[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----VA., ILL., N.C., LA., CALIF., NEV.

[Rick Halperin]

April 11


VIRGINIA:

Moussaoui Jury Hears the Panic From 9/11


For more than four years they had waited to walk into a courtroom and hold
someone responsible for the wreckage of their lives.

In the long days and nights since Sept. 11, 2001, they testified Monday,
children have spent more time at counseling than school. Parents, unable
to sleep, spent hours in their children's rooms. A young widow gave up her
fight against breast cancer. Another threw herself across her husband's
grave.

Other voices were heard Monday too, the voices - and the final screams -
of the dead.

For the 1st time, the government played 911 audiotapes of two people
trapped inside the World Trade Center, each screaming into the phone as
they tried desperately to summon emergency crews to burning offices high
above Lower Manhattan.

"I'm going to die, aren't I?" cried Melissa Doi, 32, lying across the
floor, trying to find fresh air in a south tower engulfed in smoke and
fire.

Sixteen stories above her, on the 99th floor, Kevin Cosgrove cried, "I'm
not ready to die!"

Emergency dispatchers tried to reassure them. "We're getting there. We're
getting there," they said.

Both callers died in the flames.

So did Peter Hanson, his wife, Sue Kim, and their 2-year-old daughter,
Christine Lee, the youngest to die that morning.

They were trapped on United Airlines Flight 175. Twice he called his
father. In the last call, describing passengers vomiting as the plane
rumbled nearly out of control, he said, "Don't worry, Dad. If it happens,
it will happen quickly."

The testimony and recordings were part of the prosecution's case as it
seeks the death penalty for Zacarias Moussaoui, an admitted terrorist.
Jurors last week concluded that Moussaoui had caused at least one death on
Sept. 11 because of his failure to alert the FBI to the terrorist plot,
making him eligible for execution.

Prosecutors expect to wrap up this final phase of the Moussaoui sentencing
trial Wednesday. Monday was devoted to the victims who died in New York,
and their loved ones. Today the government plans to provide similarly
wrenching testimony from the families of those killed at the Pentagon.

On Wednesday, prosecutors will conclude with testimony from those aboard
the fourth plane that crashed into a field in Pennsylvania. Prosecutors
are expected to play, again for the first time, the cockpit voice
recording that only relatives of the dead have heard.

At the start of testimony Monday, Judge Leonie M. Brinkema acknowledged
that the victim testimony had been heartbreaking. It was difficult to hear
and watch as people repeatedly broke down on the witness stand, she said.

15 relatives of the 2,972 dead testified Monday. Almost all cried. Many
sobbed.

"There's just no way of avoiding some emotion in a case like this," the
judge told the lawyers.

But prosecutors agreed to streamline their victim testimony, and the judge
decided to shorten the workday for jurors this week. "I don't want to wear
the jury out," she said.

The first tape to be played was the cry of Doi, an employee of IQ
Financial at the World Trade Center. Recently the government released
recordings of the dispatchers' voices on the tapes. This time the victims
were heard.

"I'm on the 83rd floor," she screamed. "Are you going to be able to get
somebody up here. We're on the floor and we can't breathe and it's very,
very, very hot."

"Please," she said, over and over. Five co-workers huddled around her.
"Everybody's having trouble breathing. Some people are worse."

A dispatcher asked how much smoke there was. "Of course there's smoke,"
she snapped. "I can't breathe. There is fire because it's hot.. Help help
help!"

The firefighters have been notified, the dispatcher said. But Doi was not
hopeful.

"I'm going to die, aren't I?" she screamed into the phone. "I'm going to
die. I'm going to die. I don't want to die.. It's so hot. I'm burning up..
Oh my God!"

On Floor 99, Cosgrove could not get out either. Forty-six years old, he
worked as a claims vice president for the Aon Corp. Three times he called
911. On the last call he could barely be heard because there was so much
yelling behind him.

"We're getting there. We're getting," the dispatcher told him.

Cosgrove could be heard breathing. Hard. Panting into the phone. "I need
oxygen," he screamed. "I'm not ready to die." Then abruptly came shouts
about broken windows, one long wrenching scream, what appeared to be many
voices, and then silence.

Peter Hanson's 2 calls from the plane were described by his father, C. Lee
Hanson. In the 1st call, Peter was calm.

