[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS

[Rick Halperin]

March 8


TEXAS----new death sentence

Jury Sentences Bart Whitaker To Death For Slaying Of Mother & Brother


A Fort Bend County jury sentenced Thomas "Bart" Whitaker to death Thursday
morning, for masterminding a plot that resulted in the murders of his
mother and younger brother, and the attempted murder of his father.

The jury, in 400th District Judge Clifford Vacek's court, began
deliberations Wednesday morning and continued into the night. By 10 p.m.,
Judge Vacek sequestered them in a hotel for the night, and they continued
deliberations for more than an hour Thursday before reaching their
decision.

Bart Whitaker, 27, could have received life in prison on the capital
murder charge over the Dec. 10, 2003 shootings of Kevin Whitaker, his
brother, and Patricia Whitaker, his mother.

Instead, the jury unanimously ruled they believed Whitaker represented a
contined threat of violence to society, and that no extenuating
circumstances existed that justified sentencing him to life in prison. As
such, Bart Whitaker now faces death by lethal injection.

The jury had taken less than three hours on Monday to convict Bart
Whitaker on capital murder charges. The punishment phase of the trial
began on Tuesday.

During testimony last week, four men said Bart Whitaker concocted and
discussed plans for killing his family, beginning in 1999. All 4
acknowledged acting to carry out one or more of those plots. One of the
men, 24-year-old Steven Champagne, said he drove a getaway car in the plot
that finally culminated in Patricia and Kevin Whitaker's murders.

Chris Brashear, 23, Bart Whitaker's former roommate, who also is charged
with capital murder but has not gone to trial yet, is accused of hiding in
the Whitaker family's Sugar Land home with a gun. After waiting for them
to arrive home from a dinner, prosecutors have said, Brashear shot and
killed Bart Whitaker's brother and mother, wounded his father, and then
shot Bart in the shoulder in an attempt to keep police from learning of
Bart's involvement.

After listening to five days of testimony and the presentment of evidence
in the case, "I can broad-brush this," Bart Whitaker's defense attorney,
Randy McDonald, told the jury in his closing arguments. "You listened to
all this. Factually, he's guilty. No one - I don't think anybody would
think differently. So I'm not really arguing that."

What McDonald did argue was that prosecutors presented little evidence
against Bart Whitaker beyond that of Champagne's, and that as an
accomplice in the crime, Champagne's testimony had to be considered under
Texas' so-called accomplice witness rule.

Generally, under that rule a defendant can't be convicted of an offense
based on an accomplice's testimony unless it's corroborated by other
evidence or witnesses.

McDonald attacked Champagne's credibility, saying he manipulated Sugar
Land detectives through "hours and hours of conversation" before
confessing to his role in the crime in 2005.

"He somehow keeps telling them lie after lie after lie - hundreds of lies.
I've never seen anything like it," McDonald said of Champagne.

Yet in the punishment phase of the trial, Bart Whitaker took the stand,
admitted his guilt and indicated Champgne's testimony had all been
truthful.

McDonald criticized prosecutors for granting immunity to Adam Hipp, Justin
Peters and Will Anthony, who also testified to taking part in plots
against Whitaker's family that fizzled before being carried out. And, he
criticized a deal by which Champagne agreed to testify in return for
pleading guilty to a murder charge and being sentenced to 15 years.

As he had in his opening arguments, McDonald suggested that had District
Attorney John Healey not elected to seek the death penalty in the case,
Bart Whitaker would have pleaded guilty.

"There was never a need for a trial," McDonald said. "As long as the death
penalty is on the table, you have to have a trial."

Assistant Fort Bend County District Attorney Fred Felcman, in arguing for
the death penalty, told jurors Bart Whitaker's "evil" nature could not be
stopped short of death.

Bart Whitaker's father, Kent, who survived the attack that killed his wife
and youngest son, had pleaded with prosecutors not to seek the death
penalty in the case.

After the verdict was read Bart Whitaker made no statement and was taken
from the courtroom to the Fort Bend County Jail.

He'll eventually be moved to Texas' death row, at the state's Polunsky
Unit prison, where he will live in a 60-square-foot cell with a window,
access to books and writing materials, until his is executed.

According to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, the average stay on
death row lasts for more than 10 years.

(source: FortBendNow)

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

Bart Whitaker Given Death Penalty


The jury that convicted a Sugar Land man of capital murder gave him the
death penalty on Thursday after more than 12 hours of deliberations.

