense team. "Nevertheless, ... courts concluded that Smith must shoulder the consequences," Clint Broden, Smith's appeals lawyers, said. At his trial, defense attorneys presented no witnesses. "I had no idea how the system worked," Smith said from death row. "All I knew was what I saw on TV. It's much different." Owmby, who prosecuted the case, said defense lawyers "had nothing to work with except ... to discredit the witnesses that we did have." 2 women, girlfriends of Smith, testified against him. One of them said she was in the cab when he committed one of the slayings. "Things always went wrong when I was associated with people," said Smith, who was 18 at the time of the slayings. "I didn't actually kill anyone, but it's possible I could be killed by the state." Smith, a Charlotte, N.C., native, had been in Houston about 10 months. His mother lived in Mississippi, where he dropped out of school in Laurel in the ninth grade. His father lived in Houston. He said from death row the last time he saw a relative, among them four brothers and a sister, was 1991. He also has a daughter, about 18, who has no contact with him. "I didn't want her to be exposed to this," he said. One of his girlfriends called a crime tip line that led police to Smith, who later confessed to detectives about the Feb. 7, 1992, slaying of Jacobs, 45, and the similar shooting and robbery 6 weeks later of another cab driver, Victor Bilton, a confession he said he made after police wore him down. "I realize how bad that looked, because the two were so similar," he said of the 2 slayings. "But at the same time, I still maintain I didn't kill those persons." Owmby disagrees. "He is a cold-blooded, remorseless individual who could have contributed to society, but decided to take the lives of 2 people who were important to a lot of people just by being who they were - hardworking people who drove cabs and lived good lives in Houston," Owmby said. Next on the execution schedule is Steven Staley, condemned for the 1989 slaying of a Fort Worth restaurant manager during a botched robbery. Staley, scheduled to be executed Feb. 23, won a reprieve last year. Texas Department of Criminal Justice execution schedule: http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/stat/scheduledexecutions.htm (source: Associated Press) **************** Retardation diagnosis could spare inmate----But prosecutors want psychologist to take another look at the facts An inmate from Harris County could see his death sentence commuted to life in prison, thanks to a psychologist's opinion that he is mentally retarded. But before that finding goes to a judge, the people who hired the psychologist - Harris County prosecutors - want him to look at additional information, apparently including the observations of death row guards. Assistant District Attorney Lynn Hardaway says she doesn't recall for sure but believes the guards' input was included in the material she sent to George Denkowski, who concluded that Michael Wayne Richard is retarded. That tactic, and memory lapse, have raised the ire and suspicion of Richard's lawyer. "There are shenanigans going on here," said attorney Les Ribnik. "The state gets a report it doesn't like, and they then bring influence to bear on (the psychologist) to reconsider." But Hardaway sees nothing improper with asking Denkowski, a Fort Worth psychologist, to give the case a 2nd look. "I'm not an expert on the issue, but I do have some questions about whether he's retarded," she said. Richard, a two-time parolee, was sentenced to die in 1986 for the murder of 53-year-old nurse Marguerite Lucille Dixon during a break-in at her northwest Harris County home. After the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals ordered a new trial, Richard was again convicted and sentenced to death in 1995. However, the U.S. Supreme Court declared in 2002 that the execution of mentally retarded killers would violate the constitutional protection against cruel and unusual punishment. Since then, 47 of the 445 inmates on Texas' death row at that time, including Richard, have filed appeals based on the retardation issue, according to the Texas Defenders Service, which provides legal counsel for death row inmates. Reduced to life So far, death sentences have been reduced to life in prison in 5 of those appeals, according to the Defenders Service. They include 1 Harris County case, in which Gov. Rick Perry commuted the sentence of Robert Smith in March 2004. That decision was based on a recommendation by District Attorney Chuck Rosenthal after an assessment by Denkowski. Unlike the Richard case, however, Denkowski was not asked to reassess Smith. Prosecutors say that's because no further information was available for review. Of the 407 inmates now on death row, 141 are from Harris County, according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. 