March 22
TEXAS----impending execution
High court refuses to spare man from texas execution
The U.S. Supreme Court has refused to block the execution of a Texas man who
killed a city code enforcement worker in 2005.
Attorneys for 33-year-old Adam Ward argued a high court ban on executing
mentally impaired prisoners should be extended to him because he is severely
mentally ill. The court previously has ruled mentally ill offenders may be
executed as long as they understand they are being punished and why.
The ruling came just hours before Ward is scheduled to be executed Tuesday
evening.
He was convicted of killing 44-year-old Michael Walker in Commerce, about 65
miles northeast of Dallas. Walker had been taking photos of junk piled outside
the Ward family home when he was fatally shot.
(source: Associated Press)
****************
Exoneree's amazing story of giving back
If there's anyone who deserves to be bitter about the injustices done to him,
it's Anthony Graves.
No one would blame him if he took the $1.5 million in apology money the state
gave him after falsely imprisoning him for 18 years for a crime he didn't
commit and focused solely on himself.
Instead, he deserves high praise for taking a good chunk of that money in the 6
years since his release and using it - and a lot of his time and energy - for
good.
As Dallas Morning News reporter Brandi Grissom points out in her recent news
story, his life is now about helping free other wrongly accused inmates and
providing needed services to help others ease their re-entry to society.
It's amazing that he has come out of this egregious miscarriage of justice
without apparent resentment or anger - especially considering he twice faced
execution dates in his 12 years on death row.
His motivation: "I wanted to make a difference." He's sure working hard at
that.
Graves' exoneration is well-chronicled by now: Prosecutors never established a
plausible motive linking him to the 1992 heinous deaths of 6 people who were
shot, bludgeoned and stabbed to death in Sommerville, Texas, near Bryan. The
case led to the disbarment of former Burleson County District Attorney Charles
Sebesta who withheld key evidence and elicited false testimony in the case.
The case underscored why - since 2007 - this newspaper called for a moratorium
on the death penalty. It's both an imperfect punishment - exonerations like
Graves' prove its fallibility - and irreversible.
What's lesser-known is the promising work that Graves has done in Houston and
throughout the state through his fledgling Anthony Graves Foundation.
Here's what he's been up to:
- Graves opened a health clinic this month to provide low-cost and free care to
those leaving prison and their families at the foundation's Houston offices.
- His innocence project takes on cases similar to his - the labor-intensive
ones that many other innocence projects won't take up when there's no
DNA-evidence to re-evaluate.
- The foundation provides counseling, job training, food and housing help for
freed prisoners who have no family to go home to.
Unfortunately, we've had so many exoneree stories and they sometimes tend to
run together. But Graves' case continues to stand out.
There's no way the state can reimburse Graves for what it took from him. When
he was released, at the age of 45, his 3 sons - who were children at the time
of his arrest - were grown, with children of their own.
The least we - and those working to improve the criminal justice system in
Texas - can do is learn more about his work and support him.
He deserves that.
(source: Editorial, Dallas Morning News)
**************
Denton pastor to protest Holy Week execution
Denton activist pastor Jeff Hood said he plans to get arrested tonight in
Huntsville, where he will protest the execution of convicted murderer Adam
Ward.
The execution, scheduled for 6 p.m., falls during Holy Week, which ends the
Christian observance of Lent with Easter.
Hood said he wanted to deepen his protest of the execution in part because it
falls on the holiest week of the Christian calendar.
"I'm going to walk past the barrier that keeps the protestors from the
entrance," Hood said. "I'll kneel, and if nothing happens, I'll just keep
walking toward the entrance until they arrest me."
Hood said it's possible that the guards watching over the prison unit that
houses the death chamber might point a rifle at him as he calmly passes the
barrier. A photographer accompanying Hood will likely catch the gesture.
"If that happens, I want to capture that image," Hood said. "I want to show how
far the state will go to execute someone."
