[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, CALIF., TENN., USA, KY.

[Rick Halperin]

April 10


TEXAS:

Condemned man in Dallas County case loses federal appeal


A Dallas-area man sent to death row for the robbery-slaying of his former
girlfriend 9 years ago has lost an appeal of his conviction.

The rejection by the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans
moves Robert Jean Hudson closer to his execution. He argued that his trial
lawyer was ineffective, the Dallas County sheriff's department had
forcibly medicated him during his capital murder trial, and a lower
appeals court improperly followed the law when it denied him a hearing.

The Irving man was convicted of the May 1999 fatal stabbing of 35-year-old
Edith Kendrick at her apartment in Mesquite. The attack also left her
8-year-old son severely stabbed.

Hudson still could appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. The justices have
effectively stopped all executions while it considers whether lethal
injection procedures like those used in Texas are constitutionally proper.
Hudson hasn't had an execution date set.

(source: Associated Press)

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

Rodriguez set for another step toward death row


9 days after a Randall County jury sentenced Rosendo Rodriguez III to
death, Judge Jim Bob Darnell will formally sentence him today in the 140th
District Court.

Rodriguez was convicted last month of capital murder for the rape and
murder of Summer Baldwin and the death of her unborn son in 2005.

Rodriguez killed Baldwin in a Lubbock hotel room after having sex with the
29-year-old.

He then stuffed her in a suitcase, threw her in a Dumpster and ate a
couple of fast-food value meals.

After convicting him, jurors learned during the punishment phase of the
trial of Rodriguez's history of rape and violence.

5 women, including his high-school girlfriend, testified he had raped
them.

The girlfriend said he also became violent at times, once dragging her
from a lake house through the gravel to a parked car.

The gruesome trial lasted almost a week and a half, culminating in
Rodriguez's death sentence and the jury finding out that he also confessed
to killing Joanna Rogers, a Lubbock teen who went missing in 2004.

Today Darnell will read the judgment and Rodriguez will be fingerprinted.

(source: Avalanche-Journal)






CALIFORNIA:

Jury orders death penalty for handyman


Paul Wesley Baker had been convicted of sexually assaulting and killing a
grandmother and dumping her body near Palm Springs. 'He is a monster,'
says the lead detective in the case.

A Van Nuys jury Wednesday ordered the death penalty for a handyman
convicted of sexually assaulting 3 women, including a grandmother whom he
killed and whose body he dumped in a desolate area of Palm Springs.

The decision comes less than a week after Paul Wesley Baker, 47, disrupted
the death penalty portion of his trial when he smeared his feces over his
face and had to be temporarily removed from the courtroom, authorities
said.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Gretchen Ford said the disturbance Friday was a failed
attempt to influence the jury. Ford said she was telling jurors about the
murder victim and several were crying when Baker acted out.

"It was timed perfectly," Ford said, adding that Baker has reported having
hallucinations while in jail.

Anthony R. Garcia, one of Baker's defense attorneys, said he was
disappointed with Wednesday's decision. Garcia had argued that Baker was
severely abused as a child by his parents and stepfather and did not
deserve the death penalty.

He questioned whether the disturbance had influenced the jury. "How does
one disregard an outburst like that?" he asked. "That paints a picture
that words cannot."

During the five-month trial, prosecutors presented DNA evidence linking
Baker to the murder of his former girlfriend, Judy Palmer, 60.

Palmer went missing from her Reseda apartment in April 2004. Her body,
bound with rope, was discovered a month later near Interstate 10. Her body
had decomposed so rapidly in the desert heat that an autopsy could not
determine how she died.

Prosecutors said that Palmer, clean and sober for 28 years, had been a
sponsor to countless other addicts.

"She was more than just a kind, mature grandmotherly figure. She was an
inspiration to people," Ford said.

Los Angeles Police Department Det. Steve Park, the lead investigator on
the case, said Baker had targeted vulnerable women, many of whom he knew
through sobriety meetings in the San Fernando Valley. "He is a monster,"
Park said. "He's preyed on weak people his whole life."

Baker is scheduled to be sentenced June 20.

(source: Los Angeles Times)

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

GOP, prosecutors, crime victims push effort to speed up California
executions


Prosecutors, crime victims and Republican lawmakers said Wednesday they
are prepared to go to the ballot if the Democratic-controlled Legislature
refuses to act on a package of bills to speed up California's death
penalty.

At a Capitol press conference, the death penalty advocates said their
proposed legislation could cut nearly in half the 15 to 20 years it now
takes for the state's criminal justice system to process the cases.

The bills would not affect appeals in the federal system that routinely
extend death penalty delays even further.

"The vast majority of Californians are in support of the death penalty,
but they're frustrated because the average (delay) of 17 years is just too
long, and 20, 21, 24 years is way too long," said John Poyner, president
of the California District Attorneys Association and the chief prosecutor
in Colusa County.

Lance Lindsey, executive director of San Francisco-based Death Penalty
Focus, a group that staunchly opposes capital punishment, said the thrust
of legislative package unveiled Wednesday "is moving in the contrary
direction" of concerns expressed by some members of the public about
wrongful executions.

"The notion of speeding up the death penalty is contrary to what the best
experts in the criminal justice system and the judicial system are
concluding," Lindsey said.

Backers of the legislation said they do not expect their bills to make it
through the Legislature. One key measure would cut down on the time it
takes to appoint an attorney to represent a convicted murderer facing the
death penalty, from the current average of more than five years to one.

Another would force officials to correct mistakes in the official record
of a murder case within 120 days of a conviction, a process that can now
take up to 3 years.

