Feb. 23
TEXAS:
Fighting death, one step at a time
They believe they are winning.
In the state that has used the death penalty more than any other in the nation,
three abolitionists walked from Dallas to Fort Worth to compel members of the
faith community to be more vocal in calling for the death of the death penalty
in Texas.
All the arguments against the death penalty - the exonerations, the flawed
convictions - have slowly turned public opinion in their favor, according to
Lynn Walters, Jeff Hood and Wes Magruder, the three making the 35-mile walk.
The marchers started their day in Dallas, where they delivered a letter to
Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins. They then held a news conference
before beginning their walk toward Cowtown.
They arrived in Fort Worth on Friday evening.
Walters, executive director of the Dallas-based advocacy group Hope for Peace
and Justice, said that like many others she once supported the death penalty.
Over the course of a decade she changed her mind, Walters said.
Walters said she senses a new willingness among death-penalty supporters to
listen to other options. Some people, she said, do not realize that life in
prison without the possibility for parole is a sentencing alternative being
rapidly deployed in the state.
"There is no justification for the death penalty," Walters said. "As a
Christian, I believe in redemption and resurrection. The death penalty does not
allow for any of that. I think you have to give God a chance to do whatever
work needs to be done with that person."
The walk coincides with an anti-death-penalty conference that will be held
Saturday at University Christian Church in Fort Worth. Sponsored by the Texas
Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty, more than than 100 people are expected
to attend, said Kristin Houle, TCADP executive director.
Wes Magruder, a Methodist minister, said the majority of United Methodist
church members have historically supported the abolition of the death penalty
but have been remarkably unenthusiastic about voicing their opposition.
"I think if all the Methodists spoke with one voice, the death-penalty policy
would change in Texas," he said.
The other marcher, the Rev. Jeff Hood, a member of the TCADP board of
directors, said faith leadership needs to be more active on this issue.
"We are trying to get the leaders of these churches to offer their opinion and
push," Hood said. "If anyone can move the needle on this issue, it will be
faith leaders. On some level, I think pastors are the last, great hope for
moving this issue forward."
According to a 2013 Pew Research survey, 55 % of Americans said they favor the
death penalty for persons convicted of murder, compared to 78 % in 1996.
Meanwhile, the percentage of those opposing the death penalty has risen from 18
% in 1996 to 37 % in 2013.
The trio entered downtown Fort Worth around 9:15 p.m. According to Hood, they
were tired and their feet were blistered, but they were confident that they
gained "a lot of traction, not just on our soles, but getting our message out."
(source: Fort Worth Star-Telegram)
PENNSYLVANIA:
Sentencing phase scheduled for convicted killer of pregnant woman
A man convicted of 1st-degree murder in the killings of a man and a pregnant
woman will get a new chance at a sentence in 2015.
In December the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania vacated the death penalty against
Harold Murray's, 36, formerly of Philadelphia, in the 2005 killings of Jennifer
Pennington, Shawne Mims, and Pennington's unborn child.
First Assistant District Attorney Kevin Steele said he is ready for another
penalty phase as soon as possible, but the date of the sentencing phase was
delayed at the defense attorney's request.
"He wasn't the defense for the trial," Steele said on Friday.
Murray's attorney, Michael Wiseman, helped Murray with the appeal which was
successful and will most likely be court appointed to represent Murray during
the sentencing phase.
"We need time to adequately prepare this case," Wiseman said in court on
Wednesday.
Murray's sentence was vacated because he was incorrectly given the death
penalty for killing Pennington's unborn child, the Supreme Court ruled. In
Pennsylvania a convicted killer cannot be sentenced to death for killing an
unborn child, and Murray was later given life in prison on that charge.
He appealed his death sentence in the murder of Pennington, however, contending
it was too closely attached to the sentence given for the death of unborn
child. The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania agreed.
Murray was convicted of 3 counts of 1st degree murder in October 2009. The
Supreme Court did not overturn the convictions, nor did it vacate the sentences
of life in prison for the killing of the unborn child and the murder of Mims.
A jury will be picked and sentencing arguments will begin on Jan. 5, 2015.
According to the affidavit of probable cause, on Jan. 31, 2005, detectives from
the Philadelphia Police Department???s Homicide Division responded to the 3600
block of Ford Road in Philadelphia where they found the lifeless body of
Jennifer Pennington. Investigators discovered a receipt for a hotel in King of
Prussia under the name Shawne Mims in her pocket. Investigators later found
Mims dead in the hotel.
