March 5
PENNSYLVANIA:
Could the Supreme Court kill Pennsylvania's death penalty?
In the past 15 years, courts in 5 states have struck down the death penalty.
Could Pennsylvania become the 6th state?
That’s a question that is suddenly in play, after the Pennsylvania Supreme
Court recently opened the door to a legal challenge that charges the state’s
capital punishment law is unconstitutional.
Brought by 2 death row inmates, the petition asks the court to skip its usual
procedures and hear a broad challenge to whether the death penalty violates the
state constitution’s ban on cruel punishments.
It is a request that, a decade ago, likely would have gone nowhere, legal
observers say. But with a shift in political power on the court — 5 Democrats
versus 2 Republicans — the justices in December said they will consider whether
to take up the issue.
That’s provoked a flurry of legal filings by groups opposed to the death
penalty, who are urging the court to throw out the state’s ultimate punishment.
It has drawn concern from capital punishment supporters, who say there is no
reason for the court to intervene and undo the will of the Legislature.
The petition, filed by Federal Community Defender Office in Philadelphia, cites
a recent legislative study that offered a blistering critique of the death
penalty. Released in June, the report called for a host of reforms, saying that
in the modern era of capital punishment, Pennsylvania has exonerated 6 death
row inmates, while executing just 3.
So-called king’s bench petitions are rarely granted, because they ask the
Supreme Court to leapfrog the typical process, under which the lower courts
serve as the first arbiter of legal questions. But the attorneys for Jermont
Cox and Kevin Marinelli, who were separately sentenced to death in 1995, argue
that longtime problems with Pennsylvania’s death penalty make it one of those
extraordinary cases.
The state “administers a system of capital punishment that is replete with
error, a national outlier in its design and a mirror for the inequities and
prejudices that plague American society,” the federal defenders wrote last
month in a legal brief. “Although the system was intended to apply only to the
worst of the worst, arbitrary factors, such as geography, poverty, mental
illness and race, best predict who ends up on death row.”
Cox was convicted of 3 drug-related murders in Philadelphia and sentenced to
death in 1 of them. Marinelli was found guilty of the torture killing of a
Northumberland County man during a robbery.
The Pennsylvania attorney general’s office opposes the petition, saying it asks
the Supreme Court “forgo all judicial norms and standards” to end capital
punishment in the state. Doing so based on a legislative study would be
“legally inappropriate” and “arguably dangerous,” state prosecutors wrote in a
legal filing that charged the June report was flawed.
“The notion that this court would jettison the truth-determining function of
the judicial branch and contract it out to an unregulated non-judicial
political ‘commission’ is shocking,” the filing said.
In the Northeast, Pennsylvania’s death penalty is an anomaly. In the region,
the only other state with capital punishment is New Hampshire, but it has only
1 death row inmate — and no execution chamber with which to carry out the
sentence. By contrast, there are 142 prisoners on death row in Pennsylvania,
which has been under a moratorium on executions that Gov. Tom Wolf declared in
2015.
The use of capital punishment in Pennsylvania is falling. An investigation by
The Morning Call published Sunday found that prosecutors are increasingly
reluctant to pursue it, given the high financial cost and lengthy legal battles
it guarantees. The analysis reviewed 4,184 murder convictions over 14 years in
the state.
In 2004, 40 % of murder convictions across Pennsylvania started as death
penalty cases, according to the newspaper’s findings. By 2017, that number had
dropped 70 %, to 12 % of murder convictions.
The timeline under which the Supreme Court will address the death penalty
challenge remains unclear, and oral arguments have yet to be scheduled. 2
justices — Max Baer, a Democrat, and Sallie Mundy, a Republican — dissented in
December when the court kept the petition alive.
This century, courts in five states have thrown out death penalty statutes,
finding unconstitutional flaws: New York, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida and
Washington state, according to the Death Penalty Information Center, a
nonprofit that tracks developments in capital punishment.
