[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide
June 14 AUSTRALIA: 'It's abhorrent': MP Steve Irons calls for death penalty for paedophiles Federal MP Steve Irons has called for the introduction of the death penalty for paedophiles and "people who continually abuse children". Mr Irons made the call during a debate in federal parliament on the introduction of laws to establish a compensation scheme for victims of sexual abuse. Liberal MP Steve Irons during debate on the National Redress Scheme for Institutional Child Sexual Abuse Bill 2018, in the House of Representatives at Parliament House. The MP, who grew up as a ward of the state and has been a key campaigner for a redress scheme for victims of institutional child sex crimes, said he understood the idea wouldn't get far, but it was still a "personal passion". Mr Irons said in an interview on Tuesday that both he and his wife grew up in families that suffered from either sexual or violent child abuse. "We're both strong believers that once an adult has crossed that line, it's like crossing the Rubicon," he said. "Once they've done it, they'll continue to do it no matter what and, whether it's alcohol-induced or whatever it is, those children should never be returned to their abusers at all. "What country in the world says the abuse and rape of a 2-year-old child is acceptable? "Everyone's too scared to say, I don't care what culture they come from, or what race or ethnicity they are, they need to go to jail for the rest of their life and never be in contact with a child ever again, or - should I say it? - put to death." In parliament, Mr Irons referred to the case of a seven-year-old girl who died in 2007 after her parents kept her as a prisoner in the filthy room where she "died a slow and torturous death", according to NSW police. "She wasn't in an institution but she starved to death in a home in New South Wales under the care of her own parents," Mr Irons said in parliament. "We have heard the many stories about institutional child sex abuse over the last 10 years. "They are often reflected in private homes around Australia as well, for which there is no form of redress at all under the system. After our achievement today [the introduction of a redress scheme], we need to look at child abuse in private homes and how the children continue to be returned to the abusers." On Tuesday Mr Irons said child abuse was a "It's a dark, tragic shadow on the history of Australia". "To me, the shameful thing is that it's still happening," he said. "It hasn't only happened in institutions, it's happened in family homes around Australia. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull pays tribute to the survivors and families who came forward to contribute to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. "Some of the things fathers, step-fathers and even mothers have done to their own children in the supposed sanctity of their own home is terrible and it's still continuing today." On Wednesday, Western Australia became the final state to join a $3.8 billion national redress scheme that will cover more than 90 % of eligible child sexual abuse survivors. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull says WA Premier Mark McGowan had given him a firm commitment that the state will join the scheme. A statement from federal opposition leader Bill Shorten said Labor was disappointed the redress scheme would start one year later than was recommended by the Royal Commission and that the cap on redress payments was lower than recommended. Mr Irons said work had commenced on a national apology to victims of victims of institutional child sexual abuse, which Mr Turnbull would deliver later this year. (source: watoday.com.au) SOUTH AFRICA: In these times of fear, why I favour the reinstatement of the death penalty I hold an alternate but opposing view to that of columnist Yogin Devan whose article "An eye for an eye is not the answer" appeared in last week's POST. The narrative in recent times, notably with the escalation of capital crime, suggests that society is growing impatient in the apparent kid-glove treatment meted out to heinous criminals who commit gratuitous murders of innocent people with utter impunity and without remorse. Devan argues that calling for the death penalty is an affront to human rights and dignity. I beg to differ. He correctly states that "there is no concrete evidence showing that the death penalty actually deters crime". Conversely, there is no empirical evidence to suggest that a prison sentence will equally deter a criminal from re-offending, especially in terms of murder or rape and those non-capital crimes. While our constitution guarantees the right to life, it fails consciously to account for those who, with premeditated and deliberate intent, takes the lives of others. The concept of a life-for-a-life trade-off may appear unpalatable to the moral and religious
