[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, N.C., GA., ALA., OHIO
Sept. 9 TEXASimpending execution Trottie to die over 1992 murder While many students will be attending classes and going about their daily business tomorrow at Sam Houston State University, three blocks away from campus the Texas Department of Criminal Justice will be carrying out the death penalty against Willie Tryon Trottie, after having served more than 2 decades in prison. A native of Harris County, Trottie, was only 23-years-old when he was convicted in the murders of his former partner Barbara Nell Canada, 24, and her brother Titus C. Canada, 29. After Trottie and Barbara Canada's relationship ended in September 1992, Trottie, who had a restraining order against him, threatened to kill her if she did not return to him by May 1, 1993. 2 days later, in response to Canada's lack of compliance with his request, Trottie kicked down the door to the house where Canada was staying with her mother and other family members and began opening fire with a 9 mm pistol. Reacting quickly, Titus Canada grabbed hold of his own pistol and began firing back at Trottie successfully hitting the perpetrator, before Titus himself became wounded. Trottie then went to the back of the house where he found Barbara Canada in a rear bedroom and proceeded to shoot her 6 more times in the presence of 7 children. Trottie then returned to the living room where Titus Canada was wounded and continued to shoot him execution-style in the back of the head. After driving himself to the hospital in Barbara Canada's car, Trottie was arrested. Tomorrow at 6 p.m. Trottie will face the death penalty for his actions made more than 21 years ago in the Walls Unit of the Texas Prison System. (source: The Houstonian) * Potentially Innocent Texas Man Will Die on Death Row Anyway Max Soffar already knows he's about to die, but it's not because he's on death row. The 58-year-old man has maybe a shot at seeing 2015, but even that is in doubt, due to advanced, inoperable liver cancer. Despite already spending over 3 decades behind bars, Soffar is likely to never see outside the Texas prison he has been held at since his 1st death penalty conviction in 1981. Now, with maybe weeks of life left to him, his lawyers are hoping he can have one last shot at freedom as his lawyers petition for clemency. Soffar was convicted of murder in the early 1980s, but his conviction relied heavily on a recorded confession that Soffar claims was coerced. The tape held just two hours worth of what lawyers say was over 24 hours of interrogation, some of which was believed to be strong-armed and leading, and potentially abusive. "Richard A. Leo, who teaches at the University of San Francisco School of Law and has written several books on police interrogation procedures, analyzed Mr. Soffar's tape and determined that officers in the case used verbal techniques like accusation, forceful pressure, repetition and confrontation," reported the New York Times in 2012. "All of these, Dr. Leo wrote in an affidavit, 'create a risk of eliciting false confessions when misapplied to the innocent.' Mr. Soffar, sleep-deprived and coming down from drug use, was particularly susceptible, Dr. Leo said." Although Soffar's 1st conviction was overturned because a judge felt the lawyer mishandled the case, a retrial still found him guilty, and still based that decision squarely on the taped confession even though a witness prior to the shooting ID'ed a different suspect. Under normal circumstances Soffar could potentially still get off death row with a new appeal, since the state hasn't even set a date for his execution and he isn't even out of his fifties. His terminal diagnosis, however, makes it impossible for that to ever happen in time, which is why his lawyers are arguing for clemency. "The reality is that the federal court process will likely not be completed before Mr. Soffar dies," his lawyers said in the petition, according to the Associated Press. "The exigency of this situation is the driving force behind what Mr. Soffar admits is an unusual request for clemency at this stage of a capital case." The District Attorney's office has already said they plan to turn the request down. Even if Soffar dies of his cancer before the process plays out, Texans see the battle to get him out of jail as a worthy exercise in pushing for fairness and leniency in one of the more virulently pro-death penalty states in the nation. "It's a good bet Soffar doesn't get that relief, and it's a good bet that cancer will take him before appeals are exhausted and the executioner is cleared to proceed in Huntsville," writes the Dallas Morning News editorial team. "Still, the clemency request serves a righteous purpose. It lays out another Texas capital case where the facts consist of many hazy shades of gray. Texans should know the uncomfortable truth about who's cleared to be executed in thei
