[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, PENN., GA., FLA., LA., OHIO

2018-06-05 Thread Rick Halperin






June 5



TEXASfemale to face death penalty

DA to seek death penalty in Henderson case



Henderson County District Attorney Mark Hall intends to seek the death penalty 
against Sarah Henderson, the woman charged with capital murder in the shootings 
of her 2 young daughters.


"Although the state is making its election at this time not knowing the 
ultimate result of the evaluations, and whether the defendant is found to be 
competent or incompetent and later restored to competency, the state elects to 
seek the death penalty in this case in order to allow the jury that will hear 
the case the opportunity to impose the punishment it deems appropriate, should 
the defendant be found guilt of capital murder," court records show.


Hall filed his election to seek death on Friday. He has said he had a June 1 
deadline to make a decision on the punishment if Henderson is found guilty. A 
hearing was conducted on April 27 after defense attorneys filed a motion for 
examination to determine competency.


Judge Scott McKee of the 392nd Judicial District Court entered an order for 
examination to determine Henderson's competency. Dr. Tom Allen and Dr. Timothy 
Proctor were appointed to examine the defendant.


Henderson, 30, has pleaded not guilty after being indicted in January on 2 
counts of capital murder, attempted murder and assault on a public servant. A 
jury trial has been scheduled for Jan. 28, 2019.


She was arrested on Nov. 2, 2017, at her Payne Springs home. Henderson County 
Sheriff Botie Hillhouse said at the time she had planned the murders of Kaylee 
and Kenlie for a couple of weeks and that she tried to kill her husband, Jacob 
Henderson, before the gun malfunctioned. The girls were 5 and 7.


In a 911 call, Jacob asked for help for his wife before asking a dispatcher to 
"disregard" the call. 3 hours later, he made another 911 call to report that 
his wife had shot the girls in their heads.


"The assault on a public servant arose 2 days later while Henderson was being 
held in the Henderson County jail, where she is accused of striking a detention 
officer while he was attempting to release her from restraint," according to 
reports.


McKee provided prosecutors and defense attorneys Steve Green and John 
Youngblood a restricted and protective order - that is, a gag order.


Henderson remains in the Henderson County jail on $1 million bond each on the 
capital cases and a combined $100,000 bond on the other counts.


(source: Athens Daily Review)

***--female may face death penalty

Details released for Wichita Falls woman charged in capital murder of Abilene 
man




A Wichita Falls woman has been accused of being the 2nd person involved in the 
fatal shooting of an Abilene man last month after police received a Crime 
Stoppers tip and a recorded jail phone call.


Precious Nicole Tillery, 19, has been charged with capital murder. She was in 
the Wichita County Jail Monday morning in lieu of $2 million bail. Eric Glenn 
Lee II, 22, is also facing capital murder.


If found guilty of the capital felony, Tillery and Lee would be sentenced to 
life without parole or the death penalty.


Court documents revealed Tillery was on probation for an aggravated assault 
with a deadly weapon at the time of the shooting.


She had initially been charged with aggravated robbery for the Feb. 28, 2016, 
stabbing of a man in the 400 block of Bailey Street.


In that incident, Tillery claimed he had stole money that belonged to her and 
reportedly dug through his pockets and then took his Oklahoma identification 
card.


She was indicted for aggravated assault on April 21, 2016. She accepted a plea 
deal and was sentenced to 8 years deferred probation after pleading guilty on 
Oct. 26, 2016.


According to the arrest warrant affidavit for the capital murder:

Wichita Falls police were called to the scene of a shooting in the 1000 block 
of Juarez Street around 12:56 a.m. on April 17. A detective was called to the 
scene around 1:25 a.m.


When officers arrived on scene, they found 28-year-old Matthew Liggins in front 
of the address with multiple gunshot wounds to the upper torso.


Liggins was taken to United Regional Health Care System, where he later died 
from his injuries.


A witness told responding officers that she was in the front passenger of 
Liggins' vehicle and identified a possible suspect as Lee.


The witness was taken to the Wichita Falls Police Department by detectives to 
be further interviewed.


At the station, the witness said Liggins had driven them from Abilene to 
Wichita Falls to pick up a friend who had been robbed by Lee earlier in the 
day.


She said they didn't know that the friend had been robbed until after they 
arrived in Wichita Falls.


When they arrived the apartments, the witness said Liggins contacted Lee and 
told him that they were outside.


