[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----CALIF., LA., NEB.

[Rick Halperin]

Sept. 25



CALIFORNIA:

New Journal Lends Victims a Voice


Today, the Institute for the Advancement of Criminal Justice (IACJ)
announced the release of the first of many compelling stories that will be
posted to the Victim's Voice Webpage (
http://www.iacj.org/VictimVoices.htm) in connection with the recent
publication of The Death Penalty in California, the most comprehensive
look at the death penalty in California to date.

Too often, victims voices, especially those whose murderers now sit on
death row, are hidden behind those of death penalty abolitionists and the
voice of murderers themselves during news coverage and on Websites and
blogs. IACJ seeks to give victims that voice -- a place to express their
feelings about their loss and their views on capitol punishment in
California.

"No decision by a prosecutor carries more gravity of purpose or duty than
to seek death," wrote Greg Totten, Ventura County District Attorney in The
Death Penalty in California. "That is why our exercise of discretion has
consistently reserved the death penalty for only the worst of the worst
crimes and murderers."

As Barbara Christian, mother of Terri Lynn Winchell, points out in her
statement, her daughter's killer falls in to that category.

"As long as the murderer is alive and breathing, the crime scene is
replayed constantly before the eyes of the loved ones of the victim,"
wrote Christian. "Let these victims see the case closed, and put to rest
the murder scene. The pain and loss will never end, but they can rest by
realizing that justice has been served."

Her daughter's life was ended by Michael Morales more than 27 years ago in
Woodbridge, Calif. Christian writes about the painful details that are now
often left out of news coverage and high level discussions relating to the
death penalty and the legality surrounding its implementation.

"Morales tried to strangle her with his leather belt which she broke by
fighting so hard for her life in that car. Her thick, lustrous hair was
pulled out in chunks from her scalp as he beat her head in 27 times with a
claw hammer, her body stabbed repeatedly with a butcher knife, and then
her body thrown out in the cold dark night where she was raped repeatedly
as she died. This scene I have lived with now for 27 years," she wrote.

Morales was scheduled to be executed more than 2 years ago, but just 2
hours before his scheduled execution, 2 court-appointed anesthesiologists
withdrew from the procedure, refusing to administer the lethal injection
and forced the state to call off the execution.

The US Supreme Court has ruled that lethal injection procedures are legal,
however, California's lethal injection process is still being heard in the
California Court of Appeals. If the death penalty is reinstated in
California, Morales is presumed to be the next inmate executed.

Unfortunately, Christian is just one of the victims of more than 650
condemned inmates on death row. IACJ will continue to give victims a voice
on its Website until their voices are as loud as those of the convicted
criminals.

Please check in each week as IACJ publishes a new statement by a victim of
a California capital punishment case.

For Christian's complete story and for more information on The Death
Penalty in California, please visit www.iacj.org.

Interview requests should be directed to Mitch Zak at (916) 448-5802.

[SOURCE: Institute for the Advancement of Criminal Justice]

(source: Market Watch)





LOUISIANA:

Serial killer gets 8 life sentences for killing 23 men in South Louisiana


Serial killer Ronald Dominique, 44, exits a Terrebonne Parish courtroom
Tuesday after pleading guilty to 8 counts of 1st-degree murder. Dominique
is suspected of killing as many as 23 men in south Louisiana over a
10-year period.

A Terrebonne Parish man suspected of killing as many as 23 men in south
Louisiana over nearly 10 years -- including 6 in St. Charles Parish --
pleaded guilty Tuesday to 8 counts of 1st-degree murder.

Ronald Dominique, 44, of Bayou Blue was sentenced to serve 8 consecutive
life terms. He pleaded guilty to first-degree murder in a deal to avoid
the death penalty.

Terrebonne Parish District Attorney Joe Waitz Jr. says Dominique's guilty
pleas were reached after consulting with the families of the eight
victims, all of whom were thought to have been killed in Terrebonne
Parish.

Dominique was arrested in December 2006 on a Jefferson Parish warrant at a
homeless shelter in Houma after DNA evidence apparently linked him to a
murder in Terrebonne Parish.

Once arrested, authorities say, Dominique confessed to several murders
that occurred between July 1997 and July 2005, offering information they
say only the killer would have known.

St. Charles Parish authorities think Dominique might be responsible for 6
killings there during that time frame.

Sheriff Greg Champagne said Tuesday that he will consult with the district
attorney's office to inspect the confessions to see whether the St.
Charles Parish cases will be prosecuted.

"I hope the rest of his life is miserable, considering what he has done to
other people, " Champagne said.

3 of the victims found in St. Charles -- David Mitchell Jr., Gary Pierre
and Larry Ranson -- were St. Charles residents. Champagne has said he
thinks the other 3 -- Anoka Jones, Larry Mathews and Alonzo Hogan -- were
killed elsewhere and dumped in St. Charles.

Champagne has said Mitchell, whose body was found in Hahnville in 1997,
might have been the 1st of the serial killer's victims. Authorities have
said Dominique held a variety of low-paying jobs and lured his victims
with the promise of sex in exchange for money, or by showing them a
picture of an attractive woman, supposedly his wife, and saying he wanted
them to have sex with her.

Once he got the victim to his house, he would ask to tie him up, Dominique
said in his statement to police after he was arrested. If the victim
agreed, he then raped and eventually killed him to avoid arrest. Men who
refused to be tied up were allowed to leave unharmed.

Many of the bodies were found dumped in sugar cane fields and near bayous.
Many did not have shoes, a connection that helped police tie cases
together.

Almost 30 relatives of Dominique's Terrebonne victims attended Tuesday's
hearing, crying and wrapping arms around one another for support.

Dominique sat with his head down and turned away from the relatives as
some of them testified about the effect the slayings had on their
families. He answered "Yes, sir, " and "No, sir, " to the judge's
questions and refused to make a statement.

Shackled at the waist and feet, he stood hunched over with his head bowed
as state District Judge Randy Bethancourt read the sentences and names of
the 8 young men he raped and killed in Terrebonne Parish during the nearly
decade-long spree.

"The lives of 8 young men were taken from these families by the actions of
the defendant, " Assistant District Attorney Mark Rhodes said before
sentencing. "He knew nothing about them or their families, and he
callously killed the victims and left a lifetime of pain as their legacy."

(source: Times-Picayune)






NEBRASKA:

Dell Rapids native convicted of murder in racially charged Omaha slaying
case


A Douglas County jury has convicted a 20-year-old Omaha man of 2nd-degree
murder in what prosecutors said was the racially motivated shooting death
of a 21-year-old woman.

The verdict delivered Thursday means Kyle Bormann will not face the death
penalty, as prosecutors had sought.

Bormann was found guilty of fatally shooting 21-year-old Brittany Williams
as she waited in a fast-food restaurant drive-through lane. Williams was a
student at the University of Nebraska at Omaha.

Investigators have said Bormann, who is originally from South Dakota, was
sitting in his car 100 to 200 yards away from the restaurant when he
fired.

Prosecutors had argued that Bormann shot Williams because she was black;
Bormann is white.

(source: Argus Leader)