[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
June 20 GEORGIAexecution Georgia carries out execution of condemned killer Marion Wilson Marion Wilson was declared dead at 9:52 p.m. after being put to death tonight by lethal injection for a murder committed more than 2 decades ago. The execution was carried out shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the 42-year-old's final appeals. Wilson’s lawyers had asked the high court to halt the execution, and the court waited about 2 hours after the scheduled 7 p.m. execution to issue its decision. The nation’s highest court often waits until well after that hour before deciding whether to intervene. After hearing of the high court’s denial, Wilson’s 23-year-old daughter, Tykecia, screamed, “I want my daddy, I want my daddy back!” A man picked her up as she wailed, carried her to a car and drove away. The Georgia Supreme Court refused to issue a stay of execution this afternoon, and the state Board of Pardons and Paroles declined to grant clemency to Wilson this morning. Wilson was convicted of murder and sentenced to death in Baldwin County — along with co-defendant Robert Butts — for the 1996 shooting death of an off-duty corrections officer. Donovan Parks, 24, wanted to become a counselor for inmates. The parole board held a lengthy meeting Wednesday, hearing from members of Wilson and Parks’ family. Clemency hearings in Georgia are closed to the media. The board’s deliberations are also private. Shortly after the parole board denied clemency, a Butts County Superior Court judge rejected Wilson’s latest petition. In a recent court filing, Wilson’s lawyers contended the district attorney who prosecuted the case made misleading arguments to Wilson’s jury. They also said Wilson was not eligible for the death penalty because he was not the person who shot and killed Parks. But Judge Thomas Wilson dismissed the petition, saying one claim was raised too late and the other had already been decided in prior appeals. Marion Wilson’s lawyer are now expected to appeal the judge’s ruling to the Georgia Supreme Court. This afternoon, the Georgia Supreme Court, by a pair of 7-1 votes with Justice Robert Benham dissenting, also dismissed Wilson’s appeal as well as his request for new DNA testing and a new trial. On March 28, 1996, Wilson and Butts, who was executed last year, spotted Parks at a Milledgeville Walmart and asked for a ride while he was buying cat food. Parks, who knew Butts from working with him at Burger King, had just come from Bible study. Wilson and Butts were members of the Folk Nation street gang. Minutes after Parks agreed to give them a lift, he was pulled from his car, shot in the head with a sawed-off shotgun, and left for dead in the road. Wilson’s attorneys have argued there is no evidence Wilson was the trigger man, or that he knew Butts was going to shoot Parks. Wilson has said he thought Butts was likely going to rob Parks. The petition points out then-District Attorney Fred Bright had offered Wilson a sentence of life with the possibility of parole before his 1997 trial. Wilson's attorneys have also said in filings that Bright, who died last year, took advantage of ambiguity in the evidence about which man pulled the trigger to accuse them both of it at their separate trials. Bright later said he believed Butts pulled the trigger. The DA's office noted in filings this week that Georgia law doesn’t require a person to physically kill someone to be guilty of murder. Helping in a murder is enough. Christopher Parks, who was 18 when his brother was murdered, wants Wilson to pay with his life as soon as possible. “Donovan was someone who cared about people. He was someone who was trying to help someone who said they were stranded and needed a ride. Within 30 minutes, they took his life," Parks told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. "Treated him like he was gum on the bottom of a shoe. Like he wasn’t worth anything.” Outside the prison, a group a protesters gathered before 7 p.m. They’d driven from around the country to stand against the 1,500th American execution since 1976. “That person has a family too,” SueZann Bosler said of Wilson. Bosler was the rare protester who had a family member murdered. Her father, Rev. Billy Bosler, was stabbed repeatedly in front of her on Dec. 22, 1986, by James Bernard Campbell in South Florida. Campbell also seriously wounded the daughter, 24 at the time. Campbell ended up on death row, but the daughter eventually joined the successful fight to get him resentenced to life. “My father told me 8 years before this happened, If someone ever murdered me, I would not want that person to get the death penalty,’” she said. “My dad taught me about forgiveness.” Chrisopher Parks, for his part, disagrees with death penalty abolitionists, because he believes the only punishment appropriate for taking his brother’s life is death itself. Wilson becomes t
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA----USA--1500th execution petition
PETITION TO: Governor Brian Kemp and the Georgia State Board of Pardons & Paroles We call on you to halt the upcoming execution of Marion Wilson, who is scheduled to be executed in Georgia on June 20, 2019 in response to his murder of Donovan Corey Parks. If you allow this execution to go forward, your state bears the distinction of carrying out the 1500th execution since executions resumed in 1977. We can better serve murder victim family members while safely holding dangerous individuals accountable without executions. Please do everything in your power to stop this execution and end capital punishment in your state. Thank you. ADD YOUR NAME! https://www.change.org/p/governor-brian-kemp-stop-the-1500th-execution-end-executions-now ALSO, DONATE TO SUPPORT THE EFFORT! https://actionnetwork.org/fundraising/carry-it-further-by-investing-today-2/ ___ 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----GEORGIA
May 2 GEORGIAexecution Georgia executes man for killing 2 women in 1994 Georgia has executed a man convicted of killing his ex-girlfriend and another woman nearly 25 years ago. The Georgia attorney general's office said in a statement that 52-year-old Scotty Garnell Morrow was pronounced dead at 9:38 p.m. Thursday following an injection of pentobarbital at the state prison in Jackson. Morrow was convicted of fatally shooting ex-girlfriend Barbara Ann Young and her friend Tonya Woods at Young's home in Gainesville in December 1994. Prosecutors said at trial that Morrow shot the two women and another woman when they turned him away as he tried to get Young to take him back. The third woman survived. Lawyers for Morrow argued he shouldn't have been given the death penalty. They said he snapped because of lingering trauma from abuse suffered as a child. Morrow was put to death shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court rejected a last-minute bid to block the execution. Morrow becomes the 1st condemned inmate to be put to death this year in Georgia and the 73rd overall since the state resumed capital punishment in 1983. Morrow becomes the 5th condemned inmate to be put to death this year in the USA and the 1,495th overall since the nation resumed executions on January 17, 1977. Only Texas (561), Virginia (113), Oklahoma (112), Florida (97, and Missouri (88) have executed more inmates since the death penalty was re-legalized in the USA on July 2, 1976. (sources: WRAL news & Rick Halperin) USAcountdown to nation's 1500th execution With the execution of Scotty Morrow in Georgia on May 2, the USA has now executed 1,494 condemned individuals since the death penalty was re-legalized on July 2, 1976 in the US Supreme Court Gregg v Georgia decision. Gary Gilmore was the 1st person executed, in Utah, on January 17, 1977. Below is a list of scheduled executions as the nation approaches a terrible milestone of 1500 executions in the modern era. NOTE: The list is likely to change over the coming months as new execution dates are added and possible stays of execution occur. 1496---May 16-Donnie Johnson---Tennessee 1497---May 16-Michael SamraAlabama 1498---May 23-Bobby Joe Long---Florida 1400---May 30-Christopher PriceAlabama 1500---Aug. 15Stephen West-Tennessee 1501---Aug. 21Larry Swearingen-Texas 1502---Sept. 4Billy Crutsinger-Texas 1503---Sept. 10---Mark Anthony Soliz---Texas 1504--Sept. 12Warren Henness---Ohio Learn more about efforts to #StopThe1500th Execution and how you can be involved at http://deathpenaltyaction.org/1500th [deathpenaltyaction.org] (source: Rick Halperin) ___ 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----GEORGIA
May 2 GEORGIAimpending execution Georgia high court declines to halt execution Georgia’s highest court has declined to halt an execution scheduled for Thursday evening. Scotty Garnell Morrow is scheduled to receive a lethal injection at 7 p.m. at the state prison in Jackson. Morrow was convicted of murder in the fatal shootings of his ex-girlfriend Barbara Ann Young and her friend Tonya Woods at Young’s Gainesville home in December 1994. The Georgia Supreme Court declined Thursday afternoon to delay execution plans. The high court also declined to hear an appeal of a lower court’s ruling that had rejected Morrow’s challenge to his death sentence. Authorities have said Morrow went to the home to try to win Young back and shot the women when they told him to leave. A 3rd woman also was shot, but survived. (source: Associated Press) ___ 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----GEORGIA
May 4 GEORGIAexecution Georgia executes killer of off-duty prison guard Georgia has executed a man convicted of robbing and killing an off-duty prison guard 22 years ago. Authorities say the death sentence of 40-year-old Robert Earl Butts Jr. was carried out at 9:58 p.m. Friday. Butts and 41-year-old Marion Wilson Jr. were convicted and sentenced to death in the March 1996 slaying of Donovan Corey Parks. Prosecutors say Butts and Wilson asked Parks for a ride outside a Walmart store in Milledgeville on March 28, 1996, and then ordered him out of the car and fatally shot him a short distance away. Wilson's case is still pending. Butts becomes the 2nd condemned inmate to be put to death in Georgia this year and the 72nd overall since the state resumed capital punishment in 1983. Butts becomes the 10th condemned inmate to be put to death this year in the USA and the 1,475th overall since the nation resumed executions on January 17, 1977. Only Texas (*550), Virginia (113), Oklahoma (112), Florida (96), and Missouri (88) have carried out more executions since the death penalty was re-legalized in the USA on July 2, 1976. (sources: Associated Press & Rick Halperin) ___ 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----GEORGIA
May 2 GEORGIAimpending execution Board holds clemency hearing for condemned Georgia inmate Georgia's parole board on Wednesday was considering whether to grant clemency for a condemned inmate set to be executed this week. Robert Earl Butts Jr. is scheduled to die Thursday evening at the state prison in Jackson. The State Board of Pardons and Paroles was holding a closed-door clemency hearing to hear arguments for and against commuting the 40-year-old inmate's sentence. The parole board is the only authority in Georgia with the power to commute a death sentence. Butts, 40, and Marion Wilson Jr., 41, were convicted and sentenced to death in the March 1996 slaying of Donovan Corey Parks in central Georgia. The two men asked Parks for a ride outside a Walmart store and then ordered him out of the car and fatally shot him a short distance away. Prosecutors have said Butts fired the fatal shot. Wilson's case is still pending in the courts. Butts' attorneys asked the parole board in a clemency application filed last week to spare his life. "I think about Mr. Parks and that night every single day, going over it again and again in my mind," Butts said in a statement included with his petition. "There's no excuse for what I did, and I'm tremendously sorry for what happened to Mr. Parks." His attorneys insisted in the petition that Butts wasn't the shooter. A jailhouse witness, Horace May, who testified at trial that Butts confessed to being the shooter has now signed a sworn statement saying he made the story up out of sympathy for Wilson, whom he also met in jail. Wilson also told May that the pair had agreed to steal Parks' car but that Butts believed they would release Parks, the statement says. Butts' lawyers have also filed challenges in several courts. They argued in a filing in Baldwin County Superior Court, where he was originally sentenced, that Butts' execution should be halted and he should be resentenced. Given recent trends in sentencing, he wouldn't be sentenced to death today so his death sentence is "grossly disproportionate," they argued. A judge rejected that argument, and Butt's lawyers filed a notice of intent to appeal to the state Supreme Court. In a petition filed in Butts County Superior Court, where the prison that houses death row is located, his lawyers argued that his sentence is unconstitutional. He was 18 at the time of the killing and a chaotic and troubled childhood stunted his intellectual, social and psychological growth, causing his mental age and maturity to lag behind his actual age, his lawyers wrote. Executing him would be like executing someone who was younger than 18 when his crime was committed, and that's not lawful, his lawyers argued. His attorneys have also consistently argued that his trial lawyers were ineffective and failed to thoroughly investigate his case or to present mitigating evidence, including a childhood characterized by abuse and neglect that could have spared him the death penalty. State and federal courts have rejected his appeals, but his lawyers have argued that a Georgia Supreme Court opinion published in January and a U.S. Supreme Court ruling last month in Wilson's case open the door for a federal judge to consider his claims of ineffective assistance of counsel. A federal judge has rejected those arguments. Butts would be the second inmate executed by Georgia this year. Carlton Gary, convicted of raping and killing three older women and known as the "stocking strangler," was put to death March 15. (source: Associated Press) ___ 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----GEORGIA
Sept. 26 GEORGIAstay of impending execution U.S. Supreme Court grants stay of execution to Georgia killer The U.S. Supreme Court tonight granted a stay of execution to condemned killer Keith Tharpe 3 1.2 hours after he was scheduled to be put to death by lethal injection. The court’s justices were apparently concerned about claims that one of Tharpe’s jurors was racist and sentenced Tharpe to death because he was African-American. (source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution) ___ 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----GEORGIA (correction)
May 17 GEORGIA: Friends in my earlier post, I wrote that "Ledford becomes the 13th condemned inmate to be put to death this year in the USA and the 1453rd overall since the nation resumed executions on January 17, 1977. Only Texas (542), Oklahoma (112), Virginia (112), Florida (92) and Missouri (88) have executed more inmates since the death penalty was re-legalized on July 2, 1976." CORRECTION---Ledford was the 11th condemned inmate to be put to death this year, not the 13th ___ 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----GEORGIA
May 15 GEORGIAimpending execution Murderer denied clemency; will be executed Tuesday The State Board of Pardons and Paroles has denied clemency for J.W. Ledford Jr., who will be executed Tuesday for the January 1992 murder of 73-year-old Dr. Harry Buchanan Johnston Jr. in Murray County. The decision by the five-member parole board "came after an exhaustive review of the inmate’s parole case file and following a meeting today to receive information for or against clemency," according to a press release from the State Board of Pardons and Paroles. The hearing began this morning. The Georgia Department of Corrections has scheduled Ledford’s execution for Tuesday at 7 p.m. at the Diagnostic and Classification Prison in Jackson. Ledford was convicted of malice murder, as well as two counts of armed robbery, one count of burglary and one count of kidnapping. The U.S. Supreme Court denied Ledford’s request to appeal on April 3. The Murray County Superior Court issued the order for the execution of Ledford. "The parole board maintains a comprehensive file on each death row inmate," according to the press release. "The file contains the history of the inmate’s life, including the inmate’s criminal history and the circumstances of the crime that was committed resulting in the death sentence. Prior to today’s meeting the board members had thoroughly reviewed that information." (source: Dalton Daily CITIZEN) ___ 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----GEORGIA
May 15 GEORGIAimpending execution Condemned killer’s family asks parole board to stop Tuesday execution Advocates for condemned killer J.W. “Boy” Ledford asked the State Board of Pardons and Paroles to stop his execution set for tomorrow and give him a chance to continue supporting his son and other inmates on Death Row. Ledford’s mother, his six sisters, his son, other family members and his lawyers spent about 2½ hours with the five-person board while others on his legal team continued to push his case through the federal courts. Before deciding on his clemency petition, the board will hear from those who want to see Ledford, 45, punished for stabbing to death his 73-year-old neighbor and the physician who delivered him, Dr. Harry Johnston, 25 years ago. Georgia Death Row Inmate Seeks Execution By Firing Squad In their clemency petition, his lawyers write that Ledford deserves mercy because he regrets killing Johnston, because he is intellectually disabled and because at the time he was intoxicated and under the influence of drugs, addictions he had suffered since he was a child. Ledford’s appeals to the court also complain that he is at risk of suffering a horrific death because the lethal injection drug Georgia uses may not work as it should and the pain he experiences would violate his constitutional protection from cruel and unusual punishment. They write that Ledford’s brain chemistry has been altered by taking a medication for years to address a chronic nerve problem. The lawyers say that drug will reduce the efficacy of pentobarbital, the drug Georgia uses in its executions. Ledford’s lawyers wrote that death by firing squad would more likely ensure a painless death, while lethal injection could mean he will not be unconscious enough by the time his lungs begin to shut down. Georgia law only allows executions by lethal injections. The U.S. District Court on Friday rejected that argument, so he has taken his appeal to the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Last week, the federal appeals court in Atlanta turned down an Alabama Death Row inmate’s request to be allowed to die either by electrocution or firing squad instead of lethal injection. Ledford was 20 years old when he murdered Johnston on Jan. 31, 1992. According to court records, Ledford said the older man was giving him a ride into town when Johnston accused him of stealing from him and turned around to return to his Murray County home. Johnston’s wife, Antoinette, said she saw her husband drive off in his truck with someone she couldn’t identify in the passenger seat. A short time later, Ledford came to the door asking to see the doctor. He returned 10 minutes later to ask her to tell her husband to come to his house that evening. Then another 10 minutes after his second visit, Ledford returned with a knife. He tied up the woman and left with cash, a rifle, a shotgun and two handguns he found in the house. Antoinette told police she saw Ledford drive away in her husband’s truck. He was arrested a short time later, after he had pawned Johnston’s rifle and shotgun. The next day Ledford confessed but said he killed Johnston in self-defense because he pulled a knife on him. Johnston was stabbed repeatedly. One wound was so deep he was almost decapitated. His body was found under some limbs next to the garage near his house. (source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution *** State considers stay of execution for Murray County man A clemency hearing for a Murray County man whose execution is set for Tuesday evening is underway. The five-member state Board of Pardons and Paroles convened this morning to hear arguments for converting J.W. “Boy” Ledford Jr.’s death sentence into a sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole. His mother, Mattie Ledford, sisters and others are scheduled to speak this morning. Board members will then hear arguments this afternoon for why they shouldn’t reduce Ledford’s sentence. They could make a decision as soon as this evening. If Ledford’s request for clemency is denied, he will be the first person to be executed in Georgia this year. Ledford was convicted in 1992 of killing his neighbor, 73-year-old Dr. Harry Johnston. Prosecutors and law enforcement officials have described the murder as being especially brutal, with the doctor’s head nearly severed in the attack. Five jurors, though, have since said that they would have preferred to send Ledford to prison for the rest of his life had it been an option at the time, according to Ledford’s application for clemency. Ledford’s attorneys, led Monday by John Cline of San Francisco, have also asked the board to consider Ledford’s remorse as well as his young age at the time of the murder and his intellectual disability. The 45-year-old has also unsuccessfully sought to be executed by a firing squad rather than lethal injection. His atto
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
April 26 GEORGIAimpending execution The state parole board has denied clemency for a Georgia death row inmate scheduled to die this week The state parole board has denied clemency for a Georgia death row inmate scheduled to die this week. Daniel Anthony Lucas is set to be put to death Wednesday at the state prison in Jackson by injection of the barbiturate pentobarbital. The State Board of Pardons and Paroles is the only entity authorized to commute a death sentence in Georgia. The board denied clemency Tuesday after holding a hearing. Lucas was sentenced to death for the April 1998 killings of 37-year-old Steven Moss, his 11-year-old son Bryan and 15-year-old daughter Kristin, who interrupted a burglary at their home near Macon in central Georgia. Lucas' lawyers have said his childhood was plagued by drugs and violence. They say he's been reformed in prison and should be spared. Lucas would be the 5th inmate executed in Georgia this year. (source: Associated Press) ___ 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----GEORGIA
Feb. 17 GEORGIAexecution Georgia executes ex-Navy sailor for 1992 murder of shipmate Georgia has executed former Navy sailor Travis Clinton Hittson for the gruesome 1992 murder of a fellow shipmate. Hittson, 45, was put to death by lethal injection at 8:14 p.m. He accepted a final prayer and recorded a final statement, according to the Georgia Department of Corrections. On his final day of life, Hittson met with 2 relatives, four friends and eight members of his legal team. Hittson was scheduled to die at 7 p.m. but, as is usually the case, there were delays while the state waited for all the courts to decide whether the execution should be stopped. The U.S. Supreme Court denied a stay of execution this evening, the Georgia Supreme Court ruled this afternoon that Hittson's request lacked merit, and on Tuesday the State Board of Pardons and Paroles rejected Hittson's plea that his sentence be commuted to life without parole. A Houston County jury condemned Hittson to die for the April 5, 1992, murder of Conway Utterbeck. According to court records, Hittson's lead petty officer, Edward Vollmer, told Hittson to kill Utterbeck, 20, on the pretense that Utterbeck was planning to kill them. All 4 men were sailors that spring aboard the USS Forrestal, an aircraft carrier based in Pensacola, Fla. On the weekend of the murder, Vollmer invited Hittson and Utterbeck to come with him to his parents' home in Georgia. Vollmer's parents were out of town. Hittson and Vollmer spent that Saturday night at area bars while Utterbeck stayed behind at Vollmer's parents' house. As they drove home from their night of drinking, Vollmer argued that shipmate Utterbeck was going to kill them both and they needed to "get him" first. Once at his parents' house, Vollmer put on a bullet-proof vest he had in his car and retrieved a handgun and a sawed-off shotgun for himself, according to court records. He gave Hittson an aluminum bat. Hittson hit Utterbeck in the head several times before dragging him to the kitchen where Vollmer waited with a .22-caliber handgun. Hittson shot Utterbeck in the head as he begged for his life. Hittson and Vollmer later dismembered Utterbeck???s body. They buried Utterbeck's torso in Houston County and took the remaining body parts to Pensacola. The 2 men tossed the body parts into several dumpsters after they had reported for duty the morning of April 6, 1992. Vollmer pleaded guilty to avoid trial and was sentenced to life with the possibility of parole. He has already been denied parole three times - in 1999, last year and today - and the Parole Board has said it will review his case again in 2024. According to Hittson, who confessed to the crime but demanded a trial, the murder was Vollmer's idea. Hittson is the 2nd person Georgia has executed in 2 weeks. Brandon Astor Jones, 72, died by lethal injection in the wee hours of Feb. 3 for a 1979 Cobb County murder. There are at least 3 men who have run out of regular appeals and could see execution dates set soon. Hittson becomes the 2nd condemned inmate to be put to death in Georgia this year and the 62nd overall since the state resumed capital punishment in 1983. Only Texas (534), Oklahoma (112), Virginia (110, Florida (92) and Missouri (86) have carried out more executions since the death penalty was re-legalized in the USA on July 2, 1976. Hittson becomes the 7th condemned inmate to be put to death this year in the USA and the 1429th overall since the nation resumed executions on January 17, 1977. (sources: Atlanta Journal-Constitution & Rick Halperin) ___ 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----GEORGIA