Whitaker was convicted on Tuesday of killing 2 family members in December
2003.

Deliberations on the sentencing went 10 hours Wednesday and continued 2
more hours Thursday morning. Jurors were instructed to choose a sentence
of life in prison or death.

Whitaker was found guilty of murdering his mother and brother, Patricia
Whitaker, 51, and her son Kevin Whitaker, 19. His father was also shot
during the home invasion but survived his injuries.

Whitaker's father, Kent, and his mother's brother, William Bartlett, both
asked the jury to sentence Whitaker to life in prison and not to death.
After court adjourned, the 2 told the media they felt life in prison for a
kid from Sugar Land would be much worse than being sentenced to death.

Whitaker also went on the stand Tuesday and admitted that at least two
attempts to kill his family had failed before he was successful in hiring
his roommate, Chris Brashear, to kill his mother and brother.

Whitaker told jurors he hated them because he felt their love was
conditional on a standard he could never reach. Whitaker, who was also
shot in the ambush in an attempt to deflect his involvement, said he was
sorry for plotting his family's murder and that it donned on him instantly
as he was lying on the floor, bleeding, what he had done.

Prosecutors said Whitaker wanted his family dead so he could collect a $1
million inheritance.

Steven Champagne, one of Whitaker's friends, testified that he was the
getaway driver for Brashear.

(source: MyFoxHouston)

********

Convicted killer executed after 26 years on death row


An unusually large group of death penalty opponents were present at
Wednesday nights execution in Huntsville, while only three members of the
victims family witnessed the lethal injection.

Joseph Bennard Nichols, 46, was pronounced dead at 6:19 p.m. while his
mother, father, half-brother and 2 brothers watched.

As he began his final statement at 6:12 p.m., which included a series of
expletives directed at a Texas Department of Criminal Justice supervisor
at the Polunsky Units death row, the lethal injection process began.

Shortly before he lost conciousness, Nichols said, "That's all Ive got to
say."

2 minutes later, the dose was completed, and 7 minutes after the process
began, Nichols was pronounced dead.

Nichols was convicted for the Oct. 13, 1980, murder of 70-year-old
delicatessen clerk Claude Shaffer Jr.

Michelle Lyons, TDCJ director of public information, said Nichols did not
resist being taken from his cell to the death chamber but he "didn't
cooperate either," and was carried into the chamber and placed onto the
gurney by the 5-man tie-down team.

Earlier in the day, Lyons told reporters Nichols had been "uncooperative
and beligerent."

Shaffer's daughter, Claudette Shaffer, who witnessed the execution said
she was glad this 20-year-long ordeal was over for her and her family.

"We've basically gotten close and finally justice was carried out,"
Shaffer said. "I realize you want to be sure you have the right person ...
(but) it shouldn't take 30 years to carry out a jury's decision. It's an
unnecessary waste of taxpayers' money."

Shaffer said she did not feel any sympathy for Nichols because his family
had 30 years to spend with him, but we didn't have that."

"His last statement reaffirmed the feeling I had for him," Shaffer said.
"No feeling, no remorse, no concern for anyone."

Shaffer said that she and her family had not spoken to the family of
either Nichols or Willie Ray Williams, Nichols' accomplice who pleaded
guilty and was executed in 1995 for the same crime.

Nichols apparantely winked toward his parents and three brothers in the
viewing room before he lost conciousness.

Nichols' execution was the 2nd to be carried out in 2 days.

As members of the press exited the TDCJ administration building towards
the adjacent Walls Unit, where the death chamber is located, Gloria Rubac,
a long-time supporter of the Texas Death Penalty Abolition Movement,
shouted that if members of the press didn't report that Nichols was
innocent then they were "mouthpieces for the TDCJ."

Nichols' trial was 1 marred with controversy. At his first trial, jurors
were unable to agree on the death penalty and a mistrial was declared.
Nichols missed by 30 days a change in Texas law that would have given him
an automatic life term if jurors were unable to agree on a death sentence.

It's the 2nd trial that Nichols lawyers are accusing prosecutors of
changing tactics, suppressing evidence and arguing he was the shooter so
jurors would be more inclined to decide on a death sentence, which they
did.

"They had a parties charge (to the jury)," said Roe Wilson, who handles
capital case appeals for the Harris County District Attorney's Office,
denying any improper manipulations of evidence. "They were told the
prosecution thought Nichols was the shooter, but there was no ballistics
evidence."

