Feb. 15 TEXAS: Claims of other slayings studied A Fort Worth homicide detective traveled to New Mexico this week to investigate the possibility that a man jailed in Tarrant County in connection with three October slayings may have killed a man in the mid-1990s who was reportedly then buried in the back yard of a home outside Albuquerque. Detective Cheryl Johnson and investigators with the Bernalillo County Sheriff's Office spent Monday and Tuesday digging in the back yard of the home but uncovered only animal bones, said Fort Worth homicide Sgt. J.D. Thornton. Thornton said that Christopher Chubasco Wilkins, 37, had told investigators he may have committed about a dozen slayings in at least 5 states, including Texas. "We've had detectives that have been in contact with police agencies in the jurisdictions in which he says he committed those crimes, but so far we have found nothing to corroborate his information," Thornton said. "The information he provided us is vague, and although we haven't stopped our efforts to locate the offenses, we have nothing to substantiate the information at this point." Wilkins is being held in Tarrant County Jail awaiting trial on murder and capital murder charges in the deaths of Gilbert Vallejo, Mike Silva and Willie Freeman. Vallejo was fatally shot Oct. 26 as he walked out of the Lady Luck Lounge at 426. S. Jennings Ave. 2 days later, police found the bodies of Silva and Freeman in a ditch near the 9500 block of Old Weatherford Road. Ballistics tests revealed that the same gun was used to kill all 3 men. On Nov. 4, police spotted a man driving Silva's Blazer in a grocery store parking lot on Eighth Avenue. Police pursued the driver, who led them on a short chase before crashing the Blazer and running. Two days later, Wilkins became a suspect after his fingerprints were found on the Blazer, police have said. Investigators learned that Wilkins had been arrested the night before and was in the Mansfield Jail, accused of hitting a pedestrian with a stolen vehicle. (source: Fort Worth Star-Telegram) ***************** 2 charged in students death fail to appear in court 2 suspects charged with capital murder in the death of a Brownsville college student became fugitives after they failed to appear in court Tuesday morning. Court records show that Luis Alberto Barajas, 22, Lino Ramirez, 19, and three others were charged for their alleged roles in the Oct. 25 robbery and shooting death of Benjamin Lira. Jail records show that Barajas has never been arrested in the case, while Ramirez was released on a reduced bond on charges of tampering with evidence filed in November. Judge Migdalia Lopez with the 197th state District Court issued arrest warrants for the two men on capital murder and other charges after they failed to appear in court for a Tuesday morning arraignment. Lopez ordered $1 million bonds for co-defendants Ashley Ann Moya, 18, and Antonio Quiroz, 17, who were already in custody on capital murder charges. The state district judge ordered a $100,000 bond for gave another man, Cruz Armando Rodriguez, 40, on a charge of tampering with evidence. Lira, a 29-year-old University of Texas at Brownsville and Texas Southmost College student, was shot to death in the rural community of La Paloma while he allegedly struggled with Quiroz for control of a handgun, according to police. Prosecutors contend that Quiroz was following the orders of Liras ex-girlfriend Moya, who allegedly told the San Benito teenager to "jack" Lira on his payday. An arrest affidavit indicates Lira was killed while being robbed of $150 and his 2001 Chevrolet Impala, which makes the case a capital crime. "This was a cold, calculated and planned crime," prosecutor Rebecca RuBane said previously. "Unfortunately, the victim lost his life for a couple of hundred dollars and his car." Moya denies the allegations and said that she cared for Lira and that Quiroz invented her role in case out of revenge in an old family dispute. Citing a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision, prosecutor Doug Pettit said the District Attorneys Office cannot seek the death penalty against Quiroz because he was 17 at the time of the shooting. According to Texas drivers license records, Ramirez's last known address was in the 1300 block of West Washington Street in Brownsville, while Barajas was last known to live in the 1200 block of Calle San Marcos in San Benito. Anyone with information about the whereabouts of Barajas or Ramirez is asked to call the Cameron County Crime Stoppers Hotline at (956) 350-5551. (source: Brownsville Herald) ******************* Keel announces for Court of Criminal Appeals State Representative Terry Keel, R-Austin, recently filed in the Republican primary for place 8 on the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. The position on the state's highest criminal court is a statewide race. The current incumbent is Charles Holcomb. Rep. Keel is serving his 5th term in the House and has been Chairman of the House Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence since a Republican majority was established in 2003. Rep. Keel is also a member of the House Judiciary Committee, the Committee on House Administration, and the General Investigating & Ethics Committee. Prior chairmanships have included the 79th session Chair of the Select Committee on Election Contests and the interim committee on Sex Offender Statutes. In the private practice of law, Rep. Keel is a founding partner of Keel & Nassour, an Austin firm. Prior to his election to the House of Representatives in 1996, Keel was elected in 1992 as Travis County Sheriff, the first Republican in history elected to that post. He also served as an Assistant District Attorney in Brazos and Travis counties for a total of over nine years and assignments included