Oct. 31
TEXAS----execution
Louisiana ex-con executed for 2003 Texas killing
Donnie Lee Roberts, convicted in his girlfriend's 2003 slaying in Texas, was
executed Wednesday for fatally shooting the woman and taking items from her
home to sell or trade to support his drug habit.
Roberts, 41, was given a lethal injection for the killing of Vicki Bowen at her
East Texas home.
"I'm really sorry. I never meant to cause you all so much pain," Roberts said
to Bowen's father, who was seated in a chair close to a glass window in the
death chamber viewing area. "I hope you can go on with your life.
"I loved your daughter. I hope to God he lets me see her in heaven so I can
apologize to her and see her and tell her."
Roberts also asked 2 of his friends who watched through another window to tell
his own daughter he loved her.
He repeated that he was sorry and took several deep breaths as the lethal dose
of pentobarbital began taking effect. He snored briefly before slipping into
unconsciousness, and was pronounced dead 23 minutes later.
Bowen's relatives, including some who sat on the floor where they were gathered
as Roberts was put to death, declined to speak with reporters after the
execution.
Roberts' punishment came after the U.S. Supreme Court refused to review his
case earlier this week, and no additional appeals were filed to try to block
the lethal injection.
At the time of his arrest for the October 2003 slaying of the 44-year-old
Bowen, Roberts had violated his probation for a robbery conviction in Louisiana
by fleeing to Texas after dropping out of a drug treatment program.
Authorities said he apparently met Bowen, a dental assistant, at a bar and
moved in with her at her Lake Livingston home, about 75 miles northeast of
Houston. Their relationship soured because Roberts wasn't working and was
abusing drugs and alcohol, investigators said, and he shot Bowen after she
refused his demand for money.
Roberts was arrested at a suspected crack house in the town of Livingston when
a truck missing from Bowen's home was spotted there the same day Bowen's body
was discovered.
"He was cooperative and confessed several times," District Attorney Lee Hon
said. "He was saying he wanted the death penalty."
Roberts told authorities he made several trips from the house where Bowen was
shot, collecting property that he took into town to sell and trade for crack.
He also surprised detectives by confessing to the shotgun death of a man that
happened a decade earlier in Natchitoches Parish, La. Louisiana authorities
initially believed the victim, Al Crow, had died of asphyxiation in a fire at
the camper trailer where he was living but reopened the case following Roberts'
disclosure, found shotgun pellets and determined it was a homicide.
Roberts was charged with murder but not tried for Crow's death.
Stephen Taylor, one of Roberts' lawyers at his Texas capital murder trial, said
the confessions complicated his trial defense.
"It's almost like somebody saying he was a serial killer, that he's killed
before and he killed again," Taylor said. "It's one thing to say you have the
right to remain silent. Use it!
"It's always sad for someone to lose his life, especially for something so
stupid."
Bowen didn't show up for work on Oct. 16, 2003, and a co-worker who went to
check on her found her body wrapped in a blanket and lying in a pool of blood.
A medical examiner determined Bowen was killed with 2 gunshots to her head.
Roberts took the witness stand and tried to blame Bowen for the gunfire, saying
he was acting in self-defense by grabbing a .22-caliber rifle after seeing her
reach down inside a couch to locate a pistol that was kept there.
Evidence at trial showed Roberts had a record for battery while being held in
jail in Fulton County, Ga., that he'd threatened his wife to give him money for
drugs, and that he warned there would be another killing if he didn't get a
single-person cell in Polk County when he was jailed for Bowen's murder.
His robbery conviction in Louisiana was for a Mother's Day 2001 convenience
store holdup in Baton Rouge, La., where the knife-wielding Roberts threatened
to slice the throat of the female clerk.
The Texas Department of Criminal Justice Polunsky Unit, where the state's male
death row is housed, had been Roberts' home since his capital murder conviction
in 2004. The prison is just outside Livingston and not far from where Bowen was
killed.
Earlier Wednesday, Roberts was moved about 45 miles west to the Huntsville
Unit, the prison where the execution was carried out.
3 more Texas prisoners are set to die in November, including 1 next week.
