May 26 FLORIDA: Court backs man's death sentence The state's highest court has denied a local man's effort to have his death sentence tossed on the grounds that he is mentally retarded. The inmate, Melvin Trotter, 45, who fatally stabbed a 70-year-old woman during a robbery of a convenience store, remains on death row. None of the mental health experts who tested Trotter as an adult found that he met the legal criteria of mental retardation, the Florida Supreme Court said Thursday in a 17-page opinion. Early diagnostic tests taken when Trotter was a teenager in Manatee County schools revealed mental retardation, according to his attorney, Peter J. Cannon. Trotter has a history of learning difficulties. But his disabilities, according to state prosecutors, stem in part because Trotter started school at age 9 and grew up in poverty. (source: The Herald Tribune) CALIFORNIA: Death Penalty, $250 Million Tax Burden The California death penalty has a temporary moratorium since the postpone execution of Michael Morales in February of this year; however, a side of capital punishment most Californians remain completely oblivious to is the tremendous cost to taxpayers. California taxpayers will spend an average of $200 to over $275 million for each prisoner on death row; and most of that cost is related to the high cost of capital trials, housing the death row inmate, the high cost for defense counsel and the tens of millions required to appeal convictions. In a Los Angeles Times article it was estimated that Californians paid an average of a quarter of a billion dollars for each of the 11 executed after 1977. Presently there are over 650 inmates on Californians death row. Recently, Stewart Alexander, the Peace and Freedom Party candidate for Lieutenant Governor, conducted a random survey of 150 adults in Riverside and San Diego County, to determine the awareness of the public regarding an average cost to taxpayers for inmates on death row; the cost for trials, housing, appeals, prosecutors and defense counsel. "I was extremely surprised how unaware most people are regarding how their tax dollars are spent." Of the 150 individuals surveyed, 127 believed the cost could range between $100 thousand to 5 million dollars. None of the participants surveyed thought the cost exceeded $10 million. 7 individuals chose not to participate. Alexander believes the issues concerning capital punishment are much deeper than the cost to the State. Alexander says, "Killing prisoners is big business in California and America. Inmates on death row are the poor and minorities, and for them "Lady Justice" is not blind." The Peace and Freedom Party, and all the 2006 PFP candidates running for public office, are strong opponents to capital punishment and support reforming our prison and criminal justice system. Alexander says, "Angelides, Westly and Schwarzenegger support the death penalty because that support is a popular vote-getter, however it is cloaked under the veil of justice. I reality these 3 politicians are aware that capital punishment is robbing the public of billions of dollars to subsidize a broken down criminal justice system." Capital punishment has not had an impact on reducing violent crimes in California or America which may suggest that prison reform and reforming the criminal justice system may be a better approach to reduce crime in America. For more information, search the Web for Stewart A. Alexander for Lieutenant Governor. (source: The California Chronicle - Mr. Stewart A. Alexander is a Candidate for Lieutenant Governor for the State of California for the upcoming 2006 Election. He is registered with the Peace and Freedom Party with over 80,000 registrants statewide and has received his partys endorsement. Mr. Alexander is also the Executive Director of the African American Civil Liberties Union or A.A.C.L.U.. He is a member of the Peace and Freedom Party Riverside Central Committee, a former political state lobbyist in the Florida State Capitol, a political activist in the State of California, former political talk show host on KTYM Radio in Inglewood, former Vice President of the NAACP Inglewood-South Bay Branch, and former candidate for Mayor of Los Angeles in 1989) ************* Scott Peterson, Juror Are Pen-Pals A juror who sent Scott Peterson to death row says she's been corresponding for nearly a year with the former fertilizer salesman convicted in the murder of his pregnant wife. Richelle Nice told People magazine that she and Peterson have exchanged about 2 dozen letters since August. Nice said she wrote the 1st letter as an exercise suggested by her therapist but didn't intend to mail it. She said she wanted to tell Peterson how the 7-month trial turned her life upside down. She also wanted to know why he killed his wife, Laci. Then she decided to mail it. About a month later, she got a response. "I started shaking and crying and hyperventilating," the 36-year-old told the magazine in an issue hitting newsstands Friday. "I didn't know what to