April 22
ARKANSAS:
Arkansas turns to different lethal injection drug
After surrendering its supply of a lethal injection drug to federal agents in
2011, Arkansas turned to a somewhat surprising place to look for another drug:
a list from lawyers for several death row inmates.
The state Department of Correction told The Associated Press last week that it
decided to use phenobarbital after attorneys for several death row inmates
mentioned in a lawsuit that it might be an available drug. Phenobarbital, which
is used to treat seizures, has never been used in a U.S. execution, and critics
contend that a drug that's untested in lethal injections could lead to inhumane
deaths for condemned prisoners.
"People should not be using inmates as an experiment," said David Lubarsky, who
chairs the anesthesiology department at the University of Miami's medical
school. "And that is basically what this is. It's basically experimenting."
As drugmakers object to their products' use in lethal injections, more death
penalty states have been looking at different options. But the states have
revealed little, if any, information about how they go about picking drugs.
"It's been: Here's what we're going to do and unless you can prove it's
excruciatingly painful, the courts, they're not experts either, they're going
to allow it go forward," said Richard Dieter, executive director of the
Washington-based Death Penalty Information Center.
Just last year, Missouri announced plans to use propofol, the anesthetic blamed
for pop star Michael Jackson's death, even though that drug hadn't been used in
a lethal injection. In explaining the change, the state merely said the
decision was due to a lack of another drug. Department of Corrections
spokeswoman Mandi Steele declined to comment further Friday, saying the state's
execution protocol is the subject of legal action.
The changes came after states' supplies of sodium thiopental dried up when the
makers put it off-limits for use in executions. Oklahoma was the first to try
pentobarbital, a sedative commonly used to euthanize animals, leading some
other states to follow suit. But now those supplies are running out after
manufacturers banned its use by states for executions.
In Arkansas, Department of Correction spokeswoman Shea Wilson said the agency
consulted medical sources before picking phenobarbital, but Wilson refused to
say what those sources were. She also wouldn't say whether the agency
considered using other drugs.
"Our research indicated the drug would take effect within 5 minutes and should
result in a painless death," Wilson said in an email to the AP.
But even the paperwork that came with the state's supply of phenobarbital,
which is a kind of drug known as a barbiturate, warns that the "toxic dose of
barbiturates varies considerably," according to records the AP obtained.
"We have no idea about whether or not the injection of such large doses will
produce some acute tolerance effect, in which case you may or may not actually
be able to kill someone with it," said Lubarsky, who has testified in death
penalty cases.
However, Mike Ritze, a family physician and Republican state lawmaker in
Oklahoma, said phenobarbital is humane.
"I don't want to compare humans with veterinarians, but for years, they
euthanized animals and you can use anything in the barbiturates and they're all
very humane. Basically, the person just closes their eyes," said Ritze, a
proponent of the death penalty who said he has used phenobarbital to treat
patients with seizures.
Arkansas and many of the nation's more than 30 other death penalty states once
used a virtually identical 3-drug process: The barbiturate sodium thiopental
was administered to put the inmate to sleep, and 2 other drugs were
administered to stop breathing and the heart.
As sodium thiopental supplies dried up, Arkansas and several other states
initially turned their attention overseas, obtaining the drug from a British
supplier. But in 2011, they lost their supplies to federal agents amid legal
questions about how they got the drug.
No one responded to phone messages left Friday at West-Ward Pharmaceuticals,
the company from which Arkansas bought its latest batch of drugs.
Lubarsky, the anesthesiology department chair, said that "just because the drug
sounds alike - thiopental, pentobarbital, phenobarbital - that doesn't mean
they're that close a cousin."
Those 3 drugs vary in the amount of time it takes for them to start kicking in.
Sodium thiopental is like a light switch: It starts working quickly, and it
wears off quickly. Phenobarbital, the drug Arkansas plans to use, takes a bit
longer to kick in, and it takes longer for the drug to wear off.
