[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, GA., LA.

[Rick Halperin]

April 22




TEXAS----2 new execution dates

2 condemned Tx. prisoners get execution dates----One injured in shooting
on busy S.A. street Fake priest sought in Tx. ripoffs nabbed in Vegas
Suspected gang members arrested on murder charges


At least 2 condemned Texas inmates already have execution dates following
last week's U.S. Supreme Court ruling upholding the lethal injection
process.

Charles Dean Hood, convicted of a double slaying in the Dallas suburb of
Plano more than 18 years ago, and Larry Donnell Davis, condemned for a
1995 robbery-slaying in Amarillo, are set to die, said the Texas Attorney
General's Office, which handles federal appeals involving capital murder
cases.

Hood, 38, was set for lethal injection June 17 by State District Judge
Curt Henderson. Davis, 40, was set to die July 31 by State District Judge
John Board.

"I don't think the actual warrant has been issued yet and served on Mr.
Hood," said John Rolater, chief of the Collin County Distirct Attorney's
appellate division. "The date could be modified or be withdrawn if he
files some new appeals."

In 2005, Hood came within 3 days of execution before the Texas Court of
Criminal Appeals stopped the punishment so additional appeals could be
considered. This is the 1st execution date for Davis, said Mark Baskett,
an assistant district attorney in Potter County.

The most recent execution in the country was in Huntsville on Sept. 25,
the same day the Supreme Court agreed to hear an appeal from 2 Kentucky
death row inmates who contended the lethal injection process was
unconstitutionally cruel. The procedure used there is similar to the one
used in Texas and other death penalty states.

Their appeal, which halted executions around the country, was turned down
by the high court last week in a 7-2 vote, clearing the way for capital
punishment to resume.

During the 7-month hiatus, more than 2 dozen condemned Texas inmates lost
their appeals at the Supreme Court, making them eligible for execution.
Some 20 others lost at the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, moving them
closer to punishment. And several other Texas prisoners who had execution
dates withdrawn pending the outcome of the Kentucky challenge could have
their dates reset.

Last year, 26 convicted killers were put to death by prison officials in
Huntsville, the most of any state. Since 1982 Texas has executed 405
prisoners, also the highest total in the nation.

Hood was convicted for the shootings of 3 people. He worked as a bouncer
at a Plano topless club and was befriended by a club patron, Ronald
Williamson, who let him stay at his home. Williamson, 35, and Tracie Lynn
Wallace, 26, a dancer, were found shot to death at Williamson's Plano
house in November 1989.

Hood, 20 at the time, was arrested in his native Vincennes, Ind., driving
Williamson's $70,000 Cadillac. He has denied any involvement in the
shootings.

Davis was condemned for the slaying of Michael Barrow, 26, who was fatally
stabbed and beaten at his Amarillo home. In a 14-page confession to
police, Davis said he went to Barrow's house as part of a gang plot to
kill Barrow and steal his belongings. Barrow was stabbed numerous times
with knives and an ice pick, was beaten with a pipe and had his sternum
broken by kicks or from being stomped.

Davis had several previous stints in prison. At the time of the crime, he
had been out less than 4 months after being released on mandatory
supervision from a 4-year term for theft.

(source: Associated Press)






GEORGIA----new execution date

Georgia man set to die for girlfriend's killing


The state plans next month to execute a man convicted in the 1988 death of
his girlfriend in south Georgia.

It would be the state's 1st execution in nearly a year, and it could be
the beginning of a wave of executions over the next several months.

Executions in Georgia were on hold while the U.S. Supreme Court weighed
whether the lethal injection method used in many states violates the
Constitution. Last week, the high court ruled that the method does not.

William Earl Lynd was sentenced to death for the Dec. 23, 1988, slaying of
Ginger Moore, who was shot three times following an argument the couple
had.

According to authorities, Lynd shot Moore in the face, then smoked a
cigarette. He shot her again after she regained consciousness, then put
her in the trunk of a car and later shot her a third time after hearing
the victim kicking, authorities said. He then buried her in a shallow
grave he dug near Tifton, authorities said.

Lynd later killed 42-year-old Leslie Joan Sharkey of Detroit, whom he met
on the side of a road near Chesapeake, Ohio, authorities said. Sharkey was
shot on Christmas Day as she traveled to West Virginia for a family
gathering.

After selling the murder weapon, Lynd drove to Florida, where he abandoned
the car he was driving. He later turned himself in.

Georgia Attorney General Thurbert Baker said Tuesday that Lynd is
scheduled to be executed between May 6 and May 13.

The commissioner of the Department of Corrections will set the specific
date later.

The last man put to death in Georgia was John Hightower, who was executed
in June 2007 for killing his wife and 2 stepdaughters in 1987.

Baker has filed a pair of motions with the Georgia Supreme Court asking
the justices to lift stays issued in October blocking two other
executions. The state court had halted the executions of convicted killers
Jack Alderman and Curtis Osborne to give the U.S. Supreme Court time to
rule on the lethal injection question, which stemmed from a Kentucky case.

