December 11
TEXAS----impending execution
Texas to execute Alvin Braziel on Tuesday, making him the 2nd inmate to die in
a week----Texas is scheduled to put Braziel to death on Tuesday, 25 years after
he killed a man and raped his wife in Mesquite.
Lora and Douglas White were married for 10 days when the couple decided on
Sept. 21, 1993 to take a walk around Eastfield College in Mesquite. It was the
last thing the newlyweds would do together. The night tragically ended in a
murder and rape that eventually landed Alvin Avon Braziel Jr. on death row.
Texas is scheduled to execute 43-year-old Braziel on Tuesday night, 25 years
after he attempted to rob the young couple during their campus stroll. Instead,
Braziel fatally shot 27-year-old Douglas and raped 23-year-old Lora at gunpoint
in nearby bushes. Braziel, who was 18 at the time, eventually escaped into the
night. The crime was unsolved until 2001.
By that time, Braziel was serving a 5-year sentence for a 1996 conviction of
sexual assault against a 15-year-old. In February 2001, blood samples from
Braziel were tested against samples taken from Lora’s rape kit from the night
her husband was killed. The 2 samples were a match, and Lora also identified
Braziel in a photo lineup.
Braziel was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death on July 26, 2001
in a Dallas district court. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed the
lower court’s decision in October 2003 and again upheld the decision in 2009,
when it denied Braziel’s application for a writ of habeas corpus.
With a week before the scheduled execution, Braziel’s attorneys filed for the
state's highest criminal court to reconsider the original writ on Dec. 3, but
then withdrew the suggestion the following day, according to General Counsel
Sian Schilhab.
Braziel's lawyers declined to comment on the case, though they have challenged
the district court’s decision in several filings throughout the years, arguing
that Braziel’s original trial attorney compromised a fair sentencing by failing
to present mitigating evidence of Braziel’s head injuries, exposure to drugs
and alcohol in utero, a family history of mental illness and physical abuse,
homelessness and struggles in school.
The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles unanimously decided Friday not to
recommend a 120-day reprieve and commutation for Braziel. As of Monday evening,
Braziel’s attorneys had not filed for a stay of execution.
Braziel is scheduled to be the 13th and final inmate put to death by Texas in
2018 - on the heels of Joseph Garcia’s execution last Tuesday - and the
nation’s 24th. There are currently 5 executions scheduled for 2019 in Texas.
(source: Texas Tribune)
***************************
Executions under Greg Abbott, Jan. 21, 2015-present----39
Executions in Texas: Dec. 7, 1982----present-----557
Abbott#--------scheduled execution date-----name------------Tx. #
40---------Dec. 11----------------Alvin Braziel, Jr.------558
41---------Jan. 15----------------Blaine Milam------------559
42---------Jan. 30----------------Robert Jennings---------560
43---------Feb. 28----------------Billy Wayne Coble-------561
44---------Apr. 11----------------Mark Robertson----------562
45---------May 2------------------Dexter Johnson----------563
(sources: TDCJ & Rick Halperin)
**************************************
Prosecutors: No decision on death penalty in murder of 20-month-old
No decision has yet been made on whether to seek the death penalty against a
man charged with capital murder in the death of a 20-month-old Rockdale girl,
the Milam County and District Attorney’s Office said in a press release Monday.
Shawn Vincent Boniello, who’s also known as Shayla Angeline Boniello, is held
in the Milam County Jail charged with capital murder in the death of Patricia
Ann Rader, who died on the evening of Dec. 3 at her home in Rockdale.
“The investigation into this horrible tragedy is still on-going, and our office
has yet to see a report or any of the evidence against the defendant,”
prosecutors said in the press release.
“At the time of this press release, our office has received two probable cause
affidavits, capital murder and endangering a child - nothing else. As such, no
decision has been made on what punishment our office will seek at trial,” the
press release said.
“Cost is not a determining factor for this office whether to proceed with a
death penalty trial. Once our office has received the final reports and
evidence from Rockdale Police Department, (District Attorney Bill Torrey) will
review the complete case. After review, and only after the review, DA Torrey
will meet with the family of Patrician Ann Rader, to discuss the case and what
options we will have for the trial. Only after that meeting will our office
know if we are seeking the death penalty for this heinous act,” the office
said.
Officers, firefighters and paramedics responded to the girl’s home at around
5:45 p.m. Dec. 3 after receiving a report of an unresponsive child.