Hood is on the board of the Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty, an
issue he's been devoted to for the last 4 years. The pastor has walked hundreds
of miles to protest Texas capital punishment, and he regularly visits death row
inmates to minister to them.
Adam Ward was convicted and sentenced to death after he shot and killed
Commerce code enforcement officer Michael Walker in 2005. Ward???s defense has
appealed his sentence, arguing that the inmate suffers from severe mental
illness.
Hood said that he sees part of himself in Ward. The pastor, now in his 30s, has
bipolar disorder and has taken medication for the mental illness since he was
24 years old.
Hood said he sees the execution of Texas prisoners as "a re-enactment of Holy
Week."
Death row inmates are permitted a final meeting with friends and family in
their unit in Livingston. They can share snacks from a vending machine, Hood
said, and have "a sacramental moment around the last meal."
The pastor imagines the trip to the death chamber as a shadow version of the
Passion playing out.
"They're taken to Huntsville," he said. "They're paraded through the streets.
They are brought to the death chamber in Huntsville. They are walked through
halls up to the space. They have to climb up onto the gurney, their arms are
extended and they are executed. Their skin is pierced with metal. They are
taunted, in some ways, before the execution. There are witnesses - sometimes
their family is there. The last thing you hear in that chamber is the
pronouncement of death."
While he doesn't expect his protest to halt the execution, Hood said he has
felt called to "go deeper" in his protest, which he considers a spiritual
discipline. He found examples for his plans in both the story of a Buddhist
monk in Dallas and in the Bible.
The monk told Hood the story of walking and talking with his mentor in downtown
Dallas. The 2 men turned a corner and saw a group of men beating a man. The
monk told his mentor he would call 911. The mentor intervened, Hood said.
"He looked at the situation ... and said 'wouldn't it be more fun to beat up a
couple of Buddhist monks than this guy?'" Hood said. "That story has always
demonstrated to me that the call of faith, the call of divine living, spiritual
enlightenment - whatever you want to call it - is about placing our body
between the oppressed and the oppressor. And I count it as a sacrament every
time I feel called to do that."
He looks to the Book of Matthew for guidance, too, and says the chapter
commands Christians to minister to the most vulnerable members of society.
"Look at death row. It doesn't get much more vulnerable than that," he said.
In his work ministering to death row inmates, Hood said he's met men who grew
up in poverty, burdened by mental illness, systemic racism, broken families and
addiction.
Hood has to confront the horrors the inmates have committed in his ministry,
including the murders of children. Hood is a husband and father of 5 young
children.
"We execute someone who sexually abuses and kills a child," he said. "Someone
who bankrupts our economy and destroys the lives of millions of children? Our
value system is so screwed up, and so I think the call to follow Jesus is one
of not only to place our bodies between the oppressed and the oppressor, but
also pushing back against this entire paradigm, that human value is based on
human actions. That's not the message of Grace."
Hood is no stranger to the activist pulpit. The minister, who earned his
theological training in a Baptist seminary, planted a short-lived church in
Denton to minister to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender seekers, and
preached what he calls "queer theology."
He later served the Cathedral of Hope, which is said to be the world's the
largest liberal Christian church with an outreach to LGBT residents in Dallas.
Last August, Hood was an outspoken advocate for an investigation into the death
of Joseph Hutcheson, who died in police custody in the lobby of the Dallas
County Jail. The Dallas County Medical Examiner's office ruled the death a
homicide.
Ward is to be executed by lethal injection. It will be the 5th execution this
year in Texas, which has executed more offenders than any state since the U.S.
Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976.
(source: Denton record Chronicle)
DELAWARE:
Judge won't reconsider former death row inmate's bail
Former death row inmate Chauncey Starling's bail will not be reconsidered as he
awaits a retrial for the 2001 murder of a young boy and man in a Wilmington
barbershop.
Superior Court Judge Andrea L. Rocanelli ruled Monday that Starling will not
get another proof positive hearing. This means a 2002 decision to hold him in
prison without bail will remain.