"He told us the plane had been hijacked," his father told the jury. "His
voice was soft, not too nervous. He told me that they stabbed somebody up
front. He asked me to call United Airlines and tell them it had been
hijacked."

Lee Hanson called the airline, but could not get through. He alerted his
local police department in Connecticut. Peter called back.

"He thought a stewardess had been killed," his father said. "He said
certainly somebody else was piloting the plane. He said it was a very
bumpy ride and people were throwing up all over the place. He said he
thought they were going to crash the plane into a building."

He heard Peter say, "Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God." The father said: "I
thought I heard somebody scream in the background too. I looked at the TV
and saw the plane fly into the World Trade Center."

Mary Ellen Salamone of New Jersey knew her husband, John, worked high up
in the World Trade Center. He was a stockbroker for Cantor Fitzgerald.
Hearing nothing from him, she said, she tried repeatedly to reach him.

"I called him a million times. I was so desperate to talk to him, to tell
him I loved him before he died."

She never got through. Neither did John when he tried leaving a phone
message at home. "He called about 10:10," she said. "But it was just
static."

She was among those who identified the photographs displayed by
prosecutors, pictures from wedding albums, from birthday celebrations and
family vacations to China, from trips to the neighborhood swimming pool
and a Yankees game.

Some could hardly hold their right arms straight up to take the oath,
their hands shaking so badly. Some drank water from a small cup when the
memories overtook them, or buried their faces in tissue. Many left the
witness stand emotionally wrought but also, it seemed, relieved.

"Today is closure for me on many levels," said Ronald Hans Clifford.

He is an Irish immigrant living in New Jersey. He happened to be in the
World Trade Center courtyard, and tried to help a woman badly burned
there. All the time he was unaware that his sister and niece were aboard
the 2nd plane that hit the 2nd tower above him.

"I had no clue," he said.

The burned woman he tried to save, Jeannieann Maffeo, was 40 and lived in
agony for another 41 days in a New York burn center. Clifford did not know
that either; he could only recall how together they recited the Lord's
Prayer until he and others could get her to an ambulance.

Salamone, in her testimony, told the jury she realized she was part of a
much larger drama that day.

"I'm not the only widow in the world who had young children. I know that,"
she said. "There are so many 9/11 stories. People with ideal families and
ideal stories, and it's such a tragedy that such happiness ended."

(source: Los Angeles Times)

*******************

Moussaoui Jury Hears From Grieving Families, and From Victims Themselves


The jurors who will soon decide whether Zacarias Moussaoui is to be
executed or spend the remainder of his life in prison were confronted on
Monday with a steady stream of anguished testimony from surviving family
members of those killed on Sept. 11, 2001.

The prosecutors, who are seeking the death penalty, presented 15
witnesses, nearly all of whom testified at some point through sobs and
tears. By the time the Justice Department ends its case Wednesday, some
three dozen such witnesses will have testified as part of an effort to
impress on the jurors the enduring pain and grief the terror attacks
produced.

Among them was C. Lee Hanson of Connecticut, who spoke about the loss of
his son, Peter; his daughter-in-law, Sue Kim; and his granddaughter,
Cristine Lee, 2, the youngest casualty of Sept. 11.

Mr. Hanson described talking with his son, who was using his cellphone on
one of the hijacked planes, and simultaneously watching events unfold on
television. Mr. Hanson said his son told him that he believed the
hijackers were "trying to crash the plane into a building," and that he
added, "Don't worry, Dad. If it happens, it will be quick."

Mr. Hanson testified that he then heard his son say "Oh my God" three
times, and that a moment later, he saw the plane, United Airlines Flight
175, crash into the World Trade Center on his television. He described his
anguish when investigators were able to return to him only a small bone
fragment of his son.

While the testimony throughout the day produced sadness among the
spectators and some jurors, prosecutors presented additional evidence that
produced a more chilling effect: the audiotapes of two doomed people
trapped in the towers as they pleaded with 911 operators to send help.

Unlike the tape recordings recently released by the New York City
authorities, the 2 samples played Monday included the voices of the
callers, not just those of the operators.

In one tape, Kevin Cosgrove, 46 and the father of 3, who called 911 from
the 105th floor of the south tower, said, "We're not ready to die, but
it's getting bad." A moment later, he said, "Oh, please hurry; I've got
young kids."