Feb. 1 GEORGIAimpending execution Parole Board Denies Clemency for Georgia Inmate The Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles has denied a clemency request from the state's oldest death row inmate. The board announced its decision Monday after holding a hearing on the request from Brandon Astor Jones. The 72-year-old is scheduled for execution at 7 p.m. Tuesday at the state prison in Jackson. The parole board is the only entity in Georgia with the authority to commute a death sentence. Jones was convicted in the 1979 killing of Cobb County convenience store manager Roger Tackett. A federal judge granted Jones a new sentencing hearing because jurors had improperly been allowed to bring a Bible into the deliberation room. He was resentenced to death in 1997. Another man convicted in the killing, Van Roosevelt Solomon, was executed in 1985. (source: Associated Press) ___ 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----GEORGIA
Feb. 1 GEORGIAimpending execution Parole Board weighing arguments for and against Jones’ execution The 5 members of the State Board of Pardons and Paroles are now weighing the arguments from family and advocates for condemned killer Brandon Astor Jones against the statements from prosecutors and the victim’s family in deciding if the 72-year-old man should live or die tomorrow night. Jones’ attorneys spent three hours and 15 minutes with the board this morning. Cobb County District Attorney Vic Reynolds, former District Attorney Tom Charron, who prosecuted Jones and his co-defendant in 1979, and murder victim Roger Tackett’s family met with the board for an hour in the afternoo. The members do not discuss with each other the case when deciding whether to commute before they take a vote. It takes three votes to either sustain the death sentence or to commute it to life without parole. A decision could come today. Parole Board weighing arguments for and against Jones’ execution photo Brandon Astor Jones “The death penalty is just punishment (in this case),” Reynolds said after the meeting. Reynolds disagreed with Jones’ lawyers claims that Jones should be spared because of his age — Jones’ 73rd birthday is Valentine’s Day — and his increasing dementia. Reynolds said he had read Jones’ writings, many posted on the internet, and found nothing to suggest he was failing mentally. Jones and Van Roosevelt Solomon were both convicted of murder and sentenced to die in separate trials just months after the Father’s Day murder almost 37 years ago. If Jones is executed as scheduled — 7 p.m. Tuesday — he will be the oldest man Georgia has ever executed. Tackett, a former teacher, had locked up the store that he managed at midnight. But he stayed to complete paperwork so he could be free to attend Mass with his 7-year-old daughter and his wife. Jones and Solomon were attempting to burglarize the store when they shot Tackett, 35. But a Cobb County police officer was dropping off a stranded motorist so she could use the Tenneco pay phone when he heard the shots. Within moments, officer Roy Kendall had the two in custody, and then he found Tackett on the storeroom floor, dead in a pool of his own blood. Solomon was electrocuted for Tackett’s murder on Feb. 2, 1985, but four years after that a federal judge ordered Jones’ a new trial because the jurors who had condemned him had, had a Bible in the room during deliberations. In 1997, another Cobb County jury again sentenced Jones to die. Jones lawyers and supporters declined to speak to reporters after the hearing as did Katie Tackett King, Tackett’s daughter, and Christine, Bixon, Tackett’s widow who married again several years after the murder. But Charron and Reynolds took questions. They said the only thing the board asked was which shot killed Tackett and how long did he linger after suffering the first of five wounds. Charron said Tackett was alive for some time because he aspirated blood. Charron also insisted that Tackett’s thumb was shot off almost tw0 hours before he died, a claim Jones’ lawyers have challenged in their filings. Jones lawyers say Tackett’s thumb was not shot off but was struck by a bullet that also struck him in the head. It was never determined who fired the fatal shot to the back of his head. Jones and Solomon both had gunpowder residue on their hands and they blamed each other. If Jones is executed, Charron said, “it will bring closure to this family and to me and to the justice system in Cobb County.” While the Parole Board was hearing the Jones’ case, the 11th U.S. Circuit was still considering Jones’ challenge to the state’s secrecy law that protects the identity of the pharmacist who will make the pentobarbital that will be used to put him to death. The appellate court ruled last week that Jones could not revisit his claims that he had bad legal representation but they said they would comment in a later opinion on the issue around the state’s secrecy law. (source: Atlanta Jounral-Constitution)___ 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----GEORGIA
Dec. 7 GEORGIAimpending execution State Lawyers Reject Arguments Raised by Death Row Inmate Lawyers for Georgia filed court papers Monday rejecting arguments by an inmate set to be executed this week that prosecutors had used false and misleading testimony to convict him. Brian Keith Terrell, 47, is scheduled to receive a lethal injection at 7 p.m. Tuesday at the state prison in Jackson. He was convicted of the June 1992 killing of John Watson, a friend of his mother. Terrell's lawyers argued in a court filing Friday that no physical evidence links Terrell to the slaying of the man from Covington, east of Atlanta. They also said Terrell's cousin, whose testimony prosecutors relied on, has since said he lied to save himself. Lawyers for the state countered Monday that the courts have already heard and rejected the issues raised by Terrell's lawyers. Terrell was on parole when he stole and forged checks belonging to Watson, who reported the theft but asked police not to pursue charges if Terrell returned most of the money. On the day Terrell was to return the money, he had his cousin drive him to Watson's house, where he shot the 70-year-old man several times and severely beat him, lawyers for the state have said. Terrell's cousin, Jermaine Johnson, was his co-defendant and had been in jail for more than a year with the threat of the death penalty hanging over him when he agreed to a deal with prosecutors to testify against Terrell. Johnson was allowed to plead guilty to a robbery charge, receiving a 5-year prison sentence. In a sworn statement submitted Friday by Terrell's lawyers, defense investigator Melanie Goodwill wrote that Johnson has told her and defense attorney Gerald King that he was 18 and facing the death penalty and was pressured by police and the prosecutor to testify against his cousin. He told Goodwill and King he would like to give a sworn statement telling the truth but is afraid he might be arrested and put in prison for perjury if he does, Goodwill wrote. Johnson has consistently testified under oath that Terrell admitted to killing Watson, state lawyers wrote. The hearsay statement given by the defense investigator does not meet the legal bar for new consideration, they wrote. Prosecutors also misleadingly presented the testimony of a neighbor of Watson's as having said she saw Terrell at the scene, but the woman said Terrell is not the one she saw and prosecutors never asked her to identify him in court, Terrell's lawyers wrote. State lawyers argued in their filing Monday that Terrell's attorneys already argued in previous court proceedings that prosecutors knowingly presented false testimony by Johnson and misleadingly presented the neighbor's testimony. Those arguments have already been reviewed and rejected by courts, state lawyers argued. In a separate state court filing, Terrell's lawyers have challenged the safety and effectiveness of the drug the state plans to use to execute Terrell. They withdrew that challenge Monday but filed a similar complaint in federal court and asked a judge to halt his execution. The Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles, the only state entity authorized to commute a death sentence, scheduled a clemency hearing for Terrell on Monday. It didn't immediately release a decision. (source: Associated Press) Condemned man drops state court appeal so can turn to federal courts Attorneys for condemned murderer Brian Keith Terrell today withdrew an appeal filed last week in Fulton Superior Court because, they said, the issue was better suited for federal court. While the court appeal is pending, Terrell's mother and family and friends turned to the state Board of Pardons and Paroles to ask for clemency. Terrell is scheduled to die on Tuesday at 7 p.m. He was originally slated for execution on March 10, one week after the scheduled execution of female death row inmate Kelly Gissendaner, but both lethal injections were called off because of a problem with the lethal injection drugs. In his appeals, Terrell's lawyer is again raising questions about the compounded lethal injection drug that Georgia uses in executions. And the petition to the Parole Board says witnesses who testified against him were wrong about what happened on June 22, 1992, when 70-year-old John Watson was shot and beaten to death moments after leaving his Newton County house for a dialysis appointment. In the clemency petition, Terrell's lawyer writes that Jermaine Johnson, Terrell's cousin and the prosecution???s key witness, lied when he testified and the neighbor who said she saw Terrell at Watson's house actually saw someone else. According to testimony, Terrell, just out of prison, stole 10 blank checks from Watson, his mother's friend. He wrote checks, some to himself, for a total of $8,700. When Watson discovered the theft, he told Terrell's mother he wouldn't press charge
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
Sept. 25 GEORGIAimpending female execution Georgia Set to Execute First Woman in 70 Years The state of Georgia is set to execute Kelly Gissendaner next week, on Tuesday September 29. In some ways this case is unusual, even exceptional; in other ways, it's business as usual - especially in a state like Georgia. What makes Kelly Gissendaner's case different? For one thing, she's a woman. Gissendaner is the only woman on Georgia's death row. If she's executed, she'll be the 1st woman put to death by the State of Georgia in 70 years. Another aspect of Kelly Gissendaner's case that is drawing attention is the life she's led since entering death row. She completed a theological degree program while living behind bars in Georgia through Atlanta's prestigious Emory University. She became a minister to other women living in prison with her, and has profoundly impacted the lives of many of them. You can watch the powerful testimony of some of those women here explain how Kelly changed their lives. What's somewhat less unusual - but still noteworthy - is the fact that 2 defendants accused of the same crime received starkly different sentences. One of them is now facing imminent execution while the other may one day walk free. Both Kelly Gissendaner and her co-defendant, Gregory Owen, were offered a sentence of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for 25 years if they pled guilty to the murder of Kelly's husband Douglas Gissendaner. Owen took the deal, but Kelly Gissendaner did not. She went to trial before a jury, which convicted her and sentenced her to death. The thing is, while Kelly Gissendaner has taken full responsibility for her role in the murder of her husband, it was not actually she who stabbed him to death. That was done by Gregory Owen, even if it was Kelly Gissendaner who had initiated the idea. It is not that Gregory Owen should have recieved the death penalty - no one should, regardless of the crime or their culpability, as scores of countries have recognized. But the situation brings to mind what Justice Stephen Breyer wrote in May in his dissent in the recent lethal injection opinion of the US Supreme Court, Glossip v. Gross. Suggesting that the time is now right for the Supreme Court to consider the constitutionality of the death penalty, Justice Breyer recalled how "after considering thousands of death penalty cases and last-minute petitions over the course of more than 20 years. I see discrepancies for which I can find no rational explanations. Why does one defendant who committed a single-victim murder receive the death penalty, while another defendant does not?" When prosecutors and state officials defend the death penalty, they often use the refrain that it's reserved for the "worst of the worst." That's supposed to mean that only the most serious crimes and the most culpable of offenders receive the death penalty and that the system is fair and reliable in this selection process. In reality, a host of other factors can determine who gets sentenced to death: race, class, geography, quality of legal representation, even the political aspirations of official decision-makers can play a role in who is sentenced to live or die in the United States. No one should have their human rights stripped away by the state. Cases like Kelly Gissendaner's illustrate why every person is more than the sum total of their worst actions. Although she participated in a violent crime with very serious consequences, she has gone on to improve the lives of many other women in prison. This has been recognized by many correctional staff who have come into contact with her over the years. Governments are expected to prioritize rehabilitation in their prisons. Here, a prisoner's rehabilitation is about to be met by her eradication. Surely Georgia can do better than that. (source: Amnesty International USA) ___ 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----GEORGIA, MISSOURI
Dec. 8 GEORGIAimpending execution//clemency denied Ga. panel denies clemency for death row inmate The State Board of Pardons and Paroles has denied clemency for a Georgia death row inmate who killed a sheriff's deputy. The board made its decision Monday following a clemency hearing for Robert Wayne Holsey, who is to be executed Tuesday. A jury in February 1997 convicted Holsey of killing Baldwin County sheriff's deputy Will Robinson. Holsey robbed a Milledgeville convenience store in December 1995. The clerk called police immediately afterward and described the robber and his car. Robinson pulled Holsey over minutes later. Authorities say Holsey fired at Robinson as the deputy approached the vehicle. Holsey's lawyers argued he shouldn't be executed because his trial lawyer failed to present evidence that could have spared him the death penalty. The board did not give a reason for denying clemency. (source: Associated Press) *** Robert Wayne Holsey denied clemency, scheduled to die Tuesday The State Board of Pardons and Paroles denied clemency for Robert Wayne Holsey on Monday. According to a news release, the Board thoroughly reviewed the case with Holsey's representatives. The Board voted to deny clemency. Holsey is scheduled to die by lethal injection on Tuesday at 7 p.m. at the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison in Jackson. Holsey was sentenced to death for the December 1995 murder of Baldwin County Deputy Sheriff Will Robinson. Holsey committed an armed robbery at a convenience store in Milledgeville. Deputy Robinson stopped Holsey's car a few minutes later and was killed. (source: NBC news) *** Robert Wayne Holsey Faces Lethal Injection in Georgia A parole panel in Georgia refused on Monday to grant clemency to a man who is scheduled to die by lethal injection on Tuesday evening, apparently unpersuaded by evidence that he was ineptly represented at trial by a drunken lawyer, had an exceptionally harsh childhood and has a severe intellectual deficit. But in what could be a legal decision with wider effects, lawyers for the man, Robert Wayne Holsey, were still waiting for the Georgia Supreme Court to respond to a last-minute appeal. They argued that the state's standard for determining intellectual disability in capital cases -- the country's most stringent -- runs afoul of a recent decision by the United States Supreme Court. Mr. Holsey was convicted of armed robbery and murder in 1997 and sentenced to death. He had robbed a convenience store and shot and killed a pursuing officer. His trial lawyer later admitted that at the time he was drinking up to a quart of vodka daily and facing theft charges that would land him in prison. He said he should not have been representing a client. On appeal, a Superior Court judge ruled that during the penalty phase of Mr. Holsey's trial, his lawyer had failed to effectively present evidence that might have forestalled a death penalty, including facts about Mr. Holsey's history and his intellectual deficit. That judge called for a new sentencing trial. But the Georgia Supreme Court reversed the decision, ruling that the jury had heard enough evidence about mitigating factors during the initial trial. At Monday's hearing before the Georgia Board of Pardons and Parole, Mr. Holsey's sister described the severe beatings he received as a child. Also testifying on his behalf were a prison pastor and a former prison guard who said Mr. Holsey was a reliable inmate who kept things calm, according to one of his lawyers, Brian Kammer of the Georgia Resource Center, a nonprofit legal defense group. That Mr. Holsey had received ineffective counsel seemed clear, said John H. Blume, a professor and director of the death penalty project at the Cornell Law School. "But the quality of representation in capital cases is often so low," he said, "that it's difficult to shock the courts." He and other legal experts said a more promising tack -- if not for Mr. Holsey, then for defendants in the future -- is the challenge to Georgia's standard of proof for intellectual disability. The state requires defendants to prove that they are intellectually disabled "beyond a reasonable doubt." For those near the borderline, often described as an I.Q. around 70, that standard is nearly impossible to meet. Many legal experts think it violates a Supreme Court ruling last May that said states cannot create "an unacceptable risk that persons with intellectual disability will be executed." In other states, either a "preponderance of evidence" or "clear and convincing evidence" is necessary to establish disability, said Eric M. Freedman, a death penalty expert at Hofstra University. Both are less stringent standards than the one used in Georgia. In a landmark decision in 2002, the United States Supreme Court barred the execution of mentally disabled p
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
June 16 GEORGIAimpending execution Wellons' attorneys ask Parole Board for mercy Attorneys and advocates for condemned killer Marcus Wellons met with the State Board of Pardons and Paroles for more than 3 hours Monday in an attempt to save him from lethal injection Tuesday evening. Later this afternoon, the Cobb County district attorney is among those who will meet with the board to make an argument for why Wellons should not be shown mercy. There is no estimate as to when the board will decide about the scheduled execution. Wellons was sentenced to die for the 1989 rape and strangulation of 15-year-old India Roberts, who lived with her mother in a Vinings townhouse near where Wellons lived. If he is executed, Wellons will be the 1st man Georgia has put to death using a massive dose of pentobarbitol that was compounded specifically for his lethal injection. This also will be the 1st time an execution is carried out since Georgia law made the source of lethal injection drugs a state secret. The execution is planned for 7 p.m. Tuesday at the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison in Jackson, where death row is located. In the meanwhile, Wellons' lawyers are to ask a federal judge to find it unconstitutional to keep secret the source of the compounded sedative - pentobarbital - that is to be used to put him to death. (source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution) ___ DeathPenalty mailing list DeathPenalty@lists.washlaw.edu http://lists.washlaw.edu/mailman/listinfo/deathpenalty Search the Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/deathpenalty@lists.washlaw.edu/ ~~~ A free service of WashLaw http://washlaw.edu (785)670.1088 ~~~
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
Oct. 7 GEORGIA: Supreme Court Rejects Warren Hill Petition With an assist from the U.S. Supreme Court, which today rejected Warren Hill's petition for relief, Georgia may get its way. Earlier this year three state doctors, who testified in 2000 that Mr. Hill did NOT have "mental retardation" (the legal term for intellectual disability), submitted sworn affidavits revising their diagnoses and agreeing that, yes, he DOES have "mental retardation." But federal courts ruled that they were procedurally barred from hearing this new information. Hill had petitioned to reverse that. With this rejection, Hill will not be in any immediate danger of execution, because of a lawsuit over Georgia's "Lethal Injection Secrecy Act," but it looks now as if the new information will never get a full hearing. The Supreme Court has missed an important opportunity to strengthen its ban on executions of the intellectually disabled, and has reinforced an impression that the Court is willing to let death penalty states undermine one of its most significant rulings. Other prisoners with strong claims of intellectual disability, such as Marvin Wilson in Texas who had an IQ of 61, have also gone to their execution without any sign of concern from the Supreme Court. The failure of the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene in this and other cases is emblematic of its broader failure to ensure fairness in the impossibly flawed U.S. death penalty. Procedural bars enacted by Congress and affirmed by the courts have made it so that even an execution that would clearly violate the Constitution somehow cannot be stopped. As 11th Circuit federal judge Rosemary Barkett wrote in her stinging dissent in this case [p. 40]: The idea that courts are not permitted to acknowledge that a mistake has been made which would bar an execution is quite incredible for a country that not only prides itself on having the quintessential system of justice but attempts to export it to the world as a model of fairness. The U.S. Supreme Court has now failed to act, demonstrating definitively that capital punishment is a runaway system that must be abolished. It is clear that to prevent these kinds of miscarriages of justice, ending the death penalty is the only solution. (source: Brian Evans, Amnesty International USA blog) Supreme Court won't stop execution for mental incapacity The Supreme Court on Monday refused to consider a Georgia prisoner's plea for mercy based on his claim of mental incapacity. The justices denied a petition to avoid the death penalty from attorneys for Warren Lee Hill, a twice-convicted murderer serving on Georgia's death row, even though medical experts have determined that he is intellectually disabled. The high court ruled a decade ago that people with mental retardation cannot be executed. A separate appeal of Hill's sentence remains pending in Georgia Supreme Court. The 52-year-old prisoner's case had galvanized the nation's disability community. The American Association of Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities filed a lengthy brief urging the court to block Hill's execution, citing experts' determinations that he is mildly retarded. Hill's petition had been pending before Associate Justice Clarence Thomas, who dissented in the court's 2002 Atkins v. Virginia ruling that executions of mentally retarded criminals constituted "cruel and unusual punishment" prohibited by the 8th Amendment. "We are gravely disappointed that the U.S. Supreme Court has failed to act to ensure the protection for persons with intellectual disability that was promised by the court's 2002 ruling in Atkins v. Virginia," said Brian Kammer, Hill's attorney. "It is tragic that our highest court has failed to enforce its own command that persons with mental retardation are categorically ineligible for the death penalty." There isn't much dispute about Hill's crimes. He killed his girlfriend in 1986 by shooting her 11 times. He was serving a life sentence when he killed a fellow inmate in 1990 by bludgeoning him with a nail-spiked board. He did not claim an intellectual disability at the time, and he was sentenced to death. The dispute - and the attention the case has received in the disability community - stems from Hill's mental capabilities. His lawyers say that his IQ is 70, just low enough to qualify as mildly mentally retarded, and that he functions at about a 6th-grade level. Georgia puts his IQ at 77 and argues he does not qualify for special consideration. When Hill first sought to sidestep the death penalty based on his mental capacity in 1996, the state cited his employment history and military service and produced 3 experts who said he was not mentally retarded. Georgia's 1st-in-the-nation law banning the execution of people with mental retardation included a provision that has made Hill's execution legal in the eyes of the state.