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----OHIO, NEB., S.DAK., CALIF., USA
June 14 OKLAHOMAdeath row inmate dies Death row inmate in Tulsa bank teller's murder found dead at state penitentiary A death row inmate who killed a Tulsa bank teller in 2004 and who exhausted his appeals reportedly hanged himself Saturday in his jail cell. Oklahoma State Penitentiary staff found Jeremy Williams, 35, dead in his cell from an apparent suicide, according to an Oklahoma Department of Corrections incident report. Matthew Elliott, a DOC spokesman, said Williams' death remains under investigation. DOC security officers found Williams "hanging from the vent with a ligature tied around his neck," officers state in the report. Williams was convicted for his part in a 2004 shooting death during a botched bank robbery. He was sentenced to death after his conviction and exhausted his appeals in January 2016 when the U.S. Supreme Court rejected his final appeal. Williams was on death row for nearly 12 years before he was found dead in his cell. In June 2004, Williams and Alvin "Tony" Jordan were the masked gunmen who robbed First Fidelity Bank, located in the 2600 block of East 21st Street, according to Tulsa World archives. Amber Rogers, 26, was a teller there at the time of the robbery. She was shot in the abdomen and killed. During the court case, prosecutors argued Williams and Jordan caught Rogers in crossfire. The bullet passed through her body and state medical examiners could not determine the caliber of gun that fired it. Jordan pleaded guilty and is serving a life sentence in prison. Jordan avoided the death penalty when he pleaded guilty, according to a previous story. On Saturday, prison security officers were conducting a "count" around 11:15 p.m. when they found Williams' cell window obscured by a sheet. Staff state in the incident report that Williams "did not respond to knocking." They cracked the door to pull back the sheet from the window, revealing Williams' body. Authorities attempted life-saving measures, but by 3:30 a.m. Sunday, state medical examiners had taken Williams' body. Williams was on death row, but he had not yet been scheduled to be executed. Between 1915 and 2014, state officials executed 192 men and 3 women, according to DOC records. The last execution in Oklahoma was that of Charles Warner, who died by lethal injection in January 2015. An autopsy first reported by The Oklahoman revealed that 1 of the drugs used was not part of the Department of Corrections' lethal injection protocol. Oklahoma authorities announced in March 2018 that they will transition to inert gas inhalation for executions. The announcement came after 3 years without an execution due to controversy over lethal injection. (source: Tulsa World) NEBRASKA: Nebraska Supreme Court won't let ACLU weigh in on death penalty case Just days after the ACLU asked to be allowed to file a "friend of the court" brief in Carey Dean Moore's death penalty case, the Nebraska Supreme Court on Wednesday denied it. Without elaborating, the state's highest court simply overruled the motion, according to court records. Friday, attorney Amy Miller of the ACLU of Nebraska had asked to be allowed to file a brief, in which she planned to lay out legal reasons why the court should delay issuing an execution warrant, sought by the attorney general's office, to carry out Moore's death sentence. In the motion, which contained the proposed brief, Miller listed 4 pending lawsuits, including one in which the Lincoln Journal Star, the Omaha World-Herald and the ACLU alleged a violation of public-records law regarding the source of the state's lethal injection drugs. But the ACLU doesn't currently represent Moore, who asked defense attorneys to withdraw from his case last month and isn't fighting the death penalty. Moore, on death row since 1980, was convicted of 2 counts of 1st-degree murder in the 1979 deaths of Omaha cab drivers Reuel Van Ness and Maynard Helgeland. Moore was 21 at the time. On April 3, Nebraska Attorney General Doug Peterson filed a motion for an execution warrant for Moore. Peterson's office later asked the court to expedite the execution and requested a July 10 date, or sometime in mid-July, because one of the lethal injection drugs expires this summer. Scott Frakes, director of the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services, said the potassium chloride they have to carry out the execution expires Aug. 31. (source: Lincoln Journal Star) * Mental illness, burden of 'profound failure' led Anthony Garcia to kill 4, lawyer says The doctor turned quadruple killer was wheeled into the third-floor courtroom, shoulders hunched, eyes scrunched. Forced to court by Douglas County sheriff's deputies, Anthony Garcia rolled into court as if he had rolled out of bed - with his unkempt beard, uncut fingernails and toenails, and the defiance that he has displayed throughout his
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, FLA., OHIO, TENN., MO.
