Aug. 23
OHIO:
Jury in death penalty case seated
The jury that could decide whether Anthony Stargell Jr. is guilty and whether
he faces the death penalty was selected Friday in Montgomery County Common
Pleas Court.
Court officials said opening statements in the capital murder case are to begin
Monday after the jury views locations that will be discussed during the trial.
The trial may last 3 more weeks if Stargell is found guilty and the trial
enters a 2nd phase to determine if capital punishment is appropriate.
Judge Gregory Singer, at about 6:30 p.m. Friday, seated the 12-member jury and
4 alternates for the trial of Stargell, who is accused of aggravated murder in
the slaying of Dayton businessman Tommy Nickles and his dog in 2012.
The jury of 7 men and 5 women includes 2 black women, according to court
officials. Of the 4 alternates, there are 2 men and 2 women.
Prosecutors say the evidence will show that Stargell, 23, of Dayton, shot and
killed Nickles and his golden retriever Rusty during an apparent robbery
attempt on April 2, 2012, at Quality One Electric, 838 S. Main St. in Dayton.
Stargell also is accused of setting fire to the business, grand theft auto and
taking surveillance equipment, among 22 total counts.
1 of 3 of defense attorneys, Dennis Lieberman, has said his client should not
be facing the death penalty. Prosecutors are using Rusty's death during the
alleged crimes to unduly prejudice jurors, Lieberman said before Singer issued
a gag order in the case.
Stargell is just the 4th defendant since 2001 to face a capital murder trial
jury in Montgomery County, according to the Montgomery County Prosecutor???s
Office.
The rare death-penalty jury selection process began Monday with four panels of
nearly 60 people per group being questioned by Singer. The field was narrowed
after prospective jurors' views on the the death penalty were discussed before
attorneys asked questions.
Before the docket was removed from public view, defense attorneys renewed
several motions. 2 sought to move the trial from Montgomery County because of
excessive pretrial publicity and to remove the cruelty to animals count. Singer
denied both motions.
(source: Dayton Daily News)
********************
Judge denies mistrial request for East Price Hill fatal stabbing
case----Suspect facing death penalty for robbery, stabbing
In Cincinnati, the judge has denied the request for a mistrial for the
Tri-State man facing the death penalty in the East Price Hill fatal stabbing
case.
It's been almost 2 years since a 79-year-old man was killed in East Price Hill.
On Monday, the family of John Lauck will take the next steps to justice.
Daniel Davis is accused of stabbing John Lauck, 79, to death inside his East
Price Hill home 2 years ago.
Lauck's relatives said Davis was hired by Lauck to paint his home. Davis tried
to rob Lauck and wound up stabbing him to death when the robbery went bad,
according to authorities.
Court officials said opening statements were expected to being Friday morning,
but the judge postponed the case until Monday.
(source: WLWT news)
COLORADO:
Mass Murder Defense Wants Fingerprint Experts Excluded
Attorneys for accused mass murderer James Holmes asked that testimony from
fingerprint experts be excluded at trial because their data could be
unreliable.
Holmes, 26, is accused of killing 12 people and injuring dozens during a
midnight showing of a Batman movie in an Aurora theater.
Prosecutors indicated they will seek the death penalty.
His attorneys filed a motion to exclude fingerprinting testimony in June 2013.
They claim that fingerprint evidence is unreliable because "there are no known
error rates for either the techniques used in performing fingerprint analysis
or the labs and techniques conducting the testing."
They also claim in the motion that "there are documented instances of erroneous
fingerprint identification."
Arapahoe County Judge Carlos Samour granted a hearing on the matter, which is
set for Monday.
This is not the 1st time the court has held hearings on excluding expert
testimony from Holmes' trial.
2 hearings in July centered on whether to exclude testimony from ballistics and
chemical experts.
Samour denied both motions.
The trial is expected to start Dec. 6.
(source: Courthouse News)
************************
Tonight: Diann Kissell, Daughter of Executed Killer, on Trauma and Healing
Growing up in northwest Denver, Diann Kissell carried a terrible secret inside
for more than 1/2 of her first 13 years. Her father, an insurance salesman and
the patriarch of a proud Latino family, had singled her out among his 10
children for furtive and persistent sexual abuse. His demands became
increasingly incessant and unbearable, until one day in 1963, when one of
Diann's sisters intervened and threatened to call the police.
That night Kissell's father tried to cover his crime by obliterating his entire
family. He beat his pregnant wife to death with a poker. He stabbed his
11-month-old baby daughter, strangled a 4-year-old son, bludgeoned a 6-year-old
son. Then, apparently consumed with remorse, he stopped and called the police.
Kissell's self-published memoir, A Turquoise Life: One Woman's Triumphant
Journey, written with the aid of psychotherapist Kathy Bird, doesn't mention
her father's last name; some of her siblings weren't pleased that she was
writing about the family's tragic past at all. But to anyone who's lived in
Colorado a few decades, the story is instantly recognizable as a case that made
grim headlines and led to the state's final use of the gas chamber that now
stands in Canon City's prison museum. Kissell's father, Luis Monge, went into
that chamber in 1967 - the last person in the country to be executed before a
U.S. Supreme Court decision suspended all death sentences, a hiatus that didn't
end until Gary Gilmore faced a firing squad in Utah a decade later.