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
Sept. 15 GEORGIA: 1,500 potential jurors sent summons for Guy Heinze Jr. death penalty murder trial Jury summonses have gone out in 2 counties in preparation for qualifying jurors to hear evidence against Guy Heinze Jr., who will be tried for his life in the beating death of his father and 7 others more than 4 years ago. The crime drew national attention and news accounts of the crime have continued for years in Glynn County, Jacksonville and Savannah. With all that publicity, however, defense lawyer Newell Hamilton Jr. has not asked for the trial to be moved. Jury summonses have been mailed to 1,500 Glynn County residents with the initial 450 reporting Monday for the beginning of jury qualification. Others will be called later in a process that will take weeks. When summonses are sent back by the post office as undeliverable, Sheriff Neal Jump said he dispatches deputies to try to find the jurors. "Some of them are dead," Jump said. "Some have moved." If it becomes clear during jury questioning that an impartial jury can't be seated in Brunswick, Judge Stephen Scarlett has made arrangements to move the trial to Jeff Davis County Superior Court in Hazlehurst. Jeff Davis Clerk of Court Myra Murphy said she has sent out summonses for 150 jurors to report Sept. 30 followed by 150 more Oct. 7. Jeff Davis is a mostly rural county at the farthest point inland in the 5-county Brunswick Judicial Circuit. It was Heinze who early on a Saturday morning on Aug. 29, 2009, frantically called 911 with a cellphone at a mobile home park north of Brunswick. He told dispatchers someone had beaten his whole family to death. Officers arrived at New Hope Mobile Home Park to find nine people who were badly beaten. Heinze's father, 45-year-old Guy Heinze Sr. was dead as was his longtime friend Russell "Rusty" Toler Sr., 44, Toler's 2 daughters, Chrissy, 22, and Michelle, 15, his namesake son, Russell Toler Jr., his older sister, Brenda Gail Falagan, 49, and Chrissy's boyfriend, Joseph L. West Jr., 30. Police found Toler's other son, Michael, 19, alive but he died the next day. Chrissy's son, Byron Jimerson, survived and lives with his fraternal grandmother. Except for West, all of those killed are resting in the shaded corner of the cemetery at Young's Island Community Church in northern McIntosh County. Identical gleaming slabs of granite cover their graves and all but Michael have the same date of death, Aug. 29, 2009. Artificial flowers decorate some of the graves. Michael's stone has a model of a stock car parked on a corner and a votive candle sits partially burned. Michelle's monument says, "Little Angel," Chrissy's "Loving mother," and Russell Jr. is "Home Boy." Russell Sr. is described as "Loving Father," Michael is "Mike-Mike," and Falagan is "Beloved wife, mother and sister." Heinze Sr.'s inscription says, "Beloved father, brother, son," and a small flag flies at the corner. He served in the Army and on Sept. 5, 2009, the day of the graveside service, his younger son, Tyler, then 15, walked away from the scene carrying the flag that had covered his father's coffin. Tyler Heinze said his brother hadn't killed anyone, as did his grandfather Williams Heinze, who flew with his wife, Diane, from Seattle, where they now live. "We just had to say goodbye to Guy," William Heinze said. "I couldn't believe it happened. We're just devastated. We don't know how to act." He said later that he just didn't want to believe his son had died at the hands of his grandson. Tyler Heinze said his brother had done something the night of the slayings he shouldn't have done, but said it certainly wasn't murder. "He wasn't out killing my family," Tyler Heinze said. Actually, Guy Heinze Sr. was the only family member Tyler lost in that trailer, William Heinze said. Heinze Sr. and Toler Sr. told people they were half brothers, but they weren't related at all, William Heinze said. Police have said Guy Heinze Jr. acted alone on Aug. 29. The trial is set to begin Oct. 15, perhaps with Glynn County jurors. (source: Florida Times-Union) Group aims to change part of Ga. death penalty law An Atlanta-based advocacy group, All About Developmental Disabilities, is launching a campaign aimed at changing part of Georgia's death penalty law. The group says Georgia requires a person to prove intellectual disability beyond a reasonable doubt to avoid a death sentence. The group says Georgia is the only state that requires proof at that level. Most states that impose the death penalty have a lower threshold for defendants to prove they are mentally disabled, and some states don't set standards at all. All About Developmental Disabilities says it plans to distribute thousands of buttons, hold informal gatherings with legislators, and use social media in a campaign that will run through Oct. 15. The organization provides support servi
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
July 15 GEORGIAtemporary stay of execution Georgia inmate Warren Hill granted last-minute stay of executionIntellectually disabled prisoner, 52, given 11th-hour reprieve by judge, with state courts to reconsider his case on Thursday A judge in Fulton County, Georgia, has blocked the execution of Warren Hill, an intellectually disabled man who was set to be put to death by lethal injection despite a US Supreme Court ban on judicial killings of "mentally retarded" people. Hill, 52, has been granted a slim window in which to argue that his rights have been violated by a recent state law that imposes secrecy on the drugs that would be used to kill him. Under the new Lethal Injection Secrecy Law, the identity of the suppliers of the sedative pentobarbital that would be given to him in a lethal dose has been deemed a "state secret" in an effort to bypass a growing international boycott of the use of pharmaceuticals in death sentences. The Georgia state courts will now reconsider his case on Thursday. Should the judges decide that the execution can be put back on schedule, it is possible that by the end of this week Hill will be faced with his 4th brush with the death chamber in the space of a year. Brian Kammer, Hill's lawyer, said he was relieved the stay had been issued just 3 hours before the execution was due to have taken place. "At this time, there is far too much we do not know about how the state intends to proceed in this, the most extreme act a government can take against a citizen," he said. The decision to postpone the execution by just 3 days temporarily gets the US supreme court off the hook. Hill's legal team had appealed to the 9 justices to intervene on the grounds that the same court prohibited executions for "mentally retarded" prisoners - as called in US jurisprudence - in 2002. All 9 medical experts who have examined Hill over the years are now in agreement that he is intellectually disabled. They include 3 doctors whose expert opinion in 2000 that the condemned man was not "retarded" was seminal in having him sent to his death - they now say that their initial view was rushed and based on outdated medical understanding. The US supreme court will now be stood down in considering the Hill case while the lower state courts deliberate on the issue of the secrecy surrounding the lethal injection drugs. That flows from a legal challenge lodged last Friday that argues that the secrecy law leaves the prisoner "with no means for determing whether the drugs for his lethal injection are safe and will reliably perform their function, or if they are taineted, counterfeited, expired or compromised in some other way." The legal challenge goes on to argue in the legal challenge that the uncertainty surrounding the drugs to be used to put him to death also constitutes another violation of the 8th amendment of the US constitution, rendering his pending execution this evening a singularly controversial event even by the standards of the US death penalty. (source: The Guardian) Georgia execution halted amid lethal injection concerns A Fulton County judge has temporarily stayed a scheduled execution Monday after the inmate's attorneys raised questions about a law prohibiting the release of information involving Georgia's execution drug supply. This isn't the first time Warren Lee Hill's execution has been halted because of a challenge to the state's execution method. Last July, his execution was put on hold pending a challenge to the state's plan to change from a 3-drug process to a single dose of pentobarbital. The state Supreme Court later cleared the way for the execution, although it was halted anew so courts could consider claims that Hill is mentally disabled. That stay was lifted in April and the state rescheduled the execution for Monday. Hill was condemned for the 1990 killing of a fellow inmate. (source: Associated Press) Warren Lee Hill execution halted amid lethal injection concerns A judge temporarily stays planned Warren Lee Hill execution amid concerns about lethal injection issues. Georgia inmate Warren Lee Hill was scheduled to die by lethal injection Monday night. His attorneys were arguing he's mentally disabled and should not be executed. The state argues Hill has failed to prove he's mentally disabled. Hill has spent the last 21 years on death row for killing a fellow inmate. He was originally put in prison for murdering his girlfriend Myra Sylvia Wright, according to police reports. A prayer vigil will take place Monday at 6 p.m. at the Georgia State Capitol. Below is a statement from Brian Kammer, attorney for Warren Hill: "We are relieved that the Superior Court of Fulton County has stayed the execution of Warren Hill, a man with mental retardation who has an undisputed I.Q. of 70. Today, the Court found that more time is needed t
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
Feb. 19 GEORGIAstay of impending execution Hill granted stays of execution Condemned killer Warren Hill has been granted stays of execution by the federal appeals court in Atlanta and the Georgia Court of Appeals, his lawyer said Tuesday. Hill was scheduled to be put to death at 7 p.m. He had already taken a sedative to prepare for his execution. The decision to halt his execution were announced with less than an hour to spare. The state Court of Appeals granted a stay on a challenge to the state's lethal-injection procedure. The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals granted the stay on claims by Hill he is mentally disabled and thus ineligible for execution, Brian Kammer, Hill's lawyer, said. The appeals courts' stays were issued as the U.S. Supreme Court had denied issuing a stay of Hill's appeal of a ruling by the Georgia Supreme Court. It remained unclear whether the stays could be lifted tonight or would put a halt to Hill's execution for an extended period of time. Hill was sentenced to die for the August 1990 murder of John Handspike, an inmate serving life in the same prison where Hill was incarcerated for murdering his 18-year-old girlfriend by shooting her 11 times 4 years earlier. Witnesses said Handspike had made threatening gestures of a sexual nature at Hill and a few days later Hill attacked Handspike while he was asleep. On Tuesday, former President Jimmy Carter and his wife, Rosalynn, issued a statement saying they had renewed their requests to the parole board to commute Hill's death sentence. Last July, the Carters had written the board saying its members "should commute Warren Hill's death sentence in light of the decisive assessment of psychiatric experts that Hill clearly meets the standard for 'mental retardation' under Georgia law." Also Tuesday, Laurel Bellows, president of American Bar Association, called on the parole board or the courts to stop Hill's execution. "Medical experts who have examined Hill have confirmed he is mentally retarded," she said in a statement. "The 3 state doctors who testified in 2000 at Mr. Hill's evidentiary hearing have now revised their diagnoses and agree with 6 other doctors that Mr. Hill is mentally retarded." During a rally outside the state Capitol, disability rights advocates called on state lawmakers to change Georgia's law to determine how courts decide whether a capital defendant is mentally retarded - and thus ineligible to be executed. Georgia is the only state in the nation to require capital defendants to prove their mental retardation beyond a reasonable doubt - the most difficult burden of proof to clear. 2 state court judges previously found Hill to be mentally retarded, but only by a preponderance of the evidence, not the strict standard required under Georgia law. "It's time to take another look at the law," Rita Young, director of public policy for All About Developmental Disabilities, said Tuesday at a rally outside the state Capitol. She urged the Legislature to adopt "a more realistic standard" that requires capital inmates prove their mental retardation by a preponderance of the evidence - or more likely than not. This is the same requirement used by more than 20 other states with the death penalty. Eric Jacobson, executive director of the Georgia Council on Developmental Disabilities, said Hill's intellectual disabilities could be traced back to elementary school when teachers recognized his deficits. "Nobody disputes anymore than Warren Hill has an intellectual disability," Jacobson said. "We need to change the law so this never happens again." Hill declined to request a special last meal, the state Department of Corrections said. (source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution) ___ DeathPenalty mailing list DeathPenalty@lists.washlaw.edu http://lists.washlaw.edu/mailman/listinfo/deathpenalty Search the Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/deathpenalty@lists.washlaw.edu/ ~~~ A free service of WashLaw http://washlaw.edu (785)670.1088 ~~~
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
Feb. 19 GEORGIAimpending execution Hill denied clemency The State Board of Pardons and Paroles has denied clemency to Warren Hill, rejecting pleas that he be spared execution on claims he is mentally retarded. The parole board's decision was issued shortly after the state Supreme Court voted 5-2 to deny Hill a stay of execution. Hill is scheduled to be executed tonight at 7 p.m. in Jackson. His lawyers say Hill should not be put to death by lethal injection because Hill is intellectually disabled. Chief Justice Carol Hunstein and Justice Robert Benham dissented from the state Supreme Court's decision to deny Hill a stay of execution. "We are profoundly disappointed that Georgia's Supreme Court has refused to stop tonight's execution of Warren Hill, a person with mental retardation, which we believe is at odds with the U.S. Supreme Court's protection of the mentally retarded," Brian Kammer, 1 of Hill's attorneys, said. Hill also is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to stay his execution and has asked the federal appeals court in Atlanta for permission to file federal claims to try and stop his execution. Hill was sentenced to die for the August 1990 murder of John Handspike, an inmate serving life in the same prison where Hill was incarcerated for murdering his 18-year-old girlfriend by shooting her 11 times 4 years earlier. Witnesses said Handspike had made threatening gestures of a sexual nature at Hill and a few days later Hill attacked Handspike while he was asleep. (source: Atlanta Journal-Constitutional) ** Heath Jackson homicide: Pre-trial hearings in death-penalty case go 3 more days Another 3-day round of pre-trial hearings on more than 100 defense motions begins Wednesday in Columbus' death-penalty murder case against Ricardo Strozier, the alleged burglar accused of killing disc jockey David Heath Jackson on Sept. 7, 2010. The proceedings this week before Muscogee Superior Court Judge Gil McBride continue motion hearings that began Jan. 28-30. This week's hearings are set for Wednesday through Friday. Investigators said Strozier broke in through the west-side basement door of Jackson's 1667 Carter Ave. home and was inside when Jackson arrived around 12:45 p.m. after working the 6 a.m. to 10 a.m. on-air stint at the contemporary Christian station The Truth. Coworkers said he typically put in 2 hours of production time before heading home. Detectives said Jackson surprised Strozier, who shot Jackson twice from behind before the 25-year-old ran out and died in his driveway. The charges Strozier's indictment charges him with malice murder, alleging he intentionally shot Jackson "with malice aforethought," felony murder for committing the felony of burglary during the homicide, burglary for breaking in, armed robbery for taking Jackson's wallet at gunpoint, aggravated battery for "disfiguring" Jackson by shooting him, and possessing a firearm during the commission of a felony, for having a gun during a burglary. Strozier also is charged with burglary, armed robbery and using a firearm to commit a felony for breaking into a home in the 4200 block of 15th Avenue on Aug. 6, 2010, where he robbed the resident who arrived home while Strozier was inside, investigators said. Strozier faces a 3rd count of burglary for an Aug. 11, 2010, break-in on Virginia Street, where he stole the .38-caliber handgun with which he later shot Jackson, police said. Strozier's case is the 1st in which District Attorney Julia Slater has elected to seek the death penalty, though she continues to pursue capital punishment in convictions still on appeal from cases she inherited when she took office in 2009. Pre-trial publicity Strozier's attorney, H. Burton Baker of the Georgia capital defender's office in Tifton, argues excessive courtroom security casts his client as dangerous, prejudicing potential jurors who may see Strozier on TV or in newspaper photos wearing leg chains and guarded by burly sheriff's deputies. McBride and Baker have discussed setting rules by which the media may photograph the defendant.McBride on Jan. 30 rejected 1 of Baker's early motions: The defense sought to have Strozier's indictment quashed on the argument the grand jury was not representative of the county population. The jury commission that formed it was guided by demographics reported in the 2000 and not the 2010 census.McBride ruled the variances were not wide enough to warrant dismissing Strozier's indictment. Baker may appeal McBride's rulings to the Georgia Supreme Court, which would have to rule on them before a trial date could be set.Other motions Baker's motions include: - Declaring unconstitutional Georgia laws against murder, armed robbery and burglary. - Declaring Georgia's lethal injection method of execution unconstitutional. - Prohibiting Strozier's being shackled or wearing a prison un
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
Feb. 19 GEORGIAimpending execution Georgia death row inmate set to be executed A lawyer for a Georgia death row inmate set for execution has asked the Georgia Supreme Court to stay his execution. Warren Lee Hill's is set to die by lethal injection at 7 p.m. Tuesday. Hill was serving a life sentence when he was convicted in the 1990 death of a fellow inmate. His lawyers argue Hill is mentally disabled and shouldn't be executed. The state has argued the defense failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Hill is mentally disabled. Hill has a petition for a stay of execution pending before the U.S. Supreme Court. His lawyer has also asked the state Board of Pardons and Paroles to stay his execution and commute his sentence. A state court judge on Monday declined to reconsider Hill's case. (source: Associated Press) * 10 reasons why Georgia should not execute Warren Hill---Since the Guardian first listed in July the reasons why Hill - who has been classified as mentally disabled - should not be executed, the case for sparing him has grown even stronger Warren Hill, 53, a death-row prisoner in Georgia, has just hours to live pending a last-minute stay of execution. Last July he came within 90 minutes of being put to death for killing a fellow prisoner, Joseph Handspike, in 1990. He is scheduled to be given a lethal dose of pentobarbital at 7pm Tuesday evening. Since the Guardian first listed 10 reasons why Hill should not be executed, last July, the argument to spare him has grown even stronger. Here is an updated list that sets out the arguments against his execution. 1. 9 doctors have now given expert medical opinion that Warren Hill is "mentally retarded" - the official terminology still widely used in the US in legal parlance. More acceptably expressed, that means that he is intellectually disabled. 2. Of those nine, three forensic psychiatrists gave evidence 12 years ago at a crucial stage in Hill's case, finding that he did not meet the designation of "mental retardation". Their testimony was central to the prosecution case that Hill was fully mentally capable and should be put to death for his crimes. But last week the three specialists changed their opinion and said that they made a mistake. The original evaluation was so rushed, they said, that they came to the wrong conclusion. They now agree with all other medical specialists that Hill is intellectually disabled. 3. The now-complete uniformity of medical opinion that Hill does display intellectual disabilities removes the core argument for executing Hill, as his lawyer, Brian Kammer, has pointed out in emergency appeals to the Georgia appeals court and the US supreme court that are currently before the judges in an eleventh-hour petition for a stay of execution. 4. The US supreme court in 2002 banned executions for prisoners who are "mentally retarded" - in other words, those with learning difficulties. The justices ruled that such executions violated the eighth amendment of the US constitution that prohibits cruel and unusual punishment. 5. Just months after the supreme court ban was imposed, a Georgia court found that Hill was "mentally retarded" by a "preponderance of the evidence". In plain English, he was likely to be "mentally retarded" and fall into the very category of prisoner who the supreme court had just declared must not be executed. 6. Paradoxically, in 1988 Georgia became the first state in America to ban the execution of mentally disabled prisoners. It made the move in response to huge public outcry following its judicial killing of an intellectually disabled prisoner, Jerome Bowden. Days before he was put to death Bowden was tested and found to have the mental capacity of a 12-year-old. History now appears to be repeating itself. 7. When Georgia banned executions of the "mentally retarded", it applied a standard to such cases that meant that death row prisoners had to prove "beyond a reasonable doubt" that they had learning difficulties. Experts in intellectual impairment say that is virtually impossible to do. No other state in the US applies such a harsh standard. Most states use the "preponderance of evidence" proof that Hill was found to meet. 8. Hill shows many of the classic signs of intellectual disability. He has a family history of learning difficulties and borderline intellectual functioning, though the jury at his 1991 trial heard little about that. In terms of IQ, he tests 70 - a sub-average level of functioning shared by only 3% of the general population. Such challenges render him subject to impulsive behaviour and poor decision-making at times of stress and threat. 9. The family of his victim, Joseph Handspike, is opposed to Hill being executed. Handspike's nephew Richard Handspike has written on behalf of the family that: "I and my family feel strongly that persons with any kind of signifi
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
