Nov. 10
NORTH CAROLINA:
Asheville man removed from death row 19 later, will serve life without parole
for murder
There's 1 less person on death row in North Carolina after an
Asheville man — convicted of murder nearly 20 years earlier — was re-sentenced
to life without parole Friday afternoon.
James Lewis Morgan, 63, had been awaiting execution since 1999, when he was
found guilty of murdering an Asheville woman.
Due Process
A Buncombe County jury at the time found that Morgan had stabbed Patrina King
48 times in front of his mother's home on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard.
Morgan Killed King the day after Thanksgiving 2 years before he was sentenced.
In court Friday, nobody disputed Morgan's conviction. But Morgan's attorneys —
Elizabeth Hambourger and Mark Kleinschmidt — said that the court had violated
their client's right to due process in handling his sentencing more than a
decade prior.
Hambourger, of Durham, and Kleinschmidt, of Chapel Hill, said that Morgan was
represented by 5 different attorneys in a matter of months and had not been
afforded proper psychological evaluation prior to his sentencing in 1999, which
the Supreme Court has said is a necessary component of indigent defense
services.
As a result, the all-white jury that sentenced Morgan to death knew nothing of
the severe traumatic brain injuries that Morgan had suffered "during the course
of his life, starting in childhood," Kleinschmidt told Superior Court Judge
Alan Z. Thornburg Friday.
"He can't control his emotions in ways we do," Kleinschmidt told the Citizen
Times after the re-sentencing. "That doesn't mean his actions were excusable.
But this is about what the appropriate punishment is in this instance."
Hambourger, who works with the Center for Death Penalty Litigation, added that
the death penalty "is supposed to be reserved for the worst of the worst."
Though Morgan's crime was gruesome — and he'd been convicted of second degree
murder in 1976 — neuropsychological testing conducted after his original
sentencing showed that his cognitive ability had been severely limited due to
trauma before he fatally stabbed King, Hambourger said.
"Today, this type of evidence frequently persuades juries to impose life
sentences instead of death," Buncombe County District Attorney wrote in a press
release announcing the re-sentencing.
Williams consented to the defense's request for re-sentencing on these grounds
— and after having spoken with King's father, James, he said.
In court, he explained that while he was reviewing the defense's motion "it was
clear certain due process rights were violated in 1999."
He also cited as precedent a case out of Charlotte that featured similar
circumstances — and was also litigated by Kleinschmidt. The defendant in that
case, Melvin J. Hardy, was also removed from death row and is now serving a
life sentence without parole.
"Justice is a difficult process," Williams told the Citizen Times after the
hearing Friday.
Nobody knows that better than the family members of King. Her father and sister
were among those present at Friday's hearing.
Patrina's sister, Jan King, told Morgan Friday that she forgave him "a long
time ago, but I'm still mad as hell."
"You took my sister away from her kids that I had to raise," she said.
James King, Patrina's father, said that he had mixed feelings about the
re-sentencing. On one hand, he doesn't believe in the death penalty, he said.
On the other, Morgan took his daughter from him. Took the mother from his
grandchildren.
From his seat in the audience, James King told the court that he tossed and
turned Thursday night, unable to sleep thinking about his daughter's murder. He
said he woke up thinking about what Patrina must have felt as the knife entered
her for the 1st time.
"I felt that pain myself," he said.
Hambourger read an apology prepared by Morgan. But it was clear from the King
family's reaction that no apology was going to ease their pain Friday.
If nothing else, Morgan's re-sentencing will bring legal finality to the case,
which has been ongoing since roughly the time of his 1st sentencing, Williams
said. Morgan's new sentence was granted on the condition that he dropped all
outstanding appeals claims.
Williams said Friday that the King family will never have to face Patrina's
killer in court again.
North Carolina's death row population — 141 inmates now — is the 6th largest in
the country, according to a report recently published by the Center for Death
Penalty Litigation. 7 of those inmates were sentenced in Buncombe County.
The last execution performed in the state was in 2006.
(source: Asheville Citizen-Times)
FLORIDA:
For the 28th time, Florida sentenced a man to death ... only to realize it
made a mistakeClemente Aguirre exonerated in double-murder
The state of Florida spent the past 14 years trying to kill Clemente
Aguirre-Jarquin.
The
