March 21
TEXAS----impending execution
Parents of slain Hurst Putt-Putt manager seek to halt killer's executio
The parents of a man slain during a robbery in 2006 in Northeast Tarrant County
have signed an affidavit calling on the state not to execute one of the killers
next month.
Glenn and Judy Cherry, whose son Jonas Cherry was killed at Putt-Putt Golf and
Games in Hurst where he was an assistant manager, wrote a letter to state and
local authorities requesting that Paul Storey's death sentence be commuted to
life without parole.
"Paul Storey's execution will not bring our son back, will not atone for the
loss of our son and will not bring comfort or closure," the affidavit states.
"We are satisfied that Paul Storey remaining in prison until his death will
assure that he cannot murder another innocent person in the community, and with
this outcome we are satisfied and convinced that lawful retribution is
exercised concerning the death of our son."
Cherry's parents, who are opposed to the death penalty, addressed the letter to
Tarrant County District Attorney Sharen Wilson, Gov. Greg Abbott, state
District Judge Robb Catalano and the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles.
Glenn and Judy Cherry said they know how hard it is to lose a child and have no
wish to see Storey's family suffer in a similar way.
"His family did not harm us and are innocent regarding our suffering," the
letter states.
Jonas Cherry begged for his life during the crime, which took place about 8:45
a.m. Oct. 16, 2006. Storey and Mike Porter stood over Jonas Cherry, who
pleaded: "Please! I gave you what you want. Don't hurt me."
They refused and shot him twice in the head and twice in his legs. Cherry, who
was approaching his 1st wedding anniversary, was pronounced dead at the scene.
Storey and Porter were convicted of capital murder, but only Storey got the
death penalty. Porter got life without parole after making a deal with the
Tarrant County district attorney's office.
Storey is scheduled to be executed April 12. On Monday afternoon, Storey's
lawyers continued their efforts to persuade the state to spare his life. During
a hearing, attorneys Mike Ware and Keith Hampton said they plan to file their
client's clemency petition with the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles this
week.
Clemency, or mercy, is something attorneys representing death row clients
routinely ask for but seldom receive. According to the Death Penalty
Information Center, 282 death row inmates nationwide have been granted clemency
for humanitarian reasons since 1976, but only 2 of those inmates were in Texas.
According to documents filed in federal court, Storey's lawyers were never told
that he was just barely functional intellectually. That information has, in
part, led at least 1 juror to change his mind.
Sven Berger, a 36-year-old software engineer now living in Washington state,
voted for the death penalty along with the other 11 jurors at the end of
Storey's trial in 2008. The jury deliberated less than 2 hours before assessing
the death penalty, Berger said.
"There was a definite sense in the room that a decision had already been made,"
Berger said. "Had I known he was mentally impaired there would have been a much
longer conversation about my decision."
Berger, who has signed an affidavit detailing his change of mind, also said
that prosecutors argued during the trial that Cherry's parents wanted the death
penalty to be imposed. Ware recently told him that Cherry's parents wanted
Storey to have a life sentence without parole.
"More than anything else that affected me," Berger said. "If the family of the
deceased did not want the perpetrator executed, that would have been important
for me to know, and I believe it would have been important to the other
jurors."
Christopher Wilkins, who went on a 2-day killing spree in Fort Worth and was
executed on Jan. 11, was the 1st person executed in the United States in 2017.
Berger said he got the impression during testimony that Storey was not very
bright but was not a future danger to society. But he did not feel equipped at
that time to sway other jurors to his way of thinking.
He said he never understood why Storey deserved a death sentence while his
accomplice, Porter, received a life sentence.
"It seemed clear to me that Porter was the leader," Berger said. "It irritated
me that he took the plea deal. It was infuriating to see Porter get life and
Storey get death."
Storey's mother, Marilyn Shankle-Grant, said she spoke to Berger about his
change of heart and forgave him.