lead counsel in capital cases as well as Chief Prosecutor over several divisions, including the Major Crimes Division of the Travis County District Attorney's Office. "Terry's expertise and diverse experience in criminal law is unmatched in this state," House Speaker Tom Craddick, who is endorsing Keel in the race, said. Keel's endorsements also include District Attorney Bill Hill of Dallas, and central and south Texas-area legislators including State Senator Jeff Wentworth and State Representatives Frank Corte and Joe Straus. "I believe I can bring common sense and solid practical background to the court," Keel said. "I am the only candidate for this court ever who has served as a prosecutor, a defense attorney, a lawyer who has appeared before the court itself, a law enforcement officer, and a lawmaker with extensive experience in the enactment of criminal law," Keel said. Keel holds a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Texas (1980) and a Juris Doctorate from the University of Houston (1983). (source: Bandera Bulletin) ***************** Affordable steps to justice in Texas Nobody can blame the public for becoming increasingly skeptical about the Texas criminal justice system in light of the steady stream of folks who have been released from prison because they were innocent. We certainly believe that the criminal justice system most often punishes the guilty. But in too many cases, it has been hard to determine whether a defendant was truly guilty or simply too poor to hire a competent lawyer. The Texas justice system doesn't inspire confidence when it defends sleeping lawyers as well as shoddy ones and sends people to prison on false or shaky evidence. Reasonable people can disagree about the severity and effectiveness of punishment - including the death penalty - handed out by the courts. But everyone wants to get convictions right. That's why we welcome recommendations released last week by the governor's advisory council on criminal justice. The council's recommendations would emphasize fairness without compromising toughness. Several proposals rightly focus on expanding the use of DNA testing during trials and after convictions. Forensic testing now is limited because trial judges are reluctant to order DNA testing without specific statutory authority. We agree with the governor's council that judges should have that authority. In cases with DNA evidence, there is a sure way to know if the accused or convicted is guilty. That makes sense. We have the technology, we should use it. The council recognized that expanding DNA testing would add to the backlog at Department of Public Safety crime labs, so it proposed that the state pay private labs to do DNA testing, expand capacity at state labs (including Austin labs) and give pay raises to forensic scientists who work for DPS. That, too, is reasonable. The council rightly proposed expanding methods to track, monitor and apprehend sex-crime offenders. It wants the Legislature to finance global positioning satellite surveillance of registered sex offenders for at least three years, and, in some cases, for life. Another recommendation would add $9.5 million to the attorney general's sex offender enforcement unit over two years. When combined, those recommendations would help protect children and others from sexual predators. We're glad the council didn't ignore the quality of legal representation for poor defendants - especially those accused of capital murder. Under the current system, defendants who are too poor to hire their own lawyers are appointed ones by the courts. Hampered by a lack of standards and money, the court-appointed lawyers system has largely failed to provide poor defendants with experienced, and in many cases, competent lawyers. We've witnessed cases in which court-appointed lawyers failed to do the basics - interview witnesses, check alibis, obtain DNA testing or conducted investigations. The state has made improvements in the court-appointed lawyers system. But we agree with the council that Texas might need a totally different system to provide legal representation for poor defendants in capital murder cases. The council recommended further study on using state money to establish a network of public defenders offices. (Here in Travis County, county officials are looking at a similar initiative not associated with the council's recommendation.) We don't know the total price tag for the recommendations. But estimates to get started on the proposals above would put the cost in the neighborhood of $20 million. That doesn't include a statewide public defenders network, which by itself could cost tens of millions of dollars to start up. Fortunately, Texas has a surplus. Considering the state of public education, the Legislature should use much of that to improve public schools when it meets in special session later this year. But lawmakers can't afford to ignore the state criminal justice system. The system can be fair and still be tough. A system that is tough but unfair gambles its credibility. (source: Austin American-Statesman) USA----death penalty-relevance W taps another throwback for important appeals seat Where does he find these people? No sooner had President Bush returned last week from Coretta Scott King's funeral than he nominated to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals a lawyer with a terrible record on civil rights. Bush, speaking at the service in Atlanta, rejoiced that because King and her murdered husband, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., had refused to be intimidated, "millions of children they would never meet are now living in a better, more welcoming country." The next day, the White House announced Bush's nomination to the appeals court that hears federal cases from Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi