Oct. 29
GEORGIA----impending execution
Man convicted of killing ex to be executed next month
A Georgia death row inmate convicted of killing his ex-girlfriend is set to be
executed next month, state Corrections Commissioner Homer Bryson announced
Thursday.
Steven Frederick Spears, 54, is scheduled to die on Nov. 16 at the state prison
in Jackson by injection of the barbiturate pentobarbital. Spears was convicted
of murder in the August 2001 death of Sherri Holland at her home in Dahlonega.
A Georgia Supreme Court summary of the case says Spears killed Holland because
he suspected she had been romantically involved with someone else. Spears came
up with 4 separate plans for her death and ultimately killed her by choking
her, wrapping tape around her mouth and face and putting a plastic bag over her
head, the summary says.
Spears would be the 8th inmate executed by Georgia this year, the most in a
calendar year in the state since the death penalty was reinstated nationwide in
1976. Georgia executed 5 inmates last year and 5 in 1987.
Spears, whose relationship with Holland had ended, told investigators that he
had told her when they began dating that of she was sleeping with someone else
he would "choke her ass to death."
He had been hiding in a closet in Holland's house, waiting until he was sure
she was asleep before he entered Holland's bedroom at about 2:30 a.m. or 3 a.m.
on Aug. 25, 2001, the summary says. He told her to roll over so he could duct
tape her hands and feet.
Spears and Holland struggled for about five or 10 minutes, starting in the
bedroom and continuing into the hallway. He choked her until she lost
consciousness in the hallway and then dragged her into the bedroom where he
bound her hands and feet, wrapped her face and mouth with duct tape and put a
plastic bag over her head, the summary says.
Spears placed Holland's head on a pillow, "so her face wouldn't be smashed on
the floor," he told investigators.
He locked the door, took her purse and left, returning a few minutes later to
grab a cigarette case where she kept money. He drove her vehicle to his house,
changed clothes and got a shotgun and ammunition.
Spears went to a store where he bought fishing supplies, a fishing license, a
hat and paint that he planned to use to paint over black stripes on Holland's
vehicle, the court summary says. He later ditched her vehicle because he feared
it had an anti-theft tracking device. He lived in the woods for 10 days before
an officer saw him walking along a highway, asked his name and arrested him.
Toward the end of his confession, Spears told investigators, "I loved her that
much. I told her I wasn't letting her go, and I didn't." He added that he'd do
it again if he had to.
(source: Augusta Chronicle)
FLORIDA:
Bradley attorneys overturn death penalty conviction in Florida
A team of attorneys from Birmingham's largest law firm successfully reversed
the conviction of Clemente Javier Aguirre-Jarquin - a Florida man wrongfully
convicted of murdering 2 women in 2004.
The Florida Supreme Court on Thursday unanimously vacated Aguirre's murder
conviction and ordered a new trial after attorneys Kevin Newsom, Lindsey Boney
and Ashley Burkett presented new DNA evidence resulting in the new opinion. The
new DNA evidence, coupled with "numerous, unequivocal confessions" from the
daughter and granddaughter of the victims, helped the court reach a decision.
"The Florida Supreme Court's unanimous decision is a decisive vindication for
Mr. Aguirre, who has always maintained his innocence," Boney said. "The court
recognized that there is now, undeniably, overwhelming evidence that someone
else murdered these women and a whole host of newly discovered evidence showing
that Mr. Aguirre couldn't have committed these crimes. We are relieved for Mr.
Aguirre, who has suffered for 10 long years on death row for a crime that he
did not commit, but there is still work to do to ensure that he is fully and
finally vindicated, and ultimately granted his freedom."
In the years since Aguirre's 2006 trial, investigators conducted DNA testing on
certain crime scene evidence for the 1st time, and none of the approximately
150 items tested contained Aguirre's DNA. Instead, 8 crime-scene bloodstains -
found within inches of the victims' blood - revealed the DNA of 1 of the
victims' daughter/granddaughter, who has since confessed to the murders on
several occasions. Additionally, new forensic evidence has revealed that
Aguirre's clothes could not have been worn by the murderer.