do. I wondered, 'Do I call the police? Do I even want to open it?'" Nice said she was amazed at the tone of the letter. She said Peterson has been polite and charming, often showering her with compliments. He even commented on her choice of a breast cancer awareness stamp. Peterson also seems more concerned about how the trial affected her than himself, she said. "He talked a lot about those autopsy photos and how hard that must have been for the jurors to see," Nice said. He also repeatedly denied killing his wife, she said. In December, Nice suffered a breakdown and was hospitalized in a psychiatric ward, she said. The mother of 4 boys now lives with her own mother. "I remember thinking, 'Dude, you had all the resources in the world, and you can't hold it together any better than that when the chips are down,'" she said. "'When life begins to get a little uncomfortable for you, what do you do? You commit murder?' What a sorry cop-out." ****************** Trial for mom who 'sacrificed' sons----Woman, 23, says God told her to drop small boys into bay A woman accused of killing her 3 young sons by tossing them into frigid San Francisco Bay will stand trial on 3 counts of murder, a judge ruled Thursday. Lashuan Harris, 23, told police and a psychiatrist after the October 19 drownings that God told her to sacrifice her children, according to testimony at her 3-day preliminary hearing. Judge Teri Jackson determined there was enough evidence for Harris to stand trial in the deaths of Treyshun Harris, 6, Taronta Greeley Jr., 2, and Joshoa Greeley, 16 months. "It is a tragedy for all concerned, but I am going to follow the law," Jackson said. Harris has pleaded not guilty to 3 counts of murder. Prosecutors have not said if they will seek the death penalty. Her lawyer claims Harris is a paranoid schizophrenic who was acting under the belief that God wanted her to kill. In her videotaped confession to police, Harris described how she struggled with two of her boys as she stripped them and plunged them from a pier. One of the bodies was recovered, but the others were never found. "As hard as it is to understand the tragic act, I ask that we step back and try to wrap ourselves around the illness ... that caused Lashuan to do these acts," defense lawyer Teresa Caffese said in her closing argument. After the hearing, Harris' friends and family tearfully recounted how the expressionless woman they saw in court bore little resemblance to the well-dressed, caring, capable nurse's assistant they once knew. "I think she needs to go to a hospital to get help," said friend Donella Hodges. "It was not Lashuan who threw those kids into the water." (source for both: Associated Press) ************* Laci killer kept in dark on book by pen-pal juror An ex-juror who wrote pen-pal letters to convicted killer Scott Peterson urging him to confess to the murders of his wife and unborn son is also writing a tell-all book about the trial, the Daily News has learned. But during months of correspondence with the death row inmate, Richelle Nice, 36, never told Peterson she and 6 other jurors were penning "We the Jury," set to be published this fall by Phoenix Books. "Scott had no idea what was going on. She never at any time during the correspondence told Scott she was writing a book," a source close to Peterson told The News yesterday. Nice, whose candy-apple-red hair led reporters to dub her "Strawberry Shortcake" during the trial, shared the letters with People magazine, which features a 5-page spread touting her "most unusual correspondence" in this week's issue. "If he comes clean, I don't think things will change, but it will put a lot of people's minds at ease and at rest," Nice told People. "She insists that, more than anything else, she's writing in hopes he'll eventually confess to the murder of his wife," the magazine reported. She wrote him 17 letters and he sent back eight letters and an Easter card, the magazine said. In his letters, Peterson maintained his innocence but didn't diss the jurors who convicted him. "I am just not an angry person ... I am empathetic to what you went through," he wrote. He frequently mentioned his slain pregnant wife, Laci, 27, and insisted he had looked forward to playing sports with his unborn son, whom the couple planned to name Conner, the magazine said. People's article does not mention Nice's involvement in a book deal, nor does it mention that one of the magazine's own staffers is authoring the jurors' tome. "There were only so many elements we could include" in the story, the magazine said. (source: New York Daily News) MARYLAND: John Allen Muhammad said he'd rest his defense today and may testify. His prospects look dim. With his murder trial entering its final days, John Allen Muhammad's once-confident tone gave way Thursday to frustration and confusion as his witnesses failed to poke holes in the elaborate case put on by prosecutors and the judge refused to extend the deadline to permit him to bring in witnesses from out of