February 27
TEXAS----impending execution
Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles denies delay of Coble's execution
The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles denied requests Tuesday from Billie
Wayne Coble to delay his execution scheduled for Thursday or to reduce his
death sentence to a life prison term.
Coble, 70, remains scheduled for execution by lethal injection Thursday in
Huntsville.
Coble was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to die in the 1989 slayings
of his brother-in-law, Waco police Sgt. Bobby Vicha, and Vicha’s parents,
Robert and Zelda Vicha, at their homes in Axtell. He has had several stays of
execution over the years, but the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals denied his
request for another stay of execution last week.
The U.S. Supreme Court rejected an appeal by Coble in October, which prompted
Waco's 54th State District Judge Matt Johnson to set his execution date. Court
officials said they expect a similar outcome should Coble file an 11th-hour
request for a stay of execution through the federal court system.
Jurors convicted Coble after evidence was introduced stating Coble was upset at
the failure of his third marriage. He then killed the Vichas, tied up four
children and kidnapped his estranged wife, Karen Vicha Coble.
Coble drove his estranged wife to Bosque County, where he said he was going to
rape and kill her. Before he could carry out the threat, he crashed his vehicle
during a high-speed chase with authorities.
(source: Waco Tribune)
*****************
Texas Is Planning an Execution Based on Fraudulent Testimony
Billy Wayne Coble was convicted of a Texas triple homicide in 1989. On
Thursday, he is scheduled for execution.
A former ACLU client, Coble’s story was not a happy one before he found himself
on death row. He was a Vietnam veteran who had been raised by a mother who was
institutionalized for mental illness and by a father debilitated by alcoholism.
But if Coble’s execution goes forward, he will be killed not for who he is or
for what he’s been convicted of, but because of the testimonies of so-called
“experts” whose testimony can be summed up in two words: unreliable junk.
Years after Coble was initially sentenced to death in 1990, an appellate court
in 2007 threw out that death sentence because the trial judge had erred in
instructing the sentencing jury. At Coble’s 2008 re-sentencing trial, his
behavior in prison between 1990 and 2007 posed a challenge to the state’s claim
that, as required for a Texas death sentence, Coble would be a danger to other
prison staff and prisoners if not executed.
As the court later described him, Coble “did not have a single disciplinary
report for the 18 years he had been on death row.” Rather than posing a threat,
Coble had instead become known for helping both staff and fellow prisoners
alike.
To meet Texas’s future-danger requirement, which would require checking and
countering his years of good behavior, the state’s first move was to present
testimony from Dr. Richard Coons, a psychiatrist who, over the years, had
claimed Texas prisoners would be dangerous to those around them if not
executed. It was no surprise that he did the same in Coble’s case.
But, when scrutinized, it’s clear that Coons’ predictions more closely
resembled backroom fortune telling than science.
As Coons has now admitted, his testimony, in both Coble’s and previous capital
trials, was not based on any peer-reviewed literature, field of study, or
empirical research. Rather he himself admits, as the Texas Court of Criminal
Appeals noted in 2010, to doing “‘it his way’ with his own methodology and has
never gone back to see whether his prior predictions of future dangerousness
have, in fact, been accurate.” Coons was a fraud, plying his trade to help
Texas prosecutors secure death sentences.
Texas’s second move to secure Coble’s death sentence was to present A.P.
Merillat, a prison investigator, as yet another bona fide “expert.”
For Texas prosecutors, Merillat played a similar role to that of Coons: to give
juries a reason to believe a prisoner must be executed to prevent future danger
to those around him. Merillat did so for years by enthralling juries with
horror stories of prison violence. He also swayed juries by pointing out
supposed loopholes that he claimed provided prisoners opportunities to commit
violence if sentenced to life imprisonment instead of death.
But Merillat has also been proven a fraud.
In a pair of separate appeals we litigated on behalf of our clients Adrian
Estrada in 2010 and Manuel Velez in 2012, Texas’s highest court found
Merillat’s claims in each case demonstrably false. Merillat falsely conjured
relaxed security restraints our clients would have enjoyed if not sentenced to
death, restraints that would make letting them live more dangerous.
When Coble’s death sentence was appealed in 2010, Texas’s highest court agreed
that Coon’s predictions were unscientific and never should have been presented
to the jury.