An autopsy later revealed that Pennington, who was 6-months pregnant at the
time, was killed from 2 gunshot wounds to the face. Another autopsy was
performed on Mims, who also died from 2 gunshot wounds. One hit him in the arm
before entering his chest and resting in his right lung, and the other entered
into his back.
The shootings resulted in a joint investigation between the Upper Merion
Township Police Department, the Philadelphia Police Department and the
Montgomery County Detective Bureau.
According to court documents, investigators discovered that Mims and a friend
had planned to rob a drug dealer. Later on Jan. 30, 2005, Mims and 2 others
picked up Pennington from Norristown. Pennington called a woman she knew to
arrange a drug deal. During the ride to meet the drug dealer, Mims told
Pennington they intended to rob the drug dealer. Pennington and another woman
remained in the car when Mims and another male left to rob the drug dealer.
Mims and his friend took a gray sweatshirt, cash, cocaine and 3 cell phones
from two men during the robbery. They then went to the Motel 6 in King of
Prussia to use the drugs.
Investigators later learned Murray and another person went to Mims???
girlfriend???s home and asked where he was. Murray told her he was going to
kill Mims because he robbed him of drugs and $3,000. The two men tied up the
victim's children while they searched the home. She was told not to call police
because they would be staking out her home and would know if she did.
Through a series of interviews and photo line-ups, investigators were able to
identify Murray as the man who entered the house and threatened to kill Mims
and Pennington.
(source: Times Herald)
**********************
Man ordered to stand trial in death of gun shop owner
An Indiana County man has been ordered to stand trial in the fatal shooting of
a gun shop owner, a case in which the district attorney may pursue the death
penalty.
Jack Edmundson Jr., 43, of Saltsburg, was ordered to stand trial after a
preliminary hearing Friday where state police testified about a surveillance
video that captured the shooting.
Police said the video clearly shows Mr. Edmundson grabbing a gun from a display
case Dec. 31 and shooting Frank Petro, 62, at Frank's Gun & Taxidermy in
Conemaugh, Indiana County.
Mr. Edmundson called 911 and claimed to have been defending himself from an
attack, but state Trooper Robert Valyo said that account wasn't consistent with
the video. Police believe Mr. Edmundson shot Petro after the suspect extorted
more than $130,000 from Petro by pretending to be an undercover officer
investigating Petro's winnings in an illegal lottery.
(source: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)
FLORIDA:
Local investigator hopes withheld evidence will help death row inmate
Carty, a 1-time Mrs. Florida contestant, has spent the past 3 years trying to
figure out what happened one Christmas Eve 39 years ago when 4 people were
murdered inside a furniture store in Central Florida. Tommy Zeigler, now 68,
was convicted of killing his wife, his in-laws and a citrus crew foreman.
Zeigler's case has always attracted skeptics: a former Orlando Sentinel
newspaper editor; civil rights activist Bianca Jagger; a former chief deputy
who worked on the original case and his brother. The case was the subject of a
1992 book called Fatal Flaw. None of their efforts resulted in a new trial for
Zeigler.
Zeigler's New York attorneys hope that Carty's work is different. This past
week, they appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court. The motion relies heavily on
Carty's assertion that Orange County sheriff's detectives and prosecutors not
only withheld evidence when they tried Zeigler back in 1976, but they also lied
about key details.
Each year, the U.S. Supreme Court takes up fewer than 1 % of the 10,000 cases
submitted. But Zeigler's attorneys hope the justices will pay attention to a
recent movement to end prosecutors' failure to share evidence, known as Brady
violations. The problem is considered widespread enough that a federal appeals
court judge in Pasadena, Calif., urged his colleagues to act. "Only judges can
put a stop to it," wrote Alex Kozinski, chief judge of the 9th U.S. Circuit
Court of Appeals.
On this day, one of Carty's neighbors, former Pinellas County Sheriff Everett
Rice, watched a recent interview of the lead detective on Zeigler's case.
When Rice, 69, who has no connection to the Zeigler case, was done listening,
he clenched his hands together and frowned.
"If they execute Tommy Zeigler for this case," he said, "I'll have to be
against the death penalty."