state. Muhammad, 45, stood slouching and subdued, a sharp contrast to his behavior earlier in the week when he shouted at prosecutors and belittled his alleged former accomplice Lee Boyd Malvo. He is representing himself in the trial in Montgomery County, where he has been charged with 6 counts of murder stemming from the October 2002 sniper shootings. Muhammad was sentenced to death for a sniper murder in Virginia, and Malvo is serving multiple life sentences without parole for his role in several sniper shootings in that state. Malvo has agreed to plead guilty to the same 6 sniper slayings for which Muhammad is being tried in Maryland. In his opening statement, Muhammad told jurors that he and Malvo were innocent. He said he would complete his defense presentation today and decide whether to call himself as a witness - a risky tactic that would open him to questioning by prosecutors. "He's going to testify and say he didn't do it? And then on cross examination they will make him look like an idiot," said University of Maryland law professor Abraham Dash, who is not involved in the case. Constitutional protections against self-incrimination mean prosecutors cannot call a defendant to the witness stand, but they can question one who chooses to testify. Given how poorly the case has gone for Muhammad, however, it may not matter, Dash said. "He has nothing to lose by testifying. Or anything to gain," he said. Most of the witnesses Muhammad asked court officials to summon never materialized. He missed the deadlines set by presiding Montgomery County Circuit Judge James L. Ryan to submit names of expert witnesses, and he failed to provide enough information for subpoenas of others. Of the eight who have testified to date, 3 said they came to court reluctantly, and one tried to ignore the subpoena but was brought to court by one of Muhammad's standby attorneys. One went so far as to say she hoped jurors would not be swayed by her words. "I'm hoping that my testimony amounts to nothing compared to the other evidence against him," witness Heidi Mansen said outside the courtroom Thursday. She said she believed Muhammad was guilty. Mansen, an architect from Silver Spring, Md., testified that she saw a red car speeding away from the scene of one sniper shooting. Officers determined the car was not involved in the crime. "I felt bad because I pointed out the wrong person," Mansen said. "Just because I saw something doesn't mean that really happened." Witness Robert Metzger of Greenbelt, Md., said he was summoned to court Tuesday but ignored the subpoena until Muhammad lawyer J. Wyndal Gordon came to his home Thursday to take him to the courthouse. He testified that he saw two adult men, one white and one possibly Hispanic, praying on the ground at Benjamin Tasker Middle School in Bowie, Md., three days before student Iran Brown was shot there. "What this has to do with this, I don't know," Metzger said from the witness stand. "That guy killed a lot of people," Metzger said outside the courtroom. "If I had my way, I wouldn't even be here." Muhammad has flubbed his interrogation of police detectives, his questions cut short by a volley of sustained objections. Judge Ryan denied a motion to consider out-of-state witnesses after Muhammad missed several deadlines. Despite frequent whispered conversations with his standby attorneys, Muhammad's efforts to defend himself were hampered by his lack of legal finesse. Ryan sustained objections Thursday from the prosecutors that Muhammad's questions were leading, inappropriate or irrelevant. (source: Los Angeles Times) TENNESSEE----execution date set//volunteer Holton will not oppose execution date The Shelbyville man who killed his 3 sons and a stepdaughter in November 1997 has said he's willing to die for his crimes -- and the Tennessee Supreme Court has set Sept. 19 as his new execution date. Daryl Keith Holton, 45, shot the children in an auto shop where he'd been living. Holton has become the subject of legal sparring between the State Attorney General's office and a state office established to be sure death row inmates have adequate legal counsel. On May 15, Holton filed a response of his own to the Attorney General's office which, on May 10, had requested a new execution date. Holton stated that he "does not oppose the State's motion to reset an execution date," according to a state Supreme Court order issued late Thursday. Holton's statement prompted a flurry of legal filings from attorneys who step forward to defend death row inmates, but Thursday the state Supreme Court ruled. Such efforts for a federal order to stop Holton's execution were preceded by several in state courts, some here in Shelbyville. Post Conviction Defender Donald Dawson has said that Holton shouldn't be executed because he's not competent, evidenced by his refusal to speak with anyone other than his mother. Discussion among state Supreme Court justices indicated a belief that some inmates are willing to accept punishment for their crimes. Holton, 