But, in a curious twist, the court cited a technicality to uphold Coble’s death
sentence. It found that the erroneously admitted testimony was harmless. It was
then that we entered the case, assisting Coble and his attorneys by arguing for
the U.S. Supreme Court to take his case. Regrettably, we were unsuccessful.
Coble has since continued to fight in lower courts to overturn his death
sentence, which still stands despite the fact that the state of Texas has long
since given up defending the merits of Coons or Merillat. A federal appellate
court recently called them, “2 problematic witnesses.” It observed, of Coble’s
trial, “that Coons’ testimony was unreliable and should have been excluded” and
that “the State does not dispute that parts of Merillat’s testimony were
fabricated.”
Yet the federal court allowed Coble’s death sentence to stand, again based on
technicalities. It agreed with the theory that Coons’ testimony was harmless,
and it cited technical failures by Coble’s lawyers to raise challenges to
Merillat’s testimony using the correct, if byzantine, procedures.
Since the court findings repudiating them in 2010 and 2012, neither Coons nor
Merillat has appeared as experts for Texas prosecutors. Simultaneously the
number of new death sentences in Texas has continued to plummet. Yet Coble’s
execution remains stubbornly and glaringly on track over technicalities,
despite the admittedly “problematic” testimony used to make the state’s case
for death.
That Coble will be executed on such discredited testimony is unconscionable.
The courts’ recognition that Coons was trafficking in junk science and Merillat
in fabrications may have come too late to save Coble’s life. But the example of
his case already shows all who are willing to look why the death penalty is
never justice, and why it should be abolished once and for all.
(source: Brian Stull, ACLU Capital Punishment Project)
VIRGINIA:
Charges elevated to capital murder for suspect in deadly stabbing of elderly
Danville couple
Onis Donnell Moon’s charges of 1st-degree murder were elevated to capital
murder after an indictment by a Danville grand jury in circuit court on Monday,
paving the way for a possible death sentence.
Moon was originally charged with 2 counts of 1st-degree murder in connection to
the Nov. 7 stabbing deaths of Royal Douglas Barley and his wife, Valean Ferrell
Barley.
He is now charged with capital murder and malicious wounding, Danville
Commonwealth’s Attorney Michael Newman wrote in an email.
In Virginia, murder charges must have associated aggravating factors to become
capital charges. The aggravating factor in Moon’s case is that he is accused of
killing 2 people.
“The allegation is he murdered 2 people in the same transaction or sequence of
events,” Newman wrote. “That qualifies him to be charged with capital murder.”
Newman said his office hasn’t decided if it would seek the death penalty.
Capital crimes carry the possibility of the death penalty or life sentence.
The malicious wounding charge is because Moon is accused of attacking the
couple’s daughter. Both the Barleys were in their 80s — Royal was 83 years old,
and Valean was 87 — and according to a search warrant filed in circuit court,
Moon, 55, was in a relationship with their daughter, who has not been named.
Moon was arrested walking up the street, just 3 or 4 houses away from the house
at 122 Lexington Ave. where the octogenarians were pronounced dead. He had
blood on his hands, court documents show, and was promptly arrested. The
Barley’s daughter was taken to the hospital.
She told police she saw Moon stab her parents, according to court records.
“While the caller was on the phone with the dispatchers, she began to scream
‘he is stabbing her,’” court records state. “She screamed to dispatch that her
mother and father had been stabbed.”
Moon also “made statements about the crime” to a police officer, court records
show, and admitted to “being around” drugs and alcohol before the incident.
Search warrants were filed for Moon’s car, blood and person, along with the
Barleys’ house. Those searches turned up a knife and red stains on the
property, along with a packet of cigarette wrapping paper, a briefcase holding
medication and two metal grinders full of “plant material” in his car,
according to the warrants.
Investigators noticed a strong smell of alcohol coming off Moon when they
interviewed him. His speech was also slurred, according to an affidavit.
Moon’s trial was slated to be scheduled Tuesday, but because he has now been
charged with capital murder, his case was not set, Newman wrote.
“New counsel will be called in to represent him,” Newman wrote. “It will not be
set for a trial date today.”
Newman would not comment on the case or evidence because the matter is pending.
He also would not say if any new evidence or information led to the capital
charges.