Some say that means executions using phenobarbital could take more time.
Federal public defender Jenniffer Horan wrote to Arkansas Democratic Gov. Mike
Beebe this week, calling on the governor to review the state's planned use of
phenobarbital, saying it carries a "substantial risk of a lingering and
inhumane death." A spokesman for Beebe said the governor's office is reviewing
the letter in conjunction with the attorney general's office.
Arkansas hasn't executed an inmate since 2005 and it doesn't have any
executions scheduled, though 37 inmates are on death row. Should executions be
set, the state plans to inject inmates with the anti-anxiety drug lorazepam
before giving them a large dose of phenobarbital.
"The lorazepam is a pre-execution sedative, but it also is intended to offset
the side effects of the barbiturate should any develop," Wilson said in an
email.
However, Jon Groner, a surgery professor at the Ohio State University College
of Medicine, says that might not work because lorazepam can make some people
excitable, instead of relaxed. Groner has worked with lawyers who represent
death row inmates and has written about how lethal injections create an ethical
conflict he calls the Hippocratic paradox.
Medical professionals are arguably the most knowledgeable when it comes to the
drugs used in lethal injections, but they're supposed to heal people, not harm
them.
"These states are not experts in pharmacology," Dieter said. "They're just
trying to carry out their law."
************************
Diocese's prioritiy legislation gets lawmaker action; Abortion, trafficking and
healthcare agendas all advanced by General Assembly
Death penalty
Abolition of the death penalty was the only diocesan priority not realized.
Arkansas' capital punishment has been suspended since the state supreme court
declared the statute unconstitutional in 2012. That ruling forced lawmakers to
re-work the law's language and abolitionists saw an opportunity to debate the
larger issue, especially when Gov. Beebe unexpectedly announced he would sign a
bill that outlawed capital punishment should it reach his desk.
In February, Bishop Taylor testified before a Senate committee on his personal
experience with capital punishment cases and the moral objection of the Church
to the death penalty. Bishop Taylor was joined by Ray Krone, a Tennessee man
wrongly sentenced to die but spared on appeal.
Near the end of the window for introducing new bills, 2 proposals to end the
death penalty were introduced, SB1055 by Sen. Joyce Elliott of Little Rock and
SB2166, by John Walker, also of Little Rock. Bishop Taylor responded with an
appeal to Catholics across the diocese to contact their state legislators to
urge them to push for repeal of the law.
Both bills were referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee. SB 1055 was heard
April 15 and SB2166 was scheduled to be heard in committee April 16.
(source for both: Associated Press)
NEBRASKA:
Conservatives and death penalty
Perhaps some readers were startled by a reference in a George Will column (LJS,
April 14) to "the conservative case against the death penalty."
Yes, it's true.
Some conservatives have turned against the death penalty, and there's evidence
that tide is growing stronger.
In fact, at the renowned Conservative Political Action Conference this year
there was even a booth for Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty.
Nebraskans who oppose the penalty should take note. In a red state like
Nebraska, it's the conservative arguments that hold the most potential to
change the minds of state senators.
An effort to repeal the death penalty is a perennial in the Legislature. The
bill introduced this year by Sen. Ernie Chambers is out of committee and will
be debated on the floor in coming weeks.
For some conservatives, opposition to the death penalty is part of their
general mistrust of government. Edward Crane, founder of the CATO Institute,
put it this way, "My own view on capital punishment is that it is morally
justified but that the government is often so inept and corrupt that innocent
people might die as a result. Thus, I personally oppose capital punishment."
That view has become more mainstream in conservative circles because DNA
technology has shown that some of the murderers facing death sentences in the
United States actually are innocent.
Mary Kate Cary, a speechwriter for former President George H.W. Bush, said,
"It's becoming harder to justify the death penalty in the face of evidence that
our system is flawed....For years, people like me thought that being tough on
crime meant supporting the death penalty. Times have changed, and it's time for
conservatives to get on the right side of the death penalty argument. One can
oppose the death penalty and still be in favor of a tough, affordable, accurate
and fair criminal justice system."