"This young man was placed in the position of deciding whether someone was
going to live or die," Shankle-Grant said. "He didn't want to go against the
crowd. There were a whole lot of people who were going one way and he didn't
want to voice his opinion.
"We all have things that we've done in the past that we wish we could have done
differently. I can't hate him for that."
Shankle-Grant called the support that Cherry's parents are giving to the effort
to commute her son's sentence remarkable. Shankle-Grant said she has never
stopped thinking about the Cherry family.
"I'm just so grateful, extremely grateful," Shankle-Grant said. "I think about
how difficult it must have been for her at Christmas and Thanksgiving to have
that empty chair at the table. They must have the heart of Jesus Christ himself
to want to have anything to do with the life of someone who was involved in
taking their own son's life.
Shankle-Grant also said the idea that her son was involved in an act that
caused these parents to lose their son is devastating.
"But Paul is my son," Shankle-Grant said. "As devastating as what he did was,
he's still my son. I still don't want to see him die."
(source: Fort Worth Star Telegram)
*********************
Executions under Greg Abbott, Jan. 21, 2015-present----24
Executions in Texas: Dec. 7, 1982----present-----543
Abbott#--------scheduled execution date-----name------------Tx. #
25---------April 12-----------------Paul Storey-----------543
26---------May 16-------------------Tilon Carter----------544
27---------May 24-------------------Juan Castillo----------545
28---------June 28------------------Steven Long-----------546
29---------July 19-----------------Kosoul Chanthakoummane---547
30---------July 27-----------------Taichin Preyor---------548
(sources: TDCJ & Rick Halperin)
VIRGINIA:
Death penalty possible in brutal killing of Spotsylvania store clerk
A Spotsylvania County man is now facing the possibility of being put to death
if he is convicted of the vicious Dec. 3 slaying of a convenience store clerk.
David Junior Washington, 50, was directly indicted by a Spotsylvania grand jury
Monday on charges of capital murder and robbery. The charges stem from the
death of Saleh Yousef Abukhait at the Sunoco in the 5300 block of Jefferson
Davis Highway in Spotsylvania.
Washington had been charged with 1st-degree murder and had a preliminary
hearing scheduled for next month. But the commonwealth's attorney's office
decided to increase the charge Monday.
Commonwealth's Attorney Travis Bird declined to discuss the decision.
Washington's case has now been sent to circuit court, where a trial date will
be set later. The only possible sentences for a capital murder conviction are
death and life in prison without the possibility of parole.
The entire attack against Abukhait was captured on the store surveillance
cameras. Investigators quickly identified Washington as the suspect after
reviewing the film.
According to the evidence, the suspect entered the store early that morning and
was there at least 10 minutes before the attack began. He appeared to be having
a pleasant conversation with Abukhait.
The attacker suddenly picked up a stick he'd brought into the store and
attacked the clerk behind the counter. Abukhait was struck in the head
repeatedly.
He was attacked again with the stick after it had splintered and later was
struck with hot dog tongs. The attacker then stomped on Abukhait's head before
leaving with beer and money he'd taken from the store.
Another customer entered the store shortly after the slaying. That customer
only got a short distance into the store when he saw blood, but no clerk. The
clerk was behind the counter out of sight.
The man backed out of the store and called the Sheriff's Office. Deputies came
and found the slain Abukhait.
Washington was arrested later that day at the Dunning Mills Inn in
Fredericksburg. He was taken into custody and gave a statement to Spotsylvania
detectives.
(source: The Free Lance-Star)
FLORIDA:
A wrong political argument to change the legal system
The administration of capital punishment in Florida has been at the mercy of
activist judges for so long now that people can be forgiven for forgetting the
Sunshine State actually has the death penalty.
The last death row inmate to fulfill his sentence, Oscar Ray Bolin, was
executed in January 2016 - an atypical time lag under Gov. Rick Scott. Scott
has ordered 23 executions since taking office in January 2011 - or fully 25 %
of the 92 carried out since capital punishment was reintroduced in Florida 38
years ago.
