[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, N.C., FLA., ALA., TENN.
Jan. 7 TEXASfemale may face death penalty 'Drug addict' Texas mom smirks in her mugshot after being charged with stabbing her 5-year-old daughter to death and attacking her father-in-law who tried to stop her A mom appears to be choking back laughter in her mugshot after allegedly mutilating and killing her 5-year-old daughter. Krystle Villanueva, 24, is charged with capital murder for allegedly stabbing her daughter Giovanna Larae Hernandez to death. She could face life in prison or the death penalty. Villanueva is also accused of stabbing her father-in-law, Eustorgio Arellano-Uresti, who tried to stop the attack. Mr Arellano-Uresti says that at 11am January 5 he went to go make lunch at the home in Kyle, a town located 25 minutes from Austin. According to KXAN, he saw Villanueva take a knife to her back bedroom then he heard Giovanna crying out in pain. Mr Arellano-Uresti tried to grab the weapon from Villanueva and she attacked him, stabbing him in the forehead and back. Witnesses then saw Mr Arellano-Uresti leave the home and Villanueva run after him with a shotgun that was not loaded. Police and the SWAT team were called to the scene and found Villanueva washing off in the shower. Giovanna was dead in a bedroom. Neighbors were shocked that such a horror could happen in the quiet Green Pastures subdivision. Toxicology reports are still out, but Villanueva's friends said she suffered from drug addiction. They were also in shock that the mother could commit such a crime. Arellano-Uresti alleged his daughter-in-law used drugs, alcohol and marijuana according to the affidavit. Her sister told officers in 2015 she went to a nearby rehab center for substance abuse. Villanueva's friend Sabrine Sifuentez told the station: 'She went to a rehab. She did a 90-day program and she came out good. She was doing good. She had a job. 'She tried to get help. I don't know if she just relapsed, or I really can't say what happened.' On a live Facebook broadcast by KXAN, Sheriff Gary Cutler said: 'This is one of the worst cases I've ever seen.' 'The suspect has had minor issues with law enforcement in the past, nothing major.' She is also charged with second-degree felony charge of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. In one of the 'About Me' sections on one of her Facebook profiles she says: 'The most important things to me in life is family and succeeding in life but especially my daughter Giovanna La'Rae. I'd do anything in the world for this chick.' Villanueva is being held on a $1.1 million bond at the Hays County Jail. Of the total $800,000 is for capital murder and $300,000 is for aggravated assault. (source: dailymail.co.uk) NORTH CAROLINA: Convicted killer sues, claiming a conspiracy to keep him on death row A convicted killer appeared in New Hanover County court Friday for a hearing related to a lawsuit he filed against several defendants he claims are conspiring to keep him on death row. Shan Carter, 42, is convicted of killing 3 people in 2 separate incidents, including the kidnapping and murder of Donald Brunson on Dec. 6, 1996, and the murders of Tyrone Baker and an innocent bystander, 8-year-old Demetrius Greene, on Feb. 16, 1997. In October 2016, Carter filed the lengthy, handwritten federal lawsuit, naming District Attorney Ben David, Governor Roy Cooper (in his capacity as former Attorney General), and his legal counsel on his appeal of his death sentence among others as defendants. "Between February 18, 1999 to this present date all the defendants at various times between the said dates joined in conspiracies against the plaintiff consisting of a conspiracy to murder the plaintiff by poisonous lethal injection under the color of law in the state of North Carolina's Death Chamber at Central Prison, in Raleigh, NC, malicious communicating threats to murder the plaintiff, kidnapping the plaintiff, tampering with (a civil rights) victim - witness, mail and or wire fraud, aiding and abetting, and circumventing the state criminal procedure that's federally funded," the lawsuit states. In the suit, Carter claims he attempted on at least four occasions to have Cooper investigate his cases because of "trial misconduct," but Cooper refused and "investigated other high-profile, race-based, and political cases." On Wednesday, Johnston County Superior Court Judge Thomas Lock allowed Carter's defense attorneys, William Durham and Kristin Parks, to withdraw from his case, as they could not reasonably defend Carter while attempting to defend themselves. Before the ruling, Lock gave Carter the option to remove Durham and Parks as defendants from the lawsuit, so they could continue to represent him and not delay his appeal by having new attorneys assigned to defend him. He declined. "It's going to take several months, if not more years," David explained. We're ready and have been ready, I've been
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, N.C., FLA., ALA., TENN.