The Bradley team has represented Aguirre pro bono since 2013.
(source: bizjournals.com)
****************
New ruling puts Florida's death penalty to sleep
The state Supreme Court issued its latest ruling on Florida's death penalty -
this time declaring that a jury's decision must be unanimous when issuing the
death penalty.
In January, the U.S. Supreme Court turned the state's death penalty status quo
on its ear when it decided that judges had too much say in the penalty phase of
capital trials and that the Constitution put that decision in the hands of the
jury. Prior to that, juries made recommendations to judges, who then decided
whether or not to impose the death penalty. The Justices decided that by
leaving the imposition of sentencing to the judges "the law improperly
disconnected the finding of facts and aggravating factors from the burden of
weighing the death penalty."
Florida's Legislature convened in the spring and came up with a new law that
required unanimous votes for every aggravating factor in order to warrant a
death sentence, but a 10-2 majority of a jury to impose the death penalty,
rather than the current 7-5 majority.
This is what the state Supreme Court overruled last week, noting that since
Florida's death penalty was enacted in 1972, judges had overruled jury
recommendations in over 300 cases, handing out either tougher or lesser
penalties.
What troubles prosecutors is the new ruling could wind up requiring dozens of
new trials for some (or all) Florida's 385 death row inmates. This could take
years and millions in taxpayer dollars.
It will also likely put the death penalty in Florida to sleep.
Having 12 jurors unanimously agree on life in prison or death is an unlikely
scenario, and the bad guys will be the first to realize it.
Death penalty opponents note that Florida has the highest number of
exonerations of the wrongly-convicted in the country.
Advocates note that the jury was not unanimous in recommending the death
penalty for serial killer Ted Bundy.
And it may be noted, if only for the irony, that the state court overturned the
law with a less-than-majority rule.
(source: Editorial, St. Augustine Record)
*******************
Supreme Court halts death penalty case----Ruling is strongest indicator yet
that Florida's death penalty remains in flux
The Florida Supreme Court on Friday stopped a Clearwater judge from proceeding
with a death penalty case, signaling that courts might not be able to move
forward with capital trials until the Legislature changes a law that justices
earlier this month struck down as unconstitutional.
In the tersely-worded, 5-2 decision Friday, the court granted a request by
lawyers for convicted murderer Patrick Albert Evans to stop Judge Joseph Bulone
from moving forward with a trial slated to begin Monday. Justices Charles
Canady and Ricky Polston dissented without comment.
Friday's ruling is the strongest indicator yet that Florida's death penalty
remains in flux in the aftermath of a pair of opinions issued by state's high
court on Oct. 14. Those decisions found that a statute passed in March in
response to a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in a case known as Hurst v. Florida was
unconstitutional "because it requires that only 10 jurors recommend death as
opposed to the constitutionally required unanimous, 12-member jury."
The majority in the decision in one of the cases, involving Death Row inmate
Larry Darnell Perry, found that the law was unconstitutional because it did not
require unanimous jury recommendations and "cannot be applied to pending
prosecutions."
Attorney General Pam Bondi last week asked the Supreme Court to "clarify" their
rulings in the Perry and Hurst cases, maintaining that trials already underway
should be allowed to move forward.
In Evans' case, Bulone issued an order Wednesday saying he would begin to
empanel a death-qualified jury on Monday and, if Evans is found guilty of
1st-degree murder, "proceed to a penalty phase consistent with" the Oct. 14
Supreme Court decisions.
"I don't think it would be all that hard to draft those (jury) instructions. I
don't think it would be all that hard to come up with a verdict form," the
judge told lawyers on Oct. 20, according to his order.
Bulone's decision prompted Evans' lawyers to immediately ask the Supreme Court
to intervene, warning of a "jurisprudential quagmire" if the court allowed the
case to go forward "without appropriate guidance."
"It is not a court's job to write the law," wrote Allison Ferber Miller and
Jane McNeil, lawyers in the Sixth Judicial Circuit Public Defender's office,
and Pete Mills, an assistant public defender in the Eighth Judicial Circuit, in
the 137-page motion filed Wednesday. Mills is chairman of the Florida Public
Defender Association's death penalty steering committee.