Paramedics performed CPR at the scene, but were unable to revive the girl.
Boniello was arrested that night and was initially charged with child
abandonment/endangerment, but on Dec. 4 was also named in a complaint charging
capital murder.
(soruce: KWTX news)
NORTH CAROLINA:
Bond revoked, death penalty possible in Hania Aguilar killing
The man accused of raping and killing Hania Aguilar made his 1st court
appearance Monday in Robeson County District Court, with the judge revoking all
bonds.
Michel Ray McLellan, 34, of Fairmont, is charged with 1st-degree murder,
1st-degree forcible rape and statutory rape of a person 15 or younger,
1st-degree sex offense and statutory sex offense with a person 15 or younger,
1st-degree kidnapping, larceny, restraint, abduction of a child and concealment
of a death.
He could be facing a potential death sentence should the state pursue that
penalty for allegedly murdering the 13-year-old child who was kidnapped Nov. 5
from her home at Rosewood Mobile Home Park.
“If I was the D.A.,” current Robeson County District Attorney Johnson Britt
said, “I would seek the death penalty, yes."
Britt has only 2 weeks left as the district attorney. Matthew Scott, the
district attorney-elect, will replace him.
Scott, during a news conference that followed McLelland’s Monday appearances in
District and Superior Court on unrelated charges, said that determination on
whether to pursue the death penalty had not been made.
Latest audio
McLelland’s next scheduled appearance in District Court is Dec. 21. The court
will appoint an attorney to represent him. In the meantime, he is being held in
Raleigh.
On Nov. 13, McLellan was arrested by Lumberton police on outstanding warrants
for 2nd-degree kidnapping, attempted robbery with a dangerous weapon and
possession of firearm by a felon, records show. Bail on those charges was set
at $2.5 million.
On Wednesday, McLellan was charged with 1st-degree forcible rape, 1st-degree
burglary and robbery with a dangerous weapon from an incident that happened on
Oct. 20, records show. No details were given. Bail on those charges was set at
$5 million
(source: Fayettevill eObserver)
SOUTH CAROLINA:
Accused killer of Rock Hill teen at Fort Mill Peach Stand set for court Tuesday
The accused killer of a Rock Hill teen clerk shot to death at a Fort Mill store
in January is set to appear in court Tuesday, officials said.
The death of Karson Whitesell, 19, came at the hands of a man police said was a
stranger who showed up at The Peach Stand Jan. 23 and killed her in a random
act of brutality.
Christopher Benjamin Mendez, 29, of Lancaster, is charged with murder and
possession of a weapon during a violent crime. Mendez was hospitalized for a
mental health problem before the killing and after arrest was tested by
doctors, court records show.
However, no court documents have been filed stating that Mendez is not
competent to stand trial or enter a plea in the case. No motive for the killing
has been released.
York County prosecutors confirmed the 9:30 a.m. Tuesday hearing for Mendez at
the Moss Justice Center in York, but declined to say what is expected to happen
at the hearing.
“Mr. Mendez is scheduled to appear in court Tuesday morning on the murder and
weapons charges he is facing,” said Willy Thompson, 16th Circuit Deputy
Solicitor.
Police and prosecutors have said that the shooting was a “random act” by Mendez
who did not know Whitesell.
But authorities have declined to give details about why authorities believe
Mendez was at the store while armed, and why he chose Whitesell as the victim.
Mendez could potentially face a death penalty trial. If Mendez pleads guilty
without a jury trial, the most punishment he could face is life in prison
without the possibility of parole.
Under South Carolina law, only a jury can sentence someone to death after the
person is found guilty during a trial.
Sixteenth Circuit Solicitor Kevin Brackett and Thompson have not said whether
the death penalty will be sought.
Mendez’ lawyer, 16th Circuit Senior Assistant Public Defender Phil Smith, has
filed court documents confirming that Mendez had previous mental treatment, and
asking that Mendez be tested for mental competency. He has previously declined
to comment on the case.
Mendez shot Whitesell several times just inside the entrance to the store at
the intersection of U.S. 21 and S.C. 160, Fort Mill Police Department officers
said in arrest warrants.
Mendez killed Whitesell and then waited for officers to arrive, police said.
Mendez was arrested on the scene and has been jailed without bond ever since.
Mendez was charged with assaulting a York County jailer after his arrest.
Mendez screamed out “I will kill you!” while attacking the guard in September,
police said.