Of those, only 1 state made fixes to revive the death penalty, when lawmakers
in Florida enacted legislation to address their courts’ concerns. In the other
4 states, the death penalty remains off the table.
Robert Dunham, a former federal public defender in Pennsylvania who now heads
the Death Penalty Information Center, said it is impossible to predict where
Pennsylvania’s Supreme Court will ultimately come down.
But that the challenge is even being considered speaks to a change on the
court, in which several death penalty-friendly judges were replaced through
retirement or resignation in recent years, he said.
“It does signify that the court is concerned about the way the death penalty is
being administered, certainly enough to hear the issue,” Dunham said. “And that
is something you wouldn’t have seen 10 years ago.”
Northampton County District Attorney John Morganelli agreed that times have
changed. A Democrat who is a vocal death penalty supporter, he’s hoping the
court will ultimately reject the petition.
“The old court, where the Republicans had the majority, they probably wouldn’t
have heard it,” Morganelli said. “But this court, they’re more activist.”
(source: The Morning Call)
************
Judge denies Krasner office’s request to vacate death penalty in 1984 double
murder
A federal judge on Monday denied a request by the Philadelphia District
Attorney’s Office to vacate the death penalty for a Philadelphia man convicted
of the 1984 strangulation and drowning deaths of a prominent pastor’s son and
daughter-in-law in their East Mount Airy home.
U.S. District Judge Mitchell Goldberg wrote that for three decades, the DA’s
Office had “consistently and zealously opposed” inmate Robert Wharton’s efforts
to overturn his conviction and death sentence.
Early last month, the office informed the judge it would no longer fight the
appeal. Max Cooper Kaufman, supervisor of the federal litigation unit under
District Attorney Larry Krasner, wrote that the decision came after the office
reexamined the case and communicated with the victims’ family.
In his written opinion, Goldberg described the deaths of Bradley Hart, 26, and
his wife, Ferne, 31, as “particularly horrific” and noted the DA’s Office
didn’t explain the reason behind what he called "this complete reversal of
course.”
He ordered both parties to submit briefs explaining their positions.
Krasner, a former criminal defense lawyer who took office last year, campaigned
on a platform of never seeking the death penalty. His spokesperson, Ben Waxman,
said by email Monday that the office had no comment on Goldberg’s ruling
“except to say that we are reviewing the opinion and considering next steps in
the case."
The Federal Community Defender Office, which is representing Wharton, did not
immediately respond to a request for comment.
Wharton’s co-defendant, Eric Mason, was sentenced to life in prison. Both men,
construction workers from Germantown, were 20 at the time of the murders.
Now 56, Wharton is on death row at the State Correctional Institution-Phoenix
in Montgomery County.
According to evidence in the case, on the night of Jan. 30, 1984, Wharton and
Mason went to the Harts’ home, tied up the couple, and separated them. Wharton
choked Ferne Hart with a necktie and drowned her in a bathtub. Mason denied
killing anyone, but was accused by Wharton of killing Bradley Hart by forcing
his face in water and strangling him with an electrical cord.
After the jury at his 1985 trial convicted Wharton of first-degree murder,
Assistant District Attorney Thomas Bello argued that both defendants should be
sentenced to die, noting that they turned the heat off in the house and left
the couple’s 7-month-old daughter, Lisa, to die.
Hart’s father, the Rev. B. Sam Hart, a nationally known evangelist pastor,
discovered the couple’s bodies. The baby was unharmed but suffering from
malnutrition and dehydration.
Bello told jurors that Wharton wanted revenge against the Hart family after he
was not paid for construction work he had done at a religious radio station in
Phoenixville managed by Bradley Hart and owned by his father. The Harts had
fired the subcontractor for whom Wharton worked because they were unsatisfied
with the job.
The prosecutor also told jurors that Wharton had previously committed two
burglaries at the Harts’ home and, with Mason, had burglarized the Rev. Hart’s
church, the Germantown Christian Assembly in East Mount Airy.