Feb. 17 GEORGIAimpending execution Last ditch legal battle to save 'mentally disabled' death row inmate who is set to be executed on TuesdayHill, 53, is scheduled to be executed on Tuesday unless his lawyers can prove he is 'mentally disabled' within a reasonable doubt A fierce legal battle rages on over condemned prisoner Warren Lee Hill, who is scheduled to be executed next Tuesday. In a last ditch effort to stay his execution, lawyers are trying to prove that Hill, 53, is mentally disabled and cannot be given the death penalty. 3 doctors who originally testified for the state of Georgia against Hill now claim that Hill is mentally disabled, and thus, should not be put to death. Hill's lawyers have continually argued that their client has had mental issues for the duration of his incarceration, and are doing everything in their power to spare his life. Hill is scheduled to die in an Atlanta prison via lethal injection at 7pm ET on Tuesday night for brutally attacking his then-cellmate, Joseph Handspike, in 1990. Authorities said that Hill, who was already serving a life sentence for the murder of his girlfriend, Maya Wright 4 years earlier, attacked Handspike again and again with a nail embedded in a piece of plank. Handspike died of his injuries. However, the Handspike family has publically declared that they do not agree with Hill's execution. Hill's upcoming lethal injection goes directly against the 2002 case, Atkins v. Virginia, which ruled that Daryl Atkins was 'mentally retarded' and was not of sound mind, and therefore could not be sentenced to death. Dr Thomas Sachy wrote in an affidavit last week: 'Having reviewed my earlier evaluation results and the far more extensive materials from the record of this case, I believe that my judgement that Mr Hill did not meet the criteria for mild mental retardation was in error.' The other doctors concede and claimed their evaluations of Hill in 2000 were 'rush jobs,' according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The state has said that Hill's lawyers have failed to prove 'beyond a reasonable doubt' that the man is mentally disabled. Lauren Kane, a spokesperson for the state Attorney General's Office, declined comment, saying that her office will respond when Hill's attorneys file new motions. Hill was originally scheduled to be executed in June, but the Supreme Court allowed him a stay of execution while his attorneys pursued a challenge based on the state's changing of execution method. Hill is among 3 Georgia inmates on death row fighting for a court order that would prevent the state from using a drug to execute them without a doctor's prescription first. Hill, along with Andrew Allen Cook and Marcus Wellons, argue that the Georgia Department of Corrections' use of the drug without a doctor's prescription violates the federal Controlled Substances Act. Even if the court finds him mentally disabled, Hill would still spend the rest of his life in prison, the Journal-Constitution says. The case has stirred a national outcry of those believing Hill to be mentally unwell. If he is executed, it will be the 1st carried-out execution in the state since the 2011 death of Troy Davis. At the time, Davis' conviction and condemnation drew fury, as many believed that Davis was the victim of mistaken identity in the murder of Burger King guard Mark MacPhail in 1989. Prosecutors and MacPhail's family said they were certain Davis was guilty and that justice was served. Prison officials also provided an audio recording and transcript of his last words, which he used to again proclaim his innocence and urge his supporters to "continue to fight this fight." Davis was notified of the execution date on Sept. 7, and a day later he was asked to make a last meal request. He scrawled a response in big letters: "None. Will Be Fasting!" According to figures collected by Amnesty International, the U.S. was the only country within the G8 to carry out executions in 2011. (source: Daily Mail) ___ DeathPenalty mailing list DeathPenalty@lists.washlaw.edu http://lists.washlaw.edu/mailman/listinfo/deathpenalty Search the Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/deathpenalty@lists.washlaw.edu/ ~~~ A free service of WashLaw http://washlaw.edu (785)670.1088 ~~~
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
Aug. 27 GEORGIA: Prosecutor: Ga. murder case uncovers terror plot 4 Army soldiers based in southeast Georgia killed a former comrade and his girlfriend to protect an anarchist militia group they formed that stockpiled assault weapons and plotted a range of anti-government attacks, prosecutors told a judge Monday. Prosecutors in rural Long County, near the sprawling Army post Fort Stewart, said the militia group composed of active duty and former U.S. military members spent at least $87,000 buying guns and bomb components and was serious enough to kill 2 people -- former soldier Michael Roark and his 17-year-old girlfriend, Tiffany York -- by shooting them in the woods last December in order to keep its plans secret. "This domestic terrorist organization did not simply plan and talk," prosecutor Isabel Pauley told a Superior Court judge. "Prior to the murders in this case, the group took action. Evidence shows the group possessed the knowledge, means and motive to carry out their plans." One of the Fort Stewart soldiers charged in the case, Army Pfc. Michael Burnett, also gave testimony that backed up many of the assertions made by prosecutors. The 26-year-old soldier pleaded guilty Monday to manslaughter, illegal gang activity and other charges. He made a deal to cooperate with prosecutors in their case against the 3 other soldiers. Prosecutors said the group called itself F.E.A.R., short for Forever Enduring Always Ready. Pauley said authorities don't know how many members the militia had. Burnett, 26, said he knew the group's leaders from serving with them at Fort Stewart. He agreed to testify against fellow soldiers Pvt. Isaac Aguigui, identified by prosecutors as the militia's founder and leader, Sgt. Anthony Peden and Pvt. Christopher Salmon. All are charged by state authorities with malice murder, felony murder, criminal gang activity, aggravated assault and using a firearm while committing a felony. A hearing for the three soldiers was scheduled Thursday. Prosecutors say Roark, 19, served with the four defendants in the 4th Brigade Combat Team of the Army's 3rd Infantry Division and became involved with the militia. Pauley said the group believed it had been betrayed by Roark, who left the Army 2 days before he was killed, and decided the ex-soldier and his girlfriend needed to be silenced. Burnett testified that on the night of Dec. 4, he and the three other soldiers lured Roark and York to some woods a short distance from the Army post under the guise that they were going target shooting. He said Peden shot Roark's girlfriend in the head while she was trying to get out of her car. Salmon, he said, made Roark get on his knees and shot him twice in the head. Burnett said Aguigui ordered the killings. "A loose end is the way Isaac put it," Burnett said. Aguigui's attorney, Daveniya Fisher, did not immediately return a phone call from The Associated Press. Attorneys for Peden and Salmon both declined to comment Monday. Also charged in the killings is Salmon's wife, Heather Salmon. Her attorney, Charles Nester, did not immediately return a call seeking comment. Pauley said Aguigui funded the militia using $500,000 in insurance and benefit payments from the death of his pregnant wife a year ago. Aguigui was not charged in his wife's death, but Pauley told the judge her death was "highly suspicious." She said Aguigui used the money to buy $87,000 worth of semiautomatic assault rifles, other guns and bomb components that were recovered from the accused soldiers' homes and from a storage locker. He also used the insurance payments to buy land for his militia group in Washington state, Pauley said. In a videotaped interview with military investigators, Pauley said, Aguigui called himself "the nicest cold-blooded murderer you will ever meet." He used the Army to recruit militia members, who wore distinctive tattoos that resemble an anarchy symbol, she said. Prosecutors say they have no idea how many members belong to the group. "All members of the group were on active-duty or were former members of the military," Pauley said. "He targeted soldiers who were in trouble or disillusioned." The prosecutor said the militia group had big plans. It plotted to take over Fort Stewart by seizing its ammunition control point and talked of bombing the Forsyth Park fountain in nearby Savannah, she said. In Washington state, she added, the group plotted to bomb a dam and poison the state's apple crop. Ultimately, prosecutors said, the militia's goal was to overthrow the government and assassinate the president. The Army brought charges against the 4 accused soldiers in connection with the slayings of Roark and York in March, but has yet to act on them. Fort Stewart spokesman Kevin Larson said he could not comment immediately on the militia accusations that emerged in civilian court Monday. District Attorney Tom Durden said h
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
April 21 GEORGIA: Georgia pardons board spares condemned killer Daniel Greene The state Board of Pardons and Paroles on Friday spared the life of a Taylor County murderer who had been condemned to die this week. 3 days after staying the execution of Daniel Greene, the 5-member panel voted to commute his death sentence to life without parole, an unusual move that elicited mixed reactions from the tight-knit community. "We want to thank the board so much for their courage in this case," one of Greene's elated attorneys, Lindsay N. Bennett, said in a phone interview from Atlanta. Greene, who had spent 2 decades on Georgia's death row and already ordered his last meal, received the news Friday and appeared to be in shock, Bennett said. Greene, 42, had been sentenced to death for the 1991 fatal stabbing of Bernard Walker, a former schoolmate of Greene's who had walked in on him robbing a convenience store clerk in Reynolds, Ga. Greene, who according to his attorneys was under the influence of drugs during the crime, stabbed four other people the same night in a spree across 3 counties. Bob Bacle, the former Reynolds police chief who addressed the paroles board on behalf of the victims and planned to attend the execution, condemned the decision, saying justice had been subverted. "What good was it to have a trial 21 years ago and then 21 years later 5 folks on the board of pardons can second-guess a jury?" Bacle said. "That's what we've got a system of justice for. What does this tell criminals out there coming along now?" Former Taylor County Sheriff Nick Giles offered a more neutral reaction. "I don't have a problem with it," said Giles, who had advocated capital punishment in the case when Greene was arrested. "The parole board, they know more about what the past 21 years has been like than I do." The board's decision -- which marked just the fourth time it's granted clemency since 2002 -- came days after Greene's supporters made an impassioned plea on his behalf, describing his crimes as a surprising aberration for an otherwise upstanding citizen. Greene had been a model inmate on death row, they said, receiving a reprimand only once -- for having too many stamps. While the Taylor County community was scarred by the crimes, many had greeted the specter of execution with ambivalence, including some of Walker's family members. A petition with more than 500 signatures urging clemency was presented to the board, and a number of well-respected members of the community had spoken on Greene's behalf. "One of the things that struck all of us about this case was the outpouring of support from the community," Bennett said. "It was a real testament to the community and to Daniel Greene's life before this tragedy." One of Greene's more outspoken supporters had been Patty James Bentley, the chairwoman of the Taylor County Commission who is campaigning for a seat in the state House of Representatives. She wrote an emotional letter to the board asking it to spare Greene. "I really just praise God," she said, "and I pray that Bernard's family will find some peace." Walker's family couldn't be reached for comment. A spokesman for Georgia Attorney General Sam Olens declined to comment. Mark Shelnutt, a Columbus attorney who helped prosecute Greene, told the paroles board on Tuesday that a key factor in seeking capital punishment against Greene had been that life without parole was not an option for Georgia juries at the time. "Obviously, life without parole is no slap on the hand," Shelnutt said. "He's never going to get out of jail." (source: Columbus Ledger-Enquirer) ___ DeathPenalty mailing list DeathPenalty@lists.washlaw.edu http://lists.washlaw.edu/mailman/listinfo/deathpenalty Search the Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/deathpenalty@lists.washlaw.edu/ ~~~ A free service of WashLaw http://washlaw.edu (785)670.1088 ~~~
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
Dec. 13 GEORGIA: Nichols sentence may lead to death penalty changes A jury's inability to condemn courthouse gunman Brian Nichols to death has re-energized efforts by Georgia lawmakers to allow a judge to consider capital punishment even if there's no unanimous verdict, as a growing chorus of officials says it's time to give the policy another look. Nichols was sentenced Saturday to life in prison without parole after a jury failed to deliver a unanimous death sentence for the murders of 4 people. Minutes after the sentencing, Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard became among the first to call for a revived effort to tweak the death penalty rules. "There should be some consideration of non-unanimous verdicts so that the minority of people that don't consider death won't get a chance to decide the outcome," he said at an emotional post-trial news conference. He and other policymakers say the Nichols case could become a rallying cry for legislation aimed at preventing a "rogue" death penalty opponent on a jury from sabotaging a capital case. "Without question you'll see that bill come back," said state Rep. David Ralston, who chairs a key House judiciary committee. "People are very concerned whether jurors are being truthful about their feelings about the death penalty, and whether they are really committed to following the law." Twice in the last 2 years, the House passed proposals to allow judges to impose a death sentence if 1 or 2 jurors vote against it. Both times the plan was defeated in the Senate, where it faced fierce opposition from GOP attorneys who warned it would put life-or-death decisions in the hands of a judge instead of a jury. Yet some opponents are now saying changes to the death penalty rules are worth another look. "This case has rocked Georgia's criminal justice system. When you have a case where this much money is spent, this much time, it does beg the question if the system is operating properly," said state Sen. Preston Smith, a Rome Republican who voted against the bill in March. "I think we're going to take a hard look at it." Smith, who chairs the Senate's judiciary committee, added: "This case has been a poster child for why there needs to be reform in the system." Georgia law has long required that death sentences can only be returned by unanimous jury verdicts. If even 1 of the 12 jurors will not support a sentence of death, a judge must decide whether to sentence a defendant to life in prison, with or without the possibility of parole. Superior Court Judge James Bodiford was forced to make that choice Saturday after the Nichols jury deadlocked at 9-3, with 9 in favor of the death penalty and the other 3 in favor of life without parole. After the sentencing, the prosecutor said jurors had told him the 3 holdouts refused to deliberate and were adamantly against the death penalty. "They came in with the belief the death penalty would never be just," said Howard, who supports changing the law to allow the death penalty if up to three jurors vote against it. Critics worry that changing the rules would lead to longer, costlier appeals and upend centuries of established legal tradition. "We can't change the rules every time something happened that people didn't like," said Stephen Bright, a prominent death penalty opponent who heads the Atlanta-based Southern Center for Human Rights. "If you have to convince everyone, the dynamic is that everybody has to listen to everybody. If you have less than unanimous juries, then you just take a vote," he said. "One of the beauties of the system is it requires everybody to respond." State Rep. Barry Fleming, a Harlem Republican who sponsored the 2 failed efforts to change the unanimity requirement, said the Nichols case shows that state laws must keep up with a changing society. "We're in a day and age when people get on a jury and they'll say they will vote for a death penalty, but simply won't do it. That has to be accounted for," he said. "To give the judge the option in these terrible cases is the right thing to do. There ought to be a safety valve." On the Net: http://www.legis.state.ga.us (source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution)
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
Dec. 10 GEORGIA: Sentencing hearing starts in illegal immigrants' slayings A sentencing hearing for one of the people charged in the 2005 killings of 6 Mexican immigrants in brutal attacks has begun and is expected to last at least a week. Jamie Underwood pleaded guilty in September to all 4 indictments against him. Tift County Superior Court Judge Gary McCorvey sentenced him at the time to 120 years in prison on 3 of the 4 indictments. The sentencing on the 4th indictment, which includes murder charges, is being held separately because the prosecution is seeking the death penalty. The brutality of the September 2005 attacks in which the victims were beaten, shot and, in at least 1 case, raped shocked the thousands of immigrants who have come to South Georgia for agricultural and manufacturing jobs. Tift County District Attorney Paul Bowden said in his opening statement Monday that he is seeking the death penalty because of aggravating circumstances surrounding the killings, which he says were carried out in the course of attempted robberies and burglaries. Defense attorney Dennis Francis opted to wait until the prosecution has rested before giving his opening statement. Testimony continued Tuesday. Tony Clark, who was a Georgia Bureau of Investigation medical examiner at the time of the attacks, answered questions about the victims injuries with the aid of graphic photos from the autopsies. He said most of the injuries were consistent with those inflicted by a baseball bat or hammer. One of the victims was shot to death, and the others died from blunt force trauma, according to Clarks autopsy reports. The prosecution also called as witnesses the GBI specialists who processed the crime scenes. They used photos, diagrams and evidence from the scenes to describe what they found on Sept. 30, 2005. Underwood sat between two of his attorneys throughout proceedings. On Monday, he occasionally talked to them but never registered any reaction as the sometimes gruesome photos were shown. The prosecution is also seeking the death penalty against co-defendant Stacey Bernard Sims. The men face multiple charges, including murder, felony murder, aggravated assault, armed robbery, burglary and possession of a firearm during the commission of a crime in the deaths of 6 men and the injury of at least 6 others in the attacks in and around Tifton, a rural city about 170 miles south of Atlanta. 2 women, Jennifer Lafay Wilson and Emma Jean Powell, were indicted on the same charges, but the prosecution isn't seeking the death penalty against them. Bowden has said in the past that that is because the women only drove the men from place to place. Bowden said he expects Underwoods sentencing hearing to last into next week. The other 3 defendants have not entered pleas and their trial dates have not been set. (source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution)
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
Dec. 7 GEORGIA: Condemned Ga. man seeks another day in court Troy Davis has already been spared from execution 3 times, and this week his lawyers hope to push his extraordinary case one more step toward his exoneration when they ask a federal panel to let them file another appeal of his death sentence. As they have argued before, Davis' lawyers will tell the 3-judge panel of the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday that their client was the victim of mistaken identity, and note that 7 of 9 key witnesses that testified against him in the 1991 trial have recanted their statements. But the hearing likely won't focus entirely on whether Davis was rightly convicted of the 1989 murder of Savannah Police Officer Mark MacPhail. Instead it could turn on whether federal law allows the 40-year-old's attorneys to call for a new trial at all. Davis' lawyers have struggled to convince a judge at any level to grant him another hearing on claims that he is innocent, partly because much of the evidence they say could lead to his exoneration was revealed after Davis was convicted. The hearing offers them a ripe opportunity to argue that federal laws allow them to pursue such a challenge at this late stage in the process. In their briefs, Davis' attorneys argue that it is "constitutionally intolerable" to execute Davis without first hearing his innocence claims. They say they could only press the claim that Davis is innocent after they had attempted a range of other appeals. "It's one of the arguments that can really only be brought after you've exhausted other state avenues of relief," said Jason Ewart, a Davis attorney. "For this claim to be cognizable, you have to show a convincing case of innocence. But one of the issues is whether or not we can bring this case. It's rather nebulous." Attorneys representing the state say this type of appeal, called a stand-alone innocence claim, could have been made long before Davis' team filed a motion for a new trial in Savannah's Chatham County last year. And they say the courts reviewing the case have already ruled that Davis won't meet high legal standards for a new trial. The hearing will be the latest flashpoint in a case that has attracted widespread attention, sparked dozens of international protests and won Davis the support of former President Jimmy Carter and leading law-and-order advocates who say Davis deserves another day in court. "Davis is not asking the court to set him free," former FBI Director William S. Sessions wrote in a recent column. "He is asking for the court's permission to give his innocence claims the full hearing they deserve. Our justice system should punish the guilty, free the innocent and have the wisdom to know the difference." MacPhail was working off-duty as a security guard at a bus station when he rushed to help a homeless man who had been pistol-whipped at a nearby parking lot. The 27-year-old was shot twice when he approached Davis and 2 other men. Witnesses identified Davis as the shooter in the 1991 trial, and prosecutors said he wore a "smirk" as he fired the gun. But Davis' lawyers have since argued that new evidence should exonerate their client. And they say three others who did not testify have said another man who testified against Davis at his trial confessed to the killing. Prosecutors have long argued the case is closed. Savannah District Attorney Spencer Lawton also said he doubts the new testimony meets the legal standards for a new trial, and said the witness recantations invites "a suggestion of manipulation, making it very difficult to believe." Davis execution was scheduled for July 2007, but it was postponed by Georgia's pardons board less than 24 hours before it was to be carried out. A divided Georgia Supreme Court twice rejected Davis' request for a new trial, and the pardons board turned down another bid for clemency after considering the case again. As corrections officers prepared for Davis' scheduled Sept. 23 execution, the Supreme Court issued a stay to consider whether to grant him another hearing. A few weeks later, though, the court cleared the way for the execution when it decided against hearing the case. With legal options dwindling just three days before a 3rd scheduled execution date, Davis' attorneys convinced the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta to stay the execution again. Tuesday's hearing gives them one more chance to press their appeal. As the case approaches the latest legal hurdle, the Davis and MacPhail families are in limbo. Davis, who is being held in state prison, longs for another chance to prove he's innocent, said his sister Martina Correia. "He's gone through a lot in the last year. Having 3 execution dates in a year is more than most people could bear," she said. "But he's staying faithful, and he's praying that the courts could give him some relief, that they will allow a jury to hear the evidence." For the MacPhails, the hearing is another painful delay
