[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----URGENT ACTION----MISSOURI
MISSOURI: INTELLECTUAL DISABILITY CLAIM AS EXECUTION SET Ernest Johnson, aged 55, is due to be executed in Missouri on 3 November. He was convicted of three murders committed during a robbery in 1994. There is evidence that he has intellectual disability, which would render his execution unconstitutional. Click here to view the full Urgent Action in Word or PDF format, including case information, addresses and sample messages. In the early hours of 13 February 1994, a police officer found the bodies of Mary Bratcher, age 46; Fred Jones, age 58, and Mabel Scruggs, age 57, in a convenience store in Columbia, Missouri, where the three worked. Each had died of head injuries. Ernest Lee Johnson, a regular customer in the shop, was arrested and charged with the murders. He was brought to trial in May 1995, convicted and sentenced to death. In 1998, the Missouri Supreme Court ordered a new sentencing due to the lawyer’s failure to present the testimony of a psychiatrist who had examined Ernest Johnson. The Court said it was “left with the definite and firm impression” that his testimony “would have altered the jurors' deliberations” and may have resulted in a vote for life imprisonment. At his resentencing in 1999, Ernest Johnson was again condemned to death. In 2002, the US Supreme Court ruled that the execution of people with intellectual disability (previously referred to as “mental retardation”) was unconstitutional. In 2003, the Missouri Supreme Court again ordered a new sentencing, this time because evidence of Ernest Johnson’s intellectual disability had not been adequately presented. He has had several IQ assessments during his life, including one of 77 at the age of eight, and one of 63 when he was 12 years old. He struggled in school and was placed in special education classes. He has also been diagnosed with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, which is associated with impaired intellectual functioning, and suffered two serious head injuries as a child. In 2006, Ernest Johnson was sentenced to death for a third time after the jury found that he had not proved that he had intellectual disability. The defence had argued that the burden should have been on the state to prove that he did not have intellectual disability. The defence presented two experts who testified that he did have intellectual disability, with one assessing his IQ at 67 and both finding that he had adaptive skill deficits in a number of areas, and that the disability had manifested before the age of 18. A psychometrist working for the state’s expert also assessed his IQ at 67, but the state expert asserted that Ernest Johnson was malingering. The main defence expert disagreed, having tested for malingering. The prosecutor argued to the jury that “to decide it’s more likely true than not that this guy is mentally retarded is an insult, an insult to these victims.” The state Supreme Court upheld the death sentence in 2008, ruling that “deference should be given to the jury” but three of the seven judges dissented arguing that “allocating the burden to the defendant to prove that he is mentally retarded makes the decision – whether Johnson should receive the death penalty – seem capricious” and that the conflicting facts in this case “show that the result – life or death – may well depend on which party has the burden of proof.” ADDITIONAL INFORMATION The US Supreme Court ruled in Atkins v. Virginia on 20 June 2002 that the execution of people with intellectual disability contravened a national consensus and was unconstitutional. Among other things, the Court pointed to the “consistency of the direction of change” of state-level legislation on this issue, and pointed out that in 2000 and 2001 alone, six states, including Missouri, had “joined the procession” by enacting bills against such use of the death penalty. The Atkins ruling pointed to clinical definitions of “mental retardation” as a disability, manifested before the age of 18, characterized by significantly sub-average intellectual functioning, and with limitations in two or more adaptive skill areas. It left it to states to develop “appropriate ways to enforce the constitutional restriction”, resulting in a degree of inconsistent application across the country. Click here to view the full Urgent Action in Word or PDF format. Name: Ernest Lee Johnson Gender m/f: m UA: 242/15 Index: AMR 51/2735/2015 Issue Date: 23 October 2015 Please let us know if you took action so that we can track our impact! EITHER send a short email to u...@aiusa.org with “UA 242/15” in the subject line, and include in the body of the email the number of letters and/or emails you sent, OR fill out this short online form to let us know how you took action. Thank you for taking action! Please check with the AIUSA Urgent Action Office if taking action after the appeals date. If you receive a response from a government official, please forward it to us at u...@aiusa
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----USA