Jan. 3 TEXAS: Brakes applied on death penalty cases The death penalty is rare, even in Texas, where just 7 executions were carried out last year. In some places, it's almost non-existent. In Dallas and Harris Counties, not a single death sentence was handed down last year. This is good news. Executions are costly. Their value in deterring would-be murderers and others from committing their crimes is small. And they are disproportionately carried out against persons of color. Of the 9 men sentenced to death in Dallas or Tarrant Counties since 2012, all are African-American. In Harris County, 15 of the 18 more recent death sentences have been handed down against black defendants, the other three against Latinos. Worst of all, an execution is the outcome of an error-prone system, and one that simply can't be undone once carried out. That insight was at the heart of the ruling 45 years ago in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that the death penalty violated the Constitution. "The penalty of death differs from all other forms of criminal punishment, not in degree but in kind," Justice Potter Stewart wrote in 1 of 5 concurring opinions in Furman v Georgia. "It is unique in its total irrevocability. It is unique in its rejection of rehabilitation of the convict as a basic purpose of criminal justice." 4 years later, the court ruled that with proper attention to racial fairness and other factors, the executions could resume. But ever since, Texas has had a starring role in demonstrating just how naive that second decision was. It's distressing to note that support for the death penalty remains strong in many states, including Texas (though that support is at its lowest level in decades). There is hope in the fact that actual use of the death penalty is fading fast. In the past 5 years, 26 inmates on Texas' death row have been removed. 18 saw their sentences reduced. 7 died in custody. 1 was exonerated and released. Even Texas' famously tough-on-crime Court of Criminal Appeals has grown far more careful when it comes to executions. In the past 2 years, the court has issued 15 stays of execution. In the 3 years before that, it averaged just 1 per year. Nationwide, the use of the death penalty is also at a low. It's encouraging, too, to see Justice Stephen Breyer continue his sometimes-lonely crusade to convince the rest of the court to take up again, as they did in 1972 and 1976, the overall question of whether the Bill of Rights prohibits executions. The penalty is so rare, and so random in its application, it should no longer be tolerated: "Individuals who are executed are not the 'worst of the worst,'" Breyer wrote Dec. 12, "but, rather, are individuals chosen at random, on the basis, perhaps of geography, perhaps of the views of individual prosecutors, or still worse on the basis of race." (source: Editorial, Dallas Morning News) NORTH CAROLINA: Shaniya Davis killer revives death penalty issues. Mario Andrette McNeill won't be the poster boy for getting rid of the death penalty. We can???t think of anyone on death row we'd rather see with a lethal injection in his arm. McNeill is the monster who took 5-year-old Shaniya Davis from her mother in 2009, in return for a $200 drug debt. McNeill raped the little girl and killed her, tossing her body into a remote kudzu patch where deer hunters gut their kills. Shaniya's mother got off easier than she deserved, with a 17-year sentence for 2nd-degree murder. McNeill offered no defense at his trial, saying in 2013 that, "My goal was freedom. I lost my freedom. What does it matter after that?" 3 years later, it appears that staying alive does matter to him. And so does freedom. His lawyers are asking the state Supreme Court to overturn his conviction because his original lawyers were too cooperative with the police. McNeill will get his hearing. All death row prisoners automatically get one. And we'll only hope - along with most North Carolina residents - that he isn't set free. But even though McNeill is the worst imaginable reason for taking the death penalty off the books, his case offers another opportunity to talk about it. Like most other states, North Carolina doesn't have much of an appetite for executions these days. We've got 150 prisoners on death row - including 1 who's been there for 31 years - but haven't executed anyone in more than a decade, owing to a host of legal challenges. It doesn't appear likely there will be any executions in 2017, either. We don't want McNeill to have any chance of regaining his freedom. His horrific crime deserves no mercy. But it's also clear that our society is steadily moving away from the death penalty, as state after state takes capital punishment off its books. There are good reasons for that, starting with the potential for mistakes in identification, investigation and prosecution. And there is the fundamental
