Oct. 16 TEXAS: The Community Speaks Up: Cheers and Jeers Cheers To the Texas Democratic Party and our local candidates standing on the Texas Democratic platform. Concerning capital punishment, the party platform states: "In order to promote public confidence in the fairness of the Texas criminal justice system, Texas Democrats support the establishment of a Texas Capital Commission to study the Texas death penalty system. During that study, we recommend a temporary moratorium of executions pending actions on the Commissions findings." J.C., Texarkana, Texas (source: Texarkana Gazette) ************************* Couple indicted in child's brutal murder----Dallas pair accused of using many objects to harm, kill 5-year-old A capital murder indictment against a Dallas couple Friday lists a staggering litany of objects that investigators think were used to injure and eventually kill their 5-year-old daughter. The list of objects used as weapons that caused the child's death includes "a wall, and a foot, and a shoe, and a broom, and a belt, and a hand, and a brush, and a screwdriver, and a clothes hanger, and an extension cord, and an object, the exact nature and description of which is unknown." Stepfather Jason Pumphrey and the girl's mother, Hope Pumphrey, were arrested after they brought 5-year-old Amber Hope Pacheco to Children's Medical Center Dallas on Aug. 18. The child had new and old injures, including to her head and fractures to her pelvis, arm and ribs, authorities said. The indictments charge that Amber was beaten, had her hair pulled and her airway blocked and that she was stabbed with a clothes hanger. Ms. Pumphrey, 31, told authorities that she had not sought medical treatment for the girl earlier because she thought that the child was possessed by demons and that no one would believe her. The 5-year-old never regained consciousness after being taken to the hospital and died Sept. 3 after a judge ordered that it was in her best interest to remove her from life-support machines. According to court documents, Ms. Pumphrey told investigators that her husband punched his stepdaughter and whipped her with an extension cord. Mr. Pumphrey, 43, told police that he hit the child and whipped her with a belt. The Pumphreys remain in a Dallas County jail and could not be reached for comment. If convicted of capital murder, the two could face life in prison or the death penalty, though prosecutors have not determined whether they will seek the death penalty in these cases. (source: Dallas Morning News) ****************** Man Found Guilty of Capital Murder A Polk County jury found Donnie Roberts guilty Friday of capital murder. He's accused of killing 44-year-old Vickie Bowen in her Lake Livingston home a year ago. Authorities say 32-year-old Roberts, who was Bowen's boyfriend, confessed to killing her. Roberts says he shot her with a 22-caliber rifle during an argument. He could get the death penalty. It only took jurors a little more than two hours to find Donnie Roberts guilty. Roberts was reportedly married when he moved in with Vickie Bowen. During his trial, he told the jury he wanted to get back with his wife he'd left in Baton Rouge, but she'd refused. Last October, Roberts argued with Vickie at her Lake Livingston home. That's when he pulled out a gun and shot her to death. Just after the murder, Vickie's neighbor Anne Nelson said, "I couldn't sleep. Every time I'd close my eyes, I'd see her." Roberts never denied the shooting. Jurors say that made it hard to listen to some of his testimony. Alternate juror Curtis Myers says, Roberts "Kept pretty much the same demeanor, even (during) his earlier testimony way in the beginning; just not showing a whole lot of emotions." Vickie's family, including her mom and 18-year-old son, sat in on the trial. The family section behind Donnie Roberts remained empty all week. The punishment phase of the trial starts Monday. It's expected to last about a week. (source: KTRE News) CONNECTICUT: Convicted hit man could face federal death sentence A New York man faces a possible federal death sentence after being convicted of acting as a hit man in the slaying of a Hartford street gang leader. Fausto Gonzalez was found guilty Friday by a jury in U.S. District Court of firing 13 shots from a motorcycle into a car carrying Savage Nomads street gang leader Theodore "Teddy" Casiano on May 24,1996. On Tuesday, the jury that convicted him will begin hearing evidence whether Gonzalez, 33, should be executed. Gonzalez would become the 2st Connecticut convict on federal death row in decades. The only other possible sentence is life imprisonment without the possibility of release. In June, Wilfredo Perez, a drug dealer and rival of Casiano's, was convicted of hiring Gonzalez for $6,000 to kill Casiano. He and his brother, Jose Antonio "Tony" Perez, 44, both face life in prison for their roles in the murder. Prosecutor said the killing followed a year of drug turf battles between Perez and Casiano that intensified after Casiano kidnapped a Perez underling and stole a sizable amount of cash and drugs. Casiano then sold some of the drugs at the Hourglass Cafe on Hartford's Park Street, which was Perez's turf and a hangout for the Savage Nomads street gang that Casiano headed, prosecutors said. Casiano's murder was unsolved for years, until federal drug convictions prompted some of the participants to talk in the hope of getting shorter sentences. "I'm glad justice has came through, finally," Casiano's brother, John Cruz, said Friday. "Fausto, there, does