10 death row inmates have appealed on the retardation claim and most are being, or have been, assessed by Denkowski. Since March 2005, the District Attorney's Office has paid Denkowski almost $65,000 for psychological evaluations. That figure includes $6,000, thus far, in Richard's case. Denkowski did not return calls from the Houston Chronicle. IQ below 70 A diagnosis of mental retardation generally requires an IQ below 70, inability to function normally in a number of settings and onset of retardation before 18. Denkowski reported in October 2005 that Richard's IQ is 64. He concluded that "Richard meets all 3 criteria that define mental retardation" in Texas criminal proceedings. Hardaway, the prosecutor, shared those findings with defense attorney Ribnik in November and asked for two more months to provide Denkowski with additional information. Ribnik says Hardaway told him she wanted the psychologist to have a chance to review death row guards' opinions about Richard. "She told me she had talked to (the guards) a year earlier, and that his mental retardation was of no concern (to them). So sayeth the guards," said Ribnik. A spokesperson for the state prison system acknowledged that guards are not required to have psychological training. However, said Dr. Britta Ostermeyer, a forensic psychiatrist at Baylor College of Medicine, "you're supposed to consider all material that you can possibly get." Despite his concerns, Ribnik went along with the delay request, and the 2 sides agreed to meet with state District Judge Jeannine Barr on Jan. 20. On that day, however, Hardaway asked for another month. Ribnik says he agreed but wasn't happy about it. He says Hardaway could have gotten the information from guards to Denkowski before he issued his report. Ribnik also says he's concerned that the District Attorney's Office "may be leaning on Denkowski because they don't like the results." Several pen pals Hardaway says she just wants Denkowski to have all of the evidence. Even though she's not positive she sent him what she called the guards' "personal observations," Hardaway says she believes that information "would certainly be pretty important: people who spend every day with the guy and have a chance to see what he does." Denkowski was given other information, as well, she says. "(Richard) has several different pen pals in several different countries," Hardaway said. "His commissary records show he's adding up stuff, where he's using basic math, making notes on his calendar in his cell about who he's sending letters to, the fact that he lived on his own for quite a while." Hardaway also notes that Richard had a prior check-forgery offense. "So he knew enough to endorse them," she said. A hearing on Denkowski's final findings is scheduled for later this month in Judge Barr's court. (source: Houston Chronicle, Feb. 13) ********************** Before slaying, calls signaled rough union Before a retired police officer was charged in the slaying of the friend of his estranged wife over the weekend, there were at least 10 clues that the couple had long endured a contentious relationship. That's how many times police were summoned to intervene in disputes between them, most recently last week, when the man phoned his estranged wife and said he was watching her, police reports said. Reports also show that San Antonio Police Department officials had been made aware of the incidents while the officer was still a member of the force. Sunday, Carlos Ricardo Hernandez, 45, was charged with murder in the fatal shooting of Ricardo Benavidez. Authorities believe Hernandez spotted his estranged wife, Kathryn Hernandez, with the victim at a bar on Bandera Road before 2 a.m. Sunday. The ex-officer is accused of shooting Benavidez shortly afterward, after the victim confronted Carlos Hernandez in his vehicle. Hernandez fled the scene but later turned himself in to detectives at police headquarters. He was released from Bexar County Jail after posting $100,000 bond. Hernandez found himself facing the charges almost exactly a year after Leon Valley officers 1st received calls about problems at the home he shared with his wife. The 10 incidents were from Feb. 10, 2005, to Feb. 8 of this year. Hernandez retired as a San Antonio patrol officer in October. Officers were first dispatched to the home last year because Hernandez had thrown cola and bleach in the kitchen during an argument, a report said. He apparently left the home after a police sergeant and evidence unit arrived, the report said. Of the 10 calls, Kathryn Hernandez initiated 7. Her estranged husband called police the other 3 times. Leon Valley police reports detail alleged grievances that included telephone harassment, claims of drug use and violence. In 2 incidents, San Antonio police were contacted because Hernandez was an SAPD officer. A report from March 31 said an SAPD sergeant with the internal affairs board had been contacted about one of the incidents. In December, a Leon Valley officer advised Hernandez he would face criminal trespass charges if he returned to the home. Some reports show his estranged wife repeatedly refused to file charges. In the most recent incident, Hernandez's wife called police because he kept calling and ringing her doorbell, a report said. He called 5 more times while she was speaking to a Leon Valley officer, who heard Hernandez say over the phone he would "continue to watch" his wife, the report said. Kathryn Hernandez declined to comment for this report. Bexar County records show the couple married in February 2004. (source: San Antonio Express-News) FLORIDA: Man Found Guilty of Murder in Son's Death In Key West, a man was convicted of murder and child abuse Monday for stomping his 5-year-old son to death. Christopher Bennett, 31, was accused in the death of his son Zachary, who died of a ruptured liver, a bleeding brain and broken ribs in 2003. The jury deliberated less than 2 hours. The sentencing phase is scheduled for April 4, and jurors must recommend whether Bennett