Roberts becomes the 12th condemned inmate to be put to death in Texas this year
and the 489th overall since the state resumed capital punishment on December 7,
1982. Roberts becomes the 250th condemned inmate to be put to death in Texas
since Rick Perry became Governor in 2001.
Roberts becomes the 35th condemned inmate to be put to death this year in the
USA and the 1312th overall since executions resumed on january 17, 1977. The
Death penalty was re-legalized in the USA on July 2, 1976, after it was stopped
4 years earlier on June 29, 1972.
(sources: Associated Press & Rick Halperin)
*********************
Death penalty committee to offer recommendation on Daniel case
A committee inside the Travis County District Attorney's office is expected to
make a recommendation on punishment for the capital murder suspect and accused
cop killer, Brandon Daniel. The 24-year-old fatally shot APD officer Jaime
Padron in a North Austin Wal-mart this spring. While APD's union says there???s
no question the death penalty should be pursued, it's up to the DA's office,
and ultimately the a 12-member jury, Daniel's fate.
Capital murder suspect Brandon Daniel will soon find out if he will face the
death penalty.
Daniel is in jail without bond for the murder of Austin Police Officer Jaime
Padron.
Padron responded to 911 call involving an intoxicated man inside a North Austin
Walmart last spring.
Police say Daniel and Padron had a confrontation. They wrestled, and Padron was
shot.
A committee inside the Travis County District Attorney's office is expected to
make a recommendation on possible punishments.
For Police Union Chief Wayne Vincent, the DA's Death Penalty Committee should
look beyond the possibility of life in prison for Daniel, a 24-year-old
Colorado native.
"This individual needs to stand in front of a jury with a death penalty on the
table," Vincent said. "Just the symbolic act of killing a police officer that's
trying to protect the citizens -- that needs to be addressed with the most
severe penalty."
Jamie Bush is an advocate with the Campaign To End The Death Penalty.
"I don't feel that's the government's place, to be executing its own citizens,"
she said. "I don't want the law to kill in my name."
Bush believes biblical "eye for an eye" is an ineffective crime deterrent.
"I just don't feel like capital punishment, execution, the taking of another
life is the solution," she said.
A state prosecutor tells YNN the death penalty committee should have a
recommendation in this case possibly in a week.
Ultimately, Travis County DA Rosemary Lehmberg will decide if the death penalty
is on the table. The jury would then decide punishment.
Austin Police Chief Art Acevedo said a jury of 12, not the DA, should decide
Daniel's fate.
(source: YNetNews)
ARIZONA----new execution date
Arizona's 6th execution of 2012 set for Dec. 5
The Arizona Supreme Court has granted a motion for a warrant of execution for
death row inmate Richard Dale Stokley.
The warrant announced Tuesday sets the execution date for Dec. 5.
Stokley, 60, lost an Oct. 1 appeal in the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in
San Francisco.
Stokley was convicted in the July 1991 kidnapping, rape and murder of 2
13-year-old girls who went missing from a camp-out in Elfrida in southwestern
Arizona's Cochise County. Authorities say the girls' bodies were later dumped
down a water-filled mineshaft.
Stokley was convicted and sentenced to death in 1992. The Arizona Supreme Court
affirmed the convictions and death sentence in 1995.
Stokley's friend, Randy Brazeal, was convicted of 2nd-degree murder in the
killings. He was released from prison last year.
The most recent execution in Arizona was Daniel Wayne Cook on Aug. 8. Cook, 51,
spent nearly half of his life on death row for strangling two men to death in
Lake Havasu City in 1987. His execution by injection was Arizona's 5th so far
this year.
Stokley will be the 6th. The most executions Arizona has conducted in a year
was seven in 1999.
If Arizona ties that record this year, it could become the 2nd-busiest
death-penalty state after Texas.
There was a period of 3 decades -- April 1962 to April 1992 -- during which no
executions were performed in Arizona. During that time, the Legislature rewrote
Arizona's law to comply with a 1972 Supreme Court ruling in Furman v. Georgia,
which dealt with how the death penalty is applied.
Since the death penalty's reinstatement in 1979, the Grand Canyon State has
executed 33 inmates, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.
The Arizona Department of corrections website lists 125 inmates, 3 of them
women, on Arizona's death row.