We can thank Ninth Judicial Circuit State Attorney Aramis Ayala, the top
prosecutor for nearby Orange and Osceola counties, for reminding us the death
penalty remains with us. And she did so in an ironic way: by publicly stating
she would never seek the death penalty in any 1st-degree murder case prosecuted
by her office.
"What has become abundantly clear through this process is that while I do have
discretion to pursue death sentences, I have determined that doing so is not in
the best interests of this community or in the best interests of justice,"
Ayala said at a press conference last week. "Florida's death penalty has been
the cause of considerable legal chaos, uncertainty and turmoil."
She cited the cost and length of such cases and capital punishment's
ineffectiveness as a deterrent as part of the reason for her position. But
Ayala, who last year became the 1st black person to be elected state attorney
in Florida, also believes the process is tilted against black defendants.
Her announcement touched off a firestorm, as might be expected.
On one hand, Ayala was showered with praise by civil liberties groups and civil
rights leaders for standing up against a system of punishment that they
maintain is biased toward blacks.
On the other hand, criticism rained down from law enforcement officials,
tough-on-crime types like Attorney General Pam Bondi as well as Gov. Scott, who
stripped Ayala of the Markeith Loyd case. Loyd is accused of murdering his
pregnant girlfriend last December and subsequently killing Orlando police Lt.
Debra Clayton during a manhunt that lasted for a week and spilled over into
Polk County.
Ayala has announced that she will fight her removal from the Loyd case.
The Orlando Sentinel reported recently that Ayala coyly chose not to discuss
her views on the death penalty during last year's Democratic primary, in which
she upset scandal-tarred incumbent State Attorney Jeff Ashton.
While she certainly is entitled to her opinions, it's a shame Ayala, who had
been a public defender for 8 years before being elected as state attorney, was
not candid with voters about her views last year. This is an issue they could,
and should, have adjudicated through the political process.
Ayala foreshadowed her announcement last month during a debate with Ninth
Circuit Public Defender Bob Wesley. She called her office's handling of death
penalty cases "broken," and said she was working on some unspecified reforms.
Oddly, according to news accounts, Wesley challenged Ayala's assertion,
maintaining that the pursuit of death penalty cases in Orlando had been "very,
very rational," and not done "randomly or capriciously."
Another oddity is that Ayala's pronouncement came shortly after Scott signed a
bill requiring juries in death penalty cases to hand down unanimous verdicts in
sentencing convicted killers. That was done after more than a year of judges -
from the U.S. Supreme Court all the way to South Florida trial courts -
repeatedly rejecting Florida's methodology.
The new law, the Legislature's 2nd attempt to appease a U.S. Supreme Court
decision, may not make capital punishment obsolete, but it likely will ensure
that it is exercised far less frequently than Floridians are accustomed to.
Ayala says she has the discretion to pursue the death penalty, and we can agree
to some extent with her assessment of its merits. Bolin, for example, went 30
years after he murdered three Tampa-area women before completing his sentence.
And Floridians certainly have not ceased killing each other since 1979.
Yet Ayala also has a duty to follow the laws of Florida - and the death penalty
remains the law in Florida. After her announcement, Florida's other 19 state
attorneys issued a statement through their professional association saying that
enforcing those laws is "paramount to our oath of office." "The victims'
families of Florida deserve our dedication to implement all the laws of
Florida," the statement said. "That is why the people of Florida have elected
us."
Well said. Ayala's arrogant posturing has done a terrible disservice to the
families of Orlando-area murder victims - whose cases are pending or those in
the future - who disagree with her. Given Loyd's case, it also makes her
condemnation last year of the cop killers in Dallas and Baton Rouge ring
hollow.
If she wants to affect public policy this way, and not abide her oath to
execute our state's laws, she should step aside and work on changing the law
from the inside as a member of the Legislature.
