March 19 TEXAS: Yates case revisits rigid insanity test----Defense lawyers decry the standard still used in Texas Between 2001 and 2004, 4 Texas women became famous - notorious, actually - for the deaths they inflicted on their children. 2 opted for drowning, 1 grabbed a knife and the other used a heavy rock. But their choice of method was less significant than the method in their madness. All were convinced they were doing right by their children, according to their attorneys. So intense was their disturbed mental state that it was capable of overpowering the strongest, most basic human instinct. In the aftermath of their horrific acts, the most pertinent question was not the most obvious one. Why they did it was not really answerable except in the vaguest of ways: They're insane. Of greater urgency was the one thrown in the lap of the legal system: What to do with them? In each case, prosecutors offered the same response: Try them, convict them, send them to prison - save for the case of Andrea Yates, where they chose the extreme option of attempting to have her executed. Even a Harris County jury would not agree to that, convicting her of capital murder and giving her a life sentence for drowning her children in the bathtub of their Clear Lake home. This week a new jury is expected to begin wrestling with that issue again as Yates stands trial a 2nd time. Her 2002 conviction was thrown out because of erroneous testimony by a psychiatrist. After weeks of legal wrangling and negotiations on a plea deal that would have headed off the new trial, prosecutors and defense attorneys are scheduled to begin jury selection Monday in downtown Houston. Although they won a conviction in the Yates case, prosecutors have had less luck with the others. Deanna Laney, who bludgeoned two sons to death outside of their Tyler home in 2003, was found not guilty by reason of insanity. Lisa Diaz of Plano, who drowned her 2 daughters later that year, received the same verdict. Last month, Dena Schlosser's trial ended in a hung jury, with 11 voting for acquittal. Prosecutors intend to retry Schlosser, also from Plano, who cut off her infant daughter's arms in 2004. "The fact that you have different results in these cases is itself a problem," said Jonathan Turley, a George Washington University law professor who has written about the insanity defense. "I've yet to meet anyone who seriously argues Andrea Yates was not insane. But by sticking to a rigid standard of only knowing right and wrong, you exclude the most common forms of insanity: people responding to evil voices." Damning phone call Texas law requires only that the jury find that the defendant knew his or her conduct was wrong. The fact that Yates called police after drowning her children indicates that, at least, she understood that society considered it wrong. Such knowledge often trumps an otherwise delusional state. "People like Yates may very well be able to articulate that they knew what they were doing was wrong," Turley said, "yet they were unable to keep from yielding to an irresistible impulse." Turley and others argue that the insanity definition should be broadened to where it used to be. Juries used to be allowed to consider irresistible impulse. That was the basis upon which John Hinckley was found not guilty of the attempted assassination of President Reagan. The public response to that verdict spurred lawmakers to make it more difficult for the insanity defense to succeed. Now, defense lawyers face a Herculean task when attempting such a defense, especially if testifying psychiatrists disagree about the defendant's mental condition. 'Real struggle' ahead "It's going to be a real struggle to convince a jury that (Yates) was insane at the time," said Joe Lovelace, who has lobbied the Texas Legislature on behalf of the state chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness. "(Jurors) don't know what happens to a person found not guilty by reason of insanity. All they see are 5 dead kids." NAMI's recent proposals were seemingly modest: Change one word of the insanity definition - from "know" to "appreciate" (the wrongfulness of an act) - and allow juries to be told what happens to a defendant who is found not guilty by reason of insanity. Neither proposal got a warm reception. "They were way too radical for the digestive tract of the Legislature and the governor," Lovelace said. "And the DA's association opposed any changes of what to tell the jury. They're prosecutors. It's their job to prosecute, not make it easy on the defendant, especially when they feel the community demands more." Rob Kepple, executive director of the Texas District and County Attorneys Association, said prosecutors understand they are dealing with a troubled person and not a run-of-the-mill defendant, but their job must override feelings of compassion. "It's a tough situation," said Kepple, a former Harris County prosecutor. "The prosecutor's No.1 duty is to protect people. You've got somebody who's proven that they are capable of killing, not just burglarizing. Everybody is going to be afraid that that person is going to get in that state again and be able to kill." And a murder conviction offers far more assurance than an insanity verdict that the offender is going to be locked up. The latter requires hospitalization and court supervision. If the offender improves over time, however, there is no guarantee of indefinite commitment, even though some recent changes in state law have improved the continuity of local supervision. As to why criminal charges should be pursued against people like these four women in the 1st place, when it is unimaginable that they would have hurt their children had they not been mentally ill, Kepple said it