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, N.C., FLA., ALA., TENN., OHIO
July 3 TEXAS: Gabriel Hall Trial, Other Death Penalty Cases Delayed Due To DNA Testing Law The capital murder trial of Gabriel Hall starts next month, nearly 4 years after police say he attacked an elderly couple in their home. News 3 takes a look at why death penalty cases in Texas are taking longer to go to trial. Gabriel Hall didn't say a word during a nearly hour long pre-trial hearing Tuesday. He was only 18 when he was arrested in October 2011 for the murder of Edwin Shaar and attack on his wife Linda at their College Station home. The trial was set to start more than a year ago but there are delays due in part because of a 2013 law requiring more DNA testing for death penalty cases. We're looking at in some cases hundreds of items that wouldn't have normally been tested previously, said Brazos County Assistant District Attorney Kara Comte. Comte says the law helps prevent wrongful convictions. That's all done to ensure that we don't have cases that are coming back on appeal to ensure that people get a fair trial and we get it right the 1st time, she said. While Gabriel Hall's defense team has spent $822,000, Marc Hamlin the Brazos County District Clerk tells us the county is out more than $2 million so far, and that's on the conservative side. The State Crime Lab in Austin tells us they have tested all the DNA in his case and DPS admits the backlog has gotten worse because of the law. Dennis Wayne Brown also faced the death penalty until he was found dead in the Brazos County Jail in May. He was accused of killing Noel and Mac Devin. His case had 88 items needing DNA testing. We had been advised by the DPS Lab that it was going to take up to a year to test those items, said Comte. Despite the large price tag, Hamlin says the county is able to afford it. We are very fortunate in Brazos County in one way that we have the tax base that we do to be able to encumber this amount of cost, Hamlin said. The new law is only required for crimes that carry the ultimate punishment. Hall's capital murder trial is expected to start in August. In a separate case convicted capital murderer Christian Olsen will face a new punishment trial to see if he will be re-sentenced to the death penalty. His trial starts in October. DPS officials tell us the average turnaround time for testing DNA evidence is six months. Senate Bill 1292 was co-authored by State Senator Charles Schwertner, (R) District 5 who represents parts of the Brazos Valley. We were unable to reach him for comment Thursday. (source: KBTX news) * So far this year in Texas, number of death sentences = zero Texas continues to execute people in the highest number in the nation. But new death sentences is a different matter. So far this year, not 1 death sentence has been handed down among Texas' 254 counties. That's an astounding statistic considering Texas' history with the death penalty. In 1994, death sentences in Texas reached a high of 49. It has now been more than 6 months since jurors in Texas imposed a new death sentence. The last person sentenced to death was Eric Williams, on December 17, 2014. This is the 1st time in at least 20 years that the state has gone more than 6 months without a new death sentence. And, according to Kathryn Kase at Texas Defender Service, it's also the longest we've gone in a calendar year without a new death sentence. Overall, new death sentences in Texas have declined nearly 80% since 1999. What's going on here? Lots. The Defender Service's executive director, Kathryn Kase, shared some of them with the DMN's Steve Blow in May. Among the reasons: The public knows that the justice system has made awful mistakes in the recent past, and prosecutors know that jurors know this. That means officials aren't going to be gung-ho, like they might have been previously, about taking marginal cases to trial. Plus, it's expensive to try a death-penalty case and litigate the appeals. That's 1 reason less than 1/2 of Texas counties have sent someone to death row since reinstatement in 1976. Also, this is the age of CSI. Jurors may get the idea that prosecutors should be able to present air-tight proof fresh from the lab. Without strong forensics, a DA might be prone to settle for something less. Finally - and this is potentially a big one - 2 Texas prosecutors in the recent past have been disbarred for their conniving in seeking and defending flawed murder convictions. Prosecutorial misconduct has always been a reality, but only recently have prosecutors been forced to pay a price. That will have them think long and hard about cutting ethical and legal corners to get a conviction. (source: Rodger Jones, Dallas Morning News blog) Texas Death Row Continues to Shrink As No Death Sentences Imposed in 1st Half of 2015 Death row in Texas has shrunk from 460 men and women at its peak in 1999 to
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, N.C., FLA., ALA., TENN., ARIZ., CALIF., USA