should receive the death penalty or life in prison. In 2004, the mother and great-grandmother of Zachary Bennett settled a civil lawsuit with the Department of Children & Families for $160,000. A DCF report had said Zachary should never have been placed in the care of Bennett, who had an extensive criminal record that included 11 arrests for battery, domestic violence and selling cocaine. (source: Associated Press) MARYLAND: Judges rescind death penalty----Abeokuto to get new sentencing The state's highest court ordered a new sentencing hearing yesterday for a Baltimore man who had been sentenced to death in the killing of his girlfriend's young daughter. In a decision so lengthy and complex that one lawyer compared it to a phone book, the Maryland Court of Appeals provided different reasons for overturning Jamaal K. Abeokuto's death sentence. 3 judges decided that Abeokuto's decision to have a judge determine his punishment did not amount to a "knowing and voluntary waiver" of his right to be sentenced by a jury. Two of those judges, and another, agreed -- as they have in the last several death penalty cases to come before the court -- with a legal argument that Maryland's death penalty sentencing procedure is flawed. The votes of those four judges amounted to a majority of the seven-member panel that was enough to rescind the death sentence of Abeokuto, 26, who was convicted of the 2002 killing of 8-year-old Marciana Ringo. In one opinion issued yesterday, three judges found that Abeokuto did not knowingly or voluntarily waive his right to a jury sentencing because the trial judge failed to ascertain whether Abeokuto was still taking anti-psychotic medication and, if so, whether he was experiencing any side effects that might cloud his ability to understand the proceedings. "Perhaps the lesson of this case is that trial judges have to be exceedingly careful of accepting waivers of fundamental constitutional rights from defendants with backgrounds of mental illness and defendants who have been medicated for mental health problems," said Michael R. Braudes, a public defender representing Abeokuto in his appeals. But Harford County State's Attorney Joseph I. Cassilly, who prosecuted Abeokuto, said he was "very puzzled" by the court's decisions. "If you read the decision and you look at the votes, the state won on every issue and yet we still somehow lose on the bottom-line decision," he said. "It doesn't make sense to me." Cassilly and Braudes said that because the judges were split on their reasons for overturning the death sentence, it was unclear whether the decision could be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court. The issue of Abeokuto's waiver of his right to a jury sentencing is considered a matter for the state courts, but Abeokuto's argument that Maryland's death penalty statue is unconstitutional because of a flaw in its sentencing procedure could be decided in federal courts. Lawyers with the Maryland attorney general's office would decide whether to appeal the rulings. Annabelle L. Lisic, senior counsel for capital litigation with the attorney general's office, could not be reached for comment yesterday. Marciana Ringo's frozen, partially snow-covered body was discovered in woods near Joppatowne in Harford County on Dec. 12, 2002, nine days after she disappeared. The Northwood Elementary School pupil's throat had been slit. The case was moved from Harford to Baltimore County after Abeokuto requested a change in venue. Abeokuto elected to be tried by a judge, rather than a jury. Baltimore County Circuit Judge Thomas J. Bollinger Sr. found the man guilty on 6 charges, including 1st-degree murder and kidnapping. Abeokuto also chose to be sentenced by Bollinger. During the November 2004 sentencing hearing, a psychiatrist testified that Abeokuto said that a "voice" gave him four reasons why he should kill the girl, but the psychiatrist said he believed Abeokuto was feigning mental illness. In a 76-page opinion written by Judge Glenn T. Harrell Jr. and signed by Chief Judge Robert M. Bell and Judge Clayton Greene Jr., the judges found that Abeokuto did not knowingly or voluntarily waive his right to a jury sentencing. The judges looked up in the Physicians' Desk Reference and on the Internet possible side effects of the anti-psychotic drug Geodon, listing them as sedation, nausea, dizziness and confusion. 3 judges -- Irma S. Raker, joined by Bell and Greene -- signed an additional 2-page opinion in which they reiterated their position that Maryland's death penalty law is unconstitutional because the statute requires that judges or juries at sentencing weigh evidence of mitigating factors, such as a defendant's troubled childhood, against aggravating factors, such as another felony committed along with a murder, by the standard of "by a preponderance of the evidence." The 3 judges have held that such decisions should be made "beyond a reasonable doubt" -- a significantly higher legal threshold. 