of a man who for much of his legal career has been on the opposite side of the civil rights fight from the Kings' ideals. Bush sent to the Senate the name of Michael B. Wallace, a Jackson, Miss., attorney. He is a well-connected Republican and will almost certainly be confirmed. But it should not be without a hearings process that examines Wallace's history of antipathy toward making America the more welcoming society Bush spoke about. Some highlights: Wallace, as an aide to then-House Republican Whip Trent Lott, D-Miss., in the early 1980s fought to protect the tax-exempt status of even the most notoriously segregationist institutions. That included Bob Jones University in South Carolina, where interracial dating was banned until 2000 - and even then required written consent of parents. Also with Lott, Wallace worked to require discriminatory intent - not effect - be proved in voting rights cases. Later in the 1980s, as a member of the board of the Legal Services Corp., Wallace attempted to gut the agency. He voted to hire outside attorneys to lobby Congress to reduce its appropriation, an action prohibited by the law creating the LSC, as a bipartisan group of lawmakers pointed out. As an attorney for the Mississippi Republican Party, Wallace fought so strongly for a white-friendly redistricting plan that a U.S. district court accused him of going beyond spirited representation to "needless multiplication of proceedings at great waste of both the court's and the parties' time and resources." Great record, huh, for a man whom the president would give a lifetime post on a court that is an important fulcrum in civil rights litigation? As Elliot Mincberg, general counsel of People for the American Way, said after Wallace's nomination: "He's been around for quite awhile doing a lot of things that are bad for civil rights." The Mississippi Conference of the NAACP moved quickly to voice "outrage" at Wallace's nomination. Like some of Bush's other 5th Circuit nominees, Wallace's extremism is cloaked in a solid educational background: B.A. from Harvard, J.D. from the University of Virginia Law School, where he was already displaying his strong ideological predilection. When a constitutional law professor would ask what his class thought about various cases, it's said, he would exempt Wallace, noting that the class already knew what Wallace thought. "He is one of those individuals who can intellectualize discrimination, which is the most dangerous sort of individual to this country," said Derrick Johnson, president of Mississippi's NAACP chapter. Nominating Wallace was at least fittingly re-trograde, as he would take the 5th Circuit seat vacated by the retirement of Charles W. Pickering Sr., another Lott crony whose legal and political career was marked by playing footsie with ardent segregationists and their loathsome policies. Bush took the rare step of elevating Pickering from a U.S. district court judgeship to the 5th Circuit with a recess appointment after Senate Democrats twice blocked a formal nomination. Wallace has been in the Republican pipeline a long time. Bush's father considered him for a 5th Circuit job in 1992. That prospect prompted a number of groups, including the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, to review Wallace's record. In March 1992, Frank Parker, then director of the Lawyers' Committee's voting rights project, said that Wallace's conduct in the Mississippi redistricting case showed Wallace "lacks the integrity, judicial temperament and respect for legal proceedings necessary for appointment to the judicial bench." The White House knows who Wallace is and what he represents. Hoping to counter opposition such as the NAACP's, when the White House announced Wallace's nomination, it issued a list of people to vouch for him. The top 2 were Reuben Anderson and Fred Banks, African-Americans who are former justices on the Mississippi Supreme Court. What the White House did not say was that they both are currently members of the same law firm as Wallace. Neither returned my calls. The White House seems confident that Senate Democrats are so cowed that Bush can nominate virtually anyone to these important courts, no matter how egregious the record. (source: Cragg Hines, Houston Chronicle -- Hines is a Houston Chronicle columnist based in Washington, D.C.) ***************** U.S. double standard not understood abroad Walk into just about any supermarket or corner store in Colima, Mexico, and you'll find an impressive wall of liquors for sale everything from tequila to scotch. Walk into a liquor store in Oklahoma, and if you're under 21, you'll be kicked out. Bars have mandated closing times; and complicated, county-specific regulations govern when, where and how alcohol can be sold. And yet, the U.S. sees about 45,000 drunk-driving deaths per 100,000 population as compared with about 14,000 of the same per 100,000 population in Mexico, according to Pan American Health Organization statistics for the late 1990s. Walk into a club in Mexico, and although dirty dancing is basically the same the world over, most guys will keep a respectful distance. Men stare, honk and catcall at women walking down the street as a matter of course, but by and large, you won't be followed or harassed. Walk into a house party at OU, and it's a safe bet that most guys there are more interested in copping a feel than in moving to the music. The only guy who will yell at you as you walk down the South Oval is Preacher Gary, but instead of a simple "hey, beautiful," he'll cry "whore!" because you, as a woman, have the audacity to wear pants. And yet the U.S. is where "wardrobe malfunctions" at the Super Bowl cause furors over broadcast decency standards. In America, the Kansas attorney general is currently involved