(source: Associated Press)
PENNSYLVANIA:
Sandusky moved to prison housing death row inmates
Former Penn State defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky will serve the remainder
of his 30-to-60-year child sex abuse sentence at the State Correctional
Institution at Greene, about 50 miles south of Pittsburgh, according to the
state Department of Corrections.
Sandusky, 68, will be placed in protective custody at the prison, Corrections
Secretary John Wetzel said in a statement today. The corrections department
transferred Sandusky after he completed an evaluation process at a diagnostic
and classification center in Camp Hill.
"While we normally do not discuss placement of inmates, this individual's
notoriety called for the release of this information," Wetzel said. "We make
individual decisions based on facts. Given the high profile nature of this
individual, coupled with the nature of his crimes, this makes him very
vulnerable in a prison setting."
Protective custody involves inmates being housed in a single cell while under
additional supervision and escort whenever out of the cell, the corrections
department said. Inmates are offered 1 hour of individual exercise per day, 5
days a week, and showers 3 times a week.
All meals are served and eaten in the cell. All prison services, such as
counseling, religion, medications and treatment programming is delivered
in-cell. Necessary medical and dental services are provided by clinical staff
under escort of security personnel. All visits are non-contact.
Protective custody inmates are permitted to possess a television, radio and
other personal property as authorized by the prison and conditional upon their
compliant adjustment.
SCI Greene houses about 1,800 inmates, including more than 150 facing the death
penalty.
A jury convicted Sandusky in June on 45 of 48 counts of child sex abuse
stemming from allegations involving 10 boys over the last two decades. He will
not be eligible for parole until age 98.
(source: Citizens Voice)
CALIFORNIA:
Prop 34: Death penalty
More than 700 people are on death row in California that's according to the
California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. At least 7 inmates are
from Santa Barbara county and three are from San Luis Obispo county, but their
death sentence could change after Election day.
A yes vote on Prop 34 would abolish the death penalty in California. All of the
prisoners who are currently on death row would have their sentence changed to
life in prison without the possibility of parole, and future offenders would be
in prison for life without parole.
"The death penalty is a typically a morally controversial political question,
but the initiative this time around, the arguments for are based solely on
economic grounds," said Michael Latner, Cal Poly professor of Political
Science.
The advocates argue that this measure will save the state millions of dollars.
Latner said the typical death row inmate costs the state $1-million per year
because of housing, meals, medical bills and court costs.
The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said to put someone
in prison for life without the possibility of parole costs roughly $55,000 per
year per inmate.
Oponenets argue that the death penalty is a deterrent of crime and that it
works, and we shouldn't get rid of it as a possible punishment.
Latner said there is no evidence that supports that the death penalty is a
deterrent. He said if we look at states that use the death penalty most often,
they actually have higher homicide rates.
If Prop 34 passes it would go into effect in Jan. 2013. But again it would be
retroactive -- so all the people on death row would be in prison for life
without the possibility of parole.
(source: KSBY News)
GEORGIA:
High Court to hear Lee County murder case
The Georgia Supreme Court will hear arguments Monday in the death penalty case
of a man convicted of killing a fellow inmate at Lee State prison.
At issue in this high profile case is whether the Georgia Department of
Corrections' recent decision to replace a 3-drug cocktail with 1 drug for
executions was subject to the state's Administrative Procedure Act, which
requires public hearings before such a change may be made.
Here's the Supreme Court document:
FACTS: Warren Lee Hill was given a death sentence in 1991 after a Lee County
jury convicted him of murder in the 1990 bludgeoning death of a fellow prison
inmate, Joseph Handspike. Hill and Handspike were inmates at the Lee County
Correctional Institute. According to the facts of the case, Hill was already
serving a life sentence for murdering his former 18-year-old girlfriend, Myra
Sylvia Wright, when on the morning of Aug. 17, 1990, he removed a 2-by-6 board
embedded with nails that served as a sink leg in the prison bathroom and, as
Handspike slept, pounded him in his head and chest with the board as onlooking
prisoners pleaded with him to stop. Handspike later died at the hospital. In
1993, the Georgia Supreme Court upheld his conviction and death sentence.