Both Nichols and Williams told police they shot toward Shaffer, and jurors
heard testimony from a girlfriend of one of the shooters that when Nichols
returned to their car outside the store, he said he thought he shot the
victim in the chest.

"They knew both people said: 'I shot toward him,"' Wilson said, referring
to the jury. "And even if Nichols wasnt actually the one who hit him,
under the law of parties Nichols was still guilty."

The fatal bullet could not be recovered for ballistics tests.

"I never denied being there," Nichols said recently from death row. I'm
not telling you I'm not guilty of anything."

But he insisted that when Williams fired the fatal shot, "I had already
left."

In the robbery, Nichols said Williams "got some change. I got nothing."

Nichols was 20 when he arrived on death row.

"Honestly, I thought I'd be dead at 25," he said, describing his years in
prison as good and positive. "I was able to grow and do a few things,
experience life and meet different people.

"I don't want to die, but I've come to terms. No doubt, I'm regretful."

Nichols' appeals and protests from death penalty opponents have focused on
the fact that one bullet wound killed Shaffer and that Williams was
prosecuted and convicted of being the shooter. They noted that Nichols,
who said he'd fled the store when the fatal shot was fired, also was
labeled as the shooter by Harris County district attorneys who prosecuted
the case.

"1 bullet and 2 shooters," said Nichols lawyer, J. Clifford Gunter III.
"There's no getting around that."

Prosecutors defended Nichols' conviction, saying Texas' law of parties
makes non-triggermen just as culpable in crimes like Shaffer's murder.

Gunter took the case to the U.S. Supreme Court, which previously had
rejected Nichols appeals. Gunter argued, however, that the court had
rejected piecemeal appeals and needed to delay the punishment to look at
"cumulative errors," saying Nichols had been deprived "of a complete and
meaningful post-conviction review of his case."

William Bolin, a member of the Texas Coalition against the Death Penalty,
said that this particular case was a cause for concern for the justice
system.

"The (justice) system should be free of prejudices," Bolin said. "District
attorney's are biased toward social classes, and sometimes their zeal to
convict creates an injustice."

Over 50 members of Nichols family and protestors from throughout the state
were on hand to protest the execution. Shortly after the execution, the
parking lot adjacent to the Walls unit that minutes before was filled to
brim was eerily vacant, leaving behind a sprawl of photos of Nichols and
his family.

Nichols was the 8th person to die in Texas this year.

Tuesday evening, Robert Perez, 48, who prosecutors said was a high-ranking
officer in the notorious Mexican Mafia prison gang, received lethal
injection for a double killing in San Antonio in 1994. Perez had been
linked to more than a dozen other slayings in the mid-1990s in San
Antonio.

3 more Texas inmates have execution dates this month. Next is Charles
Nealy, 42, set to die March 20 for the 1997 slaying of Dallas convenience
store clerk Jiten Bhakta, 25. A 2nd store employee also was killed in the
robbery.

As of Wednesday, 12 people were scheduled to die this year.

(source: Huntsville Item)

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

Taco Land killer's childhood described


Joseph Gamboa's parents were so focused on partying that even their
drinking buddies reported them to Child Protective Services for neglecting
their 10 children, a psychologist testified Wednesday in the punishment
phase of Gamboa's capital murder trial.

Defense lawyers put Daneen Milam on the stand to testify to what they hope
jurors will see as mitigating circumstances when they decide if Gamboa
gets life in prison or the death penalty.

The jury found Gamboa, 24, guilty last week in the June 24, 2005, robbery
and shootings at Taco Land, a small bar with a big reputation in the
underground music scene. Gamboa killed owner Ramiro "Ram" Ayala and
doorman Douglas "Gypsy Doug" Morgan. Bartender Denise "Sunshine" Koger was
shot but survived.

In the punishment phase, prosecutors have brought a parade of other
robbery and shooting victims through the 379th District Court who
identified Gamboa as their attacker.

Through Milam, the defense tried to give jurors a look into the why of
Gamboa's behavior.

He has a low IQ, of 79, Milam testified, and a highly unstable family
background of "significant alcohol and drug abuse."

His parents were referred to CPS 24 times in 10 years by doctors,
teachers, neighbors, friends, even "people that they were drinking with,"
Milam said.