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
Nov. 27 GEORGIA: The death penaltyReasonable doubt Troubling questions surround a capital case in Georgia IN 1989 Troy Davis and two friends were hanging out in Savannah, Georgia. They saw a homeless man leaving a shop and started to bully him. An off-duty policeman heard the commotion and intervened; he was shot and killed. Though no gun was found, the state produced nine witnesses who said that Mr Davis was the culprit. He was convicted of the murder and sentenced to death in 1991. It seemed a straightforward case. Americans particularly revile cop-killers and here was a parade of people saying that Mr Davis had shot a policeman. But after the trial, no fewer than 7 of the 9 recanted. Several of them said they had felt subjected to pressure by the police. Others thought someone else was the killer. The homeless man said he could not remember, and anyway he had been drinking. This was hardly the clear-cut result a state wants to have when it is handing down a death sentence, and legal wrangling has been going on ever since 1991 in state and circuit courts. Much of the debate is over procedure: judges who have ruled against Mr Davis's various appeals argue that you need lots of new evidence to revisit a case, not a gaggle of shifty witnesses. The result is a hideous mess. An execution date was set for July 2007. The day before the sentence was to be carried out, the state issued a stay. In March 2008 Georgia's Supreme Court ruled that Mr Davis should not get a new trial and another execution date was set. On September 23rd Mr Davis was again awaiting death. The prison prepared a last meal of macaroni, cornbread and salad, but he turned it down. The reprieve came with less than two hours to go: the United States Supreme Court had granted a stay. 3 weeks later, the court decided not to hear Mr Daviss case. A 3rd execution date was set for October. 3 days before it arrived, yet another stay was granted. On December 9th the circuit court will consider whether Mr Davis can continue with his appeal or whether he has to die. Even people who support the death penalty are crying foul. William Sessions, a former head of the FBI, says that because there was no physical evidence in the case, Mr Davis deserves another day in court. He may have killed a policeman, but Georgia needs to do more to prove it. (source: The Economist)
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news-----GEORGIA
Oct. 26 GEORGIA: Can Georgia Do Right? Is the legal system of the state of Georgia up to the task when the task is to rectify the flawed trial of a black man accused of killing a white police officer? The world is waiting to see if justice can prevail. Fortunately, on Friday, October 24, the U.S. Court of Appeals for Georgia's 11th Circuit issued a stay of execution that narrowly prevented accused cop killer Troy Davis from being put to death by lethal injection the following Monday. This is the 3rd stay of execution in a case that has attracted worldwide interest. Troy Anthony Davis is charged with the 1989 murder of police officer Mark Allen MacPhail. Davis has been in prison for 19 years, most of that time on death row. Circumstances surrounding officer MacPhail's death are murky. The violence erupted in a dimly-lit parking lot late at night when someone in a group of men opened fire with a .38 caliber pistol. That "someone," according to the lawyer prosecuting the case, was Troy Davis. But Davis, who was 20 at the time, was very likely framed. In the absence of solid physical evidence, including a murder weapon (the gun was supposedly never found) witness testimony is especially crucial. However, most of the witnesses had been drinking, and once the shooting started, they were seeking cover. Witnesses were coerced. One was threatened with 10-12 years in jail if he didnt implicate Davis. Another, Sylvester Redd Coles, was himself a suspect in the shooting. Coles had brandished a .38 earlier in the evening. He told the court hed thrown the gun away. Key testimony came from a woman standing 160 feet away, looking at 4 black men scrambling about in a fracas that was "over before it began." Pressured into identifying Davis at the trial, the woman called his defense that night said it was all lies. When that was reported to the court, the woman, Dorothy Ferrell, was arrested. Her lawyer told her she could be convicted of perjury and imprisoned for 10 years. "She was a single mother of 4," observes attorney Deirdre OConnor, director of Innocence Matters. "She chose freedom over the truth." Another witness said he couldn't identify the shooter when questioned that night, and again a month later. 2 years later, he confidently identified Davis as the murderer. Of the 9 witnesses who testified against Davis, 7 have tried to recant. However, the recantations have been blocked for technical reasons. Despite the shakiness of the case against Davis, the U.S. Supreme Court decided October 14, 2008 not to hear Davis's appeal. Justice John Paul Stevens, speaking for the minority, questioned the adequacy of Georgia's appeal process. In another case involving Georgia, Stevens found "particularly troubling" Georgias track record with respect to cases involving black defendants and white victims. The U.S. Supreme court's decision tossed Troy Davis's life back into the hands of Georgia, whose supreme court had already denied the appeal on procedural grounds. Prosecution lawyer Spencer Lawton, who out-lawyered Davis's meager defense team in the original trial, continues to press for the death penalty. Lawton was recently interviewed by radio journalist Dori Smith, who asked him if the unusually high proportion of witnesses trying to recant did not perhaps undermine the credibility of the trial testimony. On the contrary, Lawton responded. The high number made the recantations "suspect." He called it "too much of a coincidence," and asked rhetorically if you couldn't trust the witnesses then, how were you going to trust them later? Lawton went on to suggest that the clamor raised on behalf of Troy Davis by public interest groups like ACLU, Amnesty International, and the Innocence Project is tantamount to a "mob" gathered outside jurors' doors. As for Davis's 19-year dance with death, Lawton says "Cases like this can't drag on forever," he said. "Everybody suffers," The family of the murdered police officer and even the defendant himself Troy Davis -- are entitled to "closure." Closure for Troy Davis is to be death? If Lawton's Alice in Wonderland logic seems outrageous, it's the same logic that informed the Georgia Supreme Court's blinkered approach to the earlier appeal, when it allowed procedural gambits to override serious concern for justice. It is the logic of the very "mob" that Lawton decries. One can't but ask, would the same mentality prevail if the accused were white? More is at stake here than one man's life. Even setting aside the ethical and philosophical questions surrounding capital punishment, the fact remains: If Troy Davis cannot receive a fair and impartial trial in Georgia, this raises serious questions about the state's ability in this the 21st century to provide liberty and justice for all. Troy Davis seeks closure in the form of justice. We all do. (source: Countercurrents.org; David Morse is a journalist and human rights activist who has written extensively about Su
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news-----GEORGIA
Sept. 29 GEORGIA: Troy Davis case decision expected by Oct. 6 When the U.S. Supreme Court meets Monday to decide Troy Anthony Davis' fate, its 9 justices face a fairly straightforward question: Is there sufficient doubt about Davis guilt to warrant further scrutiny of his case? Davis needs 4 justices to vote "yes." Otherwise, his execution, halted by the high court less than 2 hours before it was to be carried out Tuesday evening, will be rescheduled. The court is expected to announce its decision by Oct. 6. Troy Davis' attorneys, from left, Jason Ewart, Danielle Garten and Dominic Vote review case materials, including a copy of the Savannah Evening Press from 1989, before a hearing this month. The high courts granting the stay at such a late hour, while not unprecedented, indicates the case has the justices interest, court watchers said. "The court can grant a stay and then refuse to hear a case, but they dont issue the stay lightly," said Thomas Goldstein, a Washington lawyer who specializes in arguing cases before the high court. "They are thinking about it hard." The stay infuriated the family of slain Savannah Police Officer Mark Allen MacPhail. They had traveled Tuesday to the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison in Jackson to witness the execution. But it sent Davis' family and supporters, who arrived at the prison in a church bus to stage a protest, into a jubilant frenzy. Davis sits on death row for the Aug. 19, 1989, murder of MacPhail, a 27-year-old officer shot dead after he responded to the wails of a homeless man being pistol whipped in a Burger King parking lot. The former Army Ranger and father of 2, working off-duty as a security guard, did not have time to draw his gun before being shot 3 times. Davis was convicted with scant physical evidence: no DNA, no fingerprints, no murder weapon. Since the 1991 trial, 7 of 9 key witnesses who testified against Davis, 39, have recanted their testimony. These include trial witnesses who testified they saw what happened, as well as witnesses who testified Davis told them he killed MacPhail. More witnesses have come forward and implicated Sylvester "Redd" Coles, who was with Davis in the parking lot, as the triggerman. Coles, when previously approached by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, declined comment. He was the 1st person to go to police and finger Davis as the suspect and is 1 of 2 witnesses who have not backed off their trial testimony. The other, Stephen Sanders, first told police he could not identify anyone at the scene except by the clothes they were wearing. But at trial, Sanders testified he saw Davis fire the fatal shots. Chatham County prosecutors say they are certain Davis is a cop killer, and MacPhails relatives say the death sentence should have been carried out long ago. But Davis lawyers contend there is too much doubt to allow the execution. Indiana University law professor Joseph Hoffman noted that at least five justices must vote to grant a stay of execution. While this does not mean the high court will accept Davis' appeal, it indicates some justices wanted more time to look at it, he said. With the exonerations of inmates nationwide based on DNA evidence, the U.S. Supreme Court is giving more careful scrutiny to innocence claims, said Hoffman, a death penalty expert. "This is the kind of case that has the court on edge right now," he said. "So it's not completely surprising that out of all the death cases that come before it this would be the one granted a stay." Davis is appealing a ruling by a sharply split Georgia Supreme Court. His lawyers are asking the high court to declare that the Eighth Amendments ban on cruel and unusual punishment bars the execution of the innocent and requires at least a court hearing to assess the recantation evidence. Courts have long considered the recantations of trial witnesses suspect. Trial testimony is closer to the time of the crime, when memories should be more reliable. Witnesses also are allowed to be cross-examined under a judge's supervision. For this reason, courts erect high thresholds for convicts to clear when seeking new trials based on newly discovered evidence or recanted testimony. In Davis' case, the question before the U.S. Supreme Court is whether the Georgia Supreme Court set the bar too high. In a 4-3 Georgia Supreme Court decision, written by Justice Harold Melton, the court followed a precedent that demands proof, with "no doubt of any kind," that a witness' trial testimony was "the purest fabrication." Melton cited a state Supreme Court ruling in 1983 involving a Clayton County murder conviction, obtained when a witness testified he lent his car to the defendant on the night of the killing and saw the bound and gagged victim placed in the back seat. When it was later shown the witness was in the Cobb County jail at that time and could not have been telling the truth, the court granted a new trial. The recantations in Davis' case do
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news-----GEORGIA
Sept. 24 GEORGIA: Camden man faces death penaltyJudge will rule today on whether to allow jurors to hear testimony on his history of violence. Prosecutors told a judge Tuesday that a Camden County man facing trial on charges of abducting his former wife and killing her male companion has a history of violence against women spanning 27 years. Harold Dean Kinlaw, 56, of White Oak faces the death penalty if convicted of murder in the Jan. 18, 2004, shooting death of Felipe Herrera, a 61-year-old U.S. Bureau of Customs and Border Protection agent who taught Spanish at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center north of Brunswick. Herrera died after being shot twice in the chest while at a Brunswick garage sale with Kinlaw's former wife, Demaris Kinlaw. Demaris Kinlaw, now 43, was abducted by a man and a female accomplice - later identified by police as Harold Kinlaw and his girlfriend, Jamie Teresa Morris - who took her to a Warrensville, N.C., motel where FBI agents found all three 2 days later. Kinlaw has pleaded not guilty to malice murder, felony murder, kidnapping, aggravated assault, aggravated stalking, possession of a firearm during commission of a crime and possession of a firearm by a felon in the case. Jailed without bail, he is scheduled to stand trial Oct. 6. Superior Court Judge James Tuten Jr. is expected to rule today whether to allow jurors to hear testimony about Kinlaw's history of domestic violence. Assistant District Attorney Jackie Johnson asserted Tuesday the proposed testimony from Demaris Kinlaw and the defendant's two other former wives is evidence of an escalating pattern of violence similar to the 2004 killing and kidnapping. Defense attorney Kevin Gough argued the women should not be allowed to testify because their testimony would prejudice the jury against Kinlaw. Gough characterized Herrera's shooting as his own fault. "All the evidence shows that Mr. Herrera assaulted Mr. Kinlaw, which caused him to be shot," Gough said. Gough implored Tuten to postpone the trial. He said he and co-counsel Ron Harrison were hamstrung by the resignation Friday of their investigator and needed more time to prepare Kinlaw's defense. Johnson told Tuten the three women each will testify that Kinlaw abused them throughout their relationship with him. The violence included separate incidents of rape, kidnapping, beatings, threats at gunpoint and stalking, she said. Kinlaw was convicted of solicitation of kidnapping in North Carolina after asking 3 people he met in a bar to abduct his 2nd wife after she fled their home because of his abuse, Johnson said. In each case, the violence peaked when the former wives separated from Kinlaw amid divorce proceedings, Johnson said. Under Georgia's similar transaction law, their testimony about the past incidents is admissible in the current case, Johnson said. In addition, Morris will be called to testify against Kinlaw during his trial, prosecutors said. "She took Mr. Kinlaw to the crime scene where the victim was killed, and she drove away with him and Mrs. Kinlaw after the killing," Johnson said. Morris, now 26, of McIntosh County, was sentenced last week to 15 years in prison for her role in the kidnapping and shooting. She pleaded guilty to single counts each of conspiracy to commit kidnapping, and being a party to the crime of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. Under the sentence imposed by Dwayne Gillis, chief judge of the Waycross Judicial Circuit, Morris must serve at least 12 years before becoming eligible for parole, District Attorney Stephen Kelley said. Although the shooting occurred in Brunswick, Gillis sentenced Morris because the gun had been obtained in Waycross, said Kelley, who is district attorney for the Brunswick Judicial Circuit. Gough told Tuten that Morris' planned testimony results from a "sweetheart deal" with prosecutors. (source: The Times-Union) *** Court stops Davis' death The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday issued a stay of execution for Troy Anthony Davis less than 2 hours before he was to die by lethal injection. Davis' family and supporters, who for years have pressed for a new trial on claims Davis is innocent, broke into tears and song when they learned the high court had at least temporarily postponed the execution. "I've been praying for this moment forever," said Davis sister and most outspoken proponent, Martina Correia. Davis' mother, Virginia Davis, said God had answered their prayers. Davis, 39, sits on death row for the Aug. 19, 1989, killing of Savannah Police Officer Mark Allen MacPhail. The height of jubilation experienced by Davis' family matched the depths of frustration felt by MacPhail's. Annelie Reaves, the slain officer's sister, said the family was angry but would return to witness the execution when it is rescheduled. "It should have happened today," she said, "but justice will be served." In response to Davis' statements that he hopes the real
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news-----GEORGIA
Sept. 23 GEORGIA: Supreme Court issues stay of execution for Davis The U.S. Supreme Court Tuesday issued a stay of execution for Troy Anthony Davis less than two hours before he was to be put to death by lethal injection. Davis, 39, sits on death row for the Aug. 19, 1989, killing of Savannah Police Officer Mark Allen MacPhail. He was scheduled to be executed at 7 p.m. Tuesday. Troy Davis received a stay of execution just before he was set to receive a lethal injection for the 1989 murder of a Savannah police officer. The U.S. Supreme Courts justices are scheduled to decide Monday whether to hear an appeal of a ruling issued in March by the Georgia Supreme Court. In that 4-3 decision, the state Supreme Court rejected Davis' request that he be granted a new trial or a court hearing to present new evidence. In its order, the U.S. Supreme Court said if the justices decline to accept Davis' appeal, "this stay shall terminate immediately." If the appeal is granted, the stay will remain in force until the high court issues its ultimate ruling on Davis' appeal, the order said. Davis claims he did not commit the crime. Since his 1991 trial, 7 of 9 key prosecution witnesses who testified against him have recanted their testimony. On Monday, the state Board of Pardons and Paroles declined to reconsider its decision to deny Davis clemency and the Georgia Supreme Court, by a 6-1 vote, declined to issue a stay of execution. (source: Atlanta Journal-Constitiution) * Amnesty International Press Release Amnesty International Praises Stay of Execution for Troy Davis Amnesty International USA (AIUSA) today welcomed the order from the Supreme Court of the United States to stay the execution of Troy Anthony Davis hours before his scheduled execution. The state of Georgia scheduled Davis' execution for today, in effect circumventing the U.S. Supreme Court before it had time to decide whether its justices would consider Davis' case. "For reasons that are unfathomable, Chatham County officials seemed doggedly determined to ram this execution through before justice could fully run its course," said Larry Cox, executive director for AIUSA. "We are grateful that the U.S. Supreme Court has shown the foresight to stay the execution. We hope that it takes up the case and looks at it with fresh eyes, marking the first time that evidence pointing to Davis' innocence will have been heard in a court of law." Davis was convicted in 1991 of killing Savannah police officer Mark Allen MacPhail. Authorities failed to produce a murder weapon or any physical evidence tying Davis to the crime. In addition, 7 of the 9 original state witnesses have since recanted or changed their initial testimonies in sworn affidavits. In March 2008 the Georgia Supreme Court decided against a new evidentiary hearing for Davis in a narrow 4-3 ruling. Last Friday, the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles denied Davis' request for clemency. Since the launch of its February 2007 report, Where Is the Justice for Me? The Case of Troy Davis, Facing Execution in Georgia, Amnesty International has campaigned intensively for clemency for Davis, collecting well over 200,000 petition signatures and letters from across the United States and around the world. To date, internationally known figures such as Pope Benedict XVI, Archbishop Desmond Tutu and former U.S. President Jimmy Carter have all joined the call for clemency, as well as lawmakers from within and outside of Georgia. Amnesty International is a Nobel Prize-winning grassroots activist organization with more than 2.2 million supporters, activists and volunteers in over 150 countries campaigning for human rights worldwide. The organization investigates and exposes abuses, educates and mobilizes the public, and works to protect people wherever justice, freedom, truth and dignity are denied. For more information about the Troy Davis case, please visit: www.amnestyusa.org/troydavis (source: Amnesty International)
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news-----GEORGIA