Oct. 23 USA: Obama says death penalty 'deeply troubling' Amid new scrutiny of American capital punishment practices, President Barack Obama said in an interview released Friday he was disturbed by the practical effects of the death penalty. While Obama said he wasn't opposed "in theory" to killing criminals convicted of heinous crimes, he said that data showing racial biases and wrongful convictions have prompted him to wonder whether the death penalty remains a legitimate tool. Obama was speaking to former New York Times editor Bill Keller, who now runs The Marshall Project, a news organization focused on criminal justice issues. "There are certain crimes that are so beyond the pale that I understand society's need to express its outrage," he said. "So I have not traditionally been opposed to the death penalty in theory. But in practice it's deeply troubling." Saying he's "struggled for quite some time" over the death penalty, Obama also said recent botched executions have led him to wonder whether the application of capital punishment is still legal. "We know that in the application of the death penalty we've had recent cases, by any standard, it has not been swift and painless but rather gruesome and clumsy," he said. In the aftermath of one of those executions gone wrong -- an Oklahoma incident that left an accused murderer writhing and convulsing for several minutes -- Obama asked the Justice Department to conduct a review of death penalty practices. Since then, several states have suspended executions, either for legal reasons or because drug companies have stopped supplying the drugs needed for lethal injections. This week, conservative Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia said "it wouldn't surprise me" if the high court strikes down capital punishment in the United States, he told CBS News, though he's made similar predictions in the past. But the case to abolish U.S. executions has gained greater traction in recent months, including an opinion from liberal Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, who questioned the constitutionality of capital punishment in an opinion this summer. "This is not what people expected when they wrote the cases upholding the death penalty more than 40 years ago, and therefore I think it's time to revisit the issue," Breyer told CNN's Wolf Blitzer in an interview this fall. (source: CNN) ___ A service courtesy of Washburn University School of Law www.washburnlaw.edu DeathPenalty mailing list DeathPenalty@lists.washlaw.edu http://lists.washlaw.edu/mailman/listinfo/deathpenalty Unsubscribe: http://lists.washlaw.edu/mailman/options/deathpenalty
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide
Oct. 23 ENGLAND: Muslim woman 'backs death penalty for homosexuality' on live radio This was the moment a Muslim woman branded homosexuality an "abomination" and appeared to back use of the death penalty to punish it. In a shocking tirade on live radio, a caller named Zainab also equated gay people with paedophiles and claimed it was against her religion. Her comments, strongly contradicted by another Muslim caller named Sohail Ahmed, enraged LBC presenter Iain Dale, who described her views as "disgusting". During a fractious exchange, the openly gay radio host asked the 22-year-old caller, from Upney in east London, how society should treat gay people. "My religion is very clear about gay people and you know what it says about gay people," she replied. "I don't know what the exact punishment is in the Quran for gay people but it is death penalty." Asked if she thought the Quran was right, she added: "I believe the Quran is the word of God." At one point she appeared to accept that people should be allowed to be gay but said it was a "choice" that was incompatible with Islam. Referring to another caller, she said: "If he wants to be that way, he can be that way. "All I'm saying is don't get my religion into it. Don't twist my religion to say that it accepts gay people. "No it does not accept gay people and it's against my religion." Her comments came hours after the other caller, Mr Ahmed, had set up a stall outside Whitechapel station as part of a campaign to change attitudes towards homosexuality in the Islamic community. He told the radio show he had struggled to reconcile being gay with his religion but branded the female caller "uneducated". He said: "In a sense - and it might sound strange and it might sound disgusting - but I understand where she's coming from. "But unfortunately, even though I understand where she's coming from, I believe she's wrong. "And I vehemently believe she is wrong. "That young woman, rather than being kind of bigoted individual or something, she's just rather what I would refer to as uneducated, perhaps, or naive." (source: Evening Standard) ZIMBABWE: Alternative to Death Sentence Way to Go The docket of the Constitutional Court is growing fast as more and more questions, which were once decided in Parliament or in society at large, are now going to the highest court of the land. The latest is the difficult question of the death penalty. Until the passage of the new Constitution this was mandatory in murder cases where the trial court could not find, as a question of fact, that there were extenuating circumstances. The judge, in passing sentence, had no discretion; once the court established certain facts it had to pass the sentence set by Parliament. The new Constitution took a different course. Only adult men can be sentenced to death and the judge has the discretion over sentence, with the death penalty just an option for aggravated murder, not a compulsory sentence. A number of questions now come to the fore. First there are people in prison under sentence of death whose sentence was passed under the old law, because the crime took place before the new Constitution came into effect. Should these people have the right to at least a new hearing over sentence? Generally, the law forbids changes to apply to the past, both in the sense that people cannot be convicted of a crime that was not defined when they committed it and cannot appeal if the crime was later abolished. But when there is a potential life or death issue that could perhaps be different. The court will further have to consider if the death penalty, although permitted under certain circumstances, can ever be applied constitutionally. This will be an interesting decision. The Constitutional Court will also be asked to address the sentence of life imprisonment without any possibility of parole. This decision is possibly even more critical. There are many in Zimbabwe who would welcome the abolition of the death penalty and more who would at least acquiesce in its abolition. But we suspect a majority of those enthusiastic or grudging abolitionists would also want to see a full life sentence as at least an option in the worst murder cases. We will no longer kill killers, but they will have forfeited their right to return to society. But it can be argued that removing any reward for reform is also cruel. The precise balance of rights of individuals and the rights of society are probably best set by a group of senior judges. But this must not mean society and its Parliament have to abdicate their own responsibilities. The Constitutional Court can only set the boundaries. How we operate within those boundaries is a legislative decision, not a judicial decision and Parliament should have the courage to debate difficult issues and be a leader as well as a follower of public opinion. Before anyone is hanged