Led by Riverside County District Attorney Rod Pacheco, the capital
punishment proponents said they want to go to the ballot in either June or
November of 2010 if they lose in the Legislature.

Pacheco, a former Republican assemblyman, said he had no plans to
resurrect a one-time candidacy for state attorney general.

California's process of executing convicted murderers by lethal injection,
meanwhile, is on hold pending a decision by the U.S. Supreme Court on
whether the procedure causes an unnecessarily painful death.

(source: Sacramento Bee)

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

District attorney's aim to ammend death penalty laws


A group of california district attorneys is working to reform the state's
death penalty laws.

The California District Attorneys' Association says the average time
between a death penalty sentence and execution in California is about 17
years.

The group is proposing several bills that would reduce the time allowed to
certify death penalty trial records, and require attorney appointments to
death penalty appeals within a year of the certification.

The death penalty reforms would also add the murder of a child under the
age of 14 to the list of special circumstances of death penalty sentencing
enhancements.

(source: Fox 6 News)






TENNESSEE:

Possible stalling on death penalty


The state's district attorneys want to abolish a 16-member committee
charged with reviewing how Tennessee carries out the death penalty, and
the Legislature should take their concerns seriously.

The committee was charged with two missions: adopt a standard policy
application for the death penalty and set a minimum standard for death
penalty defense lawyers.

The district attorneys are complaining that most of the members of the
committee oppose the death penalty, and that colors their views.

The committee's mandate will end soon, and it must produce a report,
unless the Legislature extends that mandate for another year.

Panel members said in press interviews that the accusations of bias are
off base.

They said they simply are trying to ensure the fairness of the system and
see that proper representation is afforded those who have received the
death penalty.

What our lawmakers must determine is how long this process should be drawn
out.

Does the committee truly need another year, or is this a stall tactic by
those who want to circumvent state law that allows for the imposition of a
death penalty?

(source: The Leaf Chronicle)






USA:

The death penalty is a just punishment


Capital punishment, more commonly known as the death penalty, is the
execution of a criminal who has been convicted of a capital offense. Since
World War II many people have become upset by capital punishment. Today,
90 countries around the world have abolished it all together.

But I disagree with them.

Charles Manson was found guilty of 7 counts of murder in October 1971 and
was sentenced to death, although his sentence was later reduced to life in
prison because of California's abolishment of the death penalty. He is
still alive today.

Manson should have been executed for the people who were slaughtered
during the time he ruled his "family" of followers. Their killing sprees
bore no true motive other than a crazy belief that they were helping along
the coming of "Helter Skelter," or the end of the world.

Now investigators appear to have found evidence of more victims of Manson
and the family hidden near Barker Ranch in California, one of the places
the cult hid during its time of following Manson. It is also the place
where Manson was finally captured.

After hearing about suspicions and accusations of more victims for years,
including bragging statements made by Manson follower Susan Atkins,
prosecutor Emmett Harder recently led a group of investigators to Barker
Ranch to look for more victims. The group included Debra Tate, younger
sister of actress and murder victim Sharon Tate.

No other victims have been found yet, but evidence appears to tell
investigators that there is something there worth searching for.

These events make me stop and think about how many victims Manson really
had. Sure, California found enough evidence to put him away for life, but
is that really doing justice on behalf of the victims, not to mention the
torment and agony the surviving families of the victims endured and
continue to endure?

Under the terms of what we call the death penalty today, many felons sit
in prisons for years with no real penance. Manson has lived off California
taxpayers for nearly 40 years. It seems wrong to me that we as Americans
pay taxes every year, only to have some of our hard-earned money used to
house condemned criminals.

It can be argued that executing someone, even for a serious crime such as
murder, is just repeating the crime. But why should murderers deserve to
live after having killed the innocent? A person convicted of a capital
offense deserves to be punished, and if one commits a crime as immoral as
murder, I believe he or she deserves to be executed. It is not really just
for a person who takes a life not to lose his or her own.

As for the new Manson investigation, it is said that the possibility of
new trial is slim. Finding remains would only be the first step to a
prosecution. And regardless of how many more of Manson's victims may be
found, Manson is still alive. And as long as he is alive, I believe, the
victims and their families will never truly have justice.

(source: Letter; Molly McGee is a student at Central Davidson High
School---Lexington (NC) Dispatch)






KENTUCKY:

Supreme Court releases Ky. lethal injection protocol


Kentucky's execution protocol is now public after the U.S. Supreme Court
ordered its release as part of a case challenging lethal injection.

The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to rule by June whether the protocol
passes constitutional muster.

The protocol had been kept secret until Wednesday, when an edited version
was filed publicly on order from the high court. Kentucky's lethal
injection protocol is similar to that used in 35 other states.

The 16-page protocol details everything from rules for visiting an inmate
once an execution order has been signed to how to reverse an execution if
it is halted once the drugs have started flowing.

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

Son accused of killing parents indicted, won't face death penalty


Prosecutors say they will not seek the death penalty against a 22-year-old
man charged with the death of his parents.

Commonwealth's Attorney Jim Crawford made the announcement Wednesday after
a Grant County grand jury indicted Russell Bramlage on two counts of
murder, tampering with physical evidence and second-degree criminal
possession of a forged instrument.

Bramlage has pleaded not guilty to the charges.

The bodies of Terry and Lynda Bramlage were found in November at their
home in Grant County in northern Kentucky.

Crawford said his decision was based, in part, on what the Bramlage family
wanted.

Bramlage has been held at the Grant County jail without bond since his
arrest April 1.

(source for both: Associated Press)