The tape was played for the jury as a photograph of Mr. Cosgrove was
displayed on screens in the courtroom, along with scenes of the burning
towers synchronized to the time of his call. In the final snippet of
conversation, Mr. Cosgrove said, "Oh my God, ohhh," as the tower started
to collapse at 9:58 a.m.

The other audiotape was of Melissa C. Doi, 32, a financial manager who
worked on the 83rd floor of the south tower. Ms. Doi told the operator
that she was with 5 others and repeatedly said, "It's so hot; it's very,
very hot."

At one point, she told the operator, "All I see is smoke; I'm going to
die."

The operator replied: "No, no, no. Say your prayers."

Unlike what happened in the earlier stages of the tragedy, when 911
operators were rushed and tried to take other calls, in this instance, the
operator remained on the phone with Ms. Doi for 4 minutes.

Prosecutors later this week will play the cockpit tapes from United Flight
93, which crashed in a Pennsylvania field after passengers overwhelmed the
hijackers. Judge Leonie M. Brinkema ruled Monday that the transcript of
the recordings would be made public, but that the audiotapes would not be,
as some family members had filed objections with her.

Mr. Moussaoui has pleaded guilty to conspiracy in connection with the
Sept. 11 attacks. Although he was in jail when they occurred, this jury
has already found that he was responsible for at least some of the deaths
that day because he concealed his knowledge about Al Qaeda's plans to fly
planes into buildings.

In the current phase of Mr. Moussaoui's sentencing trial, the prosecution
is presenting evidence and testimony meant to show that the heinous nature
of the crimes of Sept. 11 makes him deserving of execution.

During Monday's testimony, Mr. Moussaoui sat silently and appeared to shed
his usual posture of indifference. He paid close attention to many of the
witnesses, particularly to Sharif Chowdhury, who could barely be heard as
he testified that his faith in Islam had helped him deal with the deaths
of his son and daughter-in-law in the World Trade Center. Mr. Chowdhury
was the only witness who seemed to make a point of glaring at Mr.
Moussaoui when he walked by him.

Defense lawyers had objected in a sealed motion to the prosecution's
presentation last week, arguing that some of it was overdramatized, both
in the questions to the witnesses and in the parade of photographs of the
victims, including children.

Judge Brinkema, referring to the sealed pleading, said that the defense
had raised "significant issues" about the appropriateness of the
presentation, especially as Mr. Moussaoui was facing a death sentence. She
said that prosecutors had not yet behaved improperly, but she asked that
they limit themselves to five photographs for each witness.

She also said that last Thursday, a prosecutor should not have asked the
brother of a woman who hanged herself after her husband died in the
attacks about the fate of their uncle. The uncle died of a heart attack on
his way back to India, and Judge Brinkema said there was no way to know
why his heart had failed.

Court-appointed defense lawyers, with whom Mr. Moussaoui does not speak,
are likely to begin their case on Thursday. They are expected to say he
should not be sentenced to death because he is mentally unbalanced and is
seeking the martyrdom that execution would provide.

The jury is supposed to weigh the aggravating factors like those presented
by the prosecution's witnesses against the defense's mitigating factors,
and to choose between death or life in prison. Judge Brinkema is obliged
to impose a death sentence if that is the unanimous decision of the jury.

(source: New York Times)






ILLINOIS:

Thompson sentence upheld----Convicted triple murderer will face execution


In Springfield, the Illinois Supreme Court on Monday upheld the death
sentence of triple-murderer Curtis Thompson, who killed a sheriff's deputy
and a married couple in Stark County 4 years ago.

In a 5-1 decision, the court rejected Thompson's argument that he acted
under an extreme mental disturbance at the time of the March 22, 2002,
murders.

Thompson, then 60, used a sawed-off shotgun in the slayings of Deputy Adam
Streicher and James and Janet Giesenhagen, all in Toulon. Streicher had
been trying to serve Thompson with a misdemeanor arrest warrant, and
Thompson had feuded with the Giesenhagens for years.

Thompson's attorneys presented an insanity defense at his 2003 trial, but
jurors opted against it. Circuit Judge Scott Shore sentenced him to death.

Most of the Supreme Court agreed that Thompson's conduct was "the
culmination of an escalating pattern of violence against citizens in the
community of Toulon," according to the majority opinion written by Chief
Justice Robert Thomas. Even if Thompson had "a significant psychological
disorder," Shore properly determined that the death penalty could be
imposed in the case, the opinion said.