----
Christmas Eve 1975. Zeigler and his wife had been married for 8 years and lived
next door to his parents in Winter Garden, a bedroom community of 6,000
northwest of Orlando.
The Zeiglers operated a furniture store, which Tommy's parents, Beulah and Tom,
had opened in 1939. Tommy and his wife, Eunice, had no children but bred and
exhibited Persian cats. They were churchgoers. They hobnobbed with the town's
elite. Zeigler, then 30, was good friends with the Winter Garden police chief,
Don Ficke.
That night, Eunice's parents, who were visiting for the holidays from Moultrie,
Ga., were supposed to stop by the store to pick out a recliner for Eunice's
father for Christmas. After that, the Fickes were supposed to pick up the
Zeiglers at their home for a party at a judge's house.
But at 9:20 p.m., Zeigler called the party. He said he'd been shot.
When police got to the store, Zeigler opened the front door and collapsed with
a bullet wound in his stomach. Eunice, Zeigler's 32-year-old wife, was on the
kitchen floor with a shot to the back of the head. Her mother, Virginia, 52,
had been shot in the front of the store. Eunice's father, retired minister
Perry Edwards Sr., 72, had struggled with his attacker. He'd been beaten and
shot multiple times. Nearby, citrus crew foreman Charlie Mays, 35, lay on his
back, bludgeoned and shot. He had $400 and some furniture store receipts in his
pocket.
Zeigler's own gunshot wound missed major organs. At the hospital, he told
detectives he'd gone to the furniture store with his handyman to make some
final deliveries. Once inside the dark store, he was attacked and lost his
glasses. He shot at blurry figures with one of the guns he kept at the store.
Someone shot him. He heard one of his attackers say: "Mays has been hit. Kill
him."
Zeigler said he blacked out. When he came to, he crawled around looking for his
glasses. He may have crawled over a body; he wasn't sure.
----
Soon after the murders, Zeigler's handyman and a fruit picker contacted police
independently. The handyman, Edward Williams, said Zeigler had tried to shoot
him as he entered the store. The fruit picker, Felton Thomas, said Zeigler had
asked him to shoot guns with Mays, the dead citrus foreman, in a grove the
evening of the murders, then later tried to get both men to come to the store.
Only Mays had gone inside.
Donald Frye, the 29-year-old detective who got the case, had just gone for
blood spatter training the year before. He noticed that some of the blood near
Zeigler's father-in-law and the citrus foreman had dried at different times. He
surmised that Zeigler killed his wife and in-laws first, then tried to lure
Mays, Thomas and Williams there to kill and frame them for the murders.
Zeigler had shot himself to make it look like he'd been robbed, Frye decided.
He was convinced Zeigler planned to collect on $520,000 in life insurance
policies he'd taken out on his wife months before.
On Dec. 29, 1975, Frye came to Zeigler's hospital bed and charged him with
murder. He was convicted in 1976. The jury recommended life in prison, but the
judge sentenced him to the electric chair.
----
In 2011, Carty read an article about Zeigler in the Tampa Bay Times. The
article mentioned efforts to seek more DNA testing of blood on Zeigler's shirt.
Prosecutors had argued at the trial that Zeigler's shirt was covered with his
father-in-law's blood. In 2001, sections of the shirt were submitted for DNA
testing, which had been unavailable at the time of the trial. No trace of the
father-in-law's blood was found. Only Mays' blood was detected. Zeigler's
attorneys asked to test the whole shirt; that request was denied.
Carty was outraged. Why would the prosecution thwart attempts to figure out the
truth?
A private investigator of 13 years, Carty specializes in reuniting long-lost
relatives. She approaches each case with an almost fanatical obsession. She
quickly compiled a list of other facts that pointed to his innocence: a key
witness' story didn't add up, Zeigler passed lie detector tests and was even
interviewed under the influence of truth serum.
In 2012, she went to meet Zeigler in prison. She told him she wanted to be his
private investigator. She would work for free.
----
One of the first incongruous details that Carty noticed was a name in the
arrest report. It said a black man named Robert Foster had been hiding and
sought protection from police because of what he'd seen at the Zeigler
furniture store. Foster's name was featured in a handful of early news stories.
Then, just like that, his name disappeared, and the same story was attributed
to Felton Thomas, the fruit picker who claimed he'd gone with Mays and Zeigler
to an orange grove to shoot guns.
