May 24
TEXAS:
Texas man on death row for decapitating 3 kids loses appeal
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals rejected an appeal Wednesday from a
37-year-old Rio Grande Valley man on death row for stabbing and beheading his
common-law wife's 3 children 15 years ago.
John Allen Rubio's appeals lawyer argued unsuccessfully that Rubio's attorneys
at his 2010 trial in Cameron County were deficient, that the trial court failed
to sufficiently pay for his appellate investigation of the case and that the
Texas death penalty sentencing procedure was unconstitutional.
The state's highest criminal court also refused a second supplemental appeal
from Rubio as legally improper and declined to consider the merits of the
arguments in that appeal.
"I have to say overall I am not surprised by the court's actions." Rubio's
attorney, David Schulman, said. "I'm very, very disappointed."
He said he would ask the appeals court for a rehearing, saying he was "shocked"
the judges refused the supplemental appeal that included arguments that
prosecutors refused to discuss a plea bargain, that mitigating evidence that
could have changed the outcome wasn't presented to jurors, and that the trial
defense team was hampered by insufficient money from the trial court.
If the request failed, Schulman said other attorneys were prepared to take
Rubio's case into the federal courts.
Rubio was convicted twice of the March 11, 2003, slayings of 3-year-old Julissa
Quesada, 14-month-old John E. Rubio and 2-month-old Mary Jane Rubio in a
squalid Brownsville apartment. The appeