[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, FLA., CALIF.
Jan. 20 TEXASexecution Texas puts inmate to death for a killing 15 years ago in state's 1st execution of 2016 A Texas man put to death Wednesday for a killing 15 years ago became the state's 1st prisoner executed in 2016. Richard Masterson, 43, was pronounced dead at 6:53 p.m. after a lethal injection in the nation's busiest death penalty state. Texas carried out 13 lethal injections in 2015, accounting for nearly half of the 28 executions nationwide. Masterson had claimed the January 2001 strangulation of Darin Shane Honeycutt was accidental and had several appeals before the courts, including at four with the U.S. Supreme Court. His last-day efforts to stop his execution were rejected. He had testified at his trial that the death of the 35-year-old Honeycutt in Houston happened accidentally during a chokehold that was part of a sex act. The 2 had met at a bar and then went to Honeycutt's apartment. Honeycutt was an entertainer who performed dressed as a woman. Honeycutt's stage name was Brandi Houston. Court records showed Masterson confessed to police, told others about the killing and acknowledged Honeycutt was slain on purpose in a letter to the Texas attorney general in 2012. "I meant to kill him," Masterson wrote to then-Attorney General Greg Abbott, who is now the state's governor. "It was no accident." Evidence showed Masterson stole Honeycutt's car, dumped it in Georgia, and was arrested at a Florida mobile home park more than a week later with another stolen car. That car belonged to a Tampa, Florida, man who testified he was robbed by Masterson but survived a similar sex episode where he was choked. Masterson's attorneys argued Honeycutt's death was accidental or the result of a heart attack, that a Harris County medical examiner whose credentials have been questioned was wrong to tell jurors it was a strangulation, that Masterson's earlier lawyers were deficient and that his prolonged drug use and then withdrawal while in jail contributed to his "suicide by confession" when he spoke to police and in the letter to Abbott. Lawyers also contended trial jurors were given an incomplete instruction before their deliberations and that the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals denied Masterson his rights to due process and access to the courts by refusing their challenge to a new state law that keeps secret the identity of the provider of pentobarbital that Texas prison officials use for lethal injections. State lawyers argued that Masterson's attorneys offered no scientific evidence about Honeycutt's death that hadn't been previously raised and rejected, including by jurors at Masterson's 2002 trial. Federal courts had no jurisdiction in the execution drug secrecy because it was a state matter, they contended. Masterson had a long drug history and criminal record beginning at age 15. Court documents showed he ignored advice from lawyers at his trial for the killing and insisted on telling jurors he met Honeycutt at a bar and they went to Honeycutt's Houston apartment where Masterson said the chokehold was part of an autoerotic sex act. Honeycutt's body was found Jan. 27, 2001, after friends became worried when he failed to show up for work. Masterson also told jurors he was a future danger - an element they had to agree with in order to decide a death sentence was appropriate. Masterson's case recently drew the attention of Pope Francis, who has reinforced the Catholic Church's opposition to capital punishment. At least 8 other Texas death row inmates have executions scheduled for the coming months, including 1 set for next week. Masterson becomes the 1st condemned inmate to be put to death this year in Texas and the 532nd overall since the state resumed capital punishment on December 7, 1982. He becomes the 14th condemned inmate to be put to death in Texas since Greg Abbott became governor of the stat in Jan. 2015. Masterson becomes the 2nd condemned inmate to be put to death this year in the USA and the 1424th overall since the nation resumed executions on Jasnaury 17, 1977. (sources: Associated Press & Rick Halperin) ** Executions under Greg Abbott, Jan. 21, 2015-present14 Executions in Texas: Dec. 7, 1982present-532 Abbott#scheduled execution date-nameTx. # 15-January 27---James Freeman-533 16-February 16--Gustavo Garcia534 17-March 9--Coy Wesbrook--535 18-March 22-Adam Ward-536 19-March 30-John Battaglia537 20-April 6--Pablo Vasquez-538 21-April 27-Robert Pruett-539 22-June 2---Charles Flores540 (sources: TDCJ & Rick Halperin) FLORIDA: Lavar Monte Thompson Convicted, But A Potential
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide
Jan. 20 ZAMBIA: Scrap death sentence - UNZA don A lecturer in the School of Law at the University of Zambia, Landilani Banda, says death sentence is "state-sanctioned murder" and must thus be abolished. Mr Banda says there is no legal, political or religious justification for maintaining the death penalty in the laws of the country. Mr Banda said yesterday when he appeared before the Parliamentary Committee on Legal Affairs, Governance, Human Rights, Gender Matters and Child Affairs, that has been receiving views on whether the death penalty should be abolished or not. "There is no valid reason to maintain death sentence in the statutes of Zambia. Being on death row alone causes so much anguish and suffering to the convict that most of them actually die on death row," Mr Banda said. He contended that death sentence has not acted as a deterrent to would-be offenders and it is, therefore, only logical that it is scraped. "Death penalty is retrogression to the right of life. It is the state violating the right to life. Which citizen deserves to be killed by the state? Death penalty is not defence of life of the state," Mr Banda said. Mpika member of Parliament Mwansa Kapeya asked Mr Banda on whether he thinks Zambians will be convinced to abolish death penalty through a referendum. Mr Banda said: "Zambians have a conscience. And Government needs to sensitise citizens on their rights, which includes the right to life". Committee chairperson Cornelius Mweetwa asked Mr Banda on what the best deterrent should be in an event that the death penalty is abolished. Mr Banda said life imprisonment would be ideal to replace death penalty. Last week, the Human Rights Commission said Amnesty International described death penalty as a "premeditated and cold-blooded killing of a human being by the State", and should therefore, be abolished because it is a violation of fundamental human rights. And Panos Institute Southern Africa (PSAf) has called on MPs to help promote transparency and accountability in the country by expediting the enactment of the Access to Information (ATI) Bill into law, which media practitioners have been fighting for since 1991, TEDDY KUYELA reports. Appearing before the Parliamentary Committee on Information and Broadcasting Services at the National Assembly last week, PSAf programme manager for media development and information communication technology, Elias Banda, said access to information is a basic human right for all citizens. Mr Banda urged Parliamentarians to support the enactment of the ATI into law to help promote accountability and reduce corruption. This is according to a statement issued by Panos yesterday. "Access to Information is a basic human right supported by Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other international statutes of good governance and open societies," Mr Banda said. Among other benefits, Mr Banda informed the committee that the ATI will enable the state or public bodies to positively seek information through research and development in all spheres of life. Mr Banda said the enactment of the ATI Bill into law will also help to improve the knowledge base of an economy and help discover creative new ways of developing the country and its people. (source: Zambia Daily Mail) PAKISTANexecution Death penalty: Murder convict hanged A murder convict was hanged at the Jhang District Jail on Tuesday morning. A Prisons Department spokesperson said Allah Ditta, a resident of Chak 161-JB, was sentenced to death by a trial court. He said Allah Ditta had killed a rival in 1996. The apex court had upheld the decision of the lower court and the president had turned down his mercy petition. A district and sessions judge had issued black warrants for Allah Ditta to be hanged on January 19. (source: The Express Tribune) * Qadri appeals for state's mercy Mumtaz Qadri, whose death sentence was upheld by the Supreme Court of Pakistan for shooting to death Punjab governor Salman Taseer, has appealed the President of Pakistan for mercy. According to sources at Interior Ministry, Mumtaz Qadri's appeal for mercy will be forwarded to the President's House. Mumtaz Qadri, who was part of the security detail of Salman Taseer, had shot the former Punjab governor multiple times in Islamabad on January 4, 2011 for allegedly committing a blasphemy. Qadri has, in his appeal addressed to President Mamnoon Hussain, stated that he is the only breadwinner in his family, and thus, deserves the state's mercy. President Mamnoon Hussain will decide whether or not to condone the death penalty of Mumtaz Qadri, who had confessed to murdering Salman Taseer. (source: thenews.com.pk) INDIA: SC to rehear death row convict's plea The Supreme Court today agreed to re-hear the plea of Pakistani terrorist Mohammad Arif, alias Ashfaq, seeking review of the death
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, FLA., ALA., USA
Jan. 20 TEXAS: As an Attorney, Death Penalty Enthusiast Ted Cruz Really Loved Describing Brutal Crimes Texas Senator and presidential candidate Ted Cruz has never exactly hidden his passion for the death penalty - it's a love that speaks its name over and over whenever he talks in public. As the New York Times lays out today, his passion took a somewhat more unseemly form when he was a Supreme Court Clerk, where he seemed to take unusual relish in laying out the details of violent crimes. Cruz has always been pro-death penalty and a staunch advocate for keeping the system churning along just as it currently kills people (except, as Mother Jones pointed out, in 2010, when as a private practice attorney, he represented a wrongfully convicted man who spent 14 years on death row). He may have gotten some of that from his father; Rafael Cruz has argued from the pulpit that God himself is pro-death penalty. That enthusiasm made itself evident when he was clerking for Supreme Court Justice William H. Rehnquist in 1996, the Times writes, and became known for his colorful briefs on death penalty appeals, which "often dwelled on the lurid details of murders that other clerks tended to summarize in order to quickly move to the legal merits of the case." That's unusual for a dry, dispassionate SCOTUS brief, and really made old Ted stand out at the office, a fact he himself was not unaware of. Per the Times: "I believe in the death penalty," Mr. Cruz wrote in his book "A Time for Truth." As he saw it, it was his duty to include all the details and "describe the brutal nature of the crime." "Liberal clerks would typically omit the facts; it was harder to jump on the moral high horse in defense of a depraved killer," he wrote. Cruz's love of death began even before that, in fact, during a clerkship at federal appellate court in Virginia with Judge J. Michael Luttig. Luttig's father was killed by a 17-year-old would-be carjacker named Napoleon Beazley in 1994. The horrible incident created a bond between Cruz and Luttig, who began working for the judge soon after. A very strong and slightly macabre bond, again, per the Times: Mr. Cruz became devoted to Mr. Luttig, whom Mr. Cruz has described as "like a father to me." During his clerkship, he presented his boss with a caricature of him and other clerks pulling a stagecoach driven by the judge. According to someone who saw the illustration, there was a graveyard behind them with headstones representing the number of people executed in their jurisdiction that year. One thing we can say about Ted Cruz: the man's character is consistent. (source: jezebel.com) FLORIDA: Denise Lee's killer among death penalty cases to be reviewed In another sign of the impact of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that struck down a key part of Florida's death-penalty sentencing system, the state Supreme Court has issued orders allowing 6 death row inmates to file briefs about how the ruling might apply to their cases. That includes the sentence of Michael King, who was convicted in September 2009 in the abduction, rape and killing of North Port's Denise Lee, 21. The same jury that convicted King also recommended 12-0 that he die for the crimes. The Florida Supreme Court's orders, issued Tuesday, are in cases that already had been scheduled for oral arguments during the `st week of February. The orders will allow lawyers for the inmates and the state to file briefs next week about the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in advance of the oral arguments. The U.S. Supreme Court, in an 8-1 decision, found Jan. 12 that Florida's system of imposing death sentences was an unconstitutional violation of the Sixth Amendment right to trial by jury because it gave too much decision-making power to judges instead of juries. A key question is whether - or how - the ruling might apply to people already sentenced to death. Besides King, Tuesday's orders allow briefs to be filed on behalf of Richard Knight, convicted in a Broward County case; Raymond Bright, convicted in a Bay County case; Dontae Morris, convicted in a Hillsborough County case; Jacob John Dougan, convicted in a Duval County case; and Eric Lee Simmons, convicted in a Lake County case, according to court documents. In a motion filed Friday in the Florida Supreme Court, Morris' attorneys said the breadth of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling was "unanticipated" and that it should apply to Morris' case. The Florida Supreme Court also will hear similar arguments Feb. 2 in the case of Cary Michael Lambrix, who is scheduled to be executed Feb. 11. Lawyers in Attorney General Pam Bondi's office have argued that the U.S. Supreme Court ruling should not affect Lambrix, who has been on death row for more than 3 decades. (source: Herald Tribune) * Shelby Farah's mother to ask state not to execute Rhodes if found guilty Shelby Farah's mother is scheduled to
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide
Jan. 20 BAHAMAS: Tough Call: Time To Face Reality Over Death Penalty Last November, a regional conference in Guyana focused on abolishing the death penalty, which many Caribbean territories - including The Bahamas - want to keep on the books. Sponsored by the European Union (EU), the conference went completely unnoticed here. The main conclusion was that, although capital punishment did not deter crime, public support for it was closely linked to fear. As our murder rate rises to ever more "frightening" levels - which the authorities seem helpless to deal with - it is easy to see why ordinary citizens want to strike back. There is a strong sense that criminals are undermining our society. Former cabinet minister Leslie Miller recently excoriated the Chief Justice for pointing out that - under current law - it would take a massacre before the death penalty could be carried out here. Miller is one of a growing number of Bahamians who have had close relatives or friends murdered in recent years. He dismissed the judge's comment as "ridiculous and stupid" because it sent the wrong message to criminals. "It's sad that the courts are upholding the view that you have to have a massacre to consider you to be eligible for the death penalty. We must fight fire with fire. We have to wipe them out. It's either them or us," Miller said in typical bombastic style. Another politician who has lost a close relative to crime is Democratic National Alliance chief Branville McCartney. And he has been equally insistent on the need for executions. "How many more must die," he said recently, "before lawmakers do what is necessary to protect the public?" Fundamentalist preachers are even more unyielding. Consider this comment from Bishop Walter Hanchell: "As we can see from scriptures, the penalty for murder is death ... state killings should and must be resumed in order to rid the community of wicked persons, who have lost their right to live in our society." But all of these comments amount to spitting in the wind. There is a global trend towards abolition of the death penalty. Today, nearly 2/3 of all the countries in the world no longer execute people. Many CARICOM nations retain capital punishment on the books, but judges - whether at the Privy Council in London or the Caribbean Court in Trinidad - have gradually made the penalty almost impossible to carry out. The last executions in the region were carried out in St Kitts and Nevis (2008), the Bahamas (2000) and Trinidad and Tobago (1999). In St Kitts, the number of murders increased in the year following the 2008 execution. In Trinidad, after an appeals court determination limiting executions, the murder rate fell. Multiple studies have shown that while capital punishment does not deter crime, it does run the risk of executing innocent people. And abolitionists argue that the death penalty is often used in a disproportional manner against the poor and minority groups. As lawyer Dion Hanna has pointed out: "It's very easy to convict someone under our legal system who may be innocent, and there is no redress, unless you have public campaigns to overturn a decision, and we don't have that kind of culture in the Bahamas. So the death penalty really is a dangerous weapon in the hands of the legal system." According to a 2007 study by the United Nations and the World Bank, the causes of high crime rates in our region include the easy availability of guns, urban chaos, income inequality, and the prevalence of gangs, organised crime and drug trafficking. As the South African court which abolished the death penalty in 1995 said: "We would be deluding ourselves if we were to believe that the execution of ... a comparatively few people each year ... will provide the solution to the unacceptably high rate of crime ... The greatest deterrent to crime is the likelihood that offenders will be apprehended, convicted and punished. It is that which is presently lacking in our criminal justice system." Delegates at the Guyana conference called on Caribbean countries to formalise the unofficial moratorium on the death penalty that currently exists and respect international human rights laws. They argued that public opinion in favour of executions was not a major obstacle to achieving this. "Public support for the death penalty does not necessarily mean that (it) is right," an EU statement said, pointing to historical precedents where gross human rights violations had the support of a majority of the people, but were condemned vigorously later on. In dealing with crime, it was seen as far more important to strengthen the judicial system, while advancing public education on the issue of punishment. One of the top speakers at the Guyana conference was Navnit Dholakia, who was born in Africa and educated in India before emigrating to Britain in the 1950s. He is a member of the UK All Party
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----MO., KAN., COLO., USA