Who was Robert Foster? Carty wondered.
Frye, the lead detective on the case, had told Zeigler's lawyers in a 1976
deposition it was a typographical error. Carty didn't believe it.
Later, while looking through the files, she found an interview with a woman
named Mary Beach, who was handyman Ed Williams' landlady. She had mentioned a
tall man, over 6 feet tall, with a big belly named Robert Foster who played
softball with her husband and murder victim Charlie Mays.
Then, another break. In the spring of 2011, a woman named Susan Ambler-Graden
called Carty and said a tall, black man with a gun attempted to rob her mother
at the Gulf gas station she managed, diagonally across the street from the
Zeigler furniture store, around 6 p.m. the night of the killings.
Ambler-Graden, 10 at the time, had watched the whole thing. Her mother had
reported the attempted robbery to police. But Carty could find no record of it
in defense exhibits.
Ambler-Graden told Carty that their attacker looked exactly like Michael Clarke
Duncan, an actor in the 1999 film, The Green Mile. Carty wondered if the robber
was Robert Foster. With a picture of Duncan taped to her computer, Carty
searched the Department of Corrections website for tall men named Robert
Foster.
She found him quickly. He had been released from prison in North Carolina six
months before the murders. He had a criminal history that included armed
robbery. He was working as a fruit picker in Orange County at the time of the
murders.
Carty sent Foster's mug shot to Beach, Williams' former landlady and a retired
jail clerk. That was the Foster who played softball with Mays, Beach recalled.
Ambler-Graden also identified him.
Carty had Zeigler's lawyers hire retired Pinellas County sheriff's Capt. Calvin
Dennie Jr., 65, to track down Foster, who is now living in Tallahassee. Foster
admitted nothing except that he had been in Orange County around the time of
the murders and that he was a fruit picker.
"His answers were too short and quick," Dennie said. "Based on his body
language and his expression, I thought he was lying myself."
----
In April 2012, Zeigler's lawyers drafted an appeal based on the new
information. Orange County police had not only hidden the existence of Foster
and the robbery at the gas station, the appeal said, but Frye had lied about
it. They argued that criminal activity across the street involving someone who
knew one of the murder victims raised doubts about the prosecution's version of
events.
Circuit Judge Reginald Whitehead rejected the appeal. The Florida Supreme Court
also refused to hear the case, stating the new evidence did not warrant a new
trial, given the other evidence against Zeigler.
A growing number of high courts have rejected claims of prosecutorial
misconduct as long as other evidence exists. Judge Kozinski, a dissenter in an
appeal based on withheld evidence involving a man from Washington who was
convicted of possessing ricin for use as a weapon, argues that standard "will
almost never be met."
"The trend has led, in the words of the New York Times editorial board, to
'rampant prosecutorial misconduct,'" Zeigler's appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court
noted, "and 'a serious moral hazard for prosecutors who are more interested in
winning a conviction than serving justice.'"
"It ties into a national trend to begin to question why all these cheating
claims are falling on deaf ears and what this means for the justice system,"
said Dennis Tracey III, one of Zeigler's New York attorneys who has worked on
the case for free for almost 30 years.
Tracey said there is other evidence, including a report of another averted
armed robbery across the street at a department store about 1/2 hour before
Zeigler called police to report he'd been shot. Carty has also collected
evidence that points to a different suspect altogether. That information is not
part of the current motion before the U.S. Supreme Court, but the attorneys
would hope to introduce it at a new trial.
----
2 weeks ago, Carty, 57, and a documentary producer headed to Clermont to
interview Frye, the detective. Carty did not conduct the interview but she has
a copy of it. Carty said Frye became angry once he knew Zeigler's supporters
were involved in the interview. He could not be reached for this story. Jeff
Ashton, the state attorney for Orange and Osceola counties, did not return
phone calls. But in a 2003 interview, he was asked: "Will Zeigler ever get a
new trial?"
"Not in a million years," he responded.
Frye is adamant they have the right killer behind bars. Now 68, the same age as
Zeigler, Frye said the blood evidence was one of the most telling aspects of
the crime. Zeigler's father-in-law's blood spilled first and dried. 15 to 30
minutes later, Mays blood splattered and dried. Sometime after that, a shoulder
holster that belonged to Zeigler was dropped atop the dried blood.