Sept. 23 GEORGIAimpending execution High court to rule if convicted cop killer Troy Davis dies NEW: Officer's mother says of Troy Davis: "There is no possibility he's innocent" The pope, Susan Sarandon, Desmond Tutu ask Georgia to reconsider case Davis' attorneys allege a case of mistaken identity, say witnesses have recanted The Supreme Court to rule in a special hearing, hours before scheduled execution Troy Anthony Davis has long said he didn't kill a Savannah police officer, and the U.S. Supreme Court will decide Tuesday whether to postpone his 7 p.m. ET execution. Troy Anthony Davis, 39, says he did not kill a Savannah policeman; Davis is scheduled to die Tuesday. Davis, 39, was convicted in 1991 of killing Officer Mark MacPhail as MacPhail responded to an altercation in a Burger King parking lot. Witnesses who initially testified Davis was the killer have since recanted, but Davis' petitions for a new trial have been denied. Many have asked Georgia to grant Davis a new trial: celebrities like Susan Sarandon, Harry Belafonte and the Indigo Girls; world leaders like former President Jimmy Carter, Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Pope Benedict XVI; and former and current U.S. lawmakers like Bob Barr, Carolyn Moseley Braun and John Lewis. Amnesty International has issued a 39-page report questioning his conviction, and protesters have been gathering at the Georgia Capitol in Atlanta this week. Davis is scheduled to be executed at the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison in Jackson, Georgia. MacPhail's mother, Anneliese MacPhail of Columbus, told media outlets last week that she is "disgusted" by the calls to spare Davis' life, and she is not convinced by Davis' supporters' claims that there is a more likely suspect. In a phone interview with CNN on Tuesday, MacPhail's mother said of Davis, "There is no possibility he's innocent -- not according to what's been said in court." "Troy Davis was judged by his peers. All the courts have found him guilty. It was proven he was guilty. Please let us have some peace. Let Mark rest in peace. Let justice be done" Davis' sister, Martina Correia, said she was sleepless Monday night and was spending the day Tuesday, possibly her brother's last, at his side. She told CNN she planned to stay until prison officials told her it was time to leave at 3 p.m. "We are still holding on to hope," she said Tuesday morning. "We still hope the U.S. Supreme Court will look into my brother's case and give some relief. We will have a lot of family time with him and recall old times and pray together." The Georgia Supreme Court turned down the plea for a stay in Davis' execution Monday, saying the U.S. Supreme Court "properly has jurisdiction over Davis' pending petition." The Supreme Court called an emergency session to hear the petition. Davis was convicted of MacPhail's 1989 murder, largely on the testimony of 9 witnesses. There was no physical evidence, and no weapon was ever found. "When you only have eyewitness testimony and you have no physical evidence, people have fallacies and people make mistakes," Correia said. Davis' lawyers and supporters say this is a case of mistaken identity. 7 of the 9 trial witnesses have changed their statements, saying they were mistaken, they feared retribution from the man they say really killed MacPhail or that police pressured them into fingering Davis. During the trial, witnesses said Davis and two other men were harassing a homeless man and followed him across the street from a parking lot at the Greyhound bus station in Savannah. MacPhail was off duty. He saw the skirmish and ran over to break up the fight. MacPhail was fatally shot, and witnesses told police Davis fired the 2 shots that killed him. A manhunt ensued. Davis surrendered 9 days later. Monty Holmes is one of the witnesses who said Davis was the culprit. He has since changed his story and alleges police coerced him. "They were trying to get to me to say that he did it, but I know he didn't do it," Holmes said last year at a rally for Davis. Savannah police Maj. Everett Ragan headed the MacPhail investigation. He denies allegations of coercion and said he doesn't believe the witnesses who have changed their stories. Shortly before Davis was scheduled to be executed last year, Ragan told CNN, "There is no doubt in my mind we arrested the right man." The Georgia Supreme Court also was unimpressed with the witnesses' new stories. In affirming the trial court's judgment in a 4-3 decision, the majority said that the witnesses' new testimony failed to meet the necessary benchmark: that their original testimony "in every material part is purest fabrication." The court also was unconvinced by allegations that one of the men Davis was with that night, Sylvester "Red" Coles, killed MacPhail. In a telephone interview in 2007, Davis acknowledged that he never told police that Coles killed MacPhail. "I didn't because I didn't want to be a snitch," Dav
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news-----GEORGIA
URGENT ACTION APPEAL - From Amnesty International USA 09 September 2008 UA 250/08 Death penalty / Legal concern USA (Georgia) Troy Anthony Davis (m), black, aged 40 Troy Davis is scheduled to be executed in Georgia at 7pm local time on 23 September. He has been on death row for 17 years for a murder he maintains he did not commit. He has a clemency hearing before the state Board of Pardons and Paroles on 12 September. It is not known when the Board will make its decision. On 28 August 1991 Troy Davis was convicted of the murder of 27-year-old Officer Mark Allen MacPhail, white, who was shot and killed in the car park of a Burger King restaurant in Savannah, Georgia, in the early hours of 19 August 1989. Davis was also convicted of assaulting Larry Young, a homeless man, who was accosted immediately before Officer MacPhail was shot. At the trial, Troy Davis admitted that he had been at the scene of the shooting, but claimed that he had neither assaulted Larry Young nor shot Officer MacPhail. There was no physical evidence against Troy Davis and the weapon used in the crime was never found. The case against him consisted entirely of witness testimony. In affidavits signed over the years since the trial, a majority of the state's witnesses have recanted or contradicted their testimony. In addition, there is post-trial testimony implicating another man, Sylvester Coles, as the gunman. In 1989, Kevin McQueen was detained in the same jail as Davis. McQueen told the police that during this time Troy Davis had confessed to shooting Officer MacPhail. In a 1996 affidavit, McQueen retracted this statement, saying that he had given it because he wanted to "get even" with Davis following a confrontation he said the 2 of them had had. Monty Holmes testified against Troy Davis in a pre-trial hearing, but did not testify at the trial because, according to a 2001 affidavit, he did not want to repeat this false testimony. Jeffrey Sapp testified that Troy Davis had told him that he had shot the officer. Recanting his testimony in a 2003 affidavit, he stated that under "a lot of pressure" from police, he had testified against Troy Davis. At the trial, eyewitness Dorothy Ferrell identified Troy Davis as the person who had shot Officer MacPhail. In a 2000 affidavit, she stated that she had not seen who the gunman was, but testified against Davis out of fear that if she did not, because she was on parole at the time, she would be sent back to jail. In a 2002 affidavit, Darrell Collins, 16 years old at the time of the crime, said that the day after the shooting, 15 or 20 police officers came to his house, and "a lot of them had their guns drawn." They took him in for questioning, and "after a couple of hours of the detectives yelling at me and threatening me, I finally broke down and told them what they wanted to hear. They would tell me things that they said had happened and I would repeat whatever they said -- I testified against Troy at his trial -- because I was still scared that the police would throw me in jail for being an accessory to murder if I told the truth aboutwhat happened." Larry Young, the man who was accosted on the night of the murder, implicated Troy Davis as the man who had assaulted him. His 2002 affidavit offers further evidence of a coercive police investigation into the murder of a fellow officer: "After I was assaulted that night, some police officers grabbed me and threw me down on the hood of the police car and handcuffed me. They treated me like a criminal; like I was the one who killed the officer. They made it clear that we weren't leaving until I told them what they wanted to hear. They suggested answers and I would give them what they wanted. They put typed papers in my face and told me to sign them. I did sign them without reading them." In his 2002 affidavit he said that he "couldn't honestly remember what anyone looked like or what different people were wearing." Antoine Williams, a Burger King employee, had just driven into the restaurant's car park at the time the shooting occurred. At the trial, he identified Troy Davis as the person who had shot Officer MacPhail. In 2002 he stated that this was false, and that he had signed a statement for the police which he could not and did not read: "Even today, I know that I could not honestly identify with any certainty who shot the officer that night. I couldn't then either. After the officers talked to me, they gave me a statement and told me to sign it. I signed it. I did not read it because I cannot read. At Troy Davis's trial, I identified him as the person who shot the officer. Even when I said that, I was totally unsure whether he was the person who shot the officer. I felt pressured to point at him because he was the one who was sitting in the courtroom. I have no idea what the person who shot the officer looks like." On 17 July 2007, the state Board of Pardons and Paroles stayed Davis's execution less than 24 hours before i
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news-----GEORGIA
Aug. 15 GEORGIA: Jury selection will continue Monday in death penalty trial Jury selection for Hall County's first locally prosecuted death penalty trial in 9 years will go into a 2nd week. As of late Friday afternoon, Judge John Girardeau had questioned 72 potential jurors this week on their opinions about punishment for the crime of murder. Of those, 34 were qualified to serve on the jury. The judge has said he wants a group of 55 or 56 people qualified before attorneys make the final selection of 12 jurors plus four alternates. A total of 282 Hall County residents have been called for jury selection in the case of Ignacio Vergara. Vergara, 26, is on trial on charges of murder in connection with the 2002 drug-related shooting deaths of two people in a parked car on a remote South Hall road. He has pleaded not guilty. In order to be qualified to sit on a jury in a case in which the death penalty is sought, a person must be open to choosing any of three sentencing options if the defendant is convicted: life with the possibility of parole, life without parole or death by lethal injection. Jurors must find that certain aggravating circumstances exist in a crime before voting for anything other than life with the possibility of parole. This week, dozens of people either said they could not vote for death or could not vote for one of the other 2 options. Individual questioning of jurors, known as sequestered voir dire, was conducted with each potential juror taking the witness stand, as Girardeau, then lawyers for the prosecution and defense, posed questions. Girardeau prefaced the questioning by explaining certain aspects of criminal procedure. The individual sessions have taken anywhere from 15 to 45 minutes per person. Opinions of potential jurors have varied widely. "If they're found guilty, I think they should suffer the appropriate punishment, which is the death penalty," said one woman in her 60s. Another woman said she could not vote for the death penalty under any circumstance. A man in his 30s said he could not vote for life with the possibility of parole for someone convicted of murder. It's the 1st time Hall County citizens have been asked to serve on a jury for a death penalty trial since 2005, when a Towns County case was moved to Hall County. Vergara is the first person on trial facing the possibility of the death penalty in connection with a crime committed in Hall County since 1999. A total of 136 citizens have been scheduled to come in next week, with 22 due to report to court Monday. Those who are selected to serve on the jury will be sequestered in a hotel until the end of the trial. (source: Gainesville Times)
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
May 27 GEORGIAnew and impending execution date June 4 execution set for double murderer The state Department of Corrections has set a June 4 execution date for Curtis Osborne, who was condemned to die for a 1990 double murder in Spalding County. Osborne is to be put to death by lethal injection at 7 p.m. He was convicted of fatally shooting Linda Lisa Seaborne and Arthur Jones on Aug. 7, 1990, as they sat in a 1978 Pontiac Grand Prix. Osborne would be the 2nd Georgia death row inmate put to death this year. On May 6, William Earl Lynd was executed for the 1988 slaying of his live-in girlfriend, Ginger Moore. Last Thursday, Samuel David Crowe also was set to be executed. But in just the 3rd time since 1995, the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles commuted a death sentence. It granted Crowe a reprieve just a few hours before he was to be put to death by lethal injection. Crowe had already eaten his last meal and was waiting in a cell when he received word he had been granted clemency. He was resentenced to serve life in prison without parole. (source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution)
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
Dec. 23 GEORGIA: Death penalty issues linger in Georgia The Georgia Supreme Court ended its fall term last week without acting on dozens of potentially flawed death sentences that relied on overturned decisions. But death penalty lawyers say they plan to ask the court to assess the integrity of its so-called "proportionality review" anyway. The review required by Georgia law in every death penalty appeal is intended to identify and toss out sentences that are disproportionately severe. Typically, the court lists one dozen to two dozen similar sentences in support when it affirms a death sentence. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported in September that its research had found about 80 percent of the court's proportionality reviews since 1982 have cited death sentences that actually had been reversed. Nearly all of those murderers were resentenced to life in prison, and murder charges against several were dropped altogether. Legal observers disagree about the impact of those reversals. Some say the reviews are still valid if they cite sustained sentences; others contend rulings that rely on overturned cases are seriously flawed and must be reviewed carefully. Tom Dunn, attorney for condemned killers Jack Alderman and Mark McClain, said if necessary he will challenge the proportionality reviews done for his clients. Both men have pending appeals on other claims, and executions in Georgia have been put on hold while the U.S. Supreme Court reviews lethal injection procedures. The Georgia Supreme Court's 1985 review of Alderman's death sentence cited 20 similar death sentences. But the newspaper found 10 of those cases had been overturned at the time, and seven others have been thrown out since then. In 1996, the court cited 10 cases to uphold a death sentence for McClain, an armed robber who killed a Domino's Pizza manager in Augusta. 5 of those cases had been overturned and a sixth has been reversed since then. Last week, Chief Justice Leah Ward Sears declined to say whether the court planned to act on the issue. In September, Sears said the court was taking steps to improve its proportionality review and closely examining its use of overturned cases. Ron Carlson, a law professor at the University of Georgia, said the court might best address the issue through a future death penalty ruling. "Would clarifications be helpful in terms of assessing the reliability of proportionality review?" Carlson asked. "My answer to that ... is absolutely yes." Improving the sentence review, Carlson added, would instill public confidence in the judiciary. "It needs to be understood as fair and balanced," he said. The state Supreme Court used the review in the 1970s to throw out death sentences for armed robbery and rape. The court ruled those sentences were too severe because juries were handing down so many life sentences for similar offenses. The state Supreme Court has issued one death penalty decision since September, citing 21 other sentences in upholding death for a Macon County killer. None of those cases had been overturned. Even though some cases were reversed, the proportionality reviews may still be valid, said Ken Wynne, district attorney for Newton and Walton counties. "You still have a significant number of cases ... that were not reversed," said Wynne, president of the state's district attorneys' association. The proportionality review is just one of the safeguards in Georgia's death penalty statute, Wynne said. "What's important," he added, "are the facts the juries heard at the time. I don't think that it matters [the court cited overturned cases], so long as those cases contain similar facts or were in the same category of the case that was before them." But Stephen Bright, a lawyer with the Southern Center for Human Rights in Atlanta, said courts normally do not rely on cases that are no longer valid as part of precedent. "In light of what we know now about the flaws in the proportionality review, there are certainly some people who should receive a new and valid review," he said. Bright also called on the court to broaden its review to include more than death sentences. "Right now, the court is not looking at broader patterns of sentencing because it does not take into account all those cases in which people were sentenced to life imprisonment," he said. Such a proportionality challenge will be mounted in the appeal of Nicholas Bryant, who was sentenced Dec. 13 to death in Douglas County, said Josh Moore, one of Bryant's lawyers. During a 2006 hearing, Moore presented data that Douglas County prosecutors sought death for 25 % of murder defendants from 1980 to 2004. In neighboring Coweta County, prosecutors sought death only 3 percent of the time in that period, according to testimony. At the hearing, District Attorney David McDade disputed those statistics. He said a capital prosecution against Bryant was more than just "a whim and fancy." "This is a double homicid
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news------GEORGIA
July 21 GEORGIA: Perdue says pope won't sway him in Davis case Gov. Sonny Perdue said today he doesn't see his role as getting involved in the Troy Davis execution despite a request from the pope. Davis is awaiting the outcome of a 90-day stay granted Monday as the Pardons and Parole Board considers evidence that many of the witnesses who testified against him have recanted in the 18 years since a Savannah off-duty police officer was shot to death. Perdue was talking by phone with three newspaper reporters between meetings at the National Governors Association conference in Michigan. Asked about a letter he received Monday from Pope Benedict's American representative, Perdue said his role was limited to appointing good people to the Parole Board. "I do believe that we have some good people appointed to the board and will trust them," he said. Georgia is 1 of 3 states in which governors have no authority to grant clemency, a power shifted to the Parole Board by voters in 1943. Perdue rejects the idea of using his influence either publicly or privately to sway the board's thinking. And he refused to comment on whether or not he believes Davis is innocent, despite comments from the pope, Hollywood celebrities and Amnesty International. "I am always glad to hear from the pope," Perdue said. "He and I have a different world view." The governor favors death sentences while the pope doesn't. "I believe in capital punishment, but I believe the worst thing we could do is put an innocent person to death," he said. "...(But) I don't think we ought to be moved by people who believe in capital punishment or people who don't believe in capital punishment." Perdue's staff forwarded the letter to the Parole Board on Wednesday, a day after Davis was scheduled to receive a lethal injection. (source: Morris News Service)
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
July 13 GEORGIAimpending execution A chance of innocenceState parole board must intervene in death row inmate's case Last-minute appeals by lawyers to spare the life of a death row inmate are common. And sometimes the claims made on behalf of inmates strain credibility. Others are much more than that. Sometimes, they are legitimate efforts to stop the state from executing someone who could very well be innocent. The case of Troy Anthony Davis, scheduled to come before the state Board of Pardons and Paroles on Monday, is one of those. It would be a grave injustice if Davis is killed by lethal injection next week. Davis, 38, was convicted of the brutal murder of Mark Allen MacPhail, a young Savannah police officer responding to a fight in a parking lot in 1989. Without substantive physical evidence no gun, no DNA prosecutors relied entirely on the testimony of witnesses. They found 9 who implicated Davis. A jury found him guilty. He has been on death row since 1991, but Davis has maintained his innocence from the day he was arrested. After his legal appeals were exhausted, however, significant developments occurred that demand closer examination: 7 of the original 9 witnesses against Davis have renounced or contradicted their trial testimony. An alarming number now claim they were intimidated by the police. Of the two witnesses who have not recanted their testimony, one was implicated by 2 other witnesses during the trial as MacPhail's killer, and by 4 new witnesses since then. Davis is caught in an untenable procedural bind. Because of a 1996 law aimed at speeding up death penalty appeals, federal and state courts have ruled they can't consider new evidence in a death penalty case if the defendant should have brought it to the court's attention during the appeals process. But in the Davis case, most of the witnesses didn't recant their testimony until years later. Moreover, to get the courts to reopen the case, the defendant must be able to show that given the new evidence, no reasonable juror would convict him. That's an impossibly high standard. Some of the witnesses didn't get a chance to recant because the initial appeal in the Davis case was handled by attorneys from an underfunded state defender's agency that lacked the resources to track witnesses down and investigate what they told police, as opposed to what they testified to at trial. The case has generated an exceptional amount of interest. Groups and individuals opposed to the death penalty support Davis, including Amnesty International, Nobel Prize winner Desmond Tutu, Sister Helen Prejean and Harry Belafonte. Archbishop Wilton Gregory has asked Catholics in the Atlanta archdiocese to pray for clemency for Davis. The case has also drawn the attention of the Constitution Project, a bipartisan group that seeks consensus on difficult legal issues. William S. Sessions, a former federal judge and FBI director under three presidents, a death penalty advocate and a member of the project's Death Penalty Initiative, has researched Davis' case and strongly believes more investigation is needed. Over the years, 124 death row inmates have been released from state prisons after evidence proved their innocence. Police, prosecutors, judges, witnesses and juries make mistakes, but those mistakes can never be reversed once a death sentence is carried out. The Board of Pardons and Paroles is not being asked to set Troy Anthony Davis free. But in the name of justice it should allow him to make a new case for his innocence. (source: Editorial, Atlanta Journal-Constitution)