in a trial over whether the state can force health-care providers to report all adolescent sexual activity, even as simple as French kissing or "lewd touching," to the proper authorities. It looks to me like we have a little hypocrisy problem. Our culture wants to have it all. We want to be both completely upstanding and completely liberated. It doesn't work that way. Socially, we draw many of our ideas about what is right from probably the most repressed group in history: religious fanatics who perfected seeing the speck of sawdust in a brother's eye but not the log in one's own. But politically, we pride ourselves on our freedoms of expression, of religion, of sexuality. This sets us up for a bit of a culture shock within our own borders. A part of us wants to be the city on the hill, the shining example of the straight path. Another part wants to get plastered on Thursday nights, inhale junk food until we drive the obesity crisis to monstrous proportions and watch the pop tartlet of the moment writhe in leather chaps and tongue other women. So we become Puritan moralists having a Roman orgy. Rush Limbaugh with a drug problem. Bill Bennett, "Book of Virtues" author, who can't keep away from the gambling tables. Anti-terrorist crusaders whose death penalty laws put us in company with countries our president branded the "Axis of Evil." We talk out of both sides of our mouths and expect the rest of the world to take us seriously. I haven't been living abroad long, but it's already apparent that such an attitude doesn't give us much moral and political currency with other cultures. Perhaps, as a first step toward building that currency, we could take some lessons from those other cultures. In many countries, people are more open about their enjoyment of life's pleasures a cute member of the opposite sex or a few beers with friends. But unlike their American counterparts, most people in this world haven't made an art form of taking that enjoyment way too far. It's time to recognize our own hypocrisy and face it as a possible source of our problems. We can't think of the "War on Drugs" as a "Colombian thing" while leaving in place a draconian drug-law system that punishes victims while all but ignoring our voracious demand. We can't continue exporting crass, cheap pop culture while bemoaning the rest of the world's unwillingness to follow our lead in moral matters. That log in our national eye is starting to get pretty irritating. Maybe it's time we looked inward before telling everyone else how to fix their sawdust problems. (source: Oklahoma Daily -- Sarah Waldrop is a journalism junior) *************** Lynchings, now state-sponsored Now that the state of California, with "Govinator" Arnold Schwarzeneggers approval, has murdered Stan Tookie Williams, there is a resurgence of interest in the death penalty. For those who are unfamiliar with Williams, he helped found the Crips gang in Los Angeles, but spent the last 12 years of his life working to end gang violence. He was executed Dec. 13, ostensibly for several murders for which there were no or questionable eyewitnesses. So why should we care? As Phil Gasper writes in the January-February issue of International Socialist Review, "Every execution, whether of the guilty or the innocent, creates new victims, but none more so than this one, in which the voice of a man who has spent the last 12 years speaking out against gang violence, successfully persuading thousands of kids to leave or stay out of gangs, was silenced." Who is served by killing Williams? The only good to come out of this is a renewed vigor in the campaign against capital punishment. Opposition to the death penalty has been growing in recent years, with many valid objections to its continuance. At least 122 death row inmates have been exonerated after establishing their innocence (not counting those proven innocent after their executions). The judicial system in many areas has been proven unjust, with minorities more likely to be prosecuted, convicted, and given harsher sentences than their white counterparts. The fact that innocents, especially minorities, are convicted and sentenced - and occasionally executed - should surprise few who are familiar with the court system. This alone should be enough to ban the death penalty. However, its stated purpose as a deterrent also needs to be examined. I've discussed the issue with several police officers, including my brother (a Republican, no less!), and they all said it was not a deterrent, regardless of whether they supported it or not. Most murders are crimes of passion. Does anyone actually believe murderers calmly analyze the likelihood of ending up in the execution chamber? So why execute them? Even if the individual being executed is guilty, it will not right the wrong, it will not solve anything, and it will not prevent future murders. I would rather see our efforts directed at something which might help....eliminating poverty and improving the inadequate education of the many poor. Why are so many people so eager to offer their support for execution? What does that say about our culture? In terms of numbers of citizens executed, the United States is at the top of the bracket, with only a few countries, like China and Saudi Arabia, executing near as many people. Think about what it means to execute as many people as a repressive, dictatorial regime like Saudi Arabia. Maybe it's OK, because when we kill people, we kill them by running an electrical current through their body or inject them with lethal toxins instead of cutting their heads off. We kill humanely. As compelling as all these arguments are, I notice that very few people are willing to make the most compelling argument of all: it is wrong to kill people. It seems we live in the Age of Rationality, in which any