"There are 67 counties in the state of Florida, 20 judicial circuits and
literally hundreds of judges. It simply cannot be this court's intent for each
circuit judge to write his own law according to that judge's interpretation of
the court's decisions in Perry and Hurst," Evans' lawyers wrote.
In Friday's order, the Supreme Court majority wrote that Evans' petition
"demonstrates a preliminary basis for relief," and gave prosecutors until Nov.
14 to show why the petition should not be granted. Evans' lawyers have until
Nov. 28 to respond. The order put a stay on the circuit court proceedings.
In her request for clarification, Bondi's lawyers argued that death penalty
prosecutions can continue without a change in the law, so long as trial courts
require unanimous jury recommendations.
But Evans' lawyers argued this week that the Florida Supreme Court majority
"said it could not rewrite the act to make it constitutional."
"If that was what the court thought it could do in a constitutional manner, it
could have done so. Instead, the court said the act as a whole could NOT be
applied to pending prosecutions," they wrote.
Prosecutors, judges, defense lawyers and lawmakers are divided about whether
death penalty prosecutions should proceed. An Ocala judge last week put on hold
the penalty portion of a murder trial, saying the court needed direction from
the Legislature before proceeding.
Some judges and prosecutors have proposed moving forward with the guilt phases
of cases in which prosecutors are seeking the death penalty, and holding off on
the penalty portions of trials until the law is rewritten.
But defense lawyers maintain that empanelling new juries to handle sentencing
would result in an expensive and prolonged quagmire that could be even more
problematic.
Mills said in a telephone interview that Friday's order could have far-reaching
implications, especially for trials in which judges intend to proceed to the
penalty phase before the statute is amended.
"If the court doesn't formulate a remedy on its own, which they have said in
the past they would not do, it is now up to the Legislature to fix the statute
that the court found to be unconstitutional," he said.
The state's death penalty has been in limbo since January, when the U.S.
Supreme Court ruled that Florida's sentencing system was unconstitutional
because it gave too much power to judges, instead of juries. Following that
decision, the Florida Supreme Court indefinitely put on hold two executions,
which are still pending.
Of the 31 states with the death penalty, Florida is 1 of just 3 --- including
Alabama and Delaware --- that have not required unanimous jury recommendations
for death to be imposed. Delaware's high court has halted that state's death
penalty following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in January in the Hurst
case.
The Hurst ruling did not address the issue of unanimity, which became a
flashpoint during this year's legislative session as Florida lawmakers sought
to repair the state's death penalty sentencing process to comply with the U.S.
Supreme Court decision.
Echoing concerns expressed by other defense lawyers, Evans' attorneys argued
that allowing individual judges to craft their own rules or procedures in death
sentences would be catastrophic.
"To allow for such chaos is the essence of what the Eighth Amendment of the
United States Constitution aims to prevent: the arbitrary and capricious
application of the death penalty," lawyers for Evans wrote on Wednesday. "This
court has been suggesting to the Florida Legislature for years that the Florida
death penalty statutes need to be changed. The Legislature's unwillingness to
act does not grant the courts the authority to write the laws."
************************
Court requires state to provide lethal injection documents
Rejecting arguments that the records must be kept secret, a federal magistrate
has ordered the Florida Department of Corrections to give a decade's worth of
documents about drugs used in the state's lethal-injection procedure to lawyers
representing 7 Arizona death row inmates.
Lawyers for the Arizona inmates and the First Amendment Coalition of Arizona in
June filed a subpoena seeking years of records related to Florida's three-drug
lethal injection protocol, including the types of drugs purchased, the
strengths and amounts of the drugs, the expiration dates of the drugs and the
names of suppliers.
The lawyers sought and received similar information from other states,
including Georgia, Missouri and Texas, according to court records.
The Florida Department of Corrections refused to release the documents, arguing
that the information is exempt under the state's broad open-records law and
that the Arizona lawyers were on a "fishing expedition."
But on Monday, U.S. Magistrate Judge Charles Stampelos gave the corrections
agency 21 days to provide the documents, outlining specifically how the records
can be redacted to comply with state law.