deserve the death penalty, when you shoot somebody that many times, in broad daylight." Gonzalez was a motorcycle aficionado who used some of the $6,000 payment for the killing to buy a racing-style motorcycle from a Hartford dealership a few days after the murder, prosecutors argued. (source: Newsday) USA: Teen Executions -- Court should ban death penalty for minors Even death penalty supporters ought to hope that the U.S. Supreme Court ends the barbaric practice of executing murderers who killed when they were 16 or 17. The United States is virtually alone in permitting the execution of minors. Only 6 other nations have allowed it since 1990, and those countries, including Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and China, have practically abandoned using it. Justices have already acknowledged that maturity and mental capacity help determine a legal level of responsibility. They have applied the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment when a killer lacks the ability to understand his or her actions. The high court outlawed executions for those 15 or under when they committed their crimes, and for the mentally retarded. Still, 19 states continue to allow the death penalty for older teenagers. The arguments against the death penalty for adults are persuasive enough. Minorities and the poor make up most death row inmates. DNA technology has shown that a disquieting number of them are innocent. Moreover, because of legal challenges, the death penalty is costly, and no evidence shows that it deters. The case against executing juveniles is even more compelling. Society doesn't extend adult rights to 16- and 17-year-olds because it believes they do not possess the same maturity and judgment. Nor should they, generally, suffer the same consequences. That doesn't mean minors should not be punished, but the most severe sanction possible for adults is not appropriate for juveniles. The Supreme Court can bring the nation in line with its own Constitution -- and all standards of decency -- by outlawing the execution of children. (source: Detroit Free Press) LOUISIANA: Derrick Todd Lee juror says death penalty was 'necessary' The 12 people who found serial killings suspect Derrick Todd Lee guilty of 1st-degree murder, then sent him to death row, found Lee's defense weak and were unconvinced by his claims of being mentally retarded, the jurors said. Lee was sentenced to death Thursday for the killing of Charlotte Murray Pace. Juror Lucy Fresina said she and the others on the panel considered the sentence necessary, so the victim's family members could feel at peace. "When you have 12 people who look at the evidence every day, I think everyone's mind was made up," said Fresina, an assistant property manager. "It was a necessary decision for us to try to bring peace to those families. It was absolutely necessary to completely remove this man from society." The murder conviction was Lee's second. Lee, 35, already received a life sentence in August in the 2nd-degree murder of Geralyn DeSoto in neighboring West Baton Rouge Parish. Lee is accused of killing 5 more women. It is unclear whether prosecutors will pursue the other trials now that Lee sits on death row at the state penitentiary. Ena Lynch, another juror, said the DNA evidence against Lee was the most convincing argument - partly because prosecutors used it to link Lee to five murders. "It appeared this was almost a habitual situation - someone who showed no remorse," Lynch said. Lynch said she didn't understand how Lee could sit in court laughing when "there was absolutely nothing funny going on." She said he appeared to be "a smug and arrogant individual." Before jurors began deliberations, they tried to begin on a peaceful note. They shared a moment of silence. They then asked to see evidence pertaining to Lee's alleged mental retardation. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that mentally retarded defendants cannot be given death sentences. "Nobody believed he was mentally retarded," Lynch said. But that didn't make the decision any easier, Fresina said. Fresina said she has been having nightmares about the case and nightmares about being murdered. As she sat Thursday with other jurors about to sentence Lee to death, Fresina said she was nervous, her heart racing. They voted 12-0 on the 1st try. Then they sat looking at each other in silence. "It was a very, very quiet group," Lynch said. "Here we had been talking, and we were done, and all of us knew we were done. And then nobody said anything." (source: Associated Press) NEW YORK: Cuomo, others, look to stall death penalty restoration Like his father before him, Andrew Cuomo is working to forestall an effort to restore the death penalty in New York. Annually, during his 12-year tenure as governor, Democrat Mario Cuomo successfully vetoed legislation to bring the death penalty back to New York. The last execution in the state was in 1963. After that, the death penalty law in New York was gradually chipped away by state courts. Republican George Pataki ousted the elder Cuomo from the governor's mansion in 1994, in large part, because of a pledge to bring the death penalty back. In 1995, Pataki signed legislation authorizing executions once again in New York. The new law replaced the electric chair with lethal injection. Since the law took effect, 7 men have been sentenced to death in New York, but none executed. In 3 rulings, the state's top court, the Court of Appeals, gradually eroded the new law. In June, the court effectively eliminated the death penalty when it ruled some jurors might be coerced into voting for death when they really didn't want to because of the thought that otherwise the killer might someday be granted parole. In August, the Republican-led state Senate approved a Pataki-backed bill that would have specifically made life-without-parole sentences the alternative when juries rejected the death penalty. The measure would have also allowed juries to sentence a killer to life with the possibility of parole. But the Democratic-led state Assembly refused to go along. Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, a Manhattan Democrat, said he wanted more time to study the issue. Silver is a death penalty supporter but the legislation is not popular with many other Democrats in his chamber. In 1995, Democrats in the Assembly voted 52-41 against the measure and it passed only with Republican votes. At the moment, Silver is being particularly careful not to antagonize members of his majority. He survived a coup attempt in 2000 by his then-majority leader and there has been speculation in recent months that some Democrats would again like to try to bring Silver down. Earlier this month, Andrew Cuomo took to the steps of City Hall in Manhattan with a host of others to announce formation of a coalition calling for a moratorium on legislation to restore the death penalty until a thorough analysis is completed. The younger Cuomo, a former federal housing secretary who ran unsuccessfully for the Democratic nomination for governor in 2002, noted that the coalition was not made up entirely of death penalty opponents. He cited the New York City Bar Association as one member that "could accept a fair death penalty bill." A major thrust of the coalition is to convince Silver and other Assembly Democrats to not be quickly swayed into adopting a new death penalty measure. "Stop the quick fix," is the message, according to the former governor's elder son. Besides Cuomo and the city's bar association, the coalition includes New York City Council Speaker Gifford Miller, hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons and the state Medical Society, among others. The coalition's efforts come as the Legislature is under fire from various groups for its inability to get things done. A recent study named New York's Legislature as the most dysfunctional in America. >From his standpoint, Andrew Cuomo said that's not always bad thing. "We are in favor of governmental dysfunction in Albany sometimes," he quipped. "This is probably the only place where Albany's dysfunction is a good thing." Cuomo is eyeing a possible run for state attorney general in 2006 should the Democratic incumbent, Eliot Spitzer, run for governor as expected. Unlike Cuomo, Spitzer is a death penalty supporter. (source: Newsday) ****************** Trial by Actors: Judging 'Twelve Angry Men' 'TWELVE ANGRY MEN' Roundabout Theater Company, American Airlines Theater -- In previews; opens Oct. 28; performances through Doc. 19. For the 1st week and a half of rehearsals for "Twelve Angry Men," which opens on Broadway on Oct. 28, the actors did not work on their lines. Instead, they sat around the big table that dominates the set, and they argued. Was the defendant in the play, a teenager accused of killing his father with a switchblade, guilty? They sifted the evidence described in the script. They considered the credibility of the witnesses. They made a big chart and stuck it on the wall. On it, they organized the facts chronologically and by witness, and they wrote down everything they knew about the defendant, his father and the lawyers in the case. When the discussion grew heated, they invoked O. J. Simpson. They acted, that is to say, as a jury. The actors were a little nervous, the director, Scott Ellis, said in an interview last month at a Times Square rehearsal hall. They were worried that they would solve the puzzle of the play, that it would collapse under their analysis. To work, "Twelve Angry Men" must be, after all, an intricate and finely calibrated mechanism that finds the line not between guilt and innocence but between guilt and reasonable doubt. The exercise would thus have been counterproductive if the actors determined that the defendant, a 16-year-old boy facing the death penalty, was definitely guilty. Or surely innocent. Weeks later, a reporter asked the assembled cast to step out of character and raise their hands to vote. 4 actors thought the defendant was categorically innocent. 3 thought him quite likely guilty. The rest were just where the play's author, Reginald Rose, wanted them to be: in a sort of existential equipoise, in a state of doubt. "Twelve Angry Men" is 50 years old, and it is studded with legal and social anachronisms. A jury today would not be all male or all white. Its members would probably not wear suits, and they would not be allowed to smoke. In most states, including New York, where the play is set, there is now no capital punishment for those under 18. Sentencing in capital cases is now the subject of a separate hearing, and the death penalty is never mandatory. In the play, conviction means death. And yet despite all this, the play remains fresh, engaging and powerful, not in spite of the stirring little civics lesson at its core but because of it. Indeed, the play anticipates many of the debates that have emerged in recent years about the death penalty and the possibility of wrongful convictions. As a method of sensible, predictable or efficient decision-making, the jury system is decidedly odd. Twelve