In April 1992, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court partially granted Wharton’s
appeal, ordering a new sentencing hearing. That December, a second Philadelphia
jury reimposed the double-death sentence for Wharton.
In December 2002, then-Gov. Mark Schweiker signed his death warrant, but the
execution was stayed after Wharton appealed to federal court.
Goldberg in 2012 denied his petition, but an appellate court sent it back to
the district judge on just one claim — whether his lawyer was ineffective for
failing to tell the jury about Wharton’s adjustment to prison. That was the
claim the District Attorney’s Office last month said it would not fight.
The DA’s Office also asked the judge to grant summary relief by taking the
death penalty off the table and said that if the judge did so, prosecutors
wouldn’t seek a new death sentence in state court.
Krasner has received pushback by the judiciary in at least 1 other case in
which his office tried to throw out a death sentence.
In October, Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice Christine Donohue wrote in a
majority opinion that a jury had approved the death penalty for Lavar Brown,
and the DA’s Office couldn’t change that result “based upon the differing views
of the current office holder.”
Pennsylvania’s death penalty has been used just three times since it was
reinstated by the state in 1978. Gov. Tom Wolf imposed a moratorium on its use
in 2015. Wolf’s spokesperson said Monday that the governor believes the
moratorium should continue in light of a June 2018 report by a bipartisan
legislative task force and advisory committee, which found various problems
concerning the death penalty.
(source: philly.com)
NORTH CAROLINA:
Public Support for Death Penalty Waning in North Carolina
A new poll from Public Policy Polling has found that a majority of North
Carolinians believe the death penalty should be replaced with alternative
punishments.
Voters question the fairness of the death penalty on several fronts, including
racial bias, judicial error and mental health of the accused at the time of the
crime.
Director of Public Policy Polling Tom Jensen says the change in public opinion
has been gradual rather than swift.
“It’s definitely something where there is movement occurring over time away
from support from the death penalty, and I think you can see that especially in
the Democratic Party,” says Jensen.
The last Democratic President to voice public support of the Death Penalty was
Bill Clinton.
While North Carolina still does have the death penalty as a sentencing option,
no one has been executed in over a decade.
Jensen says one of the reasons the death penalty is rarely used in North
Carolina anymore is there is no evidence that it helps to stop crime.
“It’s been over a decade now since we’ve had an execution, and that hasn’t led
to some sort of increase in violent crime in the state,” says Jensen. “It’s
really pretty steady, so I think that sort of throws the main argument of the
death penalty out the window.”
While lack of political pressure on district attorneys to seek the death
penalty has helped to minimize it’s use, Jensen also says that regional factors
come into play.
“The more highly populated areas of the state, which will presumably have more
murder cases, also have the most progressive voters in the state,” says Jensen.
“So per capita, the places where the most crimes where you could seek the death
penalty are happening are also the places where there’s the least will from
their citizens for prosecutors to move forward with that as a punishment.”
Since the last execution in North Carolina, five people who were sentenced to
death have been exonerated, and over 20 others have been removed from death row
due to errors in their cases, according to the Center for Death Penalty
Litigation.
Executions are temporarily barred in the state due to a case which challenges
the lethal injection procedures.
(source: chapelboro.com)
************************
Jury sentences man to death in 2016 double murder at a Raleigh hotel
A Wake County jury on Monday sentenced convicted killer Seaga Gillard to death
in a 2016 double murder in a Raleigh hotel.
The case drew attention partly because District Attorney Lorrin Freeman’s
office sought the death penalty, a rarity in North Carolina.
The state has not executed a prisoner since 2006, and Wake County juries had
opted against capital punishment in nine straight murder trials prior to
Gillard’s. The nonprofit Center for Death Penalty Litigation called Freeman “an
outlier” for pursuing punishment the state increasingly rejects.
But Freeman also drew favorable attention in legal circles for seeking justice
for victims many jurors might consider marginal. On the night she was shot,
22-year-old April Holland was advertising her services as a prostitute in the
former America’s Best Value Inn near Crabtree Valley Mall, and her boyfriend,
Dwayne Garvey, was aiding the business.
April Lynn Holland and Dwayne Garvey, who were shot to death on the second
floor of the former America’s Best Value Inn in Raleigh in December 2016.
Courtesy of the Garvey family Holland and Garvey had three children together,
none of whom were living with them at the time of their death, and Holland was
12 weeks pregnant with a 4th child. Prosecutors brought testimony from multiple
other women who said Holland and Garvey were targeted for robbery by Gillard
and his co-defendant Brandon Hill, all while advertising for sex work on
websites.
On Monday, Freeman noted the 13-year moratorium on the death penalty in the
state. Still, she said, Gillard’s “path of destruction” merited seeking the
toughest penalty after murder victims, the death of an unborn child and seven
sexual assaults.
“These people mattered,” Freeman said, “and our community felt that they did
not deserve to die.”
(source: newsobserver.com)
FLORIDA:
Not guilty plea entered in Triple Springs triple homicide case----Shelby Nealy,
25, faces the death penalty in 3 of the 4 1st-degree murder cases against him.
The 25-year-old facing the death penalty for the triple homicide that took
place in Tarpon Springs just before Christmas has pleaded not guilty to all the
charges against him.
An assistant public defender entered the plea on his behalf during an
arraignment hearing Monday. Nealy, who also goes by Shelby Svensen, did not
attend the hearing. He is being held without bail in the Pinellas County jail.
Nealy faces a total of 4 counts of 1st-degree murder in the deaths of the
Ivancic family, who authorities say were killed over a year’s time in Pasco and
Pinellas counties.
The 1st murder he’s accused of took place in January 2018. He killed his
21-year-old ex-wife Jamie Ivancic, according to Tarpon Springs police
investigators, then used her phone to send text messages and photos of their 2
kids to fool family and friends into thinking she was still alive.
But when Nealy feared her family was about to unravel his scheme, police say he
targeted her family in Tarpon Springs. He is accused of bludgeoning his in-laws
Richard Ivancic, 71, his wife Laura, 59, and their 25-year-old son Nicholas
just before Christmas. He targeted them one at a time, police said, and also
killed their 3 dogs.
Investigators believe Nealy killed his in-laws because he feared they would
discover he had killed their daughter. Their deaths were discovered on New
Year’s Day, which soon led to the discovery of her body about 12 miles north of
the family’s Tarpon Springs home. The Pasco County Sheriff’s Office said she
was found buried in the yard of a Port Richey home the couple once stayed at.
Authorities tracked Nealy and his 2 young children to Lakewood, Ohio, where he
was arrested Jan. 3 on 3 counts of 1st-degree murder. The children were placed
in state custody. He has confessed to the murders, investigators say, and was
returned to Pinellas County on Feb. 2. A 4th-count of 1st-degree murder in the
2018 death of Jamie Ivancic was filed on Feb. 22.
Nealy faces the death penalty in the 3 Tarpon Springs homicides. The
Pinellas-Pasco State Attorney’s Office has not yet decided whether to pursue
that penalty in the 4th murder case.
He also faces 3 counts of aggravated cruelty to animals in the deaths of the
family dogs.
(source: Tampa Bay Times)
ALABAMA:
Suspect charged with capital murder in strangling death of 11-year-old Amberly
Barnett
A suspect has been charged in the strangling death of 11-year-old Alabama girl
Amberly Barnett, authorities said today.
Christopher Madison, 33, is held in the DeKalb County jail without bail on a
capital murder charge, according to the sheriff’s office.
DeKalb County Sheriff Nick Welden said an initial autopsy report shows Barnett
was strangled.
Barnett’s body was found about 200 yards behind Madison’s home early Saturday,
Welden said. Barnett had been reported missing late Friday in the Mount Vernon
community of DeKalb County, where she was living with her aunt on County Road
822.