"To make the crime scene look good, he went and fetched it and threw it down in
the blood," Frye said. "It's a very significant factor. It really solidifies,
if you will, our whole understanding of what happened that night."
It shows, Frye said, that Zeigler lured each victim, 1 by 1.
"We tried to make some connection between Felton Thomas, Ed Williams and
Charlie Mays," he said. "They didn't know each other. And all the handguns used
in this crime were traced back to Tommy Zeigler."
He reiterated that Robert Foster had nothing to do with the case. The attempted
robbery across the street on the evening of the murders was not relevant.
"My understanding is there was a single black male who tried it and he didn't
get anything," he said, "and the Winter Garden police did a report on it."
----
When Carty saw the video of Frye acknowledging a police report existed for the
nearby gas station robbery, she screamed. To her, it was another report
withheld from the defense.
The same day as Frye's interview, she travelled to Leesburg to interview Beach,
69, the handyman's landlord. Beach tied Foster to Mays, the citrus crew chief,
and Williams, the handyman. She said Foster and Mays played on the same
softball team. She was an umpire.
"Williams, Foster and Mays all knew each other, you know," she said.
"With your own eyes, you saw these people together?" Carty asked.
"With my own eyes," she responded.
She said she may have even seen Foster in Williams' truck the day of the
murders.
Zeigler's attorneys have always argued that Mays was part of a robbery at the
furniture store and not just a customer coming to pick up a TV, as prosecutors
claim. To Carty, the connections between Mays and the other men suggest a
possible conspiracy.
----
Back in Carty's living room, Rice, the former sheriff, acknowledged the
complexity of the case.
"But you have a lead detective who admits that an armed robbery occurred across
the street about the same time and there's a police report about it and the
defense knew nothing about it, but he says it has nothing to do with the case?"
Rice says. "That's a jury question. If that had been known at the time, the
case might have had a different result."
With so many victims and so much blood, Rice said, the case cries out for a
fresh DNA analysis. "With what we know today," Rice said, "there's a huge
amount of reasonable doubt."
(source: Tampa Bay Times)
OHIO:
Ohio's death penalty brings murderers to justice: State Rep. Jim Buchy
The following guest column is by Ohio Rep. Jim Buchy, a Republican from
Greenville. He writes in defense of Ohio's death penalty.
Joy Stewart was a 22-year-old newlywed and was eight months pregnant with her
first child in 1989 when she was brutally raped and stabbed, killing both her
and her unborn child. Had their lives been spared, that child would have blown
out 25 birthday candles this year.
Last month, her killer was put to death. The complications surrounding the
execution have brought the issue of Ohio's capital punishment policy
center-stage.
Why is this story so important to me? At that time, I was the state
representative of Preble County, where the murder occurred. I remember the
surprise and outrage of the residents and families upon learning about the
heinous murder, and I know I share the opinion of many throughout the area and
all across Ohio that justice was served when the killer was put to death.
No one should be satisfied with a capital punishment policy that results in
unnecessary pain or suffering. It is a real shame that the challenges
experienced during the murderer's execution has taken attention away from Ms.
Stewart, who suffered far more pain and suffering than did her assailant a full
quarter-century later.
Consider: The murderer lived longer AFTER committing murder than his innocent
victim lived her entire life.
If a new formula is needed to make the executions run more smoothly, then that
is a discussion I am willing to have. In fact, I am currently exploring the
issue further and looking into improving the way it is carried out in Ohio. But
I strongly believe doing away with capital punishment in Ohio would be the
wrong way to go.
People like me are frequently criticized for being unashamedly pro-life, while
at the same time supporting capital punishment. I simply believe that life is a
precious thing, and therefore taking the life of someone else should be met
with equal retribution. If the murderer did not think his victims deserved to
live, then how can he be so sure he was either?
Many of the same people who raise not even a whisper when an unborn child, the
premier symbol of innocence, is killed in the womb do not hesitate to voice out
against the state-sanctioned death of a convicted murderer.
Deterrence should not be the only measure that is considered when debating the
merits of the death penalty. Bringing convicted murderers to justice at least
provides some sense of closure to the victims??? families and loved ones.