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----USA
Oct. 23 USA: Capital punishment isn't a solution for prisoners Capital punishment is a widely debated means to end the life of a convicted individual after they have been incarcerated for crimes perceived as too heinous for them to re-enter society. Historically, capital punishment has been the subject of controversy in its legality, ethicality and necessity in society. Execution styles have changed over time, transitioning between the electric chair and death by firing squad to the most common method used today, which is lethal injection. This method by some is considered to be the most humane, as sedatives are frequently used to ease any physical or emotional stress. In spite of this, there are mounting issues with lethal injection in monetary, ethical and moral areas. There is no denying that incarceration, especially for extended periods of time, is costly. When people receive life sentences, they still need to be fed, clothed and housed for multiple years. These expenses leave some to think that the death sentence is a more frugal way of handling punishment for serious crimes. What isn't frequently considered, however, is the price of execution. Very often, when an execution sentence is being considered, the accused will have several court-ordained hearings in their defense. Each of these requires the services of a lawyer, and as most people know, those don't come cheap. The total court costs of a death penalty trial in Kansas is $400,000, which is extremely expensive when compared to $100,000 in trials not considering the death penalty. In other states, one death penalty case was priced at more than $3 million. Besides this, there is the additional cost of the chemicals used for the execution. The compounds used are not available in the United States, which I speculate is either because they're simply not available here or because marketplaces do not want their product associated with execution. While some may argue one simple solution would be to just use the same drugs already used in physician-assisted suicide, I believe this would create a negative connotation around the same drugs used to put loved ones out of suffering. This is why morphine and other narcotics are not used as sedatives already in the lethal injection process. In the same way that the morphine industry doesn't want to be associated with the death of criminals, any supplier of drugs used in end-of-life care would be hesitant to sell their product to aid the death penalty. With no other option, prisons must import the materials used in lethal injections. The Food and Drug Administration has strict regulations on importing chemicals into the country from oversea sources, so many states are running out of their supplies. This has led some prisons, notably Ohio and Texas, to execute prisoners with new experimental cocktails of lethal injection substitutes. Currently, many states have to delay their executions because they do not have one or more of the components used for the injection. This creates a variety of issues. Texas, for instance, is not experiencing a shortage but has not disclosed how much of the drugs they have or from where they bought them. Other states like Ohio have had to extend their inmates??? sentences and execution dates while they look for a new source of lethal injection chemicals. Not only is it more expensive than one would expect, but the death penalty is ultimately a flawed system. In the case of interracial murder, a black suspect with a white victim is 3 times more likely to receive a death sentence than the reverse. While this is an issue more with the judiciary system and less with the death penalty itself, the cringeworthy methods used to execute criminals in the past have raised questions concerning both ethics and the infringement of Constitutional rights. Lethal injection may not be painless, either. Despite claims of it being completely humane, there have been several instances where the person on the table has been observed to be in obvious agony, from eye twitching to extended periods of muscle spasms. In an infamous case in January 2014, an incarcerated man took 26 minutes to die and was observed experiencing severe suffering by several people. Much of this is due to the fact that no medical doctors, nurses or emergency medical technicians are permitted to administer the injection or even be present due to the Hippocratic Oath, in which medical professionals swear to do everything in their power not to inflict harm on a healthy individual. This leads to under-experienced technicians or completely unexperienced jail staff having to hook up IVs and deliver the drugs, which can easily be done improperly in ways able to cause pain. The drugs used in lethal injections have never been certified as a painless and effective method of execution and were simply picked at random to be the procedure of choice. I d
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----MO., OKLA., NEB., NEV., ARIZ., CALIF.