Thompson's attorney, Charles Hoffman, had tried to convince the Supreme
Court that his client does not deserve a death sentence because he is
mentally ill. Monday's ruling is disappointing, he said.

Thompson "is not among the worst-of-the-worst hardened criminals for whom
the death penalty is supposedly reserved," Hoffman said. Rather,
Thompson's crimes "were the product of his serious mental illness."

The Supreme Court set an execution date of Sept. 12 for Thompson, but
Hoffman said his client would not face a lethal injection on that day. Any
execution date will remain on hold while Thompson continues to pursue
further appeals, a process that likely will take years, Hoffman said.

Justice Mary Ann McMorrow dissented from the majority, saying that
imposing the death penalty against Thompson "would be fundamentally unjust
in this case."

"There is no dispute that the defendant was suffering from a mental
disorder at the time of the offenses he committed," she wrote in her
dissent. The three experts testifying at Thompson's trial disagreed only
about whether he suffers from a "delusional disorder of the persecutory
type" or a paranoid personality disorder, she added.

Thompson did not have a significant prior criminal history, and he
displayed "positive attributes," such as sending his 3 children to
college, McMorrow wrote.

"In my view, this evidence demonstrates that the crimes committed by the
defendant were aberrant events fueled by his unstable mental condition,"
she added.

(source: Peoria Journal-Star)






NORTH CAROLINA:

'No pain' directive may stop execution----Order may require a doctor or
nurse


A federal judge has ordered North Carolina prison officials to make sure a
death row inmate is unconscious and unable to feel pain during his
execution -- a requirement that has halted executions elsewhere.

U.S. District Judge Malcolm J. Howard wants prison officials to tell him
by noon Wednesday how they will comply with his order, issued Friday. It
requires the presence of medically trained personnel to ensure that Willie
Brown Jr. is unconscious during his execution, scheduled for April 21.

Experts say an anesthesiologist or a nurse anesthetist under a doctor's
supervision could do what Howard has ordered. That means North Carolina
might find itself in a predicament akin to California's two months ago,
when an inmate's execution was derailed.

In February, California prison officials couldn't find anesthesiologists
willing to make sure Michael Morales, a rapist and killer, was unconscious
when paralyzing and heart-stopping drugs were administered. Citing ethical
concerns, doctors refused to participate, and Morales wasn't executed.

Similar challenges have halted executions in Florida and New Jersey, and
the U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to decide whether inmates can challenge
the lethal injection protocols apart from their death penalty appeals.

"This puts us right in the middle of the national debate," said Rich
Rosen, a University of North Carolina law professor and a death penalty
opponent.

Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center
in Washington, cautions that lethal injection has not been outlawed.

"Judges are saying we want to know more. This is a serious issue,
deserving more information from the state," Dieter said.

On Monday, prison officials and their lawyers were reviewing the order and
declined to comment.

Brown, 61, was sentenced to death for the 1983 murder of Vallerie Ann
Roberson Dixon, a convenience store clerk in Williamston. Brown had robbed
the Zip Mart early one March morning, made off with $90 and kidnapped
Dixon. He took her to a logging road, made her lie down in the dirt and
shot her 6 times.

Brown is 1 of 2 inmates facing execution soon. Jerry Wayne Conner, 40, is
scheduled to die by lethal injection May 12 for the murder of a mother and
her 16-year-old daughter in Gates County. Conner's lawyers have raised the
suffering issue in a federal lawsuit.

Pain is debated

Brown's lawsuit challenges the state's drug protocol for executions.
Inmates are given a series of 3 drugs: 1 to put them to sleep, 1 to
paralyze them and 1 to kill them.

Brown's lawyers, J. Donald Cowan Jr. and Laura M. Loyek, say inmates may
not be sedated enough by the 1st drug. Therefore, they say, inmates may
experience intense pain but are paralyzed and unable to communicate their
agony. They cite testimony from witnesses who say prisoners appeared to
struggle before death.

Winston-Salem lawyer Kim Stevens described in an affidavit what she saw
when she witnessed the execution of John Dennis Daniels in November 2003:
"All of a sudden, he started to convulse, violently. He sat up and gagged.
We could hear him through the glass. A short time later, he sat up and
gagged and choked again and struggled with his arms under the sheet. He
appeared to me to be in pain."