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
June 25 GEORGIA: Amnesty International USA Press Release SUPREME COURT'S DEATH PENALTY RULING IN TROY DAVIS CASE REVEALS 'CATASTROHPIC FLAWS IN THE U.S. DEATH PENALTY MACHINE' Amnesty International is deeply disappointed with today's Supreme Court ruling that permits the execution of Troy Anthony Davis in Georgia. The organization maintains that evidence in his favor, which has never been heard in a courtroom, is enough to demonstrate that Davis should be granted a new hearing. "The Supreme Court decision is proof-positive that justice truly is blind -- blind to coerced and recanted testimony, blind to the lack of a murder weapon or physical evidence and blind to the extremely dubious circumstances that led to this man's conviction," said Larry Cox, executive director of Amnesty International USA (AIUSA). "At times there are cases that are emblematic of the dysfunctional application of justice in this country. By refusing to review serious claims of innocence, the Supreme Court has revealed catastrophic flaws in the U.S. death penalty machine." Troy Anthony Davis, who is African American, was convicted in 1991 of murdering Mark McPhail, a white police officer. Davis' conviction was not based on any physical evidence, and the murder weapon was never found. The prosecution based its case on the testimony of purported "witnesses," many of whom allege police coercion. 7 of the 9 non-police witnesses for the prosecution have recanted their testimony in sworn affidavits. One witness signed a police statement declaring that Davis was the assailant, then later said, "I did not read it because I cannot read." In another case a witness stated that the police "were telling me that I was an accessory to murder and that I would "go to jail for a long time and I would be lucky if I ever got out, especially because a police officer got killed"; I was only 16 and was so scared of going to jail." There are also several witnesses who have implicated another man in the murder. According to one woman, "People on the streets were talking about Sylvester Coles being involved with killing the police officer, so one day I asked him -- Sylvester told me that he did shoot the officer." Despite this, Davis' habeas corpus petition was denied by the state court on a technicality -- evidence of police coercion was "procedurally defaulted," that is, not raised earlier, so the court refused to hear it. The Georgia Supreme Court and 11th Circuit Federal Court of Appeals deferred to the state court and rejected Davis' claims. Today the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear his case and Davis is now left without any legal recourse; he could be executed within weeks. It is shocking that in more than 12 years of appeals, no court has agreed to hear evidence of police coercion or consider the recanted testimony. "It is appalling that so many judges were able to look away from such a grave breach of justice. Evidence of innocence simply hasn't mattered," said Sue Gunawardena-Vaughn, director of AIUSA's Program to Abolish the Death Penalty. "This should be viewed as a day of great shame for our nation, one in which the green light was given to execute a citizen who may well be innocent." # # # (source: Amnesty International USA)
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA
June 25 GEORGIAimpending execution Case puts lethal injection on trial On Monday, a day before his scheduled execution, triple murderer John Washington Hightower is expected to ask a Fulton County judge to spare his life. If Superior Court Judge Stephanie Manis rules that lethal injection, as it is carried out in Georgia, is unconstitutional, she could stop his execution, which would likely put a halt to all executions in the state until the issue is reviewed by the Georgia Supreme Court. Hightower's attorney, Jack Martin, plans to call guards, nurses, a doctor and the state's former medical examiner to the witness stand today to describe what has gone wrong during other executions in Georgia. Michael Mears, a veteran death penalty defense lawyer, said veterinarians are barred from killing unwanted animals with some of the same drugs used to kill humans because the drugs can cause "excessive pain." If the judge doesn't stay the execution, Hightower could become the 1st prisoner put to death in Georgia in almost 2 years. Mears was the first in the state to challenge lethal injection. Five years ago, he tried to convince Gwinnett County Superior Court Judge Michael Clark that lethal injection is inhumane. Clark was the first judge in Georgia to consider evidence on the issue since the state switched from electrocutions to lethal injection in October 2001. Now, armed with more information about executions gone awry, defense attorneys hope to win over the Fulton County judge. "This is what happened with the electric chair," Mears said. "We kept challenging it over and over again until finally someone listened to us." A jury of seven women and five men convicted Hightower in 1988 and sentenced him to die for murdering his wife, Dorothy Hightower, 41, and her 2 daughters, Evelyn, 19, and Sandra Reaves, 22, at the family's Baldwin County home. He admitted shooting the women, but his trial attorney argued that his judgment was impaired by alcohol and cocaine use and stress due to family problems. Psychologists testified that Hightower suffered from a paranoid personality disorder and was unable to see that he had alternatives to murder. Defense attorneys nationwide have long argued that lethal injections, meant to bring a gentler death than the electric chair, don't always go as planned and can be drawn out and painful, violating the constitutional ban on "cruel and unusual punishment." 9 states have temporarily suspended executions, according to Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center in Washington. California and Missouri have put executions on hold while they re-examine lethal injection protocols. (source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution)
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----GEORGIA----Troy Davis Action Alert
National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty Please forward and cross-post this message widely. If you received this message from a friend, subscribe free at http://www.demaction.org/dia/organizations/ncadp/signUp.jsp?key=28 Dear Friends, In recent weeks, we've been working to get the word out about Troy Davis, a Georgia man on death row, using the traditional media, blogs, radio stations, and of course, Facebook. Now, we're taking the first big step to reach out to the people who will ultimately decide Troy's fate. Right now, we're starting up a letter writing campaign to the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles. If Troy's last appeal is denied in the Supreme Court (unfortunately, a likely outcome), the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles will be making the last call on whether Troy Davis lives or dies. They have the power to pardon him, or to commute his sentence from death to life. So, here's how it works: 1) Go to this site: http://www.democracyinaction.org/dia/organizationsORG/ncadp/ content.jsp?content_KEY=2776 2) Copy and paste the letter into a Word document. Print it out on your personal/school/company letterhead if possible. 3) Sign at the bottom of the page, and print your name and mailing address under the signature to give your letter more weight. 4) Send your letter to: Amnesty International 730 Peachtree St. Suite 1060 Atlanta, GA 30308 Attn: L. Moye Or, fax it to 404-876-2276 Amnesty International will be collecting all the letters and delivering them to the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles. So that's all you need to do! If you have time, feel free to handwrite the letter or to write one in your own words. And the most critical thing to increase the impact: tell ten friends about this campaign, and ask them to write too! Thank you for all you do. (source: NCADP)
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news---GEORGIA
June 2 GEORGIA: Jury selected for Stinski death-penalty trial 10 women and 2 men were selected Saturday in Macon for a jury in the death-penalty trial of Darryl Scott Stinski. An additional 3 woman and a man were chosen as alternates. They would be used if anything happens that a juror could not continue. Chatham County Superior Court Judge James F. Bass Jr., who moved the jury selection process to Bibb County, will have the jurors brought to Chatham County on Monday. Opening statements and beginning of testimony are scheduled to begin at 9 a.m. Tuesday. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty for Stinski, 23. He is charged with murder in the April 11, 2002, slayings of Susan Pittman, 41, and her 13-year-old daughter, Kimberly. He also is charged with arson by burning to the ground the victims' 9693 Whitfield Ave. home to destroy evidence. (source: Savannah Morning News)
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news-----GEORGIA
Mar. 6 GEORGIA: Study finds that death penalty appeals move quickly in Georgia GEORGIA IS one of the fastest states in the country at processing death penalty appeals, according to a recent study funded by the research arm of the U.S. Department of Justice. The study of cases decided between Jan. 1, 1992, and Dec. 31, 2002, labeled Virginia the most efficient of the 14 states it examined, with a median direct appeal processing time of 295 days from sentencing to ruling by the states court of last resort. By that measure, Georgia was 5th, averaging 798 days from sentencing to decision by the state Supreme Court. But measuring from the point of the filing of a notice of appealwhen the appeals court gets the caseGeorgia was the fastest at 297 days. Virginia does not require a notice of appeal in capital cases, so it was excluded from that ranking. Georgia law imposes a 2-term rule on the state's Supreme Court, meaning the court must decide direct appeals within 2 of the court's 3 yearly terms. But the study said that Georgia lawyers took longer than those of any other state studied to file notices of appeal. Authors Barry Latzer and James N.G. Cauthen, professors at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York, cited the Georgia rule that a motion for a new trial suspends the notice of appeal deadline, and recommended the development of rules to expedite the resolution of new trial motions in the state. The median direct appeal disposition time among the 14 states studied was 966 days from sentencing to final appellate decision and 921 days when starting the clock with the notice of appeal. The study deemed Ohio, Tennessee and Kentucky the least efficient, each taking more than 3 1/2 years from sentencing to appellate disposition. (source: Daily Report)
[Deathpenalty]death penalty news-----GEORGIA
September 7 GEORGIAdeath row inmate dies Cancer kills inmate facing death penalty Convicted murderer Jack H. Potts escaped the death penalty by dying of natural causes. Potts, first sentenced to death in 1976, died Friday of liver cancer at Augusta State Medical Prison in East Georgia. "On the one hand, he can claim victory because the state didn't execute him, but he still has to face the final, ultimate judgment," said Forsyth County District Attorney Penny Penn. "At least we're not spending any more money on appeals." His latest appeals were pending. Potts was convicted of kidnapping auto mechanic Michael Douglas Priest in Cobb County in 1975 and killing him in a remote Forsyth County field. He was sentenced to die 4 times, twice on the kidnapping charge and twice in the slaying. The initial kidnapping and murder convictions were overturned by the federal courts. Forsyth County retried Potts and sentenced him to die the 2nd time in 1988. He was retried and resentenced in Cobb County 2 years later. After shooting a friend for criticizing his driving, Potts approached a farmhouse and said he had been in a car accident. Priest, the 24-year-old father of a toddler, agreed to drive him to a clinic in Alpharetta. Priest was then abducted, robbed and shot in the head as he begged for his life. Lawmen captured Potts the next day after he was critically wounded in a shootout in southwest Georgia's Brooks County. In June 1980, Potts earned national attention when he announced he had converted to Roman Catholicism and dropped his appeals because he wanted to die "while in a state of grace." He changed his mind 13 hours before his scheduled execution, and won a reprieve from a federal judge. (source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution)
[Deathpenalty]death penalty news----GEORGIA
July 5 GEORGIAimpending execution Clemency hearing set for condemned killer in mutilation case A parolee who stabbed his gay lover to death with a screwdriver, then dismembered his body - putting some parts down a garbage disposal - wants the state to halt his execution next week for a crime a prosecutor said was among the worst imaginable. A clemency hearing for Robert Dale Conklin, 44, is set for Monday, the day before he is scheduled to be given a lethal injection for the 1984 death of George Crooks, a 28-year-old lawyer who met the defendant at a highway rest stop. The execution would be Georgia's 3d this year. Conklin told police that he killed Crooks in self-defense, then panicked and decided to dismember the body. He argued in later appeals of his conviction that he was provided ineffective counsel and that the trial court erred by denying his request for money to hire a defense medical expert. Prosecutors have argued that what happened after the murder left no doubt that the killing was intentional, though it's not clear from a review of court records if a specific motive was offered at trial. Defense lawyers are preparing a clemency petition and a Superior Court motion challenging Conklin's incarceration. One of the lawyers, Mark Olive, declined to comment Tuesday, saying he would wait until after some of his paperwork is filed Wednesday. Another defense lawyer working on the case, Don Samuel, did not immediately return calls seeking comment. Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard said he will oppose clemency at Monday's hearing before the state parole board, citing the extreme nature of the crime. He noted that Fulton County over the years has rarely sought the death penalty. "It seems to me that if there is a death penalty, it was certainly designed for this kind of action," Howard said. "It's really an almost unspeakable kind of an incident." He added, "Today it would still be one of the most egregious crimes that one can imagine." Conklin told police that on the night of the murder, he told Crooks that he wanted to end their relationship. He said Crooks was sitting on his stomach on a bed in Conklin's Atlanta apartment, and he tried to push Crooks off, but couldn't. "We were there struggling and I reached over and grabbed a screwdriver," Conklin told police, according to court records. "I swung the screwdriver and it stuck into him. He rolled off the bed and I followed him screwdriver in hand." Court records describe the grisly events that occurred next. Conklin said the body was too heavy to carry so he dragged it to a bathtub and attempted to lighten it by draining its blood. Conklin then cut up the body, throwing some parts in trash bags. The rest was stuffed down a garbage disposal. The next day, Conklin, a manager at a McDonald's restaurant, went to a meeting at work and had friends over to his apartment that evening. He was arrested a few days later. An instruction manual was later recovered from Conklin's apartment describing how to slaughter animals in the same manner that Conklin admitted having disposed of Crooks' body. A year before the murder, Conklin was released on parole from prison in Illinois. His record lists convictions for burglary and theft in Princeton, Ill., burglary in Eureka, Ill., and burglary and armed robbery in Joliet, Ill., a Georgia parole board spokeswoman said. (source: Associated Press)
[Deathpenalty]death penalty news --- GEORGIA, IOWA
death penalty news April 8, 2005 GEORGIA: 'Aggravated circumstances' led to death penalty decision - DA seeks capital punishment in slaying of Pendergrass officer Killing a working policeman is such a heinous crime that Piedmont District Attorney Tim Madison decided last week to seek the death penalty for the man accused of killing a Pendergrass officer. Richard Whitaker, 27, of Flowery Branch, faces charges of felony murder, aggravated assault on a peace officer, possession of fire-arms by a convicted felon and five others. Police officer Chris Ruse was shot and killed Dec. 29. Madison filed a notice of intent March 31 with the Jackson County Superior Court that cites three reasons for seeking the toughest possible punishment for Whitaker. "After we reviewed the case and interviewed the witnesses, it appeared there were two occasions of aggravated circumstance, one for murder and the second for murder to avoid a lawful arrest (of Whitaker himself)," Madison said. "To seek the death penalty there has to be at least one and in this case there were two," he said. A third factor in the decision is that Whitaker allegedly committed the crime while out on bond after a conviction for possession of methamphetamine and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony, according to the notice. The trial's next step will be a first appearance hearing followed by an arraignment, which should happen sometime in the next 60 days, Madison said. The other man with Whitaker during the incident, Nolan Leon Chauvin IV, pleaded guilty to lesser charges last month. As part of Chauvin's plea bargain, he has agreed to testify against Whitaker, Madison said. Whitaker and Chauvin are being held in the Jackson County jail without bond. Ruse was 45 at the time of the Dec. 29 shooting, which happened about one mile from the Hall County border on U.S. 129. Authorities said Ruse had attempted to pull over a pickup truck for a traffic violation. (source: The Gainesville Times) IOWA: McKibben Calls for Debate on Death Penalty Currently, conviction on each such offense is punishable by life in prison without parole. Iowa does not have a death penalty. "The toughest punishment we have in Iowa is life without parole," said McKibben. "We simply can't stack up multiple life without parole penalties and have it mean something to these criminals. Clearly, the possibility of life without parole wasn't enough to deter Roger Bentley. We need to have a serious debate in the Legislature about instituting the death penalty for offenders like Bentley." McKibben also called on the Senate to take action on measures proposed earlier this week by Senate Republicans that would target sex offenders. Those proposals include the following: increasing penalties for the offense of lascivious acts with a child, more treatment for offenders while they're incarcerated, requiring mandatory supervision after sex offenders are released from prison, requiring those on the sex offender registry to provide DNA samples and restricting sex offenders from residing within 1,000 feet from schools and day care centers. On Thursday, the Senate Judiciary Committee appointed a bipartisan subcommittee to work on developing legislation aimed toughening Iowa's sex offender laws. McKibben, who was appointed to the committee, said future legislation must include these proposals. The subcommittee will be co-chaired by Sens. Chuck Larson (R-Cedar Rapids) and Bob Dvorsky (D-Coralville). Members on the committee include McKibben, Nancy Boettger (R-Harlan), Wally Horn (D-Cedar Rapids) and Gene Fraise (D-Fort Madison). In addition to the Senate proposals, the legislation developed by the subcommittee could also include items from a sex offender bill approved by the House on Wednesday. "Sex offenders are among the most monstrous criminals in our society and they must be dealt with seriously," said McKibben. "The state needs to ensure its taking every step to protect our children from these sexual predators." (source: Mid Iowa Enterprise)
[Deathpenalty]death penalty news --- GEORGIA
death penalty news March 2, 2005 GEORGIA: Ken Stanford: Witness to an execution I watched the state of Georgia put a man to death Tuesday night. It was the first time I have witnessed an execution in nearly 40 years in this business as a reporter. There were four of us - media witnesses - along with a number of other witnesses, including two who were there on behalf of the condemned, Stephen Anthony Mobley, who had shot and killed a Domino's Pizza store manager in Oakwood in 1991. (Domino's played a prominent role in the Mobley case as it worked its way through the appeals process. Did he or did he not hang a Domino's pizza box in his cell? Did he or did he not tatoo the word Domino's into his body? Did he or did he not made derogatory and/or threatening remarks to prison personnel making reference to Domino's deliverymen while doing so?) Most of those in the room had some official connection to the case as a local and state law enforcement official - such as former Hall County Sheriff Bob Vass who is now on the state Board of Corrections; Hall County D.A. Jason Deal; and the two Hall County sheriff's detectives worked the case. They and ten others of us were seated on three wooden benches; another 15-or-so, all of them with the state prison system - were standing around the walls of the room. The media witnesses were the last to enter the small room and we sat on the last row - with a clear view of Mobley through a glass window in the wall separating the witness room and the execution chamber. He had his head off the gurney and was looking into the room. It was 7:45. He made a final statement, requested a prayer which the prison chaplin delivered preceded by the reading of a brief passage from the Bible. With a light touch to Mobley's left wrist, the chaplin left the room and the warden read the death warrant. As he did so, Mobley raised his head again, looked into the witness room and mouthed the words "Thank you" to one of his friends. It was 7:52. To carry out lethal injections, the state of Georgia uses three drugs. The first puts the condemned to sleep. The second shuts down the respiratory system. The third stops the heart. Resting his head on the gurney, Mobley swallowed , raised his head, looked into the room again, winked at one of his representatives, laid his head back on the gurney. He licked his lips, blinked his eyes and took a deep breath. His eyes then closed and there was no more movement except the rise-and-fall of his chest as he took his last breaths. They were rapid ones. The pace of my breathing increased; my heart rate increased. The witness room was so quiet you could have heard a pin drop - somewhat surreal. The only sound was that of pencil point on notepad as those of us with the media made note of what was happening. No one moved. All eyes were fixed on Mobley. Then he stopping breathing. The seconds ticked by, dragging into minutes - seemingly like an eternity, but not. There was a marked change in the color of his skin - something we had been told to expect at or near the time of death. Then two doctors entered the death chamber. One checked for a heartbeat and looked into his eyes. The second did the same. Then came a nod to the warden - indicating that the execution had been carried out. It was 8:00. The warden formally announced that the execution had been carried out and we were ushered out of the witness room, back into our van, and returned to the media staging area near the entrance to the prison grounds. Shortly afterward, I was headed home up I-75. But, there was one final footnote to the evening: up ahead was a tractor-trailer. As I got closer and prepared to pass, I noticed that it was, irony of ironies --- a Domino's Pizza truck. (source: accesnorthga.com; Ken Stanford is the News Director for WDUN AM 550, SPORTS RADIO 1240 THE TICKET and MAJIC 1029 and is Editor of accessnorthga.com)