justification that cannot be quantified or given an economic value must be discarded. When I say killing is wrong, I cant pull out a graph to prove it, or tell how many dollars it costs, or offer a survey or study that supports my argument. That does not mean I should not say killing is wrong. I think its very important to argue against the death penalty. However, by shying away from a moral argument, it becomes a scientific, rational debate in which two sides must be weighed against each other in the court of logic. In the process, it is easy to forget that the things being argued about are actually people. Some people claim moral arguments to advance the cause of capital punishment, even though they recognize that executing a human being is immoral, no matter who, no matter the reason. Those who oppose such state-sanctioned murder ought not to have to put together cold, scientific arguments to defend their position. Scientific rationality is important and has its place; however, can anyone argue against "it is wrong to kill"? It's even in the Bible. "Thou shalt not kill" does not list exceptions. Hopefully citizens will recognize this, and work to defend the lives of those people guilty or innocent, who sit in prisons waiting for our government to kill them. (source: The Oracle Online) WASHINGTON: Indictment links ex-Hells Angels to 2001 killing, other crimes 2 former Hells Angels could face the death penalty if convicted on a murder count in a recently unsealed racketeering indictment, a federal prosecutor said Tuesday. Rodney Lee Rollness, 45, of Snohomish, and Joshua Binder, 30, of North Bend, are accused of killing 47-year-old Michael Eugene Walsh near Arlington on July 21, 2001. Both Rollness and Binder, who were arraigned Tuesday, pleaded not guilty to that charge and others included in the 13-count indictment. They will be in custody at least until their next court appearance Friday, when the government will seek their further detention without bail. Assistant U.S. Attorney Bruce Miyake told a federal magistrate judge that Rollness and Binder were motivated to murder Walsh to maintain and increase their positions with the Washington Nomads Chapter of the Hells Angels Motorcycle Club. Walsh, also known as "Santa," was not a member of the club, federal prosecutor Mike Lang said after court. Lang said it would be up to his office, along with U.S. Justice Department officials in Washington, D.C., to decide whether to seek the death penalty. According to the indictment, Rollness, Binder and two Spokane men - Richard Allen Fabel, also known as "Smilin Rick," and Ricky Jenks - are accused of participating in a racketeering enterprise that used violence, including kidnapping, witness tampering and interstate trafficking in stolen vehicles. Fabel and Jenks were arrested in Spokane and will be brought to Seattle to answer the charges. Fabel, 48, was listed as president of the Washington state chapter of the Hells Angels; Jenks, 28, is described as a club member. Rollness and Binder are described as former members who left the Hells Angels in 2003. A 5th man, Paul Foster, 49, of Arlington, was described in the indictment as an associate of the Hells Angels. Foster, arrested Tuesday in the Everett area, is charged with one count of "accessory after the fact" for his alleged role helping Rollness and Binder avoid apprehension for Walsh's murder. Jenks was charged in state court in September 2002 with the slaying of another man during a shootout in a Spokane Valley home. Jenks was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to 21 months in prison, records show. Besides acting as president of the state chapter, Fabel also serves as Hells Angels' West Coast president, according to the new charges. As state leader, he has "ultimate decision-making authority" for the club's activities in Washington, the indictment said. "These decisions included directing, sanctioning, approving and permitting other members to engage in criminal activities including murder, attempted murder, intimidation, extortion, robbery, and trafficking in stolen motor vehicles and motor vehicle parts," the indictment said. The indictment states that starting in late 1999 and continuing into this year, Fabel, Rollness, Jenks and Binder engaged in a pattern of racketeering activity. Racketeering charges carry up to life in prison and a $250,000 fine. (source : Seattle Times) *************** Book Review----Lessons learned from the Green River investigation "Serial Killers: Issues Explored Through the Green River Murders" by Tomas Guillen; Prentice Hall, 186 pp., $24.95 Books abound about the Seattle-area Green River killings - at least 60 women dead, starting in 1982. Gary Leon Ridgway, an Auburn truck painter, admitted to 48 of the murders. Tomas Guillen and Carlton Smith, then Seattle Times reporters, published the first Green River book in 1990, 11 years before Ridgway's arrest, using the title "The Search for the Green River Killer." These days, Guillen teaches journalism at Seattle University. Still obsessed by the Green River murders, he is back with another book - but a book unlike the 1990 true-crime saga, and, in fact, unlike any of the other half-dozen books about the case. "Serial Killers" is meant to serve primarily as a textbook, meant to address the needs of police, prosecutors, defense lawyers, politicians, criminologists, journalists and students headed in those directions professionally. Unlike most textbooks, however, it is compellingly readable and otherwise completely accessible to a general audience. Each of the 12 chapters focuses on a specific issue related to the Green River case and to serial-killer investigations generally. Guillen wisely arranges the chapters chronologically as the issues arose during the Green River case, meaning the textbook