Mendez worked for Goodwill in Lancaster before the shooting and lived with his
mother.
Whitesell was a graduate of South Pointe High School who had spent time in
Africa working as a missionary with children. After Whitesell was killed, her
mother created a foundation in Karson’s name to assist in mission work and help
law enforcement locally.
Hundreds of people showed up for vigils, church services and other events
honoring Whitesell’s life after she was killed.
heraldonline.com)
FLORIDA----impending execution
Catholic bishops call on Rick Scott to stop this week’s scheduled execution
The state of Florida is scheduled to execute Jose Antonio Jimenez by lethal
injection Thursday at 6 p.m. for the 1992 murder of Phyllis Mina.
Jimenez was 29 years old when he was convicted of beating and stabbing
63-year-old Phyllis Minas after she caught him burglarizing her Miami-Dade
apartment.
Governor Rick Scott originally signed a death warrant in July for Jimenez to be
executed in August, but the Florida Supreme Court issued a stay of execution on
August 10. That came after Jimenez' attorneys said their client’s legal rights
had been violated because of “newly discovered evidence” unearthed by the North
Miami Police Department.
Jimenez’ attorneys also claimed that the state risked violating the Eight
Amendment’s constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment by using the
drug etomidate in the lethal-injection process.
But a majority of the Florida Supreme Court rejected both arguments in October.
Now, the Florida Conference of Catholic Bishops is calling on Scott to commute
Jimenez’s death sentence, and says instead that Florida should give him life
imprisonment.
“Both victims of crime and offenders are children of God and members of the
same human family,” writes Michael B. Sheedy, the executive director of the
Florida Conference of Catholic Bishops. “We appreciate your difficult task as
governor and still must ask you to commute this death sentence, and all death
sentences, to life without the possibility of parole."
The governor is unlikely to be moved by the Bishops’ sentiments. Since taking
office in 2011, Scott has overseen the execution of 27 death row inmates in
Florida, the most of any Florida governor since the death penalty was
reinstated in 1976.
There are 354 people on Florida’s death row, the 2nd-largest total in the
country, only behind California.
Catholic dioceses in 7 Florida cities will be holding vigils opposing Jimenez’
execution on Thursday.
(soure: Florida Phoenix)
********************
Blood & truth: The lingering case of Tommy Zeigler
Dale Recinella steeled himself as he entered Florida’s death row and the rank
smell of men who lived year-round with no air conditioning. The electronic door
grinded as it closed behind him.
The Catholic chaplain’s Rockports squeaked on the concrete corridor as he
walked from cell to cell, on that day in 1999.
Recinella had been a Wall Street finance lawyer before deciding the work wasn’t
meaningful enough. He now served as a voluntary chaplain to hundreds on death
row and another 1,500 in solitary confinement. It was the hardest thing he had
ever done, but it had given him peace.
On the Row, angry men sometimes screamed at him, said he knew nothing about
their worlds. Others barely looked up. Then there was William Thomas “Tommy”
Zeigler.
Recinella felt at ease around Zeigler, who always came to the gate of his cell
to talk. Zeigler called himself a “foot-washing Baptist.” He seemed gentle and
cheerful. Unlike most, he always asked about Recinella’s life.
“What are you doing here?” Recinella asked Zeigler that day, about 6 months
after he had started coming to death row. “You stick out like a sore thumb.”
Until that point, Zeigler hadn’t brought up his case, and Recinella hadn’t
asked.
“You know I’m innocent, right?” Zeigler responded.
Recinella couldn’t imagine anyone on death row being innocent, not with as many
appeals as they get to file. How was that even possible?
Zeigler said his case had been explored in a 1992 book, “Fatal Flaw: A True
Story of Malice and Murder in a Small Southern Town.”
The following week, Recinella bought it and started reading. It was a complex
case, made all the more complicated by the multitude of characters who found
themselves in close proximity to Zeigler’s furniture store in the Central
Florida citrus town of Winter Garden on Christmas Eve 1975. Four people had
been murdered: Zeigler’s wife, his in-laws and a longtime customer.
Author Phillip Finch concluded that Zeigler could not have killed his family.
A few months later, Recinella visited the Midtown Manhattan law offices of
Zeigler’s lawyers and spent several days looking through thousands of pages of
documents stored floor to ceiling. The State Attorney’s Office had failed to
turn over to defense lawyers some police reports and witness statements that
supported Zeigler’s version of the story. Recinella observed a “purposefulness
to the mistake, not by everyone but by some.”