Jan. 20 MISSOURI: Bill to abolish death penalty in Missouri being considered A move to abolish the death penalty in the Show-Me State is getting a hearing before a Missouri Senate committee. Senate Bill 816 is sponsored by Sen. Paul Weiland, R-Imperial. He told the committee on general laws that being a pro-life Republican should also include the end of life. "When I got involved in public life, one of my motivations was defending human life," Wieland said. "So to me it made logical sense, in order for me to be congruent with my conscience, that I would in fact be against the death penalty, and even further, I would work to try to end the death penalty here in the state of Missouri." Weiland also argued that the death penalty does not make Missouri, nor the rest of the United States, look good in the eyes of the world. Several people testified in favor of the bill, including Nimrod Chapel, president of the NAACP's Missouri state conference. He told the committee that the death penalty in Missouri is disproportionately pronounced against African Americans. "If you murder a white person, a white woman in particular, you're nearly 14 times more likely to get executed than those who murder black men," Chapel said. "The slogan that you hear, that 'Black Lives Matter,' is directly in response to this kind of disproportionate application of state law." Mark Richardson, prosecuting attorney for Cole County, strongly disagreed that racial disparities exist in the application of capital punishment in Missouri. "As of 2005, there were 46 prisoners under sentence of death in Missouri, (and) of those 46, 24 were white and 22 were African American," Richardson said. "Based on the murders committed, not the population statistically, but who's committing the murders, there appears in our state to be no disparity." Richardson, speaking on behalf of the Missouri Association of Prosecuting Attorneys, also testified that the death penalty not only protects the public, but staff members at state prisons. "Throwing the death penalty off the table," he said, "I would be forced to tell the victim's family of a murderer of a young man, say, that started as a corrections officer, who's murdered in prison, that we will just send that inmate right back to the prison where he came from, and have no ability to deter our worst offenders from attempting and committing murders against prison staff, guards or other inmates." The hearing had to recess because the Missouri Senate was scheduled to convene at 4 p.m., and Senate rules forbid committee meetings to occur while the full Senate is in session. The hearing on the death penalty abolition bill is scheduled to resume next week. The bill's chances of success appear remote, as most of the Republican majority in the Missouri General Assembly supports the death penalty, as does Gov. Jay Nixon, a Democrat. Missouri executed 6 death row inmates last year and 18 total since lethal injections resumed in late 2013. (source: stlpublicradio.org) KANSAS: Supreme Court restores death sentences in heinous Kansas murder spree Despite deep divisions over capital punishment, the Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that in the case of some particularly heinous Kansas murders, death was the appropriate penalty. The court ruled 8-1 that death sentences handed down against 3 men should not have been tossed out for procedural reasons by Kansas' highest court. Justice Antonin Scalia wrote the decision, with Justice Sonia Sotomayor the lone dissent. The case had exposed the same tensions and fault lines over the death penalty first revealed on the last day of the court's last term in June, when it ruled 5-4 to uphold a controversial form of lethal injection. Then, 4 justices spoke emotionally over the relative correctness or cruelty of capital punishment, and Justices Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg said it might be unconstitutional. In the Kansas case, the state Supreme Court had struck down death sentences against 3 convicted murderers because of instructions given to the juries and, in the case of 2 brothers, the use of a joint sentencing hearing rather than separate ones. The state asked to restore the death sentences, and a majority of justices agreed. "These defendants tortured their victims, acts of almost inconceivable cruelty and depravity described firsthand for the jury by the lone survivor," Scalia said. Noting during oral arguments that 6 of the state's 9 death row inmates could win new hearings if the Kansas court's ruling remained, Scalia said, "Kansans, unlike our Justice Breyer, do not think the death penalty is unconstitutional and indeed very much favor it." He later went out of his way to read the gory details of the Kansas murder case, in which 5 men and women were repeatedly raped and abused before 4 were murdered and the 5th shot execution-style. Justice Samuel Alito, who