The Department of Corrections is "reviewing the request and will comply with
the court order," agency spokeswoman Michelle Glady said in an email Thursday.
The request for the records came in an Arizona death-penalty challenge focused
on whether the use of midazolam, the 1st step in a 3-drug lethal injection
cocktail, violates Eighth Amendment protections against cruel or unusual
punishment.
The U.S. Supreme Court has held that, in those types of cases, prisoners must
provide an available alternative to the method of execution being challenged.
Gathering the information from the other states is a "core component" to the
inmates' claim that Arizona's lethal-injection process is unconstitutional, the
Arizona lawyers argued.
Lawyer Joshua Anderson, who represents the Arizona plaintiffs, issued a
statement Thursday describing Stampelos' decision as a "well-reasoned opinion."
"The court is correct that states cannot carry out executions while concealing
the details of the process behind a shroud of secrecy," Anderson said.
Arizona's death penalty has been on hold for 2 years following the botched 2014
execution of inmate Joseph Wood, who died nearly 2 hours after the
lethal-injection procedure was started.
Before the Florida Department of Corrections filed a motion to quash the
subpoena in July, the Arizona lawyers offered to limit the scope of their
records request and to keep the documents off-limits to the public.
But after the sides met July 19, the Florida corrections agency "reiterated
that it does 'not intend to produce any information pursuant to the subpoena
without court order,'" Anderson wrote in August, objecting to the state's
motion to quash the subpoena.
Florida officials have long treated information about the lethal injection
drugs as a closely guarded secret. But, in the midst of the legal fight with
the Arizona lawyers, the corrections agency this summer released hand-written
logs to media outlets, including The News Service of Florida, which had
requested information about the drugs.
Stampelos, noting that the state had provided the documents to the media, cited
in his order a Tampa Bay Times story detailing information about midazolam
purchases and stockpiling.
Florida law includes a public records exemption for "information which if
released would jeopardize a person's safety" and information "which identifies
an executioner, or any person prescribing, preparing, compounding, dispensing,
or administering a lethal injection."
In his 24-page order, Stampelos acknowledged that releasing information about
drug suppliers to the public could be harmful.
"...It is apparent that disclosure has the potential to thwart the government's
ability to carry out executions. Harassed companies have ceased providing drugs
for execution purposes. It also cannot be disputed that the impact upon
companies and persons whose identities are disclosed is significant," he wrote.
But the federal magistrate ordered the state to provide the records anyway and
redact portions that would reveal exempt information, such as the supplier of
the drugs.
While the state must provide the redacted documents to the Arizona lawyers, the
records may not be available to the general public, based on Stampelos' order.
"To the degree the department is concerned about the disclosure of even
redacted documents which must be provided, the parties are encouraged to work
cooperatively to draft a protective agreement that may reduce such concerns,"
he wrote, noting that "little cooperation occurred between the parties" before
the Arizona lawyers issued the subpoena in June.
A bitterly divided U.S. Supreme Court last year signed off on the use of
midazolam for executions, ruling that lawyers for Oklahoma prisoners failed to
prove that the use of the drug "entails a substantial risk of severe pain." The
Oklahoma prisoners had argued that the drug does not effectively sedate inmates
during the execution process.
Florida and other states began using midazolam as the first step in a
three-drug execution cocktail in 2013, after previously using a drug called
pentobarbital sodium. The states switched because Danish-based manufacturer
Lundbeck refused to sell pentobarbital sodium directly to corrections agencies
for use in executions and ordered its distributors to also stop supplying the
drug for lethal-injection purposes.
The death penalty in Florida has been under scrutiny for nearly a year,
following a U.S. Supreme Court ruling, in a case known as Hurst v. Florida, in
January that found the state's death penalty sentencing system gave too much
power to judges, instead of juries, was unconstitutional.
Following the 8-1 decision in Hurst, the Florida Supreme Court indefinitely
postponed 2 executions, and lawmakers hurriedly rewrote the death penalty
sentencing law to address the U.S. court's concerns.