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, N.C., GA., ALA., OHIO
Oct. 21 TEXASnew death sentence Gonzalez gets death sentence in Sgt. Vann's fatal shooting A jury that began deliberating Monday afternoon in the penalty phase of the trial of Mark Anthony Gonzalez in the death of Bexar County Sheriff's Office Sgt. Kenneth Vann decided on the death penalty for Gonzalez on Tuesday afternoon. The jury last week found Gonzalez guilty of capital murder in Vann's shooting death. Vann's wife Sgt. Yvonne Vann testified she believes Gonzalez was "full of rage" when he shot at her husband more than 40 times on May 28, 2011. Vann was responding to a non-emergency call and was parked at a red light near Loop 410 and Rigsby Avenue when the shooting happened. The jury deliberated for less than an hour before returning the guilty verdict, but deliberations in the penalty phase went on for more than 24 hours across 2 days. Gonzalez did not testify during his trial. He is the 1st person sentenced to death in Bexar County since 2009. (source: KENS news) ** Was this Texas case the strangest death penalty trial ever? When we last told you about James Calvert, his trial in Tyler, Texas was just beginning. Accused of murdering his ex-wife Jelena Sriraman and kidnapping their 4-year-old son Lucas, Calvert had refused to take attorneys and was instead representing himself in court, despite no real legal training. Last week, a jury sentenced him to death by lethal injection - but only after a trial that included a shock belts, screams, and the defendant being dragged through court. Some legal experts believe that the courtroom antics suggest grounds for a successful appeal. Thousands of defendants around the country choose to defend themselves in court - but only a rare few do so during capital murder trials. Calvert's trial is perhaps a case study of what can go wrong for those who do. The 44-year-old defendant had already unnerved Judge Jack Skeen, Jr., in the months leading up to the trial, when he acted out during preliminary hearings. Once, he had to be dragged into the courtroom. He also apparently waived his Fifth Amendment rights before the trial even began. Once the trial began, he led long, rambling questionings of witnesses, filed many, many motions, and objected constantly to the prosecution???s testimony. The trial took a turn for the dramatic on Sept. 15, when Calvert refused to stand up while talking to Judge Skeen. Fed up, the sheriff's department activated Calvert's shock belt - essentially a wearable taser placed on most defendants - sending 50,000 volts of electricity coursing through his body. He writhed in pain and screamed loudly for several seconds. Common trial procedure says that a shock belt should only be used when a defendant poses an immediate security threat. It's not clear whether the jury heard his screams - they were out of the courtroom at the time - although they later heard testimony that he had been shocked. The judge then revoked Calvert's right to self-representation, something he had threatened to do for weeks. 2 new attorneys who had the unenviable task of taking up his defense in the middle of the trial moved for a mistrial, but Skeen denied the motion. The prosecution continued making its case, while the attorneys tried to work with what they had. The closing arguments sound like something out of a Law & Order episode. Here's the description from KLTV: First Assistant District Attorney April Sikes closed for the state in a very emotional, passionate argument for the jury. "I have waited a very, very, very long time to stand here and speak on behalf of Jelena Sriraman and Lucas Calvert," Sikes said. "He tried to silence her," Sikes said as she showed the jury a picture of Jelena and her 2 children. "That's why we're here!!" Recovering from throat surgery, Sikes made her argument with the help of a microphone ... "I'll tell you this - voice or no voice -I got a lot of fight left in me," she said ... She got very emotional at times, even being handed a tissue by the court bailiff to wipe away tears. The jury quickly convicted Calvert of murder. The sentencing phase of the trial focused on how bad an inmate he was, with witnesses from the county jail staff noting that he had been an "uncooperative" inmate who talked back and didn't follow orders. Jason Cassel, one of Calvert's defense attorneys, told me that he had tried to argue that a life sentence made sense because Calvert was only a danger to his ex-wife - and would be unlikely to encounter any more ex-wives while serving a life sentence. But the jury didn't buy it. "Because he represented himself for so long, they got to experience his personality and how he is, and there weren't any signs of remorse," Cassel said. "It just kind of changed how the jury looked at him." Calvert's case was automatically appealed to Texas' highest court after he was sentenced to death. Some experts believe the tr