Mount Vernon is about 25 miles northeast of Gadsden.
Welden announced Madison’s arrest during a press briefing at the sheriff’s
office in Fort Payne on Monday afternoon. the sheriff read a brief statement
but didn’t take questions from reporters.
“Due to the ongoing investigation, and in order not to jeopardize that
investigation, I am not at liberty to disclose any additional information
concerning this case,” Welden said.
“My heart is still shattered,” the sheriff added. “Our main focus is justice
for a sweet angel that gained her wings.”
Madison was initially arrested Saturday evening on charges of possession of
drug paraphernalia and possession of a controlled substance, records show. He
was accused of having methamphetamine and a syringe, court records show. The
capital murder charge was added Monday.
In Alabama, capital murder is punishable by the death penalty or life in prison
without the possibility of parole.
Amberly’s mother, Jonie Barnett, wrote a Facebook post in memory of her
daughter on Sunday evening.
“You were the jewel in our hearts,” the mother wrote, “you were loved in every
way, now you're gone, you're truly missed each and every day... You always
brought the sunshine and you brightened up our world, spreading happiness and
kindness since you were a little girl.”
As of Monday, a GoFundMe account already raised about $7,000 for Barnett’s
family. The online account was created by alumni of Cedartown High School in
Georgia. Jonie Barnett was a member of the class of 2009.
(source: al.com)
ARKANSAS:
Arkansas bill would expand execution drug secrecy law
An Arkansas lawmaker on Monday proposed expanding the state's secrecy
surrounding its lethal injection drugs, a move that death penalty opponents and
press advocates said would give officials broad powers to keep information
about executions from the public.
The proposal expands a 2015 law that keeps confidential the supply of Arkansas'
execution drugs. Arkansas doesn't have any executions scheduled, and the
state's supply of the 3 lethal injection drugs it uses has expired. Prison
officials have said they won't search for new drugs until state law is changed
to keep the manufacturers of its drugs a secret.
The proposal would prohibit the state from releasing documents or information
that identify or could indirectly identify the suppliers and makers of its
execution drugs. The proposal would make "recklessly" disclosing the
information a felony.
"This bill will protect those who want to help us uphold the law and help
protect the people of Arkansas," said Republican Sen. Bart Hester, the bill's
sponsor.
The measure is in response to state Supreme Court rulings in late 2017 and last
year that the state must release the package insert and labels for its
execution drugs. Justices said the 2015 law did not specifically prevent the
drugmakers from being identified.
Arkansas was sued in 2017 after it refused to release the labels and inserts.
The Associated Press has previously used the labels — with the manufacturer's
name blacked out — to identify drugmakers whose products would be used in
executions. The state Supreme Court has allowed the state to redact other
information from the labels, such as the lot and batch numbers of the drug.
Attorney General Leslie Rutledge's office said she worked with the governor and
Hester on the bill "to ensure that lawful jury sentences are carried out for
the heinous acts committed by those individuals awaiting justice." A spokesman
said Gov. Asa Hutchinson, who has called for expanding the secrecy to include
manufacturers, supports the bill.
States have increasingly kept secret information about their execution drug
supplies. Robert Dunham, executive director of the Death Penalty Information
Center, said the bill's secrecy and its criminal penalties would make it the
most extreme in the country. Jeff Rosenzweig, an attorney representing death
row inmates in a federal lawsuit challenging Arkansas' execution protocol, said
expanding the drug secrecy prevents the public from knowing whether the state
is carrying out executions in a constitutional manner.
"Unless you know what they are and where they're from and the track record,
you're hamstrung on the question of are you going to be able to prevent
torture," Rosenzweig said.
Ashley Wimberley, executive director of the Arkansas Press Association, said
executions require transparency and accountability throughout the process.
"In its current form, this bill keeps almost everything about this solemn
government function shielded from public scrutiny," Wimberley said in a
statement. "In addition, that it makes even an accidental disclosure of
information a felony has a chilling impact on free speech and whistleblower
rights."