Dec. 2 TEXASimpending execution Killer Of Texas Corrections Officer Set To Die A Texas prison inmate whose escape 6 years ago left a corrections officer dead is set for execution this week in Huntsville. 43-year-old Jerry Martin has ordered no more appeals filed to try to stop his scheduled lethal injection Tuesday evening. Martin and another inmate, John Falk Jr., broke away from a work detail outside the Wynne Unit prison in Huntsville in 2007, got a gun while struggling with an officer and rammed a stolen pickup truck into 59-year-old Susan Canfield before speeding off. She was on horseback, was thrown from her horse and died of injuries. Both prisoners were back in custody within hours. Martin already was serving 50 years for attempted capital murder. Falk was serving life and is awaiting a retrial on his capital murder charge. (source: Associated Press) NORTH CAROLINA: N.C.'s death penalty: Going, going, good riddance Recently, former President Jimmy Carter called for the abolition of the death penalty based on continued and significant evidence that, just like in 1972, the application of our ultimate punishment is as arbitrary as a lightning strike. North Carolina's recent repeal of the Racial Justice Act was designed to remove an important barrier to the resumption of executions, on hold since 2006. But the state, like the nation, is unlikely to return to the days of greater use of the ultimate punishment. Nor should it. The death penalty has become almost purely symbolic, applied only in extremely rare instances, in just a few places. The majority of death sentences since the modern resumption of the death penalty in 1976 come from only 2 % of U.S. counties. The vast majority of counties, nationwide, have never witnessed an execution. In North Carolina, from 1976 through 2011, over 21,000 homicides occurred. But during that period there were only 43 executions: just 0.2 percent of the number of homicides. Nationally, we often have 15,000 to 20,000 homicides each year, but we consistently execute fewer than 100 people a year. Death is simply not the penalty for murder, and it never has been. When the Supreme Court ruled the application of the death penalty to be unconstitutional in 1972, its focus was on the arbitrary and capricious nature of its application. The decision prompted a massive overhaul of the nation's death penalty system, including innumerable reforms in North Carolina. However, these reforms have not succeeded in making the death penalty's application equitable. Our state has executed 43 individuals for murder since 1976. Collectively, these condemned inmates killed 56 victims. 42 % of people murdered in North Carolina during that time were black men. However, only 1 person has been executed for the crime of killing a black man. (A 2nd was executed for killing 3 individuals, 1 of whom was a black man.) 43 % of the victims of those executed in North Carolina were white women, even though white females represent only 13 % of homicide victims during this period. In our state, people who kill white women are 40 times more likely to be executed than those who kill black men, based on the numbers from 1976 to present. Recent litigation associated with the now-defunct Racial Justice Act demonstrated that blacks were excluded from juries in capital trials at significantly higher rates than whites. The response of the legislature was to rescind the legislation in hopes that executions could resume. But we should recognize that the death penalty has never been used as the punishment for homicide. Rather, it has always been targeted at only a miniscule subset of homicides, in particular those with white victims. The death penalty is also far more costly than the alternative punishment of life without the possibility of parole, and is used so rarely as to render moot any possible deterrent effect. Over 100 individuals, including several in our state, have been exonerated after being sentenced to death. This discovery of innocence has transformed the debate. Further, in North Carolina as in most states, the vast majority of death sentences imposed by the courts are later overturned on appeal. Only about 20 % of those sentenced to death nationwide have been executed. The more likely outcome is that the sentence is later changed to life in prison without parole. Rather than continue this costly and racially charged symbol, we would all be better off with abolition. There is, of course, little chance that our current legislative leaders in Raleigh will move away from their stated enthusiasm for the death penalty. But as more Americans recognize that the system is costly, arbitrary, ineffective, prone to error and biased in terms of the race, class status and gender of the victims, capital punishment will disappear. That trend has already begun. 6 states have abolished the death penalty in the past 6
