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