Kissell's book isn't primarily a true-crime story. It's the tale of someone who
went from being a confused and guilt-ridden abuse victim to an out-of-control
teen and angry young woman involved in destructive relationships before finding
ways to confront her past and heal. "My father is part of the story, but the
main focus is to let people know you can survive anything and still have a good
life," Kissell says. "I'm getting letters every day from people saying it's
helped them."
Kissell's own journey included a wildly dysfunctional marriage (she's now
happily married to someone else), an appearance on "Oprah," and gradually
coming to terms with her long-suppressed rage over what her father did to her,
her mother and her siblings. It was while speaking out on trauma that she came
to know Bird, and a partnership was forged that would lead to the book.
Before Monge's execution, his surviving children visited him several times in
prison - a turn of events that struck some observers as bizarre. But Kissell
says that was part of her upbringing in a strongly Catholic family. It was
Monge, not his kids, who kept pressing for his own execution, even requesting
to be hanged at high noon on the steps of Denver's City and County Building.
"For him, it was the chicken's way out," Kissell says now. "He never had to
deal with the anger of his children. He died with the love of his children
intact."
She admits to having mixed feelings about the death penalty to this day. "I
never wanted my father to die, but I never wanted him to be around my
children," she says. "It's made my life easier that he isn't around."
Her book has a powerful message for social workers, police and others about the
long-term consequences for abuse victims, she adds: "You think if you take them
out of the house, everything's okay. But if you've been given a message that
you're worthless your whole life, you're going to keep on self-destructing
until you get some real help...I have an incredibly wonderful life these days."
Kissell and Bird will discuss A Turquoise Life at a launch party at 6 p.m. this
evening at Heartfire Books of Evergreen, in the Bergen Village Shopping Center,
1254 Bergen Parkway. Call 303-670-4549 for more information.
(source: westword.com)
ARIZONA:
Judge Grants Arias' Request to Delay Upcoming Death Penalty Trial
The penalty phase to determine whether convicted killer Jodi Arias will face
life in prison or the death has been postponed.
Back in May 2013, Arias was found guilty of the 1st-degree murder of her
ex-boyfriend Travis Alexander, who was killed in his Phoenix home in 2008.
According to medical examiners, Arias stabbed him 27 times, primarily in the
back, torso and heart. She also slit Alexander's throat from ear to ear, nearly
decapitating him, and shot him in the face before she dragged his bloodied
corpse to the shower.
Although Arias was convicted of murder, the jurors failed to reach a unanimous
decision on her sentencing. As a result, her retrial will begin next month to
determine whether or not she should be sentenced to death, life in prison or
life with a chance of release after serving 25 years, Reuters reported.
Arias' retrial was originally set for Sept. 8, however on Wednesday Maricopa
County Superior Court Judge Sherry Stephens granted Arias her request to delay
it, pushing back the start of jury selection to Sept. 29, said a court
spokeswoman, according to Reuters.
Arias, who has decided to act as her own attorney in the upcoming trial,
petitioned the court to postpone the retrial because she said she ran into
obstacles while trying to interview an expert witness from her prison cell.
Earlier this week, Judge Stephens denied Arias' defense attorney, Kirk Nurmi,
his request to resign from her death penalty trial.
Nurmi, who has made several motions to drop Arias due to their ongoing tension,
filed a recent motion asking the judge to let him resign from the case since
Arias will be her own legal rep, while he was assigned to be her legal advisor.
He also cited his original attempt to withdraw and Arias' repeated efforts to
have him fired.
However, on Monday, Judge Stephen decided not to let Nurmi withdraw from the
case.
According to the Associated Press, a hearing in the case is scheduled for Sept.
4.
(source: latinpost.com)
CALIFORNIA:
Supreme Court Upholds Death Sentence for Throat-Slashing Killer----Limitations
on Evidence Implicating Original Suspect Not Prejudicial, Justices Rule
The California Supreme Court yesterday upheld the death sentence for a man
convicted of three murders in a case in which it took 5 months to seat a jury,
56 days of testimony before the jury got to deliberate, and seven days of
deliberation to reach a partial verdict.
San Diego Superior Court Judge Laura Palmer Hammes sentenced David Allen Lucas
of Spring Valley to death in 1989 for the murders of Suzanne Jacobs, her
3-year-old son Collin, and Anne Catherine Swanke. Jurors acquitted him of one
murder, deadlocked 11-1 for conviction on two others, and convicted him of one
count of attempted murder.
All of the victims had their throats cut, but Jody Santiago Robertson survived
and identified Lucas as her attacker. The crimes occurred between 1979 and
1984.
Impaired Memory Claimed
Defense attorneys challenged Robertson, saying her memory was impaired by
trauma. They attacked the prosecution???s use of serological evidence and
sought to convince jurors that another man was responsible for the crimes.