[Deathpenalty]death penalty news----GEORGIA
Feb. 23 GEORGIA: Legislators call for moratorium on executions Georgia should place a moratorium on executions until enough safeguards are put in place to make sure the wrong people never get executed, House and Senate lawmakers said Tuesday. During a morning news conference attended by civil rights and religious leaders, Sen. Sam Zamarripa and Rep. Pam Stephenson, both Democrats from Atlanta, said they will push for legislation that halts state executions and creates a capital punishment study commission. "The question is: Are we executing the right people?" Zamarripa said. "This is not a trivial question. This is not a question you can pass over. This is not a question of whether the death penalty is right or wrong." Zamarripa conceded that the 2 resolutions stand a slim chance of passage. This is the 3rd time Stephenson has introduced the legislation. Laura Moye of Amnesty International noted that in recent years, more than 110 people on death row nationwide were found to be wrongly convicted. "No innocent person should ever face the death penalty or be wrongfully executed," she said. "This legislation does not end the death penalty. It simply calls for a timeout." Stephen Mobley, who killed a Domino's Pizza store manager in Hall County in 1991, is scheduled to be the next Georgia inmate to be executed, on March 1. He would be the second person executed in Georgia this year and the 38th in the state since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976. (source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution)
[Deathpenalty]death penalty news-----GEORGIA
Jan. 24 GEORGIAimpending execution Man convicted in 1992 beating faces execution on Tuesday In what would be Georgia's 1st execution of 2005, a man is scheduled to be put to death for killing a teenager during a robbery. The condemned man's lawyer, meanwhile, hopes to win a delay or have the sentence commuted to life in prison. The fate of Timothy Don Carr, 34, could be decided as early as today, when a clemency hearing is held in Atlanta. If the parole board denies clemency or if further appeals fail, Carr will be given a lethal injection at the state prison in Jackson on Tuesday for fatally stabbing and beating 17-year-old Keith Patrick Young in Monroe County on Oct. 8, 1992. In petitions filed Friday, defense lawyer Brian Kammer said Carr should not be executed because his sentence was disproportionate compared with that of his co-defendant and girlfriend Melissa Burgeson, because the prosecutor presented conflicting theories of the crime, and because Carr's jury was unaware that Burgeson received a life sentence or that the state had portrayed Carr as her puppet. The lawyer also argued that Carr's jury was unaware that Burgeson physically took part in the stabbing. Kammer said Burgeson has a history of similar crimes and dominated Carr and that the jury was unaware of mitigating circumstances. Prosecutor Tommy Floyd said the arguments should not prevent the execution from going forward. (source: Associated Press)
[Deathpenalty]death penalty news----GEORGIA
Jan. 7 GEORGIAnew execution date Georgia Department of Corrections James E. Donald, Commissioner Office of Public Affairs Scheree' Lipscomb, Director Contact: Scheree' Lipscomb at 404-656-9772; lipsc...@dcor.state.ga.us For Immediate Release -- Commissioner Sets Execution Date for Monroe County Murderer The Monroe County Superior Court has ordered the execution of convicted murderer Timothy Don Carr, age 34. The Court ordered the Department to carry out the execution between 7:00 p.m. on January 25, 2005 and ending 7 days later at 7:00 p.m. on February 1, 2005. The execution is scheduled to take place at the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison Jackson at 7:00 p.m. on Tuesday, January 25, 2005. Carr was sentenced to death in April 1994 for the 1992 murder of Keith Patrick Young in Monroe County. Carr slit the victims throat, stabbed him numerous times, and bludgeoned him with a baseball bat in the head and face. Carr and 2 co-defendants then stole the victims money and Pontiac Grand Prix. If executed, Carr will be the 14th inmate put to death by lethal injection. (source: Georgia Department of Corrections)
[Deathpenalty]death penalty news-----GEORGIA
About two months ago it was discovered that three White Guards convinced three young White Death Row inmates that they could help them escape if they use their European contacts to pay the guards. Supposedly sneaking the inmates out in plain clothes undetected. The guards even snuck in two way text devices to the inmates. Well of course the caper was foiled before anything could take place. One guard was supposedly arrested and released, the inmates continue to have their priviledges, letting us know it was more so the prison guards involvelment. Georgia still has contact visits and the Death Row family members, continue to do what we are suppose to, never causing any problems, never sneaking in any contriband unlike the guards who sneak in money, drugs and various other things. The Warden at the prison insist though on punishing the families and the Death Row inmates, by asking the Department of Corrections to take away contact visits. They have stopped the Death Row inmates from knitting, crotcheting and using their art to relax them. If they had no family to pick up their possessions the Warden had them destroyed. The inmate mail is being held and even Legal Mail being read and held for days at a time. The DR inmates are only allowed outside on a concrete slab once every three days and so if you don't play basketball, there is nothing to do. There is no air in the visitation room, and the children are not allowed to wear shorts if they are 10 years and older. There is no heat or air in the Death Row dorms. The guys have to pay $5 to see the doctor if they have money on the book. They are charged a $1 a month if they have any money in their accounts. The Christmas boxes they were allowed to get are now down to amost nothing. If Family members such as the elderly have metal pins in their hips etc. and they beep going through the metal detector even though the guards no of the Medical device, they have to be strip searched which usually take 1 hour before they are allowed to visit. One visitor and elderly man was asked to remove his orthopedic stockings, he told the guard he had severe arthritis and needed assistance, they refused to help him get the stockings off and to help him put them back on. Therfore wasting almost two hours and telling the man if he could not get them back on he had to throw the orthopedic stockings that costs a lot of money in the trash. Vending machines are expensive but large families are only allowed $20, a soda, chips and snack is an average $5.00 per person. People with babies can only bring 2 diapers and 2 bottles, no change of clothes for baby. Everytime the prison messes up the families have to suffer, no family member ever assisted in any wrongdoing, it is always staff, yet when priviledges are taken it is from the families. The guys have no media outlets, they have no access to law library which is being done away with I hear. Families can no longer send paper, stamps etc, everything has to be purchased from prison at an inflated price , so if you have no money coming from family, you have basically nothing. Religios meals are being ignored , Muslims, Jews with special dietary needs. Martina Correia Please help us by writing letters to the Warden or faxing letters to the prsin and the Department of Corrections about what is happening. As you know that we are in the South so, you get farther with Sugar than Salt, So we need an appeal to their good side not to atogonize. Thank you for any help on this matter. Legal Mail being Read by Officers Mail being held for days in Mail room Taking away contact visits Taking away craft hobbies NO adequate heat or air ventilation on the Row Traumatizing Elderly family Members who want to visit Strip searching people they know have metal prosthetics Children under 16 not allowed to wear appropriate shorts Not allowed to bring in adequate provisions for Infants and Babies Not allowed to bring in enough money for vending machines Derrick Schofield Warden Georgia Diagnostic & Classification Prison P O Box 3877 Jackson, Ga. 30233 770-504-2000 fax 770-504-2006 Department of Corrections Commisioner James Donald 404-656-6002 fax 404-651-6818
[Deathpenalty]death penalty news----GEORGIA
The petition below is for Troy Anthony Davis who is the brother of this year's NCADP "Outstanding Community Service Award" winner Martina Correia. Dear Friends, I have just read and signed the petition: "SAVE TROY A DAVIS INNOCENT MAN ON DEATH ROW IN GEORGIA" We are trying to reach 1,000 signatures, and we need YOUR HELP! Please help by signing this petition. It takes 30 seconds and will really help. Please follow this link: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/153402169 Once you have signed, help even more, by telling your friends and family to sign as well! Thank you!
[Deathpenalty]death penalty news --- GEORGIA, CALIF.
death penalty news August 5, 2004 GEORGIA: Prosecutors may seek death penalty against woman accused of killing baby The death penalty may be sought against a mother accused of killing her newborn child in March, the Douglas County district attorney said. During a Wednesday status hearing for Kelly Yanez, District Attorney David McDade said the prosecution will decide on whether to seek the death penalty by January, unless the case is resolved before then. Yanez, 21, has been indicted on murder charges in the death of the child, who was found in a trash bag at a garbage dump. Autopsy results indicated the baby died from blunt-force trauma. (source: AP) == CALIFORNIA: Justin Helzer case took heavy toll on jurors - Woman recalls range of emotions endured while arriving at death-penalty decision On most nights, Gwen woke up weeping or screaming in her Concord studio, her head filled with the ugliest of nightmares. Her 9-year-old daughter, Kayla, often climbed into her bed to try to snuggle away the thoughts. But Gwen couldn't tell Kayla what she was going through. She couldn't tell anybody. "Mommy, when are you going to be done?" Kayla would ask. Gwen, a 38-year-old jewelry designer who doesn't want her last name used, is otherwise known as Juror No. 6. She just emerged, bewildered and wounded, from one of the most twisted and grisly court cases in Bay Area history. A dog was fed human flesh, an elderly woman was forced to smoke methamphetamine, and Gwen quietly took notes. The quintuple murder trial of Justin Helzer, 32, ended Tuesday with a Contra Costa County jury holding hands and sobbing while recommending the death penalty, closing a trial that was so wrenching that the judge broke into tears. "I think that was the hardest thing any of us will ever do in life," Gwen said of the jury. "I don't wish this on anybody else." Gwen's account of the four-month trial gives a look at how 10 women and two men worked through emotions from anger to guilt to find that Helzer was sane and that he should die for helping to kill Ivan and Annette Stineman and Selina Bishop, the daughter of bluesman Elvin Bishop. Helzer was sentenced to life in prison without parole for the murders of Jennifer Villarin, Bishop's mother, and her friend James Gamble. Gwen's experience also highlights how the damage inflicted in the summer of 2000 has gone far beyond the victims and their loved ones. Helzer, his 34-year-old brother, Glenn Taylor Helzer, and their roommate, Dawn Godman, 30, formed the cultlike "Children of Thunder." They tried to extort $100,000 from the Stinemans for a self-awareness group they say they believed would hasten Christ's return to Earth. Selina Bishop was used to deposit the money, while the final two victims were killed to cover up the scheme. Glenn Taylor Helzer has pleaded guilty and faces a death penalty hearing, while Godman testified for the prosecution in exchange for a sentence of 38 years to life. Jurors began rounds of deliberation with a prayer. There were crying and hugs. A Mormon juror was quizzed about the faith that the Helzers were raised in. And moments of despair were broken by afternoon chocolate breaks, bits of court humor or a bailiff saying, "Hang in there." In the end, Judge Mary Ann O'Malley called the panel -- which included four alternates -- the best she has seen. And they worked cheap: $15 a day. Gwen didn't imagine where her life was heading when she, along with hundreds of others, received a jury summons in February. She'd been called every year since she was 21, and she was dismissed each time -- with great relief. She was selected and warned about the trial to come, but Gwen said she wasn't prepared for the disturbing narrative laid out on opening statements on April 30. "It was surreal," Gwen said. "Nobody could do that stuff." By the time Godman took the stand, to calmly describe how the trio had declared war on Satan before eviscerating and dismembering the first three victims and dumping them in the delta, the trial had dominated Gwen's life. She had trouble sleeping and eating. She didn't feel safe. And she started to dream about her own family members being killed by the "Children of Thunder" while she watched helplessly. There were other emotions. When Playboy model Keri Mendoza, one of Glenn Taylor Helzer's ex-girlfriends, took the stand and wouldn't give straight answers, "I just wanted to slap her," Gwen said. Finally, Gwen had to make some decisions. On Justin Helzer's sanity, she said she "couldn't buy" the idea that he "caught" insanity from his bipolar brother because he was dependent on him. She also couldn't get past a psychiatrist's testimony -- that "Justin knew general society would condemn what they did." After the death penalty hearing, jurors began deliberations by holding hands and praying. Some wanted a last look at autopsy photos. "By seeing up
[Deathpenalty]death penalty news----GEORGIA
July 19 GEORGIAimpending execution Supreme Court Won't Stop Execution The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday refused to stop the execution of a death row inmate scheduled to die later in the day for kidnapping, raping and murdering his 2-year-old niece. Defense attorneys have argued DNA testing of two newly discovered hairs could prove he is not the killer. Eddie Albert Crawford, 57, faced execution by injection Monday evening after 20 years on death row for the 1983 killing of Leslie Michelle English in Griffin. Crawford claims he blacked out after drinking and doesn't remember what happened. The nation's highest court did not comment on Monday's decision. 3 of the court's more liberal members -- Justices John Paul Stevens, David H. Souter and Ruth Bader Ginsburg -- supported giving Crawford a stay. His attorneys did not immediately return calls on whether they planned any other legal steps. Several defense attorneys are seeking DNA testing of two hairs found on the girl's body and clothing to determine if they belong to Crawford or someone else. The attorneys hoped the courts would find that prisoners have a constitutional right to have such existing evidence tested. The state parole board denied their requests Friday, citing overwhelming evidence against Crawford, including his own comments after he was taken into custody. It was the 1st use of a new Georgia law that allows convicts to request DNA testing to be exonerated. Crawford was linked to the crime by other hair and carpet fibers found on the girl's body, as well as her blood found in his car. Crawford's attorneys had filed appeals with the U.S. Supreme Court over the weekend, as Crawford has exhausted all of his legal options within Georgia, said Spalding County District Attorney Bill McBroom. Crawford was originally set to die last December before the Georgia Supreme Court put his execution on hold pending DNA testing of items taken from the crime scene. But the high court then ruled that even if the items tested positive for someone else's DNA, that wouldn't clear Crawford. State courts have ruled additional DNA testing inadmissible on four occasions because Crawford still would have been found guilty, McBroom said. DNA testing that McBroom independently ordered in 2003 found that blood on Crawford's shirt was similar to that of a sibling of the girl's mother. "Just because you find some hairs out there, you have to show it's connected to the crime," McBroom said. Crawford's attorney at his 1st trial, Tamara Jacobs, said 3 men convicted or accused of child molestation, including some family members, may have had access to the girl that night. Prosecutors argued at trial he sneaked into the house and kidnapped the girl after her mother -- his sister-in-law -- refused to have sex with him. "I'm sorry, but he doesn't deserve to breathe the same air I'm breathing," said Angela Ledford, the girl's cousin. The new hairs will be tested in the coming weeks by the Georgia Innocence Project, even if the execution goes forward, said Aimee Maxwell, the project's executive director. (source: Associated Press)
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news-----GEORGIA-----Execution Alert Update
Eddie Crawford, GA July 19, 7:00 PM Take Action: http://www.demaction.org/dia/organizations/ ncadp/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=83 The state of Georgia is scheduled to execute Eddie Crawford, a white man, July 19 for the 1983 murder of his niece, Leslie Michelle English, in Spalding County. Mr. Crawford is a veteran of the U.S. military, having served in Vietnam. He was scheduled for execution in December 2003, but the execution was stayed as his lawyers pursued avenues to allow for DNA testing. The Supreme Court of Georgia ruled that DNA evidence did not matter, as Mr. Crawford was linked to the crime by hair and carpet fibers. Mr. Crawford's first conviction and sentence was overturned. He was retried and resentenced in 1987. As it was a highly visible case in Spalding County, the defense filed motions for a change in venue. A Georgia judge denied these motions and Mr. Crawford's case was decided by a jury that was comprised of eight jurors who were familiar with the previous trial, five jurors who knew he had been convicted, and three jurors who were aware that he had been previously sentenced to death. Mr. Crawford argues ineffective assistance of counsel, largely because his trial attorney did not receive the funds and assistance he needed. The defense filed numerous motions for an additional attorney, scientific experts, an investigator, a challenge to jury array, a community prejudice survey to support a change in venue, and a medical doctor to present critical mitigation evidence on the brain functioning of alcoholics. Mr. Crawford's defense received a total of $2,000 for these efforts; the first $1,000 allocated only two weeks before the trial began. The defense was unable to retain experts to testify on Mr. Crawford's behalf. The defense unequivocally did not receive enough time or money to adequately prepare. On appeal, the defense hired a psychologist who researched Mr. Crawford's medical history. Mr. Crawford, a victim of childhood abuse, had previously sought medical treatment for his mental illness and his family had tried to commit him to the VA hospital. Mr. Crawford was diagnosed with borderline personality disorder and severe post-traumatic shock disorder stemming from the horrors he witnessed in Vietnam. Mr. Crawford's family testified that he was a broken man upon his return from military service. The defense argues that "his history post-Vietnam is remarkable for intrusive thoughts over death scenes he witnessed, feelings of guilt, dreams, anger, depression, increased alcohol and cannabis use, self-destructive behaviors, inability to sustain employment, three marriages, suicidal ideation, and emotional liability." He became an alcoholic and suffered frequent black-outs. Two members of the jury have submitted affidavits testifying the jury initially voted unanimously for life in prison, but the judge would not give an assurance that Mr.Crawford would not be released on parole. Please contact Gov. Sonny Perdue and urge him to declare a moratorium on executions in light of the mounting evidence that shows indigent defendants are not receiving adequate representation. Please contact the Georgia Board of Pardons and Parole and urge them to commute Mr. Crawford's death sentence to life in prison. (source: Kathleen Jones Communications Assistant National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty 202-543-9577 ext. 14)
[Deathpenalty]death penalty news---GEORGIA
June 30 GEORGIAstay of execution Court Stays Hicks' Execution The Georgia Supreme Court delayed for a day the execution of a convicted rapist who fatally stabbed a woman 9 months after he was released from prison. Robert Karl Hicks, 47, had been scheduled to be given a lethal injection at 7 p.m. Wednesday at the state prison in Jackson for killing 28-year-old Toni Strickland Rivers in 1985. The execution was reset for Thursday at 3 p.m., said court spokesman Rick Diguette. The high court did not issue a reason for the temporary stay, Diguette said. Hicks' request for clemency for Rivers' murder was denied Monday by the state parole board. Hicks stabbed Rivers 8 times with a pocket knife, slit her throat and left her body -- nude from the waist down -- in a field near Griffin, about 35 miles south of Atlanta. Hicks, who did not know the woman, had followed her from a rural grocery where she was using a pay phone, prosecutors said. Hicks had been granted parole the October before the murder after serving less than half of a 15-year sentence for raping a 16-year-old girl. Hicks used an insanity defense at trial -- his doctor said he suffered from a disorder that prevented him from controlling his impulses. In recent days, Hicks claimed he was innocent and that a drug dealer and another man committed the murder. The man who handled the prosecution at trial described Hicks' latest explanation as ridiculous. Hicks was picked up by a sheriff's deputy near the murder scene after his car ran out of gas. A bloody knife later determined to be the murder weapon was found in his pocket. His pants, socks, and car seat were stained with the victim's blood. A pair of women's shorts, sandals and a key ring with the initials "T.R." were found in the car, court records show. The execution would be the 1st in Georgia this year and 35th since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976. ** Georgia Supreme Court stays execution of convicted killer for a day The Georgia Supreme Court delayed for a day the execution of a convicted rapist who fatally stabbed a woman nine months after he was released from prison. Robert Karl Hicks, 47, had been scheduled to be given a lethal injection at 7 p.m. Wednesday at the state prison in Jackson for killing 28-year-old Toni Strickland Rivers in 1985. The execution was reset for Thursday at 3 p.m., said court spokesman Rick Diguette. The high court did not issue a reason for the temporary stay, Diguette said. (source: Associated Press)