(source: Editorial, The Ledger)
*******************
Florida death penalty fight raises questions about race
Last November, Democrat Aramis Ayala became the 1st Black elected state
attorney in Florida's history when she defeated incumbent Jeff Ashton for the
position.
Within weeks of her election, Markeith Loyd, a young black man, shot and killed
his girlfriend, Sade Dixon, a young black woman. When Orlando Police Lt.
Deborah Clayton, also a young black woman, attempted to apprehend Loyd at a
local Wal-Mart, Loyd allegedly murdered her, too, with an autopsy confirming
that the killing shot having been fired execution style as Clayton was lying on
her back.
Thus began a manhunt that took nearly three weeks before Loyd was taken into
custody, where he now faces 2 counts of 1st degree murder along with a host of
related felony offenses. It is also important to note that a 2nd law
enforcement officer, Orange County Deputy Norman Lewis, a black man, was killed
in a car accident during the Loyd manhunt.
Earlier this week, now State Attorney Ayala took the bold (and rare) step of
announcing that her office would not seek the death penalty against Loyd.
With a nod to the statistical data that proves that since capital punishment
was reinstated by the United States Supreme Court in 1976 that the same is
disproportionately administered according to race, Ayala remained defiant
despite calls from Florida Republican Governor Rick Scott for her to recuse
herself if she could not bring herself to file notice to seek the death
penalty.
When Ayala refused to budge, yesterday, Scott issued an executive order
appointing Ocala State Attorney Brad King to handle the case.
Said Scott: "(Ayala) made it clear that she will not fight for justice and that
is why I am using my executive authority to immediately reassign the case to
State Attorney Brad King...these families deserve a state attorney who will
aggressively prosecute Markeith Loyd to the fullest extent of the law and
justice must be served."
Since Scott's decision, both attorneys and laypersons of all races have weighed
in via social and traditional media about Scott's decision, one whose effect
has caused one of the more unusual unions of people of differing political
ideologies and races who are joined together at this moment either in support
of Scott, or in unison behind SA Ayala.
As a history major during my undergraduate and graduate school days at
Morehouse College and Florida A&M University, as a former prosecutor, and as
the only black attorney in my circuit who is state certified to serve as lead
counsel in death penalty cases, this current controversy has been particularly
intriguing to me.
The historian in me knows full well that Florida, like most of its former
Confederate neighbors, once was a hotbed of lynching and had Loyd killed his
girlfriend and directly or indirectly caused the deaths of two police officers
60 years ago, Loyd never would have seen the inside of a courtroom because a
lynch mob would have murdered him within hours of his apprehension.
The former prosecutor in me knows that as a "minister of justice," as the ABA
and Florida Bar rules require, where defendants meet the requisite aggravating
factors to seek the death penalty, including whether they were prior convicted
felons, whether the defendant caused a great risk to others by his murderous
acts, and whether the murders were heinous, atrocious and cruel or committed in
cold, calculated or premeditated fashion, then said prosecutor should file
notice to seek the death penalty.
Indeed, when I considered a run for State Attorney in my circuit last year, one
of the factors that gave me pause was my personal aversion to the death penalty
and my knowing that if elected, it would be my duty to seek it when the facts
warranted the same.
But the defense attorney in me, the one who has tried numerous murder cases and
who knows the nauseous feeling that all defense lawyers get as we wait to hear
whether the jury has found your client guilty or not guilty, or recommended the
death penalty or life without parole, appreciates SA Ayala's personal dilemma
with the death penalty as applied along racial lines. It is perspicuous that
with all of the individuals that have been cleared by advocacy groups like the
Innocence Project based upon DNA testing results, that there have been innocent
individuals across America who have been executed for crimes that they did not
commit.
But should that reality apply to Loyd, one who boasted about killing cops on
social media amid overwhelming evidence of his guilt?
Should the families of Loyd's victims, or the public writ large, be denied
retribution in the form of capital punishment if that is the overwhelming
desire?