(source: godanriver.com)
FLORIDA:
Murder trial placed on hold after suspect deemed incompetent to stand trial
On Monday morning, a court ruled a 24-year-old murder suspect incompetent to
stand trial.
Cedric Plummer is accused of killing two employees at the Summer Place
Apartments in Gainesville. His trial is on hold as he’s scheduled to undergo
further mental health evaluations.
Plummer will be transferred from the Alachua County Jail to a Florida state
hospital in Chattahoochee for evaluations. He was in court Monday for a
competency hearing where doctors appointed by the state and the defense ruled
he was incompetent to stand trial and should be committed.
State attorney Bill Cervone told TV 20 Plummer will return to Alachua County to
stand trial when he’s fount to be competent.
Plummer is facing charges in connection to the deaths of Jude Osuji Jr. and
Robert Early Brumbaugh and the kidnapping of a 19-year-old woman.
Cervone is pursuing the death penalty in Plummer’s case.
(source: WCJB news)
OHIO:
Executions put hold in Ohio
Mike DeWine postponed the execution of Warren Henness last month. Then, last
week, the governor went further in pressing for a death penalty protocol that
meets the standard set by the federal courts — and complies with the spirit and
letter of state law. He told an Associated Press forum in Columbus: “As long as
the status quo remains, where we don’t have a protocol that has been found to
be OK, we certainly cannot have any executions in Ohio.”
So, in all likelihood, the state won’t go forward with scheduled lethal
injections for May and August, or the Henness execution reset for September.
The governor rightly appears willing to see the federal court perform its job.
As Magistrate Judge Michael Merz explained in a scheduling order, the
governor’s decision amounts to “excellent public policy.”
The federal court has been trying for years to set a legal path forward for the
death penalty in the state. Yet it has been hard to gain traction in view of
the state continuing to schedule executions, each receiving attention from the
court under the pressure of time. The governor’s action, as the magistrate
judge noted, allows the court to proceed deliberately, the state devising a new
protocol and then the court weighing its constitutionality.
What’s wrong with the state’s three-step lethal injection process? As
Magistrate Judge Merz made plain in a December ruling concerning the Henness
case, the protocol falls short of the state’s requirement for a “quick and
painless” death and collides with the constitutional ban on “cruel and unusual
punishments.”
The problem involves the first step, or the sedative midazolam. The evidence
indicates that the drug fails to reduce consciousness enough. Thus, when the
next 2 drugs, a paralytic and then potassium chloride to stop the heart, are
applied, the prisoner faces severe pain, “as though fire was being poured”
through his veins, in the view of the magistrate judge.
More, the evidence points to the massive dose of midazolam causing pulmonary
edema, an excess of fluid in the lungs. The result for the prisoner is pain and
a sense of drowning, all of it, according to the magistrate judge, the
equivalent of waterboarding, or torture, which the country has declared
unacceptable and inhumane by treaty and law. Again, this isn’t about the awful
killings committed. It involves how the state chooses to take a life in the
name of Ohioans.
The state has resorted to this protocol because it no longer can obtain the
powerful barbiturates used successfully in earlier executions. For legal and
moral reasons, drug manufacturers have barred access. So, Ohio and other states
have been left to scramble and have yet to find an adequate substitute.
At the AP forum, the governor stated flatly, “Ohio is not going to execute
someone under my watch when a federal judge has found it to be cruel and
unusual punishment.” The governor proved revealing in another way when asked
whether he supports the death penalty. He recalled that as a state lawmaker, he
sponsored the current law governing capital punishment. He added carefully: “It
is the law of the state of Ohio. And I’ll let it go at this point. We are
seeing clearly some challenges ... in regard to carrying out the death
penalty.”
In choosing not to discuss further the subject, the governor suggested much.
The moment isn’t just right for the federal court to conduct a full examination
of lethal injection. It is timely, too, to take up the value and practicality
of capital punishment, especially with the option of life in prison without
parole. That is what lingers in what the governor didn’t say.
(source: Editorial Board, Akron Beacon Journal)
***************
Governor says ‘no executions’ without court-backed drugs
Recent statements and actions by Gov. Mike DeWine suggest Ohio could go years
without executing another death row inmate.
Last month, the Republican governor ordered the prison system to come up with a
new lethal drug protocol after a federal judge’s scathing critique of the first
drug in Ohio’s method.