Oct. 23 MISSOURI: Prosecutor Intends on Seeking the Death Penalty in Murder Case According to online court documents, the Christian County Prosecutor will seek the death penalty against a man charged with killing a woman near Ozark last summer. Aaron Clemons is charged with 1st degree murder and kidnapping in the death of Bailey Clemons. The body of Clemons was found in her burned home in June 2014. According to a probable cause statement, the state Fire Marshall found 2 melted gasoline containers in the basement of the house in northeast Ozark. Online court records show County Prosecutor Amy Fite filed a notice of intent to seek the death penalty on Wednesday of this week. (source: ozarksfirst.com) *** Prosecutor wants death penalty for man accused of wife's death, burning The Christian County prosecutor is seeking the death penalty for an Ozark man accused of beating a woman in front of her 2 young children before killing her and burning her body, according to court documents. In June 2014, police arrested Aaron Clemons, now 32, saying he killed his wife, Bailey Clemons, in her Ozark home and that her burned body was found the day after the home was set on fire. At the time, police sent a probable cause statement to prosecutors, who then charged Clemons with murder, kidnapping, armed criminal action, arson and multiple counts of child endangerment. The children, who were 6 and 9 years old at the time, saw their mother being beaten, but did not see her slain, the News-Leader previously reported. According to the court documents, Christian County Prosecutor Amy Fite will look to prove that murder of the first degree took place because it was "outrageously or wantonly vile, horrible or inhuman in that it involved torture, or depravity of mind" and that Clemons was "engaged in the perpetration (of) ... a felony of any degree of kidnapping." (source: Springfield News-Leader) OKLAHOMA: Suspension of capital punishment an indictment on Oklahoma There is significant irony in the fact that Oklahoma had its ability to carry out the death penalty suspended because officials couldn't execute it properly. The state delayed executions after Clayton Lockett juddered around on a gurney while the drugs were improperly administered during the process. The misplaced needles didn't do anything to build sympathy for a murderer who got off much easier than his victim, but it certainly gave opponents of capital punishment a good argument to take before judges that the 8th Amendment's "cruel and unusual punishment" clause had been violated by the state. Then, the state admittedly used the wrong drug when it resumed carrying out the death penalty and substituted potassium acetate for potassium chloride in the execution of Charles Warner early this year. Next Oklahoma officials broke through several months of delays to carry out final justice on Richard Glossip only to discover the wrong drug was delivered again. Glossip's execution was stayed after he ate his 2nd last meal and now the state won't head back to the death chamber until at least January of 2016. A federal judge granted a request by defense attorneys and Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt where both requested the delay. Pruitt wants time for his office to do a complete review. Defense attorneys for inmates on death row want time to prove the state is incapable of carrying out executions in a manner that is constitutionally acceptable. "We cannot trust Oklahoma to get it right or to tell the truth," said defense attorney Dale Baich. "The State's disclosure that it used potassium acetate instead of potassium chloride during the execution of Charles Warner yet again raises serious questions about the ability of the Oklahoma Department of Corrections to carry out executions." Oklahoma has proven as a state that we can't be trusted with the keys to the car. 7 states in the past decade have voted to eliminate capital punishment. Kansas has the death penalty but they haven't used it since 1988 and have no plans to begin anytime soon. When the United States Supreme Court heard the Richard Glossip appeal recently, Ruth Bader-Ginsburg pointed out that more than 100 people convicted of capital crimes had been proven innocent while on death row. She also argued the innate unfairness of the fact that only seven states had executed inmates last year and, even in those states, the use of the death sentence varies wildly by county. "If you commit a crime in Louisiana, the chances that you would get the death penalty are very high," the justice said. "But if you committed the same deed in Minnesota, the chance of getting the death penalty are almost nil." The Glossip case is one of a cluster of cases that all came up at the same time where convictions and the resulting death sentences were based primarily on the testimony of a co-conspirator who actually committ