June 14 TEXAS: Death Watch: Intellectually Disabled or Mentally Ill?3 cases raise the question The Court of Criminal Appeals granted its first stay of execution of the year, and now Smith County man Clifton Williams will face a new hearing instead of lethal injection, which was scheduled for June 21. Williams was sentenced to death in 2006 for killing a 93-year-old woman in a home robbery gone wrong. He's spent the last decade fighting his sentence to little reward, but on May 23, his attorneys filed an appeal contending Williams is "intellectually disabled" and therefore not subject to execution. Atkins v. Virginia, a 2002 Supreme Court case, determined that executing people with intellectual disabilities qualifies as cruel punishment and violates the Eighth Amendment, but the CCA decision on Williams is the result of a more recent Supreme Court ruling on Texas death row inmate Bobby Moore, who SCOTUS concluded was sentenced in part on outdated medical research on intellectual functioning. Indeed, Texas had been using material from 1992, as well as guidelines based in part on Lennie from John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men - factors that advanced "lay stereotypes" and made Texas an "outlier" in comparison to other states' handling of similar cases. Williams now awaits examination. His Atkins hearing won't take place until that occurs. He has a hearing in Smith County District Court on June 21, to appoint substitute counsel. Meanwhile, Moore's case appears to be headed down a different path. On June 6, the CCA upheld its ruling that he is competent enough for execution, and agreed to adopt current medical standards going forward (the same ones that moved the needle the other way in Williams' case), but the judges believe even under the new framework, Moore "failed to demonstrate adaptive deficits sufficient to support a diagnosis of intellectual disability." And a similar conversation continued last week in the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, where Andre Thomas was granted, in part, a certificate of appealability to file a brief and have his recently denied appeal reviewed. In 2005, Thomas was sentenced for killing his ex-wife, her baby, and their young son. He spent the months leading up to the murders claiming to hear voices from God and cutting himself, and in the course of the murders cut out the hearts of the 2 children and stored the organs in his pocket, before trying to kill himself. Later, in jail, he gouged out his right eye. Unsurprisingly, 3 psychologists concluded Thomas suffered from paranoid schizophrenia. Though his trial attorney argued he was too ill to be given the death penalty, an all-white jury disagreed. (Thomas is black; his ex-wife was white.) 3 years later, he pulled out his other eye and ate it. Unlike Williams and Moore, who used Atkins to further their appeals, Thomas is mentally ill - meaning he suffers from a disorder, as opposed to intellectual functioning and adaptive behavior limitations (i.e., intellectual disability). The 5th Circuit denied only 1 of Thomas' 5 COA issues: whether execution of the severely mentally ill violates the Eighth Amendment, stating "this issue is foreclosed under our precedent." Though the U.S. still allows mentally ill inmates to be executed, the 5th Circuit's approval might just force a Supreme Court decision. (source: Austin Chronicle) ** "Blood Will Tell" investigation, death row with disabilities On this week's TribCast, Emily talks to Evan, Jolie and the New York Times Magazine and ProPublica's Pamela Colloff on Pam's 2-part "Blood Will Tell" series on blood spatter analysis and the state's consideration of intellectual disabilities in death row cases. On this week's TribCast, Emily talks to Evan, Jolie and the New York Times Magazine and ProPublica's Pamela Colloff on Pam's 2-part "Blood Will Tell" series on blood spatter analysis and the state's consideration of intellectual disabilities in death row cases: In Blood Will Tell, Pam told the harrowing story of Joe Bryan, a small-town Texas school principal who's been imprisoned for decades for the murder of his schoolteacher wife - based on blood spatter analysis that remains in question as a forensic science. Pam made some pretty big news on the TribCast: Bryan has just been denied parole again. He's 77 and has congestive heart failure and is on his 3rd pacemaker. In 2002, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that people with intellectual disabilities aren't eligible for the death penalty, and just over a year ago, the court knocked down Texas' method of determining whether death row inmates qualified as intellectually disabled. Jolie talks about 2 recent cases where the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals used new standards to uphold one death sentence and delay another. Thanks for joining us! We'll see you next week. (source: Texas Tribune) FLORIDA: Convicted killer asks for new