(source: cleveland.com)
********************
Burning at the stake might have been faster than Ohio execution
The recent bungled execution in Ohio again brings the practice of capital
punishment to the forefront. The execution was an agonizing 25-minute ordeal,
when an untried combination of lethal drugs failed to cause a quick death. USA
Today quotes an assistant Ohio Attorney General as saying, "You're not entitled
to a pain-free execution." As anyone who has euthanized a beloved pet can
attest, the pet euthanasia process takes about 30 seconds, with no apparent
pain. We are more humane to our pets than we are to fellow human beings. By any
standard, deprivation of life is sufficient punishment; additional torture is
unnecessary. In this case, the unbelievably barbaric, ancient practice of
burning at the stake might have been faster.
The Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution bars cruel and unusual
punishment. By an amazingly convoluted interpretation of the constitution, the
U.S. Supreme Court inexplicably has managed to avoid defining capital
punishment as cruel punishment. Because it is commonly practiced, capital
punishment is not unusual in the U.S., but it is undeniably cruel.
What could be more cruel than depriving a person of life?
As a protest to executions, a U.S. company stopped manufacturing a
commonly-used execution drug.
European countries, the alternate source of execution drugs, now refuse to sell
the drugs for executions. Europe, with the exception of Belarus, has banned
capital punishment and actively promotes a ban elsewhere.
The 32 states that still practice capital punishment are, of necessity,
resorting to untried combinations of drugs.
According to a Gallup Poll, the 60 % of the population that supports capital
punishment is at the lowest point in 40 years. Approval reached a high point of
80 % in 1994.
Capital punishment is supported by 81 % of Republicans, 47 % of Democrats and
60 % of independents. People may reach their own conclusions about the
philosophical differences that cause this divide. The long-term trend is
against capital punishment, but it usually takes considerable time for public
policy to match public opinion.
Death penalty supporters state emphatically that no innocent person has been
executed. The probable reason is a murder investigation typically ends after
the execution. Were it not for the advent of DNA testing, most of the 18
exonerated former prisoners on death row eventually would have been executed,
according to the Innocence Project. Hence, the logical conclusion is some of
the prisoners executed before the advent of DNA testing were innocent. Forensic
methodology is much improved and we still have people wrongly convicted. The
error rate was undoubtedly higher in earlier times.
It is understandably difficult to generate enthusiastic support for the rights
of murderers, but consider the facts. According to the Innocence Project, after
conviction, 312 prisoners have been exonerated by DNA tests. This included 18
prisoners on death row. Most people are convinced they never will be falsely
convicted of murder and sit on death row. If they could imagine themselves in
that horrendous situation, they never again would favor capital punishment.
(source: Opinion, Darrell Shahan is a Zanesville resident; Zanesville Times
Recorder)
MICHIGAN:
This week in Michigan history: Death penalty abolished
In June 1881, death penalty opponent Sojourner Truth told the Legislature: 'It
shocked me worse than slavery.'
Michigan abolished the death penalty on March 1, 1847, making it the first U.S.
state and possibly the first in a democratic country in the world to do so.
That was the day Michigan's Revised Code of 1846 took effect, according to
David Chardavoyne's chapter in the book "The History of Michigan Law." The
anti-capital punishment campaign was waged over the years by people including
state Sen. Flavius Littlejohn of Allegan County and state Rep. Austin Blair of
Jackson County, who would later become governor.
In 1881, a movement to reinstate the death penalty grew. That June,
abolitionist Sojourner Truth, who lived in Battle Creek, spoke to the
Legislature: "It shocked me worse than slavery. I've heard that you are going
to have hanging again in this state ... Where is the man or woman who can
sanction such a thing as that? We are the makers of murderers if we do it."
The last time a person in Michigan was punished by death under state law was on
Sept. 24, 1830, when Michigan was still a territory.
Stephen Simmons, a 50-year-old tavern keeper and farmer, killed his wife in a
drunken, jealous rage, according to the book, "A Hanging in Detroit."
Simmons' speech before the crowd gathered in downtown Detroit about the dangers
of drinking and rendition of the hymn "Show Pity, Lord, O Lord, Forgive" moved
people to oppose the death penalty.
Wayne County Sheriff Thomas Knapp had refused to handle the hanging himself due
to ethical concerns.
There were still federal executions in Michigan, though.
The last person executed was Anthony Chebatoris, who was hanged July 8, 1938,
at the federal prison in Milan after he was convicted of killing a bystander
during a bank robbery in Midland.
(source: Detroit Free Press)
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