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, S.C., FLA., LA., OHIO
Oct. 23 TEXAS: Grand jury indicts ex-Austin cop VonTrey Clark in Samantha Dean case A capital murder charge against VonTrey Clark will go forward after a Bastrop County grand jury indicted the former Austin police officer in the death of Kyle police victims counselor Samantha Dean. Clark, 32, could face the death sentence if convicted, but Bastrop County District Attorney Bryan Goertz told the American-Statesman it was too early in the case to determine whether his office will seek the highest penalty. (source: Austin American-Statesman) SOUTH CAROLINA: Judge assigned 3rd defense attorney to Emanuel AME case A 3rd attorney will join the defense in the case of the man accused of gunning down nine black parishioners inside a downtown Charleston church. The order from Judge JC Nicholson comes after the currently appointed defense team of Ashley Pennington and William McGuire asked that the trial be pushed back from July 2016 until the fall. Nicholson denied the request, and instead assigned attorney Teresa Norris of Blume, Norris, and Franklin-Best. She has been approved for up to 500 hours of work on the case by Nicholson, according to the filing -- but more hours could be added as the case goes on. Norris will also be protected from further cases under the order of protection Nicholson issued for the attorneys handling the case, meaning they will not be handed more cases until 90 days after the conclusion of the trial. The state has said it will seek the death penalty for Dylann Roof, the 21-year-old man from outside of Columbia who is accused of killing nine members of the Emanuel AME Church on June 17. After the shooting, investigators say Roof fled the state and was captured near the town of Shelby, North Carolina. He is being in isolation at the Sheriff Al Cannon Detention Center without bond. Attorneys said during a hearing to discuss the lifting of a gag order on the case that Roof was willing to plead guilty in the case if the state removes the threat of death penalty. However, nothing further has been made public about that potential deal. (source: WCIV news) FLORIDA: Florida death row inmate becomes state's 1st to demand the electric chair For the 1st time in nearly 2 decades, a Florida prison inmate is demanding that he be put to death in the antiquated electric chair and not by a lethal injection method that has been repeatedly challenged in court. Wayne Doty, 42, of Plant City, has been on death row since 2011 after he killed a fellow inmate. In a state where condemned inmates often wait for decades to be executed, Doty wants to die immediately, in part to attain "spiritual freedom." "I think his goal is to get put to death as quickly as possible," said Sean Fisher, a private investigator in Gainesville who once worked for Doty. "I think he's nervous about lethal injection being found unconstitutional." Fisher said Doty learned the reality of life in prison: "It's 10 times worse than you expected and you have no hope." Executions in Florida have been on hold for much of the past year because of lawsuits alleging that lethal injection is cruel and unusual punishment and thus unconstitutional. But the U.S. Supreme Court has upheld it, and the next execution is set for next Thursday, Oct. 30. Florida is 1 of 8 states, mostly in the South, that have kept the electric chair as a form of capital punishment. Tennessee reinstated it last year because of challenges to lethal injections. Florida's electric chair, cynically nicknamed "Ol' Sparky," has been idle for 16 years after a 2nd botched execution forced the Legislature and then-Gov. Jeb Bush to change the method. During the 1997 execution of Pedro Medina, who came to Florida from Cuba during the 1980 Mariel boatlift, a mask covering his face caught fire and filled the death chamber with smoke. At the 1999 execution of triple murderer Allen Lee "Tiny" Davis, blood appeared as 2,300 volts of electricity coursed through his 350-pound body. The state Supreme Court temporarily halted executions but later ruled in a 4 to 3 decision that electrocution was not a form of cruel and unusual punishment. The state switched to a lethal injection of chemicals that sedate an inmate and stop the heart. But in changing the method of execution, Bush and the Legislature also gave inmates the one-time option of selecting electrocution. Doty is the 1st inmate to do so. In a handwritten affidavit, Doty wrote: "I'm invoking my right of free will to choose execution by electrocution due to confliction (sic) surrounding executions through lethal injection." Doty initially was sentenced to life in prison for the fatal shooting of Harvey Horne II, a watchman at a Plant City manufacturing plant, during a drug robbery in 1996. He was 23. Sentenced to life at Florida State Prison in Raiford, Doty was a "runner" who fetched meals for fellow inmates. He and anothe