But, in a pair of decisions issued on Oct. 14, the Florida Supreme Court ruled
that the new law is unconstitutional because it does not require unanimous jury
recommendations before defendants can be sentenced to death.
Attorney General Pam Bondi has asked the justices to "clarify" their decision.
Bondi is arguing that death penalty cases can continue to move forward, but
defense lawyers maintain that cases in which prosecutors are seeking death
should be postponed until the law is rewritten to prevent further litigation.
(source for both: news4jax.com)
ALABAMA:
2 charged with capital murder of north Alabama man found dead in burned home
2 Madison County men have been arrested in connection with the killing of a
Toney man whose body was found in his burned mobile home last month.
Justin King, 28, and Dakota Allen Vickers, 18, are charged with capital murder
in the killing of Danny Ray Smith, according to the Sheriff's Office.
Smith, 51, was found dead in his home on Carter's Grove Road in the Hazel Green
community on Sept. 30. The home was burned, but the fire hasn't been
definitively identified as the cause of death, Lt. Brian Chaffin said.
A 51-year-old Toney man died Friday morning in a mobile home fire, according to
the Madison County coroner.
Initial autopsy results from the Alabama Department of Forensic Sciences list
Smith's manner of death as homicide, but the specific cause hasn't been
determined, Chaffin said during a press conference this afternoon.
The cause of the fire also hasn't been determined, said Steve Holmes, public
information officer for the State Fire Marshal's Office.
"The cause of the fire itself may or may not be part of the homicide," Holmes
said.
Chaffiin said because the body was burned, investigators haven't been able to
determine the exact injury that caused Smith's death.
"We won't know that until the final autopsy," Chaffin said. "We expect (the
results) in the near future. It wouldn't be fair to anybody in this situation
if I speculated on how the subject was killed."
The motive in the homicide still is under investigation, but Chaffin identified
the relationship between the victim and suspects as "acquaintances."
It wouldn't be fair to anybody in this situation if I speculated on how the
subject was killed.
"We have people in the community who have responded well to our investigation
and have assisted in the questions we've asked and information we've gathered,"
Chaffin said.
King and Vickers are held in the Madison County Jail without bail. Capital
murder suspects automatically are denied bail, unless a judge chooses to set a
bond.
If convicted, the suspects face either the death penalty or life in prison
without the possibility of parole.
The capital murder charges were leveled because arson was involved.
(source: al.com)
********************
Alabama tilts the advantage in executions in favor of prosecutors
Only law enforcement officials, prosecutors, and members of the media can have
phones, paper, pens or pencils handy when Alabama executes one of its
prisoners.
Guess who can't have any of these items during an Alabama execution? The people
who need them the most: Capital defense lawyers charged with the macabre - but
honorable-beyond-belief duty - of having to document their clients' last
moments (clients they've represented for years, and in some instances, decades)
while zealously protecting their constitutional right to be free from cruel and
unusual punishment.
It's not for lack of asking. Federal defenders in Alabama who, like all
lawyers, bear the designation of being "officers of the court," have
repeatedly, and very nicely, asked state prosecutors, the federal courts, and
Alabama Department of Corrections (ADOC) officials for the right to bring into
the witness room one cell phone, paper, and some writing utensils.
Repeatedly, obstinately, pigheadedly, the answer they've been given is "no."
Instead, contravening common sense and the Constitution, Alabama remains
steadfast in denying a meaningful right to counsel and access to the courts
during the most critical moments any death row inmate has - as the state's
executioners tinker, and in some instances, fumble around with their machinery
of death.
In the case of Christopher Brooks, who was executed at Holman Prison, in
Atmore, Ala., on Jan. 21 of this year, federal defenders specifically requested
access to a cell phone or landline during the execution in case something went
wrong and they had to quickly call the judge because of a botch. As detailed in
"Courts denied phone to attorneys of man condemned to death" (February 9,
2016), in their court filings, Brooks' lawyers argued that without access to a
phone during the execution, "Brooks will be without meaningful access to the
courts during his execution, as his only witnesses, including designated
members of his legal team, will be unable to contact the courts and seek
intervention if something arises during his execution that warrants seeking a
stay or other appropriate relief."