45, divorced his wife, Crystle, in 1993 after she became pregnant by another man. Reconciliation had failed. He concluded that his children's lives were ruined because they'd be raised in a broken home, so he killed them. He planned to go to Rutherford County and kill their mother and himself but realized if he died, he couldn't explain himself, so he surrendered to police in Shelbyville. A June 8, 2005, execution date had been set in Holton's case but it was put on hold nearly one year ago by Senior Judge Don Harris, who presided over Holton's case here on May 16, 2005. In their May 10 request to the Supreme Court for a new execution date, Solicitor General Michael E. Moore and Jennifer L. Smith, associate deputy attorney general, said Dawson's request to Harris was late and wasn't supported by Holton, so that failed, and his request for relief in the federal courts should also fail for the same reasons. (source: Shelbyville Times-Gazette) *********** Sept. 19 execution date set for child-killer Holton----Shelbyville man won't appeal death sentence in 'homicide times 4' The Tennessee Supreme Court yesterday set an execution date of Sept. 19 for Daryl Keith Holton, a Shelbyville man who killed his 3 sons and their sister 9 years ago and has given up his appeals. Holton, 44, made news earlier this month when the state's highest court said lawyers could not go forward with appeals in state court without his permission. After the May 4 ruling, lawyers for the state asked the Supreme Court to reset his execution date. On May 15, Holton filed a motion on his own saying he "does not oppose the state's motion to reset an execution date." The Supreme Court opinion, which addressed Holton and seven-time convicted murderer Paul Dennis Reid, did say that a "next friend," a family member or friend acting in his best interest, could go forward with the appeals for him if Holton is not competent. Death penalty advocates have applauded the Supreme Court's ruling, saying lawyers shouldn't be able to keep the appeals going even when the inmate wants them to stop. Others say that the opinion could allow the mentally ill to be executed because they may not be competent to make the decision to give up the legal battle and may be so isolated that they neither have a friend nor family member to come forward on their behalf. Holton, a Gulf War veteran and mechanic, lined up the four children, ages 13 to 4, and shot them with a semiautomatic rifle before calling police and reporting a "homicide times 4." He had just picked up the children from his ex-wife and told them he was going to take them Christmas shopping. After the slayings, he told police that he killed them to get revenge on his ex-wife because she had not let him see the kids for several months. Their bodies were found stacked together under a tarp in an apartment inside an auto repair shop where Holton worked. (source: The Tennessean) ****************** Lethal-injection flaw lingers The U.S. Supreme Court has refused to hear a Tennessee case about its lethal injection protocol in executions, but that does not settle the issue, and it certainly doesn't bring an end to similar cases. The nation's high court refused, without comment, to accept the case of death-row inmate Abu-Ali Abdur'Rahman. But other cases across the nation will keep the issue alive because of compelling arguments as to whether the method involves an unconstitutional use of cruel and unusual punishment. In fact, another Tennessee death-row inmate, Sedley Alley, is raising the same issue in court appeals. As more is learned about the protocol, the harder it is to defend. When Bradley MacLean, one of Abdur'Rahman's lawyers, said the protocol "is not fit for a dog," he wasn't being flippant; the drug Pavulon used in the protocol is forbidden from use on animals. Increasingly, the lethal-injection protocol is being questioned because of concerns that it only masks pain and suffering. Pavulon, which is used after a drug that is supposed to render the inmate unconscious, is a paralyzing chemical; the third drug actually stops the heart. The legal challenges to the protocol claim that rendering a person unable to move, then injecting him with a painful substance is cruel punishment and therefore unconstitutional. After the court's decision to not consider the case of Abdur'Rahman was announced, state Attorney General Paul Summers said the decision confirmed that the lethal injection protocol isn't cruel and unusual punishment. That isn't true. As MacLean points out, the court said nothing about the merits of the case. Summers' remarks are misleading. The validity of the argument has not diminished. At some point, the Supreme Court will have to deal substantively with lethal injections. When that time comes, the constitutional question cannot be ignored. (source: Opinion, The Tennessean)
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news-----FLA., CALIF., MD., TENN.
Rick Halperin Mon, 29 May 2006 00:44:04 -0500 (Central Daylight Time)