That man, a Kentucky drifter named John Massingale, was arrested for the 1979
Jacobs murders and was still in custody when Lucas was arrested in 1984 and
charged with the later crimes. Massingale confessed, but later recanted, saying
that he said what the police wanted him to in order to avoid the death penalty
and that his confession only matched the physical details of the murders
because the police showed him many photos of the interior of the victims'
house.
Police and prosecutors ultimately became persuaded, based on physical evidence,
that it was Lucas and not Massingale who committed the Jacobs murders.
Massingale was released after several years in custody, received a declaration
of factual innocence, filed suit for wrongful arrest, and was called as a
witness at Lucas' trial to bolster the claim that he had been mistakenly
charged and that Lucas had committed all of the murders.
The Jacobs killings occurred in 1979 in the Normal Heights section. Evidence
used to tie Lucas to the crimes included a bloodstained note, containing the
name and phone number of a local insurance brokerage from which Lucas obtained
a policy around the time of the murders.
Massingale testified that he was essentially illiterate.
Lucas was acquitted in the death of Gayle Roberta Garcia, a realtor who was
found with her throat slashed in a vacant Spring Valley house in 1981.
The Robertson attack occurred in June 1984 in El Cajon. Rhonda Strang, 24, and
Amber Fisher, 3, were killed in October 1984, a month before the body of the
last victim, Swanke, was found on a Spring Valley hillside.
Strang, whose brother was a friend and employee of Lucas, was baby-sitting the
child when the crimes occurred. Strang's husband was a drug dealer - there was
evidence Lucas was a customer - and the defense suggested he may have killed
his wife and Amber after learning that she was cooperating with a police
investigation of his activities.
Conflict of Interest
On appeal, the defense argued that Hammes should have disqualified the District
Attorney's Office due to conflict of interest.
It was unfair, the defense contended, to allow the same agency that had
prosecuted Massingale to prosecute Lucas, in part on the basis of Massingale's
testimony that he was innocent. The District Attorney's Office, counsel
claimed, was arguing in the criminal case that Massingale's confession was
involuntary, while claiming in defense of his civil suit that he was
cooperative and the police did nothing improper.
Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye, writing for a unanimous court, said that
even if the asserted conflict existed, it did not require the extraordinary
remedy sought by the defense.
"[The defendant] does not explain how the conflict may have altered any trial
testimony to his detriment," the chief justice wrote "If anything, the
prosecutor's assertion in the civil case that Massingale's confession was
voluntary would have encouraged those who interrogated him to describe
Massingale's confession as uncoerced, and this circumstance would have assisted
defendant in his 3rd-party culpability defense."
Cantil-Sakauye also said there was no prejudice to the defendant as a result of
limitations Hammes placed on defense cross-examination regarding Massingale's
civil suit.
The ruling was erroneous, the chief justice acknowledged, because it rested "on
the false assumption that Massingale's finding of factual innocence could be
admitted into evidence in his civil trial," when in reality it was inadmissible
by statute.
But the error was not of constitutional magnitude, Cantil-Sakauye explained,
and would only be grounds for reversal if it was more probable not that jurors
would have reached a verdict more favorable to the defense if they had heard
the testimony.
Jurors knew that Massingale had confessed to the Jacobs murders, spent years in
custody as a result, recanted, and had been found factually innocent, the chief
justice pointed out. He had been examined and cross-examined at length, she
said, and "jurors were fully aware that Massingale had a significant incentive,
albeit not necessarily financial, to testify against defendant - an interest in
avoiding prosecution and the death penalty."
Given all of that, the additional knowledge that he had a civil suit pending
would not have changed jurors' perception of his credibility, Cantil-Sakauye
said.
The case is People v. Lucas, 14 S.O.S. 3637.
(source: Metropolitan News Company)
*******************
California to Fight Ruling Against Death Penalty
California is appealing last month's federal court ruling that declared the
state's enforcement of the death penalty to be unconstitutional.
State Attorney General Kamala Harris said Thursday that she would appeal the
ruling by Judge Cormac Carney of the U.S. Central District of California, who
said that the state's death penalty violated the Eighth Amendment???s ban on
cruel and unusual punishment.
Last month, Carney, a Republican-appointed judge in Orange County, vacated the
death sentence of Ernest Jones, who was convicted in the 1995 rape and murder
of his girlfriend's mother but is still on death row. In a lengthy decision,
Carney ruled that uncertainties and delays over executions in the state
violated inmates' constitutional rights.
"The dysfunctional administration of California's death penalty system has
resulted, and will continue to result, in an inordinate and unpredictable
period of delay preceding their actual execution," Carney wrote. "As for the
random few for whom execution does become a reality, they will have languished
for so long on death row that their execution will serve no retributive or
deterrent purpose and will be arbitrary."
The case will now move to the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
"I am appealing the court's decision because it is not supported by the law,
and it undermines important protections that our courts provide to defendants,"
Harris said in a statement. "This flawed ruling requires appellate review."
Only 13 people have been executed in California since the death penalty was
reinstated in 1978, and no inmate has been executed since 2006. More than 900
are currently on death row in the state.
(source: TIME)
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