It's unclear when Georgia's top court will act on the motions. The Lynd
case was not subject to a state Supreme Court stay.

(source: Associated Press)






LOUISIANA----new execution date//female

Orleans judge sets July 15 execution date for Antoinette Frank


Orleans Parish Judge Frank Marullo today signed a death warrant for
convicted killer Antoinette Frank, the former police officer sentenced to
die by lethal injection for the 1995 triple murder at a local Vietnamese
restaurant.

Marullo, acting on his own, ordered the state of Louisiana to execute
Frank on July 15, between the hours of 6 p.m. and 9 p.m., on the lethal
injection table located at the state penitentiary at Angola.

But Frank's state-appointed defense attorney said that the judge's order
won't stand under the law and that Frank will receive her Constitutional
guarantee to begin the state post-conviction stage of her appeal - and, if
unsuccessful there, the beginning of her federal appeals.

Marullo set the next hearing date for June 10 at Orleans Parish Criminal
District Court, telling the defense team to turn in its post-conviction
appeal at that time.

Forty-nine days, however, flies in the face of the legal standard in which
capital defense attorneys have to file such an appeal, said Frank's newly
appointed public defender. The American Bar Association standard is that a
post-conviction state death penalty appeal requires an average 3,300
attorney hours, he said.

"She has a lot of litigation to go," said Gary Clements, of the Capital
Post-Conviction Project of Louisiana, who first met Frank last month and
formally signed on to take over her appeal today. "I am quite confident
that Judge Marullo knows this and is fully aware" that his execution order
will be overturned.

"No one will be executed July 15," said Clements, who made his 1st
courtroom appearance as Frank's attorney Tuesday. "Not Antoinette Frank,
not anyone."

Clements, who has handled capital appeals for 16 years in Louisiana, has
been appointed to represent Frank through the Louisiana Public Defender
program. Frank was deemed indigent at her trial in 1995, when attorney
Robert Jenkins received what Tulane and Broad's veterans consider the
city's most notorious murder case.

Frank, who will turn 37 on April 30, remains at the women's prison at St.
Gabriel. In 1995, an Orleans Parish jury unanimously decided that she
deserved the death penalty for the rampage at the Kim Anh restaurant that
left dead police officer Ronald Williams, 25, and siblings Ha and Cuong Vu
- who had worked with their family at the restaurant, then located in
eastern New Orleans.

Rogers LaCaze was separately ordered to die by lethal injection by another
Orleans Parish jury for his cohort role in the armed robbery turned
slaughter.

Louisiana last executed a convicted killer on May 10, 2002, at Angola.
Leslie Dale Martin died by lethal injection for the rape and strangulation
of Christina Burgin in Calcasieu Parish.

About 90 convicts remain on the state's death row. Clements said that
Frank is among 66 condemned inmates who have yet to exhaust their state
appeals, which take place before a death row inmate may ask the federal
system for a review.

An Orleans Parish jury hasn't sent a convict to death row since 1997, when
Phillip Anthony was condemned for the triple killing at the Louisiana
Pizza Kitchen in the French Quarter.

On Sept. 12, 1995, the Frank jury unanimously returned a guilty-as-charged
verdict on three counts of capital murder and then recommended she be put
to death. Marullo formally sentenced her to die Oct. 20, 1995 - 7 months
after the triple killing at Kim Anh.

Marullo said today that he followed the letter of the law in the Frank
case, despite what Clements argued before him at court. Frank's former
attorneys, Denise LeBoeuf and Nick Trenticosta did not file for a
re-hearing before the U.S. Supreme Court, which in February denied their
request to revisit Frank's death sentence, the judge noted.

That failure to file for a rehearing, Marullo wrote in the death warrant
is equal to "finalizing the judgment and sentence reached by the trial
court."

"This thing has been well-litigated," said Marullo after Tuesday's
hearing. "They never filed for a rehearing. If you read the law, it says
'handled expeditiously.' So I set the execution date. We followed the
statute."

Frank, originally from Opelousas, was a 23-year-old NOPD rookie officer
when she staged the lethal armed robbery on the Kim Ahn, where she had
worked a detail, the jury found.

One of the Vu relatives testified in ghastly detail at the Frank trial,
recounting how from a hiding spot in a darkened freezer she watched Frank
and LaCaze stalk the restaurant before unleashing a rampage on her brother
and sister.

(source: New Orleans Times-Picayne)

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

Death Warrant Signed For Cop-Killing Ex-Cop


A death warrant has been signed for a former New Orleans police officer
convicted of murder and facing execution.

State Judge Frank Marullo on Tuesday signed the death warrant for
Antoinette Frank, who was found guilty of murdering her partner and 2
others inside a New Orleans East restaurant back in 1995.

According to the warrant, Frank will be executed by injection on July 15.

Meanwhile, an attorney for Frank said he will appeal Marullo's order.

(source: Associated Press)