Sept. 3
ARIZONA:
Arizona Supreme Court rules on self representation law
It may literally be a death-defying act.
But the Arizona Supreme Court ruled Thursday that people convicted of murder
have the right to represent themselves in the part of the trial where a jury is
deciding whether they live or die.
The justices rejected the pleas of Aaron Gunches, now finally represented by a
public defender, that they should overturn the decision by a jury to sentence
him to death because he acted as his own lawyer in the penalty phase of the
trial. Justice John Pelander, writing for the unanimous court, while the
decision was "ill advised," said there is a long-standing constitutional right
of defendants who are competent to represent themselves.
Stephen Whelihan, a deputy county public advocate, did not dispute that right
exists for an actual trial. But he argued this is different.
In capital cases there are actually 2 phases, with the 1st to determine guilt
or innocence.
In the 2nd phase, the jury decides if there are certain "aggravating factors"
that would make a death sentence more appropriate than life behind bars. These
include things like committing a crime for financial gain or that the victim
was a police officer.
In this case, jurors found 2 factors: a prior conviction of a serious offense
and that the murder was committed in an especially cruel and heinous manner.
Jurors also are supposed to consider whether there are "mitigating factors" to
spare someone's life, like lack of a prior criminal record and things in the
person's history that might explain his or her conduct like prior abuse or
mental or physical illness.
Gunches, representing himself, presented none of that to the jury.
Now, on appeal for the 2002 shooting death of Ted Price in the desert near
Mesa, Gunches' attorneys said that constitutional right of self-representation
should be limited to the guilt-or-innocence part of the trial.
"The independent societal interest in the fair administration of justice has
been found to outweigh even the right of the accused to counsel of his choice
enshrined in the Sixth Amendment," Whelihan argued.
The high court disagreed.
(source: The Daily Courier)
CALIFORNIA:
Trial To Begin For Hemet Man Accused Of Killing Wife, Daughter, Raping
Ex-Girlfriend ---- The defendant allegedly confessed he wanted to get rid of
his "baggage."
Trial proceedings are slated to get underway Tuesday for a convicted felon
accused of killing his wife and 5-year-old daughter, as well as raping and
stabbing his ex-girlfriend, in Hemet.
Johnny Lopez, 36, could face the death penalty if convicted in the November
2013 slayings of 36-year-old Joanna Angel Barrientos Lopez and his daughter,
Mia.
Lopez is charged with 2 counts of murder, along with 1 count each of attempted
murder, forcible rape, burglary and being a felon in possession of a firearm,
with a special circumstance allegation of taking multiple lives in the same
crime.
Riverside County Superior Court Judge John Monterosso is expected to hear
pretrial motions next week and outline a trial schedule. Jury selection may
take several weeks because it's a capital murder case.
Lopez is being held without bail at the Southwest Detention Center in Murrieta.
He was arrested on Nov. 9, 2013, shortly after the alleged attacks at 2
separate locations in the unincorporated east end of Hemet.
According to court documents, the defendant confessed to sheriff's detectives
that he had carried out the killings to get rid of his "baggage" -- an apparent
reference to the victims.
Investigators allege that on the night of Nov. 9, Lopez fatally shot his
daughter, whom he'd sired in a prior relationship, then turned the gun on his
wife, who walked into the room after hearing the gunfire.
Both victims were shot twice in the head with a 9mm pistol, according to
investigators. They were later discovered in the living room of Lopez's
single-story house at 26174 Girard Street.
After the shootings, the defendant drove to his ex-girlfriend's home at 41060
Sunset Lane, less than a mile away, and allegedly forced his way inside via a
window. Carrying an ax and knife that he'd allegedly stolen from a nearby
property, he subdued the 30-year-old victim, whose identity was not released,
and sexually assaulted her, prosecutors allege.
"According to his confession, he used the knife to slit her throat," Deputy
District Attorney Burke Strunsky told City News Service in 2014.
When Lopez walked out of the house with blood on his hands, a neighbor called
911, and a sheriff's deputy arrived moments later.
"The deputy sees Lopez standing in front of a house across the street and
approaches him, and the defendant takes off," Strunsky said.
The lawman deployed pepper spray to stop Lopez, who put up a fight, culminating
in the deputy striking him with his baton, at which point the convicted felon
surrendered, according to investigators.
The ex-girlfriend underwent surgery and ultimately recovered.
Lopez has prior felony convictions for illegal possession of controlled
substances and recklessly discharging a firearm.
(source: patch.com)
USA:
Fell defense seeks release of co-defendant files
The defense team for Donald Fell is asking the court to order a law firm to
release files generated in connection with Fell's co-defendant, Robert Lee.
Fell and Lee were accused of kidnapping and killing North Clarendon resident
Terry King in November 2000. Lee died in prison the following year.
In 2005 Fell was convicted of the murder and later sentenced to death. However
the ruling was overturned due to juror misconduct. A retrial is scheduled for
early next year.
According to a motion filed in U.S. District Court this week, the legal
documents could contain evidence admissible in the guilt and penalty phase of
the trial. Last October, Lee's father signed a waiver authorizing the release
of the file and other records.
At the time of his detention, Lee was represented by Vermont attorneys John
Pacht and Bradley Stetler. Pacht, formerly a partner with the firm Hoff Curtis
in Burlington, was appointed to Vermont Superior Court in January.
Robert Katims, an attorney at Hoff Curtis, said the files are still at the
firm. "We wouldn't turn them over absent a court order that said we need to,"
Katims said. "Attorney-client privilege is pretty sacrosanct and something we
take very seriously."