As a chaplain, Recinella was forbidden from advocating for inmates. His job was
to read them scripture and pray, listen and give communion. If they asked for
him before they were to be executed, he went. He could lose his privileges at
death row if he was too outspoken on someone’s behalf. But he couldn’t stop
thinking about Zeigler. If the man was innocent, that meant he had lost
everything — his wife and in-laws, his home and his business, his name and his
freedom.
That would mean he, too, was a victim.
No Florida death row inmate has begged the courts for DNA testing more than
Tommy Zeigler.
His lawyers have asked 6 times.
After his 2nd request in 2001, Zeigler obtained limited tests, which appeared
to support his story that he was a victim of a robbery at his furniture store.
But he has been denied more advanced testing of the blood-stained clothes,
fingernail scrapings and guns.
Zeigler, now 73, has been awaiting execution for 42 years. He was convicted
with the help of blood evidence that was, at the time, more theory than science
and has been unable to get forensic testing that’s now available in murder
cases.
Florida has deprived 19 men from accessing modern science. Another nine,
including Zeigler, were allowed DNA tests when the technology was in early
development but were later prevented from conducting more tests or advanced
analysis.
Their appeals for post-conviction DNA tests have been rejected 70 times, or
almost three out of every 4 requests, according to a Tampa Bay Times review of
more than 500 death row cases since 1976, when the death penalty was reinstated
in Florida.
8 of the men were executed without ever obtaining the tests.
Almost 70 % were convicted in the 1970s or ’80s, when DNA testing didn’t exist
or was at its origins.
9 were convicted partially with “microscopic hair comparison,” a method
employed by the FBI for decades that has been discredited. The evidence in 12
cases has been lost or destroyed.
3 of the men, including Zeigler, who were convicted in front of the same judge
in Orange County, have spent more than 40 years on death row.
Many of the men requesting tests are likely guilty and hoping only to run the
clock on their death sentences.
But the state Legislature wanted to eliminate the possibility that even one
innocent man could be executed.
In 2001, it passed a statute to provide a way for inmates to obtain DNA testing
in all cases. Almost 20 years later though, some prosecutors routinely fight
DNA requests, especially in high-profile death row cases, and the courts often
fail to intervene.
Court rules dictating procedure can supersede the state DNA law. And judges
have wide discretion.
In most states, including Florida, judges often allow DNA analysis that can
prove innocence, such as a test of a rape kit, where the perpetrator can be
positively identified.
Judges aren’t as likely to allow for the testing if they aren’t convinced it
will exonerate. And they rely on evidence from the original trial to reach that
conclusion.
“There’s a failure by courts and prosecutors to understand that DNA testing is
different,” said Seth Miller, executive director of the Innocence Project of
Florida. It can transform, he said, the meaning of the other evidence.
In some cases, judges are rejecting advancements like touch DNA, which can
reveal whether someone participated in the crime.
Those who believe Zeigler guilty say there is too much other evidence that
points to him as the killer. But his supporters have spent years poking holes
in the case.
What’s clear is that a rookie detective, fresh out of a week-long blood-spatter
school, decided Zeigler was guilty within hours. Police and prosecutors failed
to turn over reports and witness statements that might have swayed Zeigler’s
divided jury. The trial judge called a distraught juror’s doctor, who sent over
Valium during deliberations — and sentenced Zeigler to death after the jury
gave him life.
Questions have been raised about the primary witnesses who testified against
Zeigler and about the 1970s interpretation of the evidence. His lawyers say he
never would be convicted today with such a flimsy case.
Could he be innocent?
Scientists say there is a way to know, so that the state with the most
exonerations in the country doesn’t execute the wrong man.
Florida refuses.
Robert Eagan flipped through a scrapbook one day last March, looking back at
his storied career weeding out crime and corruption across Florida.
The former Orange County state attorney won most of his murder cases and
indicted dozens of cops for bribery and extortion. He wore seersucker suits,
and his patient personality drew comparisons to Atticus Finch.
“I was a very popular man with every governor,” the 92-year-old said, chuckling
in the living room of his Maitland home.