Mr. Brooks' lawyers pointed out the obvious: that, as respected members of the
bar and highly-skilled and trustworthy federal employees, they should be
trusted to bring paper products and one cell phone into the witness room
adjoining the execution chamber. They noted that such phone access has been
granted to death penalty counsel as a matter of either protocol and/or
professional courtesy, citing examples in Tennessee, Arizona, and Ohio. They
even proposed a plan to ADOC officials where they would buy a disposable cell
phone for use only to witness Brooks' execution; at the end of the execution,
ADOC would then take possession of the phone. This reasonable request was
denied.
Now, it turns out, that that phone access which Mr. Brooks' lawyers pleaded for
before his execution could have been extremely useful in vindicating Brooks'
constitutional right not to be exposed to cruel and unusual punishment.
As reported in "Alabama's last execution may have burned a man alive," a
federal investigator witnessing Brooks' execution saw Brooks' eye open after he
was administered midazolam, a controversial drug that is supposed to
anesthetize the prisoner. Brooks' lawyers have alleged - with supporting
affidavits and the opinion of a medical expert - that Brooks' eye could not
have opened as it did at that point in the execution unless Brooks was
experiencing excruciating pain.
Instead of being able to immediately call the court the minute Mr. Brooks' eye
popped open to request a stay of execution, his lawyers were forced to sit and
watch, completely powerless to act or even scribble notes on a notepad, as
their client's internal organs burned from the inside out.
This was exactly the kind of hellacious scenario that federal district judge
Aleta A. Trauger sought to avoid during the 2000 execution of Robert Glenn Coe
by lethal injection in Tennessee. Trauger ordered that Coe's counsel be
permitted access to a phone as he witnessed Coe's execution because Coe, like
Christopher Brooks and all citizens of this country, has "an Eighth Amendment
right not to be subjected to cruel and unusual punishment, and substantial
caselaw supports the contention that this right attaches until his successful
execution." Coe v. Bell, 89 F.Supp.2d 962, 967 (M.D. Tenn. 2000).
Unfortunately for Mr. Brooks (and other death row prisoners in Alabama, who are
mostly housed at Holman prison, also known as "Hell on Earth") while they'll
give you one last crappy meal, last rites, and a free pauper's burial, the one
thing Alabama won't give its condemned: the meaningful right to counsel and a
lawyer when they need it most.
(source: Stephen Cooper ---- thehill.com)
OKLAHOMA:
Oklahoma charges man suspected of double murder, attempted decapitation
Oklahoma County prosecutors filed first degree murder charges on Friday against
a man who has been on the run for nearly a week after being suspected of
killing 2 relatives and trying to decapitate them.
Michael Vance, 38, is also suspected of wounding 2 police officers in a shoot
out and posting his getaway on social media. Police believe he was shot twice
in a gunfight, in which he wounded two police officers and then stole a police
vehicle.
The U.S. Marshal Service has joined in the search for Vance. He could face the
death penalty if he is convicted of killing Ronald Wilkson, 55, and his wife
Valerie Wilkson, 54, who were found dead in their home on Sunday about 30 miles
northeast of Oklahoma City.
Vance is thought to have killed his aunt and uncle about 3 hours after the
shootout with police, the Oklahoma County Sheriff's office said. He then stole
their car.
The Sunday incident crime spree started with officers responding to a call of
shots being fired. Both suffered wounds that were not life threatening.
Vance also has an infectious disease that he may be trying to spread. In July,
he was charged with child sexual abuse, the office said.
In a video posted on Facebook Live while fleeing, Vance can he heard saying he
is about to steal another car and that the chase has been "intense."
"This ain't a joke. This ain't a prank," Vance said, adding he was set up.
Vance also stated in the video that he was shot. The Oklahoma County Sheriff's
Office said there appeared to be a large amount of blood on his shirt and a
rifle or shotgun next to him in the vehicle.
Vance is suspected of shooting at least 1 person in attempts to steal vehicles.
The shooting victim survived, local law enforcement said.
(source: Reuters)
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