Stetler, a criminal defense attorney with Stetler, Allen & Kampmann, said when
he and Pacht were co-counsel they each maintained their own files. He declined
to comment further.
In its motion the defense argues that the file could undermine the government's
contention that Fell was the ringleader. The 2 were childhood friends, and in
an earlier motion the government argued, "Mr. Fell was the dominant and
manipulative leader; and Mr. Lee was the obedient, conditioned, follower."
However, the defense says this characterization may not hold up.
"The file could contain evidence that would not only contradict the
government's theory that Mr. Fell manipulated his submissive and compliant
friend Mr. Lee, but could also show that Mr. Lee was actually the major or sole
participant in the crimes, or that it was actually Mr. Lee who manipulated Mr.
Fell into committing the crimes," the motion says.
Attorney-client privilege, while not protected under the Constitution, has
generally been upheld by the courts. However in some cases the court has ruled
that the privilege is not absolute.
The Second Circuit has recognized that in criminal cases exceptional
circumstances can overcome the attorney-client privilege. In a 2001 case the
court ruled that attorney-client privilege would not be upheld if the exclusion
of evidence would "render the trial fundamentally unfair."
Fell's lawyers argue that the circumstances of this case are exceptional. Fell
could be facing the death penalty. His co-defendant has been dead for 15 years.
And the government is seeking to admit Lee's statements in the penalty phase of
the case.
According to the motion, "The government is attempting to use a dead
co-defendant's hearsay statements to secure Mr. Fell's conviction and execution
and there is substantial reason to believe that the co-defendant's statements
to his legal defense team would contradict the statements being relied upon by
the government."
In addition, Fell's attorneys argue that the "exceptional nature of death
penalty cases" warrants the release of the files.
In July U.S. District Court Judge Geoffrey Crawford, who will preside over the
retrial next year, held 2 weeks of hearings on the constitutionality of the
death penalty. He has not yet issued a decision.
(source: vtdigger.com)
******************
Judge mulls allowing bloody shirts as evidence in Gary Sampson death penalty
trial
They are pieces of evidence the jurors didn't get to see, the bloody, shredded
shirts that Jonathan Rizzo and Philip McCloskey were wearing at the time they
were stabbed to death in July 2001.
13 years ago, US District Judge Mark L. Wolf refused to show them to jurors in
the death-penalty trial of Gary Lee Sampson, finding they were so graphic they
would pose a "risk of unfair prejudice" toward the death-penalty. Sampson, who
had admitted to the murders, was sentenced to death anyway, but the jury's
verdict was overturned on appeal.
Now, in advance of Sampson's new death-penalty trial in September, US District
Judge Leo T. Sorokin said Friday he wants to see the shirts himself,
reconsidering prosecutors' arguments that the shirts speak to the "heinous,
cruel, and depraved" nature of his crime, making him deserving of death.
Sorokin gave lawyers for Sampson a September 12 deadline to respond, and
ordered the government to make the shirts available for his inspection. The
shirts were cut from the bodies of Sampson's victims, and preserved in
plexiglass.
"The victims' shirts ''' are unquestionably relevant to Sampson's intent, as
well as the heinous, cruel, and depraved nature of the murders," prosecutors
argued in court records Thursday.
Sampson, now 56, had admitted to the carjacking and killing of Rizzo, 19, and
McCloskey, 69, during a violent spree in July 2001. He also killed Robert "Eli"
Whitney, 58, that same week in New Hampshire.
A jury agreed after a 2003 trial to sentence him to death, but Wolf vacated
that decision after finding that one of the jurors had lied during a screening
process.
The question of admitting the shirts as evidence was one of the loudest
arguments in the original trial. Wolf initially planned to show them to jurors,
agreeing they speak to the heinous nature of the crime - 1 of the factors
prosecutors want to prove in seeking the death penalty, and which requires
evidence of torture or physical abuse - but he later reversed that decision,
saying instead that it could be overly prejudice.
"An honest balancing of the competing factors at this point should operate to
exclude the shirts," the judge said, quoting Shakespeare's "The Tragedy of
Julius Caesar" to raise concerns that the shirt would "incite revenge."
Wolf also questioned whether jurors would be influenced by the reactions of
Sampson's victims in the courtroom, and whether the shirts would become
"powerful and immediate symbols of the victims and the brutality of their
murders."
"I do find that the danger of unfair prejudice in terms of overwhelming
emotions and rational response in the context of all the other evidence and the
way the case has evolved outweighs the probative value," the judge said.
The families of Sampson's victims had long criticized Wolf's handling of the
2003 trial, and point to his refusal to admit the shirts as evidence, and his
concerns over how the families would respond, as one of their key disputes.
"We thought this was very important evidence in our case," Michael Rizzo, the
father of Jonathan Rizzo, said in an interview Friday, adding that he was glad
that the question is at least being reconsidered.
Prosecutors argued that other court decisions have upheld the admissibility of
blood-stained clothing as evidence since the Sampson trial, and that such
evidence is routinely introduced in local murder trials.
The prosecutors also noted that the clothing of 2 of the victims of the Boston
Marathon bombing - Krystle Campbell and Martin Richard - was introduced in the
death-penalty trial of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.
"The vicious, brutal nature of a defendant's conduct is not itself sufficient
to justify a complete exclusion of evidence tending to show the defendant
engaged in those acts," prosecutors argued.
(source: Boston Globe)
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