On July 3, 2012, the Lee County Superior Court entered an order authorizing the
state Department of Corrections to execute Hill by lethal injection within the
7-day period between July 18, 2012 and July 25, 2012. The department originally
scheduled Hill's execution for July 18, then rescheduled it for July 23. The
change in date occurred at the same time that the Department of Corrections
announced it was changing from a 3-chemical execution method to a 1-chemical
method. On July 20, Hill's attorneys filed a complaint in Fulton County
Superior Court seeking to declare the new procedure invalid and to prevent his
execution by means of the allegedly invalid procedure. They also petitioned the
court for a "writ of mandamus" to force the state to follow the rule-making
procedures required by the Administrative Procedure Act. And they filed a
motion to stay Hill's execution pending the resolution of his claims.
On July 23, 2012, the day his execution was scheduled, the Fulton County
Superior Court ruled the Administrative Procedure Act did not apply and denied
a stay of execution. Hill then appealed to the Supreme Court of Georgia, and
hours before his execution, this Court unanimously granted Hill a stay so it
could consider his appeal. (On the same day, in a separate order, the high
court denied Hill's request to appeal a Butts County Superior Court ruling,
which found that Hill had failed to prove he was mentally retarded beyond a
reasonable doubt and that the "beyond a reasonable doubt" standard was
constitutional.)
ARGUMENTS: Hill's attorneys argue the lower court erred by dismissing Hill's
challenge to the new lethal injection protocol. Official Code of Georgia #
42-2-11 states the Board of Corrections is authorized to adopt and put into
place rules "governing the transaction of the business of the penal system of
the state." The same law states: "All rules and regulations adopted pursuant to
this Code section shall be adopted, established, promulgated" and published in
accordance with the applicable provisions and procedure as set forth in Chapter
13 or Title 50, the "Georgia Administrative Procedure Act.'" Therefore, Hill's
attorneys argue, if the new lethal injection procedure is a "rule," it is
invalid unless it is put into place in compliance with the APA. The key
question, they argue, is whether the new legal injection protocol is a "rule."
"The Procedure is a rule within the meaning of Title 42 and the APA," Hill's
attorneys argue in briefs. "Because Appellees ignored Title 42 in the
promulgation of the Procedure, it is invalid and cannot be used to execute Mr.
Hill." The Department of Corrections developed the procedure "hastily and in
secret, and claim that the public has no interest in it. But no issue is of
more vital concern to the public than the manner in which the State conducts
executions." The public "has an interest in knowing that executions are carried
out according to lawful procedures and that every step of the process,
including the selection and procurement of lethal injection drugs, is lawful.
As such, Appellees cannot argue that the Procedure is simply an internal
management statement, interpretive rule, or general statement of policy that
does not affect private or public rights."
The state argues the trial court correctly ruled that the Department of
Corrections' lethal injection protocol is not a rule triggering the procedural
requirements of the Administrative Procedure Act. "Were this to be the law,
death penalty litigation could soon dominate the administrative arena and an
overly broad construction of the term 'rule' would have far reaching effects on
the administrative rules and regulations used by a host of state agencies," the
state argues in briefs. "It would only be a matter of time before the judicial
system is flooded with new prisoner lawsuits regarding the failure to follow
the APA process in every minor administrative matter." The Department of
Corrections has always had a protocol for carrying out court ordered
executions. "Those procedures have never been adopted as 'rules' under the
Administrative Procedure Act," the state contends. Neither the Board of
Corrections, the Department of Corrections, nor the Commissioner of Corrections
is an "agency" under the APA. All statutory mandates regarding lethal injection
are directed exclusively to the department and the commissioner and not to the
board. "The Board of Corrections, being exempted from general application of
the APA, is required to adopt rules only in limited areas, which do not include
the regulation of lethal injection protocols," the state argues. "Even if one
assumes that the protocol is a proper subject for the Board's rule making, the
protocol would still fall under one of the exceptions to the definition of rule
or one of the exemptions from compliance with the rule making procedures."
Attorneys for Appellant (Hill): V. Robert Denham, Jr., Brian Kammer
Attorneys for Appellee (State): Samuel Olens, Attorney General, Mary Beth
Westmoreland, Dep. A.G., Joseph Drolet, Sr. Asst. A.G., Ashley Culberson, Asst.
A.G.
(source: WALB News)
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