does double duty as a journalistic report of sorts about a sensational investigation. Here are some of the issues Guillen discusses: - Marginalization of the missing women, in large part because many of them worked as prostitutes. If they had come from more "respectable" professions, law-enforcement agencies might have mounted a more coordinated effort in 1982, perhaps catching Ridgway after a few murders instead of dozens. - The science of preying on women. Although poorly educated and not well-spoken, Ridgway, in his early 30s when the killing started, knew how to lure women into dangerous places. He emerged as a suspect early in the investigation. But police dismissed him and then pretty much forgot him for almost 20 years, believing Ridgway lacked the brains and the smoothness to pull off so many murders without getting caught. - How ill will between journalists and police investigators might have set back solution of the crime, and how it definitely led sometimes to a poorly informed public. - Why so-called experts cannot always be trusted. For example, now-renowned FBI profiler John Douglas issued a completely erroneous opinion during the Green River investigation, after examining an anonymous letter delivered to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Douglas said the letter definitely did not come from the killer. He was wrong, but police did not learn of his mistake until Ridgway's confession 19 years later. - Effective and ineffective interrogation techniques. Police investigators tried to get Ridgway talking about each of his victims by treating him with respect, then, later, by demeaning him. Neither strategy worked well. In the end, Ridgway escaped the death penalty without coming completely clean. - Why some individuals with screwed-up childhoods end up as serial killers, while others overcome the unhappiness to become law-abiding, productive adults. - Whether it is possible for anybody involved, especially the families of the murder victims, to achieve closure when serial killings become known. Guillen says he hopes publication of this book will bring closure for him. I doubt it. (source: The Seattle Times - Steve Weinberg is a freelance investigative reporter in Columbia, Mo., who writes frequently about the criminal justice system) CALIFORNIA: The lethal effect of snitches If the federal court does not stay the execution of Michael Morales, now scheduled for Feb. 21, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger will be faced with his 3rd life-or-death decision in as many months. In December the governor rejected clemency for Stanley Williams, whose plea rested on his redemption based on the good works he had done while on death row. In January Clarence Allen was put to death after the governor rejected his plea for mercy based on his advanced age and poor health. Both men insisted on their innocence despite the fact that both had been convicted of multiple murders. So why should Schwarzenegger grant clemency in this case, when guilt is not contested and neither redemption nor infirmity is the foundation for the request? The answer is that in the case of Morales, the very foundation of the jury's death sentence has collapsed. Even the trial judge, having learned that testimony the jury relied on to impose the death penalty was flawed, has now renounced the jury's verdict and his own part in the process. In a letter dated Jan. 25, 2006, to Schwarzenegger, Judge Charles McGrath (appointed by Ronald Reagan) wrote that if he had known at the time what was later discovered by the Attorney General's Office - that a key witness was lying - he "would not have let the death sentence stand." How did this happen? The short answer is that when Morales was arrested along with his cousin Ricky Ortega for the rape and murder of 17-year-old Terri Winchell and placed in the San Joaquin County Jail, an inmate (and jailhouse informant) named Bruce Samuelson was also a resident there. The use of jailhouse informants is a regular feature of death penalty trials. Samuelson told the jury that Morales had confessed to him in jail, and gave chilling details about how he had planned the murder and how he had boasted about it many months later. At the time of the Morales trial, Samuelson was facing 6 felony charges. But after writing to Morales's prosecutor with a promise that he could provide the evidence that would guarantee a conviction with special circumstances - making Morales eligible for the death penalty - the prosecutor dropped 4 of the 6 charges against him and managed to get court approval of a very light county-jail sentence for the remaining two charges. When asked years later by the attorney general how he'd managed to elicit so much damning information from the accused in a crowded jail cell, without any other inmate hearing the alleged conversations, Samuelson asserted that he and Morales had conducted their confessional sessions in Spanish. There is only one problem with this explanation: Michael Morales, a fourth-generation American, does not speak Spanish. The case of Michael Morales is exactly what executive clemency is designed to address. Schwarzenegger has the power to undo the lethal effects of false testimony - if he has the courage to do the right thing. (source: Pacific News Service - Michael Kroll works with incarcerated juveniles who write for The Beat Within. He is the founding director of the Death Penalty Information Center in Washington, DC.) ******************* Capital Punishment - Key Events 1851 - Legal executions authorized under the Criminal Practices Act of 1851. 1872 - February 14 - Capital punishment authorized in Penal Code. 1891 - Amendments provided for capital punishment to occur inside state prisons. Until 1891, executions were conducted by county sheriffs. No compilation of California executions before 1891 is known to exist. 