Cowan and Loyek included toxicology reports from the state's last four
executions showing that post-mortem levels of the sedative varied. Howard,
the judge, noted that the toxicology reports contradicted the levels
predicted by the state's expert who testified that the inmates were
unlikely to experience pain.

Though several lawsuits have challenged the state's method of lethal
injection, this is the 1st time a judge has reviewed toxicology data.
"Serious questions have been raised by the evidence concerning the effect
of the current execution protocol," Howard wrote. "If the alleged
deficiencies do, in fact, result in inadequate anesthesia prior to
execution, there is no dispute that Brown will suffer excruciating pain."

Will doctors help?

But whether prison officials will be able to enlist doctors to provide
adequate anesthesia during executions is unclear. Prison doctors monitor
inmates' heart rates during executions, which violates ethical guidelines
set by the American Medical Association. The AMA opposes most physician
participation in executions.

However, national and state professional anesthesiologist groups have not
taken a position in the matter. Some doctors might not have any ethical
problem with participating in an execution, said Dr. Richard J. Pollard,
president of the N.C. Society of Anesthesiologists.

Pollard, a Charlotte physician, also said: "I don't think you are going to
find a bunch of anesthesiologists lining up to take part in this."

Dick Adams, an advocate for crime victims, said this is part of the
continuing effort by some to end the death penalty.

"It's time that he pay his price to society," Adams said.

In 1992, Adams witnessed the execution of John S. Gardner, who murdered
Adams' son and a girl in 1982. Adams didn't see any evidence that Gardner
experienced a painful death.

"He went to sleep very, very, very peacefully," Adams said.

(source: The News & Observer)

*************

Lethal injection issues halt a N.C. execution ----U.S. district judge
cites local ruling, defers death penalty


A San Jose federal judge's order halting a California execution because of
questions about the state's lethal injection process has become the
precedent for a similar court intervention in North Carolina.

Citing the San Jose ruling as persuasive, U.S. District Judge Malcolm
Howard told North Carolina prison officials Friday that they could proceed
with inmate Willie Brown Jr.'s execution April 21 only if someone with
medical training is present to make sure Brown is unconscious when
potentially painful drugs are injected.

As in the California case, Howard said records and observations of
executions in his state suggested there were problems with the
administration of lethal injections. He cited lawyers' accounts of
prisoners apparently writhing in pain on the execution table.

Howard gave North Carolina officials until Wednesday to identify medically
trained personnel who would attend the execution -- notwithstanding
medical associations' codes of ethics, which oppose doctors' participation
in executions. Noelle Talley, spokeswoman for state Attorney General Roy
Cooper, said Monday that officials were still reviewing the ruling and had
not decided how to respond.

Mike Edwards, spokesman for the North Carolina Medical Society, said the
organization, with 12,000 physician members, followed the American Medical
Association ethical code against doctors taking part in executions. The
code is not legally binding, however.

North Carolina executed five inmates in 2005 and has put 2 more to death
this year. California has executed 3 in the same period.

Howard's ruling was the first in the nation to rely on U.S. District Judge
Jeremy Fogel's unprecedented decision to require medical monitoring of
lethal injection, the method of execution used by 37 of the 38 states with
death penalty laws. When California officials were unable to comply, Fogel
granted a stay of execution to Michael Morales of Stockton, who had been
scheduled to die Feb. 21 for the 1981 rape and murder of 17-year-old Terri
Winchell.

Fogel has scheduled a hearing for May 2-3 in San Jose to determine whether
California's lethal injection procedures pose a significant risk of
causing severe pain, in violation of the constitutional ban on cruel and
unusual punishment.

In response to his February ruling, the state has altered its procedures
to require continuous infusion of a powerful sedative, sodium pentothal,
to keep the prisoner unconscious throughout the execution. Neither the
former procedures nor the revision provides for a doctor's participation.

John Grele, a lawyer for Morales, said the North Carolina ruling indicates
"the courts are beginning to understand that the lethal injection process
is much more problematic than it seems on the surface."

Senior Assistant Attorney General Dane Gillette, death penalty coordinator
in Attorney General Bill Lockyer's office, said he was unaware of Howard's
ruling. But he said one piece of evidence cited by the North Carolina
judge -- postmortem tests showing a lower-than-expected level of sodium
pentothal in the blood of an executed prisoner -- had been "pretty well
discredited'' because of the timing of the tests.