strangers are literally locked in a room and instructed to come out when they have made an important decision - unanimously. They are told almost nothing about how to go about this, and what little they are told is incomprehensible legal jargon. The concept of reasonable doubt itself, which is central to both the play and to criminal law, for instance, "defies easy explication," according to the United States Supreme Court. Yet judges try to explain it anyway, using varied and uniformly unhelpful definitions. Sometimes the Supreme Court later approves of these definitions, sometimes not. It is O.K., the court has ruled, to tell jurors that reasonable doubt is not "some possible or imaginary doubt." But it offends the Constitution, the court has said, to tell them that it "must be such doubt as would give rise to a grave uncertainty." The 1957 film version of "Twelve Angry Men" taught audiences, and potential future jurors, about the value of arguments and evidence and collaboration and time. It has doubtless steeled the spines of countless holdouts, and they have probably held out long enough to change some minds and to free some people who might otherwise have been convicted. Yet legal experts and studies say that the play is in fundamental ways quite unrealistic. A jury split 11-to-1 at the outset does not stay split very long, they say: the holdout folds. And the play's suggestion that the jurors contribute equally does not hold up either: 3 or 4 people tend to dominate. Reginald Rose, who died in 2002, wrote other versions of "Twelve Angry Men" over the years. There was a one-hour TV drama for "CBS Studio One" in 1954; the indelible Sidney Lumet film, which was nominated for an Academy Award for best screenplay and best picture; differing stage versions in 1964 and 1996; and, in 1997, a Showtime remake using a racially mixed but still all-male cast. This is the play's Broadway premiere. The defendant in the film was 18. He is 16 in the most recent version of the play, a timely fact, for the United States Supreme Court has just heard arguments about whether it is constitutional to execute people who were 16 or 17 at the time they committed their crimes. The play anticipates other legal developments, too. The jurors consider, for instance, the defendant's background. "This boy's been kicked around all his life," says Juror No. 8 (Henry Fonda in the movie, though a less saintly, more earthy Boyd Gaines here). "You know, living in a slum, his mother dead since he was 9. That's not a very good head start." These days, a defendant's troubled background is known as "mitigation evidence," and the sentencing phase of a capital trial is largely devoted to considering it. The jurors are also sensibly skeptical of eyewitness testimony, which has since been proved to be surprisingly unreliable. In cases where DNA evidence has categorically demonstrated innocence, mistaken eyewitness testimony often played a role in an initial conviction. "You can't send someone off to die on evidence like that," Juror No. 2 (Kevin Geer) wisely says of the testimony of a woman who claims to have seen the murder, from a distance, through a passing elevated train, possibly without her glasses. The jury also takes the measure of the defendant's unenthusiastic if not incompetent lawyer. Juror No. 8 explains that the lawyer was appointed by the court. "It could mean a lot of things," he says. "It could mean he didn't want the case. It could mean he resented being appointed. It's the kind of case that brings him nothing. No money. No glory. Not even much of a chance of winning. It's not a very promising situation for a young lawyer." That, too, may have changed. "If you're truly innocent," Alex Kozinski, a federal appeals court judge in California, told an interviewer for Litigation magazine recently, "the best thing that could happen to you is to be tried for capital murder because you get government-paid lawyers, investigative teams, psychiatrists - the resources you get to mount a defense become vastly greater. My concern is that we've got two million people in prison losing parts of their lives, some of whom I'm sure are innocent." At the broadest level, the play's concern with the possibility of wrongful conviction is mirrored in the recent conduct of capital jurors. The number of death sentences in the last few years has fallen off a cliff. There were 143 last year, versus an average of 290 in the 1990's. The murder rate does not explain the change. Nor does the number of capital cases brought, or the number of capital convictions. Rather, jurors seem to be struggling with an exquisite increment of doubt. Having found the defendant guilty of a terrible murder, necessarily by accepting evidence of his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, they stop short of the death penalty, opting for life without parole. They are moved, experts in capital punishment say, by scores of death row exonerations and the troubling questions they raise. "There is a new gunshyness to being involved in imposing a death sentence," said Lawrence C. Marshall, the legal director of the Center on Wrongful Convictions at the Northwestern University School of Law. "It really becomes a study in fallibility and humility that allows juries to convict people but convinces juries to spare their lives." Juror No. 8 said something similar in the play. "We're just gambling on probabilities," he says. "We may be wrong. We may be trying to return a guilty man to the community. No one can really know." (source: New York Times)