3 judges -- Alan M. Wilner, Dale R. Cathell and Lynne A. Battaglia -- dissented from the finding that the lack of an exploration into Abeokuto's use of the medication cast sufficient doubt on whether the waiving of sentencing by jury was "knowing and voluntary," finding no reason to grant Abeokuto a new sentencing hearing or trial. "There is nothing in this record to suggest such a problem, however, and this Court should not invalidate a perfectly good waiver by conjuring such a hypothesis out of thin air or its own imaginings," Wilner wrote. (source: Baltimore Sun) PENNSYLVANIA: Rendell signs warrant for Allentown killer -- Harvey Robinson was convicted of killing 3 in east Allentown. Gov. Ed Rendell on Monday signed an execution warrant for Harvey Robinson, who raped and murdered a girl and two women in Allentown in the early 1990s and was thought to be one of the youngest serial killers in the nation's history. Robinson, now 31, is scheduled to die by lethal injection April 4. He was convicted and sentenced to death in November 1994 for raping and murdering Joan Burghardt, 29; Charlotte Schmoyer, 15; and Jessica Jean Fortney, 47. All were killed on the city's east side. In 1999, Robinson's new lawyers appealed, saying his former lawyers failed to present evidence that could have allowed him to escape the death penalty. 2 years later, Lehigh County Judge Edward D. Reibman upheld Robinson's 3 murder convictions but threw out the death penalties imposed in the killings of Burghardt in August 1992 and Schmoyer in June 1993. Reibman said the trial judge gave improper instructions to jurors about how they could consider the multiple murders as an aggravating factor. A resentencing hearing was held in 2003 in which Robinson's court-appointed lawyer, Philip D. Lauer of Easton, said Robinson was deprived of a fair trial when he was convicted of 1st-degree murder and sentenced to the three separate death sentences. In 2005, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court upheld Robinson's death sentence in Fortney's July 1993 killing and his 1st-degree murder convictions in the deaths of Burghardt and Schmoyer. Robinson was 19 when he was convicted of the killings. The three cases were tried together in Lehigh County Court, and experts said DNA linked Robinson to all of the crimes. A fourth victim, who was beaten and raped, survived and helped police apprehend him. Besides the execution warrant for Robinson, who remains on death row at the state prison at Graterford, Rendell signed warrants of execution for Michael B. Singley and Tedor Davido. Singley, 29, pleaded guilty to the November 1998 murder of Christine Rohrer of Chambersburg, Franklin County, in August 2000. He was also convicted in the murder of James Gilliam but was sentenced to life imprisonment in that case. His execution is set for April 6. Davido, 30, was found guilty of raping and killing his girlfriend, 20-year-old Angelina Taylor, in December 2001. He is scheduled for execution on April 11. Rendell has signed 51 death warrants since taking office in 2003. The last person to be executed in Pennsylvania was Gary Heidnik in July 1999. He was convicted of murdering 2 women he had imprisoned in his Philadelphia home. Since Pennsylvania switched from electrocution to lethal injection in 1990, there have been 3 executions. (source: The Allentown Morning Call) SOUTH CAROLINA: Inmate unable to drop appeals A man on death row for killing a York County deputy 14 years ago is not mentally competent to drop his appeals and be executed even though he has asked to die, the S.C. Supreme Court ruled Monday. The decision was applauded by Mar-Reece Hughes' lawyer, but the mother of the slain deputy railed against a justice system that she said is failing. Hughes was convicted and sentenced to die in 1995 for killing Brent McCants during a traffic stop on Dave Lyle Boulevard in 1992. Another defendant, Eric Forney, was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. The S.C. Attorney General's Office has 15 days to decide whether to appeal Monday's ruling and ask the Supreme Court for a rehearing, spokesman Mark Plowden. Hughes has asked since at least 2000 to die in the electric chair, but his lawyer has argued through several courts that Hughes isn't capable of making that decision. "The court did the right thing," said Hughes' lawyer, Teresa Norris of the Center for Capital Litigation. Norris said she is pleased with Monday's decision "but it's sad when a man is so mentally ill that he reaches a point of incompetence." In a 2004 court hearing, Hughes described himself as world-class athlete whom the state wanted to kill to dissect his body to discover the secret to his athletic prowess. Hughes has smeared feces on walls in prison, said he believes prison staff is poisoning his food and claimed the FBI runs a concentration camp in prison. Three psychiatrists testified in 2004 Hughes was schizophrenic and psychotic, court records show. Two circuit court judges, in 2002 and 2004, ruled Hughes is competent to waive his appeals and be executed. Norris appealed those earlier court rulings, culminating with a hearing in October before the Supreme Court that led to Monday's ruling. A distraught Myra McCants, Brent McCants' mother, said Monday that Hughes has been pulling a charade for years. "It never ends," Myra McCants said Monday. "I'll probably be dead 20 years and he (Hughes) will still be pulling this little game." Monday's ruling does not mean Hughes will never be executed. The Supreme Court ruling -- by a four to one decision -- means that Hughes' appeal goes back to York County civil court. S.C. Chief Justice Jean Toal dissented against the majority justices in Monday's ruling, stating that the majority was "cherry picking" from the transcript and record of Hughes through the years. Hughes is competent and understands the decisions he is making, Toal wrote. (source: Rock Hill Herald)