Starling was sentenced to death in 2004 for the murder of Damon J. "DJ" Gist
Jr., 5, and Darnell Evans, 28, in the Made 4 Men barbershop at Fourth and
Shipley streets.
The Delaware Supreme Court in mid-December overturned Starling's death sentence
and granted him a retrial, citing mistakes made in his 1st trial by both the
defense and prosecution.
Soon after the ruling, his defense attorneys requested a court hearing to
determine if Starling is eligible for bail in light of his conviction being
overturned.
Death penalty repeal bill stalled for high court ruling
They argued that he should be granted the new hearing because of the passage of
time, but the state opposed their request, Rocanelli wrote.
"The mere passage of time, albeit substantial, does not reflect the type of
'changed circumstances' reflected in Delaware Supreme Court case law that
warrants reconsideration under the Doctrine," Rocanelli wrote.
Starling's attorneys also argued that a new hearing should be granted because
of the Delaware Supreme Court's current review of the constitutionality of
Delaware's death penalty statute.
President Judge Jan R. Jurden issued a temporary stay on all pending capital
murder trials as the court considers Delaware's law in light a recent U.S.
Supreme Court ruling striking down a portion of Florida's law.
The court rejected the notion that the Delaware Supreme Court's review should
impact his bail status.
"Second, the fact that the State may not be able to proceed on capital charges
against Defendant at some point in the future - pending the Supreme Court's
determination on the constitutionality of the death penalty - is too
speculative to warrant a new proof positive hearing at this point in the
proceedings," Rocanelli wrote.
(source: delawareonline.com)
VIRGINIA:
Lawyer: Man accused of killing Officer Ashley Guindon is mentally impaired
An Army staff sergeant charged with shooting and killing a newly sworn Virginia
police officer is mentally impaired as a result of his two tours in Iraq, his
defense lawyer said Tuesday.
Ronald Hamilton, 32, of Woodbridge, is charged with capital murder for the Feb.
27 shooting death of Prince William County police officer Ashley Guindon, who
was working her 1st shift after being sworn in.
At a pretrial hearing in Prince William General District Court, Hamilton's
lawyer, Ed Ungvarsky, said he expects Hamilton's state of mind to be a major
issue going forward, though he did not commit to pursuing an insanity defense.
"After serving 2 tours in Iraq, Sgt. Hamilton presents as a psychologically
damaged and mentally impaired person," Ungvarsky told Judge Robert Coleman.
Prosecutors say Hamilton shot Guindon and 2 other police officers who responded
when Hamilton's wife called 911 for help. Crystal Hamilton was found shot dead
in her home. The 2 other officers who were shot, Jesse Hempen and David
McKeown, survived.
Court records indicate that Hamilton confessed to the shootings.
Neither Ungvarsky nor Prince William County Commonwealth's Attorney Paul Ebert
would comment on Hamilton's mental health after Tuesday's hearing. Ethical
guidelines bar attorneys from discussing potential evidence in the case outside
of court.
Ungvarsky's comment came as he argued multiple pretrial motions, including a
request for a gag order on all the lawyers in the case, and a request that
would bar prosecutors from using a search warrant to obtain Hamilton's personal
records, such as health records and phone records. Ungvarsky said prosecutors
should instead be required to seek such records through a subpoena, a process
that would allow defense lawyers to object to anything they deemed improper.
Coleman rejected all of Ungvarsky's requests, saying he lacked authority as a
district judge with limited jurisdiction to grant them. A preliminary hearing
is scheduled for next month, and if a judge finds probable cause, the case will
be sent to a grand jury for an indictment and then to Circuit Court for a
trial. If convicted, Hamilton could get the death penalty.
(source: Associated Press)
********************
Appeals court hears Virginia death row inmate's case
A Virginia prisoner who killed 2 people during an escape was improperly denied
a chance to show that he wouldn't do it again if spared the death penalty, his
lawyer told a federal appeals court Tuesday.