1893 - March 3- 1st state-conducted execution. Jose GABRIEL, convicted of murdering an aged farm couple, was hanged at San Quentin. Executions (by hanging) were conducted at both existing state prisons - San Quentin and Folsom. 1937 - Legislature replaces hanging with lethal gas as execution method, effective August 27, 1937. 1937 - December 3 - Final execution by hanging at Folsom State Prison. A total of 92 inmates were executed by hanging at Folsom. 1938 - Gas chamber installed at San Quentin. 1938 - December 2 -First executions by lethal gas at San Quentin. Robert Lee CANNON and Albert KESSEL were convicted of the murder of Warden Clarence Larkin. 4 other inmates were also executed in connection with this murder, 3 within 2 weeks. 1941 - November 21 - 1st woman, Eithel Leta Juanita SPINELLI, executed by lethal gas in California. 1942 - May 1- Final execution by hanging at San Quentin. A total of 215 inmates were executed by hanging at San Quentin. 1962 - August 8 - Elizabeth Ann DUNCAN, the last woman to date to be executed by lethal gas. 1967 - April 12 - Aaron MITCHELL, convicted of killing a peace officer during robbery, executed by lethal gas. A total of 194 had been executed by lethal gas, 190 men and 4 women. 1972 - Death sentence declared unconstitutional. 107 taken off condemned status. 1976 - Death sentence declared unconstitutional. 68 taken off condemned status. 1977 - California State Legislature reenacted the death penalty statute. 1978 - November - California voters approve Proposition 7 reaffirming the death penalty. 1992 - April 21- Robert Alton HARRIS, convicted of killing 2 teenagers in San Diego, executed by lethal gas - the 1st California execution in 25 years. 1993 - January 1 - California law changed to allow condemned inmates to choose lethal injection or lethal gas as method of execution. 1995 - October 4. U.S. District Judge, Northern District, ruled the gas chamber was cruel and unusual punishment. The ruling upheld by the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals February 21, 1996. 1996 - February 23 - Serial killer William George BONIN, convicted of sexually assaulting and killing 14 boys in Los Angeles and Orange Counties, was the 1st California inmate executed by lethal injection. (source: ABC News) FLORIDA: Move toward anonymous juries gets boost from Fla. appeals court Seemingly lost in a sensational murder case that featured a videotaped abduction, a fight over crime-scene photos and live television coverage was an appellate court decision that could make it easier for trial judges across the country to seat anonymous juries. The decision in The Sarasota Herald-Tribune v. State was announced by Florida's 2nd District Court of Appeal on Nov. 17, 2005, the same day the jury at issue returned guilty verdicts against Joseph Smith for the February 2004 kidnap, rape and murder of 11-year-old Carlie Brucia in Sarasota. The case drew national attention when police trying to find Brucia released a videotape of her abduction taken by a security camera at a car wash. Brucia's half-naked body was found 4 days later a few miles from the car wash. Photos and a video of the crime scene were at the center of one of the battles between the news media covering the case and trial judge Andrew Owens Jr. Although the photos and video were introduced as evidence in the trial, Owens ruled the media could not view or publish them. 3 newspapers and a television station appealed that ruling, and the 2nd District reversed Owens in part, saying the media could view the evidence but could not publish, broadcast or post it on the Internet. Florida's attorney general then asked the Florida Supreme Court and the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the appellate courts ruling, but both courts refused. Owens' concern about media coverage first surfaced in an order he entered more than 2 weeks before the trial began. In the order, Owens barred court personnel from releasing the names, addresses and other identifying information of potential jurors, prohibited the media from publishing names and addresses of potential jurors, required that prospective jurors and the jurors ultimately selected be identified only by an assigned number and barred the media from photographing or videotaping the faces of prospective or seated jurors. The Sarasota Herald-Tribune, Tampa Tribune and WFLA-TV challenged Owens' order, claiming it violated their First Amendment rights and constituted an improper prior restraint. Interestingly, however, they told the appellate court they did not intend to publish jurors' names and addresses or release photographs of them during the trial. Therefore, the appellate court noted, the appeal was filed "more as a matter of principle and as academic exercise rather than from a genuine need and desire to publish information [the media] has determined to be vital to its readers or viewers." The appellate court also noted the appeal had not been filed until after "the jury had been selected and had already been promised by the trial court that its privacy would be protected" and after Owens had decided to not sequester the jury. Still, the appellate court reversed parts of Owens order. The trial judge, it said, could not constitutionally prohibit the media from publishing information about jurors that the media learned from sources outside the courthouse. Nor could the trial judge restrict the publication of information about or photographs of jurors after the trial had concluded. Finally, the appellate court said, Owens - after the jury was seated - could not prohibit the media from contacting or publishing information about persons who had been called but not chosen for the jury. While the appellate court's decision was a partial victory for the