This last part, the public policy implications, vexes me the most in that it
pits conflicting issues within my own historical and legal body of knowledge---
and my core value system. Meaning, does the public outrage at SA Ayala
reticence to enact the death penalty come from the same outrage that used to
fuel lynch mobs several decades ago? Separately, such also compels me to ask
how can those of us who proudly exclaim that #BlackLivesMatter on the one hand,
not give deference to the fact that Loyd's victims King, the unborn child,
Clayton and Lewis were black? Since their lives mattered, would Loyd serving a
life sentence truly recognize that fact, or would lethal injection or the
electric chair be the only methods to square their lost lives?
The irony in this is that the Black Lives Matter movement began in earnest
after George Zimmerman was acquitted of murdering Trayvon Martin by a Sanford,
Florida jury in 2013. A year before his acquittal, Gov. Scott replaced then
Sanford State Attorney Norm Wolfinger with Jacksonville State Attorney Angela
Corey after Wolfinger dragged his feet for almost 50 days before finally
recusing himself. Scott's move back then was applauded by many black lawyers,
civil rights activists and concerned citizens who wanted to ensure that the
highest charges and attendant punishments would be sought against Zimmerman.
Today, Scott is being blasted by some lawyers and activists for meddling in
Ayala's use of discretion not to seek the death penalty. Now the key
distinction is that Wolfinger recused himself while Ayala did not, one that
could lead to a fascinating legal battle where the courts may have to determine
whether Scott illegally overreached by replacing Ayala, or whether her refusal
to follow his dictates allowed him leave to replace her.
Whatever the final decision on this matter, the fact remains that the anecdotal
evidence on social media is clear that politics makes strange bedfellows where
murder, capital punishment and race are concerned.
(source: Chuch Hobbs, thehill.com)
ALABAMA:
Former DA Says Vernon Madison Case is Perfect Example of Flaw in the Judicial
System
Vernon Madison is a name 2 former Mobile prosecutors will never forget.
Madison was sentenced to death for the 1985 murder of Mobile police officer
Julius Schulte. Prosecutors say Shulte was sitting in his car filling out a
report when Madison came up and shot him in the back of the head. Madison was
convicted and sentenced to death, but he never will fulfill his punishment.
"The death penalty has basically become a cruel joke," former District Attorney
Chris Galanos said. "I haven't been the DA for over 30 years, and there are
still cases that are pending adjudication."
Galonos said he thinks it's a flaw in the judicial system that Madison was able
to evade his fate for 31 years due to the lengthy appeals process. Just last
week a judge ruled that Madison is now mentally incompetent for the death
penalty because he no longer remembers the murder or why he's even behind bars
due to dementia-related strokes.
(source: WKRG news)
TENNESSEE:
Supreme Court denies review for death-row inmates claiming intellectual
disability
The US Supreme Court on Mondaydenied the petitions of Pervis Payne, Michael
Sample, and Vincent Sims, 3 Tennessee death-row inmates who argued they should
not be executed due to their intellectual disabilities. In their petition, Sims
and Sample argued that Tennessee failed to retroactively apply the court's
ruling in Hall v. Florida, which prohibited states from relying solely on
intelligence test scores to determine whether a death row inmate is eligible
for execution or not in borderline cases. Payne's petition made the same
argument. The Supreme Court outlawed the execution of those with intellectual
disabilities in 2002.
The death penalty has been a pressing issue across the country. Last month the
Mississippi house approved a bill allowing firing squad executions. Also last
month a judge for the US District Court for the Southern District of Ohio
refused to lift a preliminary injunction that delays executions in Ohio. In
January Judge Michael Merz blocked Ohio's lethal injection protocol by deeming
it unconstitutional under the Eighth Amendment. Also in January the US Supreme
Court refused to consider a challenge to Alabama's death penalty system. In
December a report by the Death Penalty Information Center found that the use of
capital punishment in the US is at a 20-year low.
(source: jurist.org)
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