Attorney Jonathan P. Sheldon said the trial judge should have allowed an expert
witness to testify that William Morva would not endanger other inmates or
prison guards if sentenced to life without parole. The jury had cited "future
dangerousness" as the aggravating factor in sentencing Morva to death for the
2006 slayings.
Virginia Senior Assistant Attorney General Alice Armstrong argued that the U.S.
Supreme Court has never required a trial judge to allow the kind of expert
testimony sought by Morva.
The appeals court typically issues its decision several weeks after hearing
arguments.
Morva was in jail awaiting trial on attempted-robbery charges in 2006 when he
was taken to a Blacksburg hospital for treatment of an injury. He overpowered a
Montgomery County deputy sheriff in the hospital and used the deputy's pistol
to shoot unarmed security guard Derrick McFarland.
Morva shot Cpl. Eric Sutphin of the sheriff's department 1 day later on a
walking trail near the Virginia Tech campus, which had been shut down on the
1st day of classes as police tracked the escapee.
Sheldon also argued in court papers that Morva's trial attorneys failed to
adequately investigate their client's background, but Tuesday's hearing focused
entirely on the trial court's refusal to allow a psychologist to conduct a
prison-violence risk assessment and present the results to the jury.
Prosecutors argued during the sentencing phase of the trial that Morva "would
kill again if put in prison," Sheldon said. He said the defense expert would
have countered with scientific evidence that Morva posed an "exceedingly low"
risk of violent behavior.
He said every other state that imposes the death penalty based on "future
dangerousness" allows such defense testimony, but appeals court Judge Albert
Diaz said "that doesn't mean it's constitutionally required."
Armstrong said a defendant is entitled to a psychiatric expert only if mental
health is an issue, and Morva had an expert for that purpose.
(source: Associated Press)
NORTH CAROLINA:
Death penalty sought in delivery driver homicide case
Guilford County prosecutors plan to seek a death sentence if the suspect is
convicted in the death of a delivery driver last year.
The News & Record of Greensboro reported that prosecutors said Monday they will
seek a death sentence against 22-year-old Jeremy Carter of Greensboro.
Carter is charged with killing 30-year-old Bakri Khidir Mohamed Khidir last
fall. Khidir was a Sudanese delivery driver for an Italian restaurant in
Greensboro.
Assistant District Attorney Stephen Cole said there is sufficient evidence that
Carter killed Khidir in an armed robbery. Armed robbery is one of the crimes
that can justify a death sentence under North Carolina law.
The owner of the restaurant called sheriff's deputies after finding Khidir dead
at the address where he was to make a delivery Oct. 11.
(source: WXII news)
MISSOURI:
Missouri Corrections Department Violated Sunshine Law In Execution Case, Judge
Rules ---- Missouri's refusal to disclose records revealing the sources of the
drugs it uses in executions violated the Sunshine Act, a judge has ruled.
The Missouri Department of Corrections purposely violated the state's Sunshine
Law when it refused to turn over records revealing the suppliers of lethal
injection drugs for executions, a state court judge ruled late Monday.
Cole County Circuit Judge Jon E. Beetem's decision came in 3 parallel cases,
including one brought by 5 news organizations: The Kansas City Star, The St.
Louis Post-Dispatch, the Springfield News-Leader, The Guardian and the
Associated Press.
Beetem last July ordered the DOC to disclose the names of the pharmacies from
which it buys lethal injection drugs. But the issue remained moot while he
reviewed the records in question to see if they needed to be redacted in order
to protect the identities of members of the execution team.
On Monday, Beetem ruled that while an exemption in the Sunshine Law protects
the identities of the doctor and nurse who are present during the execution as
well as non-medical personnel who assist with the execution and are also
present, it does not protect the identity of the pharmacists who supply the
execution drugs. He ordered the DOC to produce those records without
redactions.
He also ordered the DOC to pay the plaintiffs' costs and attorneys' fees. In
the news organizations' case, that amounted to $73,335.
The state has already indicated it plans to appeal. The Department of
Corrections did not immediately return a call seeking comment on Beetem's
decision.