would not be right to substitute a prosecutor's judgment for a jury's. "Our job is to run it up the flagpole and see how much somebody wants to hold them accountable," he said. Mental health and the law Perhaps Yates' conviction and the publicity that attended it made some impact on the jurors in those later cases. Or perhaps it was just the particularities of the evidence, of the appearance of the women, of the uncertain nature of the jury system itself. But the fact that 2 women received not-guilty verdicts, and the other may yet, offers little confidence to defense lawyers. "Cases like this are never going to be easy, no matter what the statutory formulation is," said David Haynes, Schlosser's attorney. "Where mental health meets the law, it's not a smooth junction." Haynes said the rationale behind an insanity defense is betrayed if obviously ill people cannot successfully use it. "The reason we say insanity is a defense is that if you have a diseased mind, you shouldn't be punished as completely blameworthy," he said. "I don't know what to do with these people. We should not say, 'To hell with them, they did a bad act, stuff them in a prison.' Nor do I think we should say, 'Here, you didn't do so good, take your pills and we'll let you go in a few months.'" "They have to be segregated from society to protect society, and get the best kind of treatment we can give them," Haynes said. "And we should house them in a way that is humane, recognizing that what they did is different from those who killed for money or out of anger or whatever." Question of control Some states provide for something close to that with an alternative verdict - guilty except for mental illness, or guilty but insane. But conservative lawmakers, district attorneys and even some mental illness advocacy groups would oppose such a change in Texas. Turley argues that there is no need to go that far. All he pushes for is allowing juries to consider whether defendants were really capable of controlling their actions. "The state would lose nothing," Turley said. "They could still argue the person is faking or not really insane. They could still put on expert witnesses. It simply would remove this artificially rigid test that prevents a jury from reaching a reasonable decision in cases like Andrea Yates.'" (source: Houston Chronicle) FLORIDA: Attorney speaks out against death penalty Days after one of his clients was sentenced to death, assistant public defender Adam Tebrugge spoke to a group of church parishioners on Saturday, telling the audience that life in prison is a better, and more just, punishment. Tebrugge represented Joseph P. Smith, the man sentenced to die Wednesday for the kidnapping, rape and murder of 11-year-old Carlie Brucia. In the Smith case, "If the death penalty had not been in play, the defendant would have walked into court and pleaded guilty," Tebrugge said during his talk Saturday morning at St. Joseph Catholic Church in Bradenton. "There would have been no trial." A defense attorney for 21 years, Tebrugge has made nearly a dozen such appearances in the past year, since he offered to be a guest speaker at local Catholic churches. Tebrugge says the death penalty is a "topic of increasing importance" these days. And it's a bigger issue this year than usual in Manatee and Sarasota counties, where court officials are preparing for as many as 4 death penalty cases. In Manatee, the state is seeking death against three young men -- Blaine Ross, Richard Henderson and Cliff Davis -- who are accused of killing more than one family member in brutal attacks. And in Sarasota, prosecutors want Elton Murphy, who authorities say killed downtown art gallery owner Joyce Wishart, to die for his crime. But death penalty cases often take years to resolve after conviction. Tebrugge said the criminal justice system would be better served by allocating resources to help victims and their families through counseling and other support. A sentence of life with no possibility of parole, he said, means a killer will die behind bars in a "drab and bleak" prison. "Yes, the system achieved its desired goal, but at what cost?" asked Tebrugge, fielding a question Saturday about Smith's death sentence. "The case is just beginning and will continue on." (source: Bradenton Herald) USA: Judge in Moussaoui Trial Faces a Delicate Task----Deciding when attorney who 'tainted' witnesses will testify while keeping jury intact are her foremost concerns. With the sentencing trial for Zacarias Moussaoui stumbling forward again, lawyers for the two sides were sharply at odds Saturday over when a government attorney would testify about why she tried to influence witnesses. The coaching efforts by Carla J. Martin nearly shattered the prosecution's effort to have Moussaoui receive the death penalty for his role in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Defense lawyers want Martin on the stand as soon as Monday in the trial over whether Moussaoui, 37, should be executed or sentenced to life in prison. Prosecutors want to delay Martin's appearance until the middle of the week and have her testify only if she agrees to answer questions about her conduct and not invoke the 5th Amendment against self-incrimination. "We see no reason" to have Martin take the stand "simply to have [her] invoke her rights," prosecutor Robert A. Spencer said in court papers. In the middle of the dispute is Judge Leonie M. Brinkema. Clearly irked by the revelations about Martin early last week, Brinkema has made no secret of her view that the lawyer with the Transportation Security Administration may end up with criminal or civil sanctions for attempting to coach several witnesses. But Brinkema also is trying to keep together a jury