Neglect, rather than abuse, seemed to be the pattern. The parents left
their younger children in the care of their older ones. One night while
the parents were out, Milam said, the kids put their baby sister to sleep
on a bed and left the room to watch television. The infant slipped between
the bed and wall and suffocated, Milam said.

Gamboa's siblings told Milam they had been afraid to be in the house where
the baby died. They begged their parents to stay with them, she said, but
they went out again that night.

Final arguments begin today.

(source: San Antonio Express-News)

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

Jessica's Law misdirects threat of death penalty


Few crimes are more heinous than the sexual abuse of a child, and child
molesters should be punished harshly. On that most Texans agree.

So lawmakers faced with a bill to sentence repeat child sexual abuse
offenders to death would have a heck of a time opposing it and explaining
that to voters in the next election. That explains the 119 official votes
in the House of Representatives this week for the Texas version of
Jessica's Law.

It hardly matters to supporters of the bill, which is named for 9-year-old
Jessica Lunsford, who was abused and murdered in Florida, that the death
penalty is probably unconstitutional. Nor did they heed advice that the
threat of execution might well lead molesters to kill their victims.

Texas legislators easily could have kept repeat sexual abusers of children
off the streets with a penalty of life without parole on second
conviction.

Apparently, it was much more satisfying to assign the ultimate punishment
of death for that category of crime. Plus, it is a tailor-made campaign
issue for the next election.

Voting against executing repeat child abusers would require detailed
explanations that don't fit well on push cards or in 30-second commercials
and 2-minute debate responses. Given the complexities, it was easier to
vote for the bill and ignore the questions of legality, danger and
potential cost.

Still, the bill that passed the House this week was better than the
original bill filed by state Rep. Debbie Riddle, R-Tomball. Under the
redrafted bill, 1st convictions of continual sexual abuse of a child
carries a penalty of 25 years to life in prison. A second offense carries
a penalty of life without parole or death by lethal injection.

The redrafted version also gives a nod to the ongoing investigation of
sexual abuse at Texas Youth Commission facilities by making it a felony to
fail to report sexual abuse of minors. It also includes a "Romeo and
Juliet" clause to exclude teenage consensual lovers.

Riddle is the Legislature's queen of symbolic gestures. Besides the death
penalty for pedophiles bill, she sponsored a measure to add "under God" to
the pledge to the Texas flag and supported the slogan "In God We Trust" on
the House message board. State Sen. Dan Patrick, R-Houston, another
culture warrior of some repute, headed the successful effort in the Senate
to have "In God We Trust" permanently etched in the Senate chamber.

As with the death penalty provision for repeat child abusers, the
references to God on message boards and in the pledge to the flag are
difficult issues to oppose. They are the perfect symbols for election
campaigns, and members oppose them only at peril to their political
careers.

Politicians in Austin and Washington make their careers on such symbolic
issues. In the end, it doesn't matter much that a religious slogan is
displayed on the message boards or added to the pledge to the flag.
There's no real damage in that.

And it's a good bet that no one will ever be executed in Texas for sexual
abuse of a child. But it's entirely possible that some child will die
because a pedophile fears the death penalty for a second offense.

So why won't life without parole suffice? Simply because it doesn't
resonate symbolically and politically like the death penalty. What a
terrible reason to put a child's life in danger.

(source: Editorial, Austin American-Statesman)

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

Court upholds death sentence for Blue


A former Bryan resident on death row since 1995 for dousing a woman with
gasoline and setting her on fire was denied a reprieve Wednesday by the
Texas Court of Criminal Appeals.

Lawyers for Carl Henry Blue, 42, argued that he was mentally retarded - a
condition that, if true, would make his execution illegal according to a
2002 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court.

In its 19-page ruling released Wednesday the Texas Court of Criminal
Appeals noted the higher-court decision, which states that execution of
the mentally retarded violates the Eighth Amendment ban on cruel and
unusual punishment.

But the judges also noted that Blue's attorneys already had filed an
appeal - a year after the Supreme Court ruling was filed - and failed to
make the mental retardation argument the 1st time.

A second chance at appeal should be allowed only, the court noted, if
"there is evidence that could reasonably show ... that no rational finder
of fact would fail to find he is mentally retarded." Blue did not meet the
"heightened-threshold burden," the group decided.

Blue was arrested in August 1994 after police said he attacked former
girlfriend Carmen Richards, 38, and Larence Williams outside Varsity II
apartments off George Bush Drive in College Station. Richards died several
weeks later. Williams survived the attack.