The witness said Lee and a person with brown and black dreads ??? she thought 
the person might be a 

[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, PENN., GA., FLA., LA., OHIO

2017-04-01 Thread Rick Halperin





April 1



TEXAS:

As execution looms, juror in Hurst Putt-Putt murder hopes to change law


When Sven Berger looked around at the other jurors in the deliberation room 
during a 2008 capital murder trial, he knew that the majority wanted the death 
penalty. He also knew he didn't.


But he voted for it anyway. It's a decision he still regrets, and one he says 
he wouldn't have made if the law had been clearly explained in that Tarrant 
County courtroom.


He'd sat in the courtroom and listened to how Paul Storey, the 22-year-old 
defendant in an ill-fitting suit, and another man had robbed Putt-Putt in Hurst 
and fatally shot the assistant manager, 28-ear-old Jonas Cherry. Berger knew 
Storey was guilty, he said in a recent Texas Tribune interview, but in his gut, 
he didn't believe the man would be a future danger to society, a requirement in 
issuing the death penalty in Texas.


What Berger didn't realize - in part because of the language in the jury 
instructions - was that his vote alone could have blocked the jury from handing 
down a death sentence and given Storey life in prison without the possibility 
of parole.


Thinking that he'd have to convince most of his fellow jurors to spare Storey 
from execution, he didn't fight as the jury deliberated, Berger said. When the 
life-or-death questions went around the table, he answered like everyone else.


Now, with Storey's execution set for April 12, Berger and at least 2 state 
lawmakers are hoping to change jury instructions in death penalty cases.


"The judge instructed us that any vote that would impose a life sentence would 
require a consensus of 10 or more jurors," Berger wrote in a letter to the 
Senate Criminal Justice Committee last week. "With the vast majority of the 
other jurors in the room ... voicing their vote for death, I seriously doubted 
I could persuade 1, let alone 9 other jurors, to vote to incarcerate Mr. Storey 
for the remainder of his life, and I switched my vote."


'I was shocked'

To hand down a death sentence in Texas, the jury's decision must be unanimous. 
If even 1 juror disagrees, the trial automatically results in a sentence of 
life without parole. But the jury instructions don't say that, and, under state 
law, no judge or lawyer can tell jurors that either.


Instead, deliberations in a trial's sentencing phase focus not on death versus 
life, but on 3 specific questions the jury must answer: is the defendant likely 
to be a future danger to society? If the defendant wasn't the actual killer, 
did he or she intend to kill someone or anticipate death? And, if the answer is 
yes to the previous questions, is there any mitigating evidence - like an 
intellectual disability - that the jury thinks warrants the lesser sentence of 
life without parole?


To issue a death sentence, the jury must unanimously answer "yes" to the first 
2 questions and "no" to the last question. But, the instructions state, to 
answer "no" to the first 2 questions or "yes" to the last, 10 or more jurors 
must agree.


What those complicated instructions don't say is that a single juror can 
deadlock the jury on any of the 3 questions, eliminating death as an option and 
triggering an automatic life without parole sentence.


Berger didn't get the distinction.

"I'm appalled that Texas' capital jury instructions misled jurors about the 
implications of their vote, and find it unconscionable that men and women like 
me, with the power of life and death, are told that they must act only as a 
single group, and that their individual voice doesn't matter," Berger wrote in 
his letter.


He's not the only one upset. Democratic Sen. Eddie Lucio, Jr. of Brownsville 
and Rep. Abel Herrero of Robstown filed bills in the Texas Legislature to 
strike the language that says ten or more jurors must agree to answer against 
the death penalty, and also remove a sentence that bars judges or lawyers from 
telling jurors what their votes mean. And Republican Rep. John Smithee, of 
Amarillo, has since signed on to Herrero's bill as a co-author. Senate Bill 
1616 and House Bill 3054 have both been referred to committee.


"I was shocked to learn that the instructions in place actually lie to jurors 
who are tasked with quite literally making a life or death decision," Lucio 
told the Tribune, saying religious advocates first informed him of the current 
jury instructions.


'A guessing game'

The bills might not make much headway in a Republican-dominated legislature 
that tends to avoid anything that could affect the death penalty. Though no 
opposition has come forward yet (neither bill has even been granted a hearing), 
prosecutors would likely fight it if it gained traction.


"In a death penalty case, the jury's job in sentencing is to answer the special 
questions required by the law, not decide the ultimate sentence. This bill 
informs them of the effect of their vote and basically encourages any hold-out 
jurors to try to hang the jury on