But Zeigler’s case looms over Eagan’s legacy. At least seven retired police
officers, a retired Orlando Sentinel editor and Bianca Jagger have raised
questions about Zeigler’s guilt. More than 2,300 people have signed a petition
to the governor for DNA tests of the evidence. Analyzing the blood, they argue,
could raise more doubt about the prosecution’s theories, opening the door to a
new trial. Or it would provide scientific certainty that Zeigler killed 4
people.
Zeigler’s lawyers have offered to pay for the DNA tests, and experts say modern
technology is likely to produce results.
But Eagan is glad the courts have denied the requests.
“The fact that all this stuff is going on and on and on, you say to yourself,
where does it end?” he said. “Finally, put an end to it.”
He feels that the victims’ families shouldn’t be dragged, again and again,
through their loved ones’ deaths.
Zeigler’s execution, he said, is long overdue.
He remains convinced he got the right man.
No doubt in his mind.
Body chains clinked in the hallway before Tommy Zeigler appeared in a visiting
room, a guard by his side. He looked skeletal, his pale, freckled skin
stretched tight over a 6-foot-2 frame. Earlier this year, he caught the flu,
and his weight dropped below 143 pounds.
His knees hurt with arthritis, but the visitor’s room felt good on a humid day
in July compared with his 2nd-floor cell, where the only air came from vents
and a 9-inch fan and temperatures can reach more than 100 degrees.
“It’s about 15 degrees cooler here than it is up there,” he said.
Gerald Ford was president and gas was 59 cents a gallon when Zeigler — then 30
— arrived in July 1976.
Only 1 of the 346 others has been here longer and only by 3 months.
The men on death row are a blur of society’s ills and humanity’s vices, of rape
and cruelty and jealousy and poverty and mental illness. They murdered for
money, for betrayal, for “intellectual pleasure,” for hire.
They are divided between Union Correctional Institution and Florida State
Prison, adjacent facilities 9 miles outside Starke. Their numbers are shrinking
because of challenges to the death penalty. About 60 % are white, 37 % are
black. 58 have lived there 30 years or more.
Three times a week, they get 10-minute showers. Twice a week, they get several
hours in the prison yard, and there is a weekly visit with family or friends.
They are brought three meals a day, the first at 5 a.m., and eat with a spork.
Zeigler’s cell is in a row of 14. None of the men can see each other. If he
wanted to talk to the guy a few cells down, he would go up to the cell bars and
yell out to him. Everyone would quiet down and let them talk. Sometimes, the
conversations go on for hours, with others chiming in. They talk about sports
or politics or death. They are a noisy bunch, and the chatter echoes off the
steel and concrete, along with the clanking of heavy gates, the whirring of
metal doors.
Zeigler used to play chess with the man in the next cell, Ted Bundy. Since they
couldn’t see each other, they called out moves. Bundy was executed almost 30
years ago, and Zeigler no longer plays.
“I got too old and too tired,” he said.
He used to make sweaters and scarves, until the guards, who call him “Ziggy,”
took away his plastic knitting needles.
He used to run in his cell, back and forth, for hours, to get exercise. For
him, it’s two paces each way. But he messed up his knees, so now he does 1,000
sit-ups on even days, and 500 pushups and 400 back-arm pushups on the odd days.
It takes him about three hours. If he didn’t, he said, he would “go to seed.”
He takes Sundays off.
The rest of the time, he reads, writes letters, watches news, golf or football
on his 13-inch TV and stares at the empty walls.
He has dodged death twice.
Gov. Bob Graham signed his 1st death warrant in 1982. Zeigler promised to quit
smoking Kents if he avoided the second warrant, issued in 1986. He said he
hasn’t smoked since.
94 men and 2 women have been executed in Florida since the death penalty’s
revival. Zeigler has been around for each of them. He sat in the next cell over
when John Spenkelink left for the electric chair in 1979.
Spenkelink had killed a fellow hitchhiker in Tallahassee 6 years earlier.
“It smelled like burnt bacon,” Zeigler said.
Zeigler has spent 24 years fighting to get all of the evidence against him
tested for DNA.
“The courts,” he said, “don’t want to admit they made a mistake.”
He clings to hope.
“I was raised that if you tell the truth, the truth’s gonna find you out,” he
said. “And I can’t believe that God has put me through this, and not gonna
straighten it out. I can’t believe that.”
The evidence is stored in Orlando. It is preserved in paper bags, in a
humidity-controlled vault, with answers to a crime that rattled a small town on
Christmas Eve 1975.
(source: newsherald.com)
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