According to authorities, Blue had gone to a gas station next door to the
apartment complex on the morning of the attack and bought 50 cents worth
of gasoline in a paper cup. He then waited outside Richards' apartment for
her to emerge for work.

During his trial, Blue said he had been drinking beer and smoking crack
behind the convenience store when he decided to play a prank by offering
Richards the gasoline to drink. But he became enraged when he saw
Williams, he said, and intentionally set the 2 on fire.

He was convicted of capital murder in the 272nd District Court in 1995 and
sentenced to death. He was retried - with the same result - in 2001, after
a federal district judge questioned the testimony of a psychologist who
testified for the defense in the 1st trial.

In their arguments that Blue is mentally handicapped, his attorneys
pointed to school records and anecdotal evidence from friends and family,
information the judges labeled Wednesday as "sketchy." Failing most of his
courses, he was placed in special education classes, in 5th grade and he
dropped out in the eighth grade after being held back a year.

According to the ruling, friends and family members reported that "even
from the earliest times, [Blue] was gullible and susceptible to getting
into trouble at the instigation of others, could barely read, could not
follow but the simplest instructions, could not manage or even count
money, could not fill out job applications on his own, was capable of only
the most menial jobs, which he did not hold for long, and was generally
incapable of planning ahead, thinking for himself, or getting by
day-to-day without assistance."

But the only hard evidence for or against mental retardation - an
admittedly incomplete IQ test administered during one of his punishment
hearings - placed his IQ between 75 and 80, the judges noted. Mental
retardation occurs with an IQ below 70, the judges said.

"Viewed in isolation, none of these factors would be dispositive; taken as
an overall pattern, mental retardation is strongly suspected," James
Patton, an expert in mental retardation, was cited in the appeal as
stating. "Only a full and thorough assessment, however, can answer that
question."

Blue's lawyers complained to the Court of Criminal Appeals that they were
working pro bono and could not afford the expensive tests to bolster their
case.

"We are neither unmindful, nor unsympathetic to, counsel's plight," the
judges responded.

But because the issue was not addressed in the 1st appeal, there is little
the court can do, they wrote. Instead, they said, it is an issue that
should be taken up with the Texas Legislature.

Blue is 1 of 2 men on death row for crimes that occurred in Brazos County.

The other, Marcus Druery, was 22 in 2002 when authorities said he
repeatedly shot a man, then stole his money and drugs before setting him
on fire. An execution date has not been set for either inmate.

(source: The Eagle)

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Jury set in pair of Freeport slayings


After a month of sifting through 150 potential jurors, prosecutors and
defense attorneys picked the last person Wednesday to fill a panel of 12
jurors and 2 alternates for the capital murder trial of John Joe Bodley.

The trial is set to begin March 26.

Bodley, 22, is facing a charge of capital murder, and he could face the
death penalty if convicted. He is accused of shooting 4 people in a
Freeport apartment July 14, 2005. 2 of them, James Beverly, 31, and
Chastity Smith, 28, died from their wounds.

Prosecutors and defense attorneys originally started with a pool of 100
jurors and then had to pick from 2 more pools of 50 jurors after going
through the first 100 without completing the jury, said Jimmy Phillips,
one of Bodley's attorneys.

Potential jurors in the case initially were given a 98-question
questionnaire Feb. 5. The questionnaire asked a variety of questions
including the person's feelings about the death penalty, prior jury
experience and what kind of bumper stickers they put on their cars.

It is used to help pick a jury that is unbiased enough to serve on a death
penalty case, attorneys said.

6 to 8 jurors were individually questioned every day beginning Feb. 12 and
ending with the selection of the final juror Wednesday.

"It was a long process," said prosecutor Keith Allen. "Some (jurors) are
excused by the court and some are excused by agreement" between the
prosecutors and defense attorneys.

The process is lengthy because of the individual questioning that tries to
determine whether the person can sit on a death-penalty jury, said
Katherine Scardino, one of Bodley's attorneys.

"Everybody is different," she said. "Everybody is interesting."

Scardino and Phillips immediately started reviewing the evidence of the
case against their client Wednesday afternoon, trying to prepare for the
trial.

"We're refreshing our memories because we've been picking a jury for so
long," Scardino said.

A hearing regarding a taped interview Bodley gave to police is scheduled
March 22, Phillips said. Bodley's attorneys believe the tape is not
admissible because police did not properly warn Bodley before the
interview began, Philips said.

(source: The Facts)