Last week, DeWine said Ohio “certainly could have no executions” during that
search and the court challenges that would follow adopting a new system.
After Ohio started looking for new drugs in 2014, it took the state more than
three years to establish its current three-drug lethal injection protocol.
Since then, it has become even more difficult for states to find drugs, meaning
a new search could easily last as long.
The first drug in Ohio’s new system, the sedative midazolam, has been subject
to lawsuits that argue it exposes inmates to the possibility of severe pain
because it doesn’t render them deeply enough unconscious.
Because of Ohio’s use of midazolam, federal Judge Michael Merz called the
constitutionality of the state’s system into question in a Jan. 14 ruling and
said inmates could suffer an experience similar to waterboarding.
But because attorneys for death row inmate Keith Henness didn’t prove a viable
alternative exists, Merz declined to stop the execution.
But DeWine did, postponing Henness’ execution from Feb. 13 until Sept. 12,
although that would be contingent on the state having a new, court-approved
lethal injection system in place, which is unlikely in that time frame.
Ohio is also scheduled to execute Cleveland Jackson on May 29, a timeline Merz
questioned last week, given the governor’s order.
Surely the prison system is “not ‘planning’ on carrying out an execution using
a protocol the Governor has publicly disavowed,” Merz wrote Friday.
In the same opinion, he said DeWine’s decision “embodies excellent public
policy” since a fully constitutional method could avoid the usual last-minute
delays.
DeWine says it wouldn’t be right to carry out executions until a lethal drug
method meets with court approval.
“Ohio’s not going to execute someone under my watch when a federal judge has
found it to be cruel and unusual punishment,” DeWine said during a Feb. 19
forum sponsored by The Associated Press.
Attorney General David Yost, a fellow Republican, deferred to DeWine and his
decision to ask the Department of Rehabilitation and Correction for a new
system.
If DeWine “feels that the prudent course is to develop a new cocktail, we’re
going to look and see what DRC comes up with and we will appeal in court to
defend its constitutionality,” Yost told the AP.
Prosecutors say they trust DeWine will resolve the issue so executions can
resume.
Capital punishment is “an important criminal deterrent, and an expression of
society’s moral outrage at the most heinous crimes in the state,” said Louis
Tobin, executive director of the Ohio Prosecuting Attorneys Association.
DeWine should be applauded for his statements, said Tim Young, the state public
defender, who said the breadth of expert testimony heard by Merz, the federal
judge, made it clear the drug is inappropriate for executions because it’s not
a traditional anesthetic.
Finding a new lethal drug system will take time, as it should, said Young.
“When the government is going to use its awesome power to kill somebody, to
take a life, it should be incredibly thoughtful and deliberate about that,” he
said.
Henness, 55, was convicted of killing 51-year-old Richard Myers in Columbus in
1992. Authorities say Myers had been helping Henness find a drug treatment for
his wife.
Ohio’s last execution was July 18, when Robert Van Hook was put to death for
choking and fatally stabbing David Self, whom he met in a Cincinnati bar in
1985.
(source: The Tribune)
TENNESSEE:
Tennessee bill to nix 1 death penalty court review advances
A Tennessee bill to eliminate one state court's review of death sentences is
headed to the Senate floor.
The Judiciary Committee voted favorably Tuesday for Republican Sen. John
Stevens' bill, despite a judge's testimony that his court takes less than a
year of sometimes 3 decades of court action before executions.
Court of Criminal Appeals Judge John Everett Williams told senators his court
completed its last four death penalty reviews within 3 to 6 months.
He said changing the law would add more challenges in the federal court system,
saying attorneys could argue it's unfair that death penalty cases are getting
less review in state courts than lesser offenses.
The bill's supporters include Republicans House Speaker Glen Casada and Senate
Speaker Randy McNally, who said justice delayed for decades isn't justice at
all.
(source: Associated Press)
ARIZONA:
Death penalty is requested for man accused of killing a Nogales Police Officer
It has been nearly a year since a Nogales police officer was shot and killed in
the line of duty.
Officer Jesus Cordova died on April 27, 2018.
The Santa Cruz County Attorney is asking for the death penalty for David
Murillo the man they said killed the Nogales police officer.
The last time the office tried a death penalty case was over 35 years ago.
Jesus Cordova was the 1st officer to die in the line of duty since 1888.