Nebraskans in recent years have seen repeated examples of how the criminal
justice system can deliver a flawed result, ranging from the convictions
overturned in the Beatrice Six cases to the murder charges in the Murdock case
that were dropped after it turned out blood evidence was planted by a crime
scene investigator, who later was convicted of planting evidence.
Another conservative argument against the death penalty is cost. It's cheaper
to keep murderers in prison without parole than it is to pay for the seemingly
endless appeals that are required to reduce error and bias in administering the
death penalty.
Republicans in the Legislature should take note. They can vote for repeal of
the death penalty without turning in their conservative credentials.
(source: Editorial, Lincoln Journal Star)
UTAH:
Judge to consider suppressing Lovell's confession in new trial
A judge has taken under advisement a defense motion to suppress former death
row inmate Doug Lovell's sworn testimony as to how and why he killed a South
Ogden woman in 1985.
Lovell was sentenced to die at his 1993 sentencing hearing after he detailed
strangling Joyce Yost. Now his case is set for trial in February 2014, since a
Utah Supreme Court ruling allowed him to withdraw his guilty plea to the
killing. In July 2010 the high court ruled that Lovell was not explicitly told
out loud in open court when he pleaded guilty in 1993 that he had a right to a
public trial before an impartial jury.
After brief oral arguments on the suppression bid Friday morning, Ogden 2nd
District Judge Michael Lyon said he would issue a written decision at a future
date.
The suppression motion claims Lovell's Fifth Amendment rights against
self-incrimination are at stake because his 1993 admissions did not amount to a
"knowing and voluntary" waiver of those Fifth Amendment rights upon reversal
during appeal.
But Deputy Weber County Attorney Gary Heward argues that Lovell did not have to
take the stand and describe the killing as he did, but did so voluntarily.
Heward's reply motion quotes the transcript from Lovell's June 28, 1993,
hearing where he pleaded guilty, saying he wanted to "come clean" and get the
case behind him. "I've pretty much wanted to do exactly this for a long time,"
Lovell said at the time.
Heward's motion also notes that Lovell at his Aug. 3, 1993, sentencing hearing
"voluntarily elected to be placed under oath, voluntarily subjecting himself to
direct questioning and cross-examination."
That, according to the motion, was instead of the opportunity for "allocution"
as it is called, where a defendant, without being sworn and subject to
questioning, can make a statement to the court at sentencing.
Instead, Lovell took the stand and went into extensive detail on the killing,
even noting he returned to where he hid Yost's body in Ogden Canyon to remove
jewelry from the decomposing body and pawn it.
There is no Utah case law and very little case law elsewhere addressing
Lovell's unusual situation of his sentencing preceding a trial by 21 years,
reads the suppression motion filed by Lovell's public defenders in March.
Lovell's admissions, according to the defense, were made as part of an attempt
to gain leniency and avoid receiving the death penalty. Which, reads the
motion, "creates an inherent coercion."
The prosecution response motion also notes that 1993 is not the only time
Lovell has taken the stand to make a sworn confession.
He did so again at a Nov. 14, 2005, hearing in Ogden before Judge Lyon pursuant
to one of the many appeals tracks in the case, states the motion.
"At this hearing he again confessed, stating that he had told his family and at
least 31 other prisoners that he 'did in fact do this.'...He again testified to
having earlier repeatedly raped and sodomized the victim, to having contracted
on at least 2 separate times to have her killed, and to his decision to and
ultimate fulfillment of his desire to kill her."
Lovell paid 2 different ex-con friends roughly $400 apiece at different times
to kill Yost, said the motion, but neither followed through.