Brown, the North Carolina inmate, was convicted of fatally shooting a
clerk during a 1983 convenience store robbery. As in Morales' case, his
lawyers argued that an inadequate or improperly administered initial dose
of sodium pentothal may leave the inmate conscious and in pain during
subsequent injections of paralyzing and heart-stopping chemicals.

After reviewing blood tests, eyewitness accounts and testimony from the
same expert witness used by the state in the Morales case, Howard said in
Friday's ruling that "serious questions have been raised by the evidence.
If the alleged deficiencies do, in fact, result in inadequate anesthesia
prior to execution, there is no dispute that Brown will suffer
excruciating pain."

(source: San Francisco Chronicle)






LOUISIANA:

2 accused of killing girl won't face death penalty


The death penalty will not be sought against 2 of 3 men accused of killing
a 13-year-old girl after she refused to have sex with them, according to a
court filing.

Herbert L. Prejean, Thornton Gross and Joseph G. James are charged with
1st-degree murder in the October 2004 beating death of Alexuia Feast,
whose body was discovered in a wooded area.

Prosecutor Floyd Johnson has opted not to pursue the death penalty against
Gross, 36, or James, 39, if the men are convicted, according to a formal
notice filed in court Monday. Johnson refused to comment on his decision.

Johnson said he has not decided whether he would seek the death penalty
against Prejean, 31, who was engaged to Feast's sister at the time of the
attack. In an unrelated capital rape case, Prejean is accused of raping a
young girl at a motel where he had taken her to swim in the summer of
2004.

Separate trials have been ordered for the 3 men, starting with Gross on
May 1.

(source: Associated Press)






CALIFORNIA:

High court upholds death penalty in 1986 C.V. murder


The California Supreme Court on Monday upheld the death penalty for a San
Francisco man who killed a Castro Valley woman in 1986 with her own
shotgun after breaking into her house.

Michael Huggins was convicted in Alameda County Superior Court of
murdering Sarah Anne Lees at her house in Castro Valley on March 8, 1986.

The jury also found special circumstances that the murder was committed
during a burglary, robbery and rape or attempted rape. The special
circumstances provided the basis for a death penalty verdict.

The original trial jury deadlocked in 1990 on whether to give the death
sentence, but a 2nd jury ruled in 1993 that Huggins should be executed.

At the time of the murder, Huggins had escaped from a California Youth
Authority work crew that was working near Lees' house.

Prosecutors theorized at the trial that Huggins broke into her home,
robbed her of her shotgun and shot her to death at close range. Huggins
claimed he killed her accidentally after she returned home unexpectedly.

The state high court upheld the death penalty by a 5-2 vote, rejecting a
series of arguments in which Huggins claimed there were errors in his
trial.

Justices Joyce Kennard and Kathryn Werdegar said in a dissent that the
trial judge might have made a crucial mistake by leaving out a phrase in
jury instructions during a mental competency trial for Huggins in 1987.
The jury in that proceeding found Huggins competent to stand trial for the
murder.

Kennard and Werdegar said the case should be sent back to Superior Court
to determine what was actually said during the instructions. But the
members of the court majority, in a decision by Justice Carlos Moreno,
said they could "conclude with confidence" that a standard written
instruction was read correctly by the judge and that the court
stenographer made a mistake in transcription.

Huggins now can appeal in the federal court system.

(source: Chico Enterprise Record)




NEVADA:

Nevada court orders new hearing in death penalty case


A man sentenced to death for murdering his ex-girlfriend in Las Vegas --
after he was mistakenly released from jail -- has won a new penalty
hearing from the Nevada Supreme Court.

The high court also says 2 aggravating circumstances brought up by
prosecutors in efforts to get the 1st death sentence can't be used again.
That still leaves a 3rd "aggravator," that the murder was committed while
James Chappell was trying to sexually assault Deborah Panos.

Panos, the mother of Chappell's three children, was stabbed repeatedly
with a kitchen knife in 1995. His lawyer said Chappell acted in the heat
of passion after becoming enraged about a love-letter Panos got from
another man.

Chappell had been in jail as a result of several charges, including a
domestic violence allegation.

Following a court hearing on the day of the murder, he was supposed to go
to a drug treatment program. Instead, he wound up on the street.

(source: Associated Press)