On April 27, 2018, officer Cordova responded to an armed carjacking. Murillo
was seen in his car driving in the area of Villa’s market. According to police,
after being pulled over, Murillo got out of his car and began to fire multiple
times at Officer Cordova.
Nogales Police Chief, Roy Bermudez said “Officer Cordova didn’t lose his life,
he gave his life to the community. He gave his life for the department.”
Last week Chief Bermudez awarded Officer Cordova’s wife, Alyssa the Officer of
the Year award.
The first ever Community Service plaque was awarded to the owner’s of Villa’s
Market as they had to close for 2 business days for the investigation. Bermudez
stated that it was a “senseless act that yields no winners.” And that the
suspect did what he did to avoid jail but now the death penalty is being sought
out for his actions. Bermudez asks “what did he get out of it?”
A judge will rule on the death penalty request at a later time this year. A
trial date has been set to be in the year 2021.
(source: KVOA news)
CALIFORNIA:
After More Than 3 Decades, 2 Death-Row Prisoners Freed in California
2 former California death-row prisoners who had spent a combined 70 years in
prison are now free men, after federal courts overturned their convictions and
local prosecutors agreed to plea deals on non-capital charges. James Hardy was
freed on February 14, 2019 after pleading guilty to 2 counts of 1st-degree
murder in exchange for a suspended sentence and release on probation. Freddie
Lee Taylor was released on February 20 after pleading guilty to manslaughter
and a sentence of time served. Both men have claims of innocence, but their
plea deals make them ineligible for DPIC’s Innocence List. Each spent more than
30 years on death row.
James Hardy was convicted and sentenced to death in Los Angeles in 1984 for the
murder of Nancy Morgan and her son, Mitchell Morgan. Hardy was tried along with
two co-defendants, Mark Reilly and Clifford Morgan, the husband and father of
the victims. Clifford was convicted of hiring Reilly and Hardy to kill his
family so he could collect insurance money. Prosecutors argued that Hardy was
the actual killer and Reilly the middleman in the conspiracy. On appeal, Hardy
argued that his trial attorney had been ineffective because he had failed to
investigate or present evidence that the prosecution’s key witness was actually
the killer. The California Supreme Court overturned Hardy’s death sentence, and
a 3-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit later
overturned his conviction, writing, “Hardy’s attorney failed him, and the State
of California failed Hardy by putting a man on the stand that it should have
known committed the crime.” The court said, “there is a substantial likelihood
that the jury would not have convicted Hardy had [his trial lawyer] performed
effectively.” Rather than retry Hardy, the Los Angeles District Attorney’s
office agreed to a plea deal.
Freddie Lee Taylor was convicted and sentenced to death in Contra Costa County
in 1986. Taylor had experienced severe trauma and abuse as a child, started
using drugs by the age of 10, and was housed from age 13 to 17 in a juvenile
detention center that was described in court records as a “gruesome,
dehumanizing and frightening world where rape, beatings and fear were
constant.” He was arrested in 1984 during a “family dispute” and was sent to a
mental institution, where he attempted suicide. Despite doctors’
recommendations that he be placed in a mental hospital because he was a danger
to himself or others, he was released by hospital staff. He burglarized the
home of 84-year-old Carmen Vasquez, leaving fingerprints in her home. When she
was murdered days later, he was identified as a suspect because his
fingerprints were at the crime scene. Taylor’s long history of mental illness
was ignored at his trial, where his lawyer never requested and the court did
not independently order a competency evaluation. His appeal lawyers argued that
his conviction was invalid because he was not competent to stand trial. A
federal judge reversed Taylor’s conviction in 2016 and the Ninth Circuit upheld
that decision in 2018, saying there was insufficient evidence to accurately
assess Taylor’s mental health at the time of the crime and his trial. The
federal court gave Contra Costa County prosecutors 60 days to decide whether to
retry him, but they instead agreed to the plea deal. “Had he not had the
benefit of zealous appellate lawyers dedicated to his cause, Freddie Lee Taylor
may well have been executed,” Chief Public Defender Robin Lipetzky said. “His
is but one case. Others like him who have meritorious claims may not be so
fortunate. There are over 700 more people on death row — many waiting for an
attorney to be appointed to their case and others still waiting for their cases
to be finally resolved by the courts.”
(source: Death Penalty Information Center)
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