media, the part that was a defeat is more significant. No doubt aided by the media's curious admission that they wouldnt use the information anyway, the appellate court crafted a defense of anonymous juries that will likely be used against more aggressive members of the media for years to come. Not surprisingly, the court's defense of anonymous juries includes words that have made First Amendment advocates cringe for more than 10 years: "Since the trial of O.J. Simpson," the court said, "we have known that judges, lawyers, and expert witnesses can easily become household names and celebrities by virtue of a well-publicized trial." When courts facilitate this publicity by allowing live television coverage, the 2nd District Court reasoned, they should protect jurors from media attention. "[C]itizens who are compelled to serve as jurors would seem to be entitled to some degree of protection when the government partners with the media to transform a courtroom into a live television show, supplemented by a large number of multimedia internet sites." The notion that live coverage transforms a trial into a television show was central to the courts ruling. "The cable television industry has come to realize that the public, including people far from Sarasota County, Florida, will view a trial not merely to assure that both sides receive a fair trial, but as a form of informative entertainment," the court said. "Mr. Smiths trial, however, from his perspective, is not a matter of informative entertainment. He has a constitutional right to a fair trial by a jury uninfluenced by matters or people outside the courtroom. "Likewise, the jurors did not come to the courthouse to be celebrity guests on a reality TV show. Because they are adults with drivers licenses, they received an order of court compelling them to appear. They are obeying the law and performing a valuable public service that many others shirk." Therefore, the court concluded in language that undoubtedly will be cited again and again to support anonymous juries, seating unidentified jurors in highly publicized cases is both necessary and fair. "When a trial becomes such an extraordinary event, the trial court often needs to protect the jury from outside influence," the appellate court says. "Without some protection during the trial, jurors names and faces would be readily recognizable by strangers who see them at the gas station, grocery store, or a restaurant. The likelihood that one or more persons would try to influence their decisions, innocently or otherwise, seems very high." The court's conclusion, however, is flawed in at least two respects. First, a "seems very high" standard is hardly one that supports the denial of important constitutional rights. What should be required instead is evidence - evidence that identified jurors in high-profile cases often are contacted by strangers, evidence that jurors have been influenced by such contact and evidence that the risks associated with such contact are more significant than the risks associated with permitted contact between anonymous jurors and their family, friends and co-workers. No such evidence was presented to the court in this case. Realizing this, the court relied on the 3rd District appellate courts 1998 ruling in Sunbeam Television Corp. v. State, in which the court stated that juror anonymity would protect jurors from "advice," "tips" and unwanted comments and opinions from strangers. The court in Sunbeam Television Corp., however, also was not relying on evidence but instead cited only the trial judge's general concerns about possible efforts to contact identified jurors. Judges therefore are relying only on assumptions and unsupported biases when they determine anonymous juries are necessary. Second, the notion that jurors identities should be protected because jurors are involuntary participants in the process is a dangerously expansive view of the privacy rights of persons involved in highly publicized cases. That logic, for example, can just as easily be applied to a reluctant or fragile witness, whose privacy likely is even more at risk than a juror's. After all, if a juror who appears in response to a jury summons is entitled to anonymity, why isn't a witness who appears in response to a subpoena? And why isn't a defendant - criminal or civil - who probably also considers himself an involuntary participant in the process? One would like to believe that, logical consistency aside, courts seating anonymous juries will not start extending that protection to witnesses and parties. Surely, we'd like to believe, judges see that our open judicial system cannot function if witnesses and parties join jurors behind the cloak of secrecy. However, as long as we allow judges to base these decisions on assumptions - whether they are assumptions about outside influences or about the fragility of those involved in the process - our ability to protect an open judicial system is at considerable risk. (source: First Amendment Center) ILLINOIS: Former officer sues village of Buffalo Grove A former Chicago policeman who served 14 years in prison before being cleared of murder and kidnapping charges has filed a lawsuit against 2 former suburban police officers. Steven Manning says Gary Del Re and Robert Quid used fabricated evidence in a 1991 murder case against Manning. Del Re currently is Lake County sheriff. Neither has commented on the lawsuit, which was filed yesterday. Manning was convicted of taking part in the 1984 kidnapping of 2 reputed Kansas City drug traffickers. Then, he went to death row in the 1990 murder of a suburban Chicago trucking firm owner. The Illinois Supreme Court reversed the murder conviction in 2000. Manning was released from jail last year after an appeal in the Missouri case. (source: The Associated Press)