that has been left in the dark over the developments in the case - the only one to be tried in the U.S. that stems from the 2001 attacks. Moussaoui pleaded guilty last year to plotting with the hijackers. The government contends he should be put to death because he failed to alert the FBI to the plot, which resulted in the deaths of almost 3,000 people. "I'm fully aware of how important it is for this matter to become resolved," the judge told the prosecution and defense teams in a teleconference session late Friday. "I'm fully aware of the huge resources that have been expended on this case, the fact that we summoned 850 jurors, that we have an excellent jury of 17, and I agree that it would be unfortunate if this case could not go forward .. " One week into the trial, Brinkema abruptly stopped it Monday when word surfaced that Martin had attempted to influence witnesses from the transportation agency and the Federal Aviation Administration. Martin briefly appeared in court on Tuesday but declined to testify and was excused until she could find legal representation. Her newly hired lawyer, Roscoe C. Howard Jr., has since said she was eager to testify but needed some time to prepare. "She is entitled to a fair opportunity to prepare and present her side and a fair judgment of her intentions, her conduct and the conduct of others," Howard said. Brinkema first banned from the trial all testimony and evidence about aviation security because of Martin's action. But the judge scaled back her ruling Friday, allowing prosecutors to present 1 or 2 witnesses on the issue who were not "tainted" by Martin. For prosecutors, that decision drew new breath into their case for the death penalty for Moussaoui. They had told jurors they would prove that, had the French citizen cooperated with the FBI upon his arrest on an immigration violation in August 2001, the government would have tightened airport security across the country. Those measures, prosecutors said, could have prevented hijackers from making it onto the airplanes used in the Sept. 11 attacks. Defense lawyer Edward B. MacMahon Jr. said in court papers that he wanted Martin on the stand after he finished cross-examining FBI Special Agent Harry Samit on Monday morning, which is where the trial left off when it was postponed. He said she should be the next witness before the prosecution brought in any "untainted" witnesses on aviation security because her testimony would provide "critical information" about the nature of the witness-tampering effort. (source: Los Angeles Times) SOUTH DAKOTA: Death penalty foes say their message is more urgent this year A group says it's time to put urgency into its message of opposition to capital punishment because the state's first execution since 1947 has been scheduled. A judge has set the last week of August for the execution of Elijah Page, convicted of the torture slaying of Chester Poage of Spearfish in 2000. Hearings and other legal matters could postpone the execution. Members of the Interfaith Task Force Against the Death Penalty say the execution date has given death penalty foes a new sense of urgency and passion in their fight. They say they hope the news of Page's scheduled execution will prompt a dialogue about the death penalty. "We're no longer talking about something that's 10 years down the road," said group member Karl Kroger. "The real deal is going to take place, and now is the time for us to step out and get the message out: We don't want our government to kill people." People don't think about capital punishment very much unless there's an active case to consider, said Scott Moeller, another member of the group. Group member Mark Sanderson of Sioux Falls said the number of people involved in the anti-death penalty effort tends to change with current events. "The news of this, and being in the front pages of the paper, brings this topic to the forefront," he said. "Maybe this trauma will really hit home for people. We the people of South Dakota are actually killing one of our citizens." The group's 9th-annual vigil at the South Dakota State Penitentiary in Sioux Falls is set for Good Friday, April 14. More than 100 people attended last year. The group also said it might use the state's new abortion ban to try to persuade the governor and legislators to eliminate the death penalty. Religious denominations are divided on capital punishment. Catholic, Methodist and Presbyterian churches generally oppose it, Southern Baptists generally support it, and other denominations vary. Both sides can find Bible verses to back their arguments, said the Rev. Charles Cimpl, pastor at St. Michael Catholic Church in Sioux Falls. "Human life is sacred from conception to natural death," he said. "Anytime we intentionally go against that, we're breaking the dignity of human life." Jesse Moore, pastor at Ridgecrest and Sonrise Southern Baptist churches, said he differs with most in his denomination on the issue. "I looked at the idea of the sanctity of human life, which is where I draw my opposition to abortion," Moore said. "If I'm going to value the life of an unborn child in the womb, I have to give the same value to a life that's outside the womb." Richard Dieter, director of the Death Penalty Information Center in Washington, said debate over the death penalty tends to increase when a state prepares for an execution. "When the death penalty becomes real, it focuses people on the issue," Dieter said. The 1st execution in a long time typically involves someone like Page who asks to waive their appeals, he said. "There's still debate, but it doesn't frame the issue as strongly as someone who's saying the statute is unfair or begging for his life," Dieter said. (source: Associated Press)