"At this point, it has cost the state of Missouri more than $100,000 to assert
a frivolous position," said Kansas City attorney Bernard Rhodes, who
represented the news organizations. "At what point will the state realize that
they're wrong and at what cost to the taxpayers will it take before the state
realizes they are wrong?"
The other lawsuits challenging officials' refusal to provide information about
the state's execution protocols were filed by former Missouri legislator Joan
Bray, a death penalty opponent, and by the Reporters Committee for Freedom of
the Press, the American Civil Liberties Union and Christopher S. McDaniel,
formerly of St. Louis Public Radio.
The news organizations had sought records from the DOC related to drugs used in
the execution of 6 Missouri inmates between October 18, 2013, when the state
enacted its current execution protocol, and May 9, 2014, when they filed their
lawsuit under the Sunshine Law.
Missouri, like other states, has had difficulty finding lethal injection drugs
after European and American drug makers began refusing to provide them. The
state has resorted to using largely unregulated compounding pharmacies, often
keeping the sources of the drugs secret.
In their lawsuit, the 5 news organizations said that public disclosure of the
source, quality and composition of the drugs "reduces the risk that improper,
ineffective, or defectively prepared drugs are used; it allows public oversight
of the types of drugs selected to cause death and qualifications of those
manufacturing the chosen drugs; and it promotes the proper functioning of
everyone involved in the execution process."
In his ruling last July, Beetem found that the DOC knowingly violated the
Sunshine Law by failing to respond to the news organizations' request in a
timely manner, withholding entire categories of documents without
justification, refusing to provide redacted records and citing irrelevant
portions of the Sunshine Law as justification for withholding documents.
The suit was filed not long after the botched execution in Oklahoma of
convicted murderer Clayton Lockett. He died of an apparent heart attack 43
minutes after the administration of a 3-drug cocktail.
Since the news organizations filed their lawsuit in May 2014, Missouri has
executed 13 inmates, Rhodes said.
(source: KBIA news)
*****************
Missouri ordered to reveal pharmacies that supplied its execution drugs ----
Judge rules in 2-year lawsuit led by the Guardian that pharmacies are not part
of execution team and thus not afforded protection from identification
The Missouri department of corrections has been ordered to release the names of
the two pharmacies from which it bought lethal drugs used in executions,
dealing a significant blow to the shroud of secrecy that has been thrown around
the death penalty in the state and beyond.
Guardian challenges lethal injection secrecy in landmark Missouri lawsuit
The final judgment of the circuit court of Cole County heavily criticises the
Missouri prisons service for knowingly violating its duty to inform the public
about the way it conducts the death penalty.
The judge ruled that the pharmacies involved could not be counted as part of
the execution team, and thus offered protection from identification, and that
as a result the state had to divulge the details of how it obtained
pentobarbital for use in the death chamber.
For the past 2 years a group of media outlets led by the Guardian has argued in
the Missouri courts that under the state's own freedom of information or
"sunshine" laws, the department of corrections was obliged to disclose the
source of its lethal injection drugs.
The Guardian, joined by the Associated Press and 3 prominent local news
organizations - the Kansas City Star, the St Louis Post-Dispatch and the
Springfield News-Leader - held that it was in the public interest that citizens
were aware of how the ultimate punishment was being wielded in their name.
Judge Jon Beetem excoriated the department of corrections for refusing to hand
over to the media plaintiffs key documents that identified the pharmacists
involved.
The judge ruled that the DOC had "knowingly violated the sunshine law by
refusing to disclose records that would reveal the suppliers of lethal
injection drugs, because its refusal was based on an interpretation of Missouri
statutes that was clearly contrary to law".
Beetem ordered the prisons service to pay the plaintiffs $73,335 in legal
costs. He also ordered the state to hand over all relevant documents, though he
stayed that requirement pending appeal. Missouri has indicated that it will do
so.