(source: Texarkana Gazette)
NEBRASKA:
Justices: Nebraska County Owes $28M for Wrongful Convictions----The Supreme
Court is rejecting an appeal from a Nebraska county that has to pay a $28
million court judgment to 6 people wrongfully convicted for a 1985 slaying.
The Supreme Court on Monday rejected a rural Nebraska county's appeal of a $28
million court judgment aimed at compensating 6 people wrongfully convicted of a
1985 slaying.
The justices turned away Gage County's last-ditch effort to avoid the hefty
judgment, after a federal appeals court in St. Louis found the award was
justified because of egregious law enforcement conduct. In August, the county
raised its local property tax levy as high as state law allows to pay off the
debt — a move that could become a major drag on the local economy.
All 6 people were wrongfully convicted for the rape and murder of Helen Wilson.
They spent more than 75 years combined in prison until DNA evidence cleared
them in 2008. Wilson's death has since been linked to a former Beatrice,
Nebraska, resident who died in 1992. Beatrice is about 100 miles (161
kilometers) southwest of Omaha.
Jeff Patterson, an attorney for four of the 6 who were wrongfully accused, said
his clients "are just happy that things are moving along" so they can collect
what they're owed.
The lawsuit alleged that law enforcement officials recklessly strove to close
the case despite contradictory evidence and coerced false confessions. The 3
people who gave false confessions all had histories of psychological problems.
1 of the 6, Joseph White, died in a workplace accident in Alabama in 2011.
Gage County expects to spend roughly $3.8 million per year over 8 years to
cover the legal debt, attorney fees and interest, said Myron Dorn, a former
county supervisor who helped approve the payment plan.
Because the county is mostly rural farmland, Dorn said roughly 1/2 of the total
burden will fall on land-rich farmers whose incomes have plummeted because of
low crop prices.
For a typical mid-sized farmer, the 12-cent increase per $100 of taxable value
could mean an extra $14,000 in property taxes owed over the next eight years.
Dorn said one major producer is bracing to pay nearly $100,000 in additional
taxes.
Homeowners will feel the feel the pinch as well. The owner of a $100,000 home
will pay an additional $120 in property taxes each year — nearly $1,000 in
total — until the county pays its debt.
"We're going to notice it, big time," said Don Schuller, a farmer who has
lobbied state lawmakers for help with the debt . "That's a big chunk of money
out of the economy of Gage County."
Schuller said he was concerned the sharp increase could make voters more
reluctant to approve bond measures for school construction and other projects
that might help the economy. He argued that state officials should shoulder
some of the burden because the 6 were threatened with the state-sanctioned
death penalty , prosecuted under state law and served their time in state
prisons.
Dorn, who is now a state senator, introduced legislation this year that would
allow the county to apply for state assistance to help pay off the judgment,
but he isn't optimistic lawmakers will approve it given the state's budget
troubles.
"The probability of that happening is probably pretty slim this year," he said.
Many residents have complained they weren't responsible for the wrongful
conviction, and some argue they didn't even live in Gage County at the time.
Art Nietfeld, who owns farmland near the Kansas border, told a legislative
committee last month that he'll owe an estimated $10,000 in additional property
taxes to pay his share of the judgment.
"I sure didn't have anything to do with it," he said.
After the 1st trial ended in a mistrial in 2015, the 8th Circuit ruled that
there was substantial evidence to support allegations that Gage County
officials conspired to convict the 6 people. That included evidence that
investigators conducted unreported interrogations, ignored verifiable alibis
and suggested that three of the 6 had repressed memories of the crime.
The wrongfully accused, known as the Beatrice Six, are Joseph White, Thomas
Winslow, Ada JoAnn Taylor, Debra Shelden, James Dean and Kathy Gonzalez. White
was killed in a factory accident in 2011, about less than 3 years after winning
his freedom.
(source: Associated Press)
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