In Lovell's 1993 plea bargain, prosecutors agreed not to seek the death penalty
if Lovell could lead investigators to Yost's remains in Ogden Canyon. When a
5-week search led by a handcuffed Lovell failed to find anything, the Weber
County Attorney's Office asked for and received the death penalty.
As he has testified, Lovell killed Yost to prevent her from testifying to his
rape of her that same year. He was still convicted of the rape, currently
serving a 15-years-to-life prison term. He wasn't charged with her murder until
1992.
(source: Standard-Examiner)
ARIZONA:
Beyond A Reasonable Doubt: 12 Of Jodi Arias' Biggest Lies Exposed
As Jodi Arias' explosive murder trial winds its way to a conclusion, trial
watchers are looking back at the case against Arias, including her bizarre
behavior and habitual lies about the murder of her former boyfriend Travis
Alexander.
Arias is accused of shooting the 30-year-old motivational speaker in the face,
stabbing him 29 times and slitting his throat from ear to ear in his Mesa,
Ariz. home in June 2008. She faces the death penalty if convicted.
Arias claims she killed her ex in self-defense.
As the unusual case unfolded over the past 4 years, Arias, 32, has been caught
in a firestorm of lies surrounding her involvement in the murder and her
relationship with Alexander.
To help separate the fact from the fiction, RadarOnline.com is breaking down
the 12 biggest lies told by Arias that have been revealed over the course of
her murder trial.
1. Arias said she would never harm Alexander
Arias initially denied any involvement in Alexander's murder.
In fact, she insisted she would never hurt her former boyfriend during a
recorded interrogation from July 15, 2008 that was played in court during day 7
of her murder trial.
"I would never want to hurt him...If I did that, I'd be fully ready to face the
consequences. I'm all for the Ten Commandments - thou shall not kill," Arias
said on the video that was played for jurors.
Later, Arias admitted to shooting Alexander and attempting to cover up, rather
than take responsibility.
2. The last time she saw Alexander
"Jodi stated she last saw Travis in April of 2008," a police officer wrote in a
document that was read to the jury during the trial.
However, photos recovered from a camera found at the crime scene and time
stamped the day of the murder, revealed that Arias had in fact been at
Alexander's house the day Alexander was killed.
The recovered images showed Arias lying naked and in sexually provocative
positions on the victim's bed, naked pictures of Travis in the shower, and
blurry pictures of the bloody crime scene.
Based on the photos, an investigator wrote: "Jodi was lying about not seeing
Travis since April of 2008. This also proves that Jodi was the last person I
can prove had contact with Travis prior to his death."
On June 26, 2008 DNA evidence offered more evidence that Jodi was in fact at
the crime scene.
The results revealed that hair and a bloody print found inside Alexander's home
belonged to Arias and also indicated that a bloody print from the crime scene
was a mixture of Arias' and Alexander's DNA.
3 & 4. The 2 Different Intruder Stories
After evidence linking Arias to the crime scene was revealed, Arias told
authorities that 2 masked intruders killed Alexander, recounting 2 different,
but both very detailed, versions of the intruder story.
In 1 version Arias created, 2 intruders broke into Alexander's house and held
her at gunpoint. The intruders argued with each other at one point she said. In
another fantastical version she claimed an intruder pulled the trigger of the
gun held to her head, but the gun did not fire.
In her male-female 2-intruder story, Arias said, "She (the other intruder) was
in the bathroom, standing over Travis. I charged her. I ran down the hall,
pushed her as hard as I could."
Arias later dropped the intruder stories and admitted to killing Alexander but
said it was in self defense. During the trial, prosecutor Juan Martinez got
Arias to admit to the jury that both of her intruder stories were lies. Arias
testified she couldn't keep her stories straight.
5. Alexander sent Arias letter "admitting" he was a pedophile
Arias claimed Alexander sent her letters before his death, including one in
which he admitted to being a pedophile.
But during the trial, Prosecutor Martinez told the court that the letters were
tested and found to be forgeries.
6. How she incurred cuts on her fingers after Alexander's killing
During the trial, Arias new love interest at the time of Alexander's murder,
Ryan Burns, testified that Arias had told him that the cuts on her hands were
from a margarita glass that she broke while working at Margaritaville
restaurant in Yreka.
An expert later testified that there was no restaurant by that name in Yreka,
indicating that Arias had lied about her job and about how she got the injuries
to her hands around the time of Alexander's murder.
Arias hands were bloody and later bandaged after the killing and the cuts
almost certainly were the result of stabbing Alexander repeatedly.
7. Her story on Travis Alexander owning a gun
In a recorded interview with Detective Flores on July 15, 2008, Arias told
authorities she was afraid of guns. She also initially told police that Travis
did not own a gun.
"That is one of the things I am scared of. [Guns and] public speaking," Arias
said.
"That was one of the things [Alexander] was trying to get me to do - get out of
my comfort zone."
But in the same interview, the defendant admitted to Flores that, if she had
killed Alexander, she would have most likely used a gun, calling into question
her initial statement.
"I'm not the brightest person, but I don't think I could stab him, I'd have to
shoot him...The least I could do is make it as humane as possible," Arias said
in that recorded interview.
Arias was really tripped up when she testified that as Alexander supposedly
chased her in a murderous rage, she fled into his walk-in closet and grabbed
his gun from a shelf. Previously she told police he did not own a gun.
8. Her 'Inside Edition' Interview
Arias said she was approached by the show's producers about doing her infamous
Inside Edition interview, and at one point, Arias also alleged that she had
been pressured by a prison guard to talk on camera.
However, evidence presented during the case suggested that Arias had reached
out to the producers herself.
During the trial, Martinez presented copies of magazines that Arias had used to
send coded messages to her ex-boyfriend Matt McCartney, which in addition to
including coded messages about his testimony during the trial, also contained
the name and number of a former ABC producer. That fact conflicts with Arias'
claims that Inside Edition solicited her for her the interview.
9. Text messages and phone calls from Alexander
To support her claims that Alexander grew angry when confronted with his
alleged sexually deviant behavior, Arias discussed repeated text messages and
phone calls Alexander supposedly sent her after she discovered him masturbating
to a photo of a young boy.
But Martinez poked holes in Arias' story, pointing out discrepancies regarding
the timing of Alexander's text messages and that none of the text messages from
the victim actually referenced masturbation.
Martinez also told the jury that phone records indicate that Alexander called
Arias only 5 times during the entire day, not as persistently as Arias had
claimed.
10. Arias' coded messages to Matt McCartney
The prosecutor indicated magazines that Arias had used to send coded messages
to Matt McCartney also showed that Arias was trying to get her ex-boyfriend to
change his testimony to support her own version of events.
The prosecution shared phrases from the coded messages that, when combined,
read as the following: "You f**ked up. What you my attorney next day directly
contradicts what I've been saying for over a year. Get down here ASAP and see
me before you talk to them again and before you testify so we can fix this."
11. Her alibi the night-of the murder
During the trial, Martinez questioned Arias about how she faked her alibi
immediately after she killed Alexander.
Alexander left messages on Alexander's cell phone, visited Burns in Utah hours
after the attack claiming she was late because she got lost, and even sent
flowers to Alexander's grandmother after his body was discovered. She also sent
him an email, writing how much she was looking forward to seeing him soon.
12. Travis Alexander's temper
In her infamous TV interview with CBS' 48 Hours she said Alexander had never
threatened her life. "He lost his temper a few times and it wasn't anything
that really required me to...I never felt my life was in danger," she said on
camera. Later, she testified that Alexander flew into a murderous rage when she
dropped his camera on the bathroom floor.
She also claimed during the trial that Travis injured one of her fingers by
kicking her repeatedly as she was on the ground and used her hands to try to
protect herself.
(source: RadarOnline)
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