The Guardian was represented in the legal action by the Media Freedom and
Information Access Clinic at Yale Law School, along with Bernard Rhodes of
Lathrop & Gage LLP in Kansas City, Missouri.
"Without this information, the public is unable to exercise meaningful
oversight of the executions carried out in its name," Rhodes said. "One of the
primary purposes of a free and independent press is to perform a watchdog
function over government activities, and this lawsuit is a perfect example of
that."
In recent times, Missouri has been one of the most aggressive death penalty
states in terms of its determination to carry out executions. Last year it put
to death 6 prisoners, behind only Texas which judicially killed 13.
Since the Guardian's litigation was first lodged, 13 inmates have been put to
death by Missouri - going to their deaths without them or the public having any
idea of where the drugs used to kill them came from, nor of their quality.
All that was known was that the pentobarbital probably originated a compounding
pharmacy, an outlet that makes up small batches of the drug to order, normally
for cosmetic purposes.
Along with most other active death penalty states, Missouri has increasingly
wrapped itself in secrecy in an attempt to get around a powerful European-led
boycott that has blocked trade in lethal injection drugs to US prison
departments on ethical grounds.
In order to circumvent the stranglehold, states have taken to hiding the
identity of pharmacists and medical laboratories involved in selling and
testing the drugs for use in executions.
As the boycott tightened, death penalty states turned to ever more extreme -
and in some cases bizarre - supply routes. Last year, BuzzFeed tracked down one
such illegal supply line to an office complex in Kolkata, India.
The danger of carrying out the death penalty while withholding from the public
the nature and the source of the drugs used was underlined by a succession of
botched executions in which gruesome scenes were witnessed on the gurney.
They included the execution of Clayton Lockett in Oklahoma in April 2014, in
which the prisoner took 43 minutes to die, apparently in great pain, from an
untested cocktail of drugs whose source was not made public.
Ben Picozzi, a law student intern at Yale's Media Freedom and Information
Access Clinic, said the lawsuit went to the heart of the issue of public
oversight.
"Hopefully this will serve as a deterrent to the department and other
government bodies from committing similar violations in the future," he said.
(source: The Guardian)
CALIFORNIA:
Suspect in deaths of 2 men near Roseville returns to court
Joshua Daniel Smith will return Friday to court after a second delay to secure
an attorney for the Sacramento man suspected of killing 2 men who were shot and
set on fire last June near Roseville.
Along with the murder charges, Smith also faces allegations of committing the
crimes in service to a criminal street gang, using a gun and laying in wait -
the latter giving Placer County prosecutors the option of seeking the death
penalty. Smith appeared in Placer Superior Court Tuesday in Auburn.
Placer County District Attorney's prosecutors allege Smith, 38, is a Norteno
gang member and shot Jason John Benson, 33, and Warren Alexander Galsote, 34,
in the head on rural Annabelle Avenue between Roseville and Granite Bay June
25, 2015, before soaking the still-alive men with gasoline and setting them
ablaze.
Prosecutors say Smith targeted Galsote because he had witnessed a crime. The
men later died at an area hospital.
Defense attorney Martin Jones of Ciummo & Associates, the county's Madera-based
public defense contractor, initially called for a week's delay at Smith's 1st
appearance on Monday. Jones said the firm had reached the negotiated limit of
homicide cases its attorneys are able to accept in Placer County.
But Placer Superior Court Judge Angus Saint-Evens ordered the parties back to
his Placer County Jail courtroom on Tuesday where the judge appointed Jones
until another attorney is selected to represent Smith in the potential capital
case.
Smith has been held without bail in Auburn since his arrest last Thursday at
Sacramento County Main Jail, where he had been held on other charges since
July, according to Placer County Sheriff's officials.
Sacramento Superior Court records show Smith has been in and out of Sacramento
County custody for more than 2 decades, arrested nearly a dozen times on
offenses ranging from burglary to auto theft and assault.
A no-bail warrant for his arrest was issued by Placer County in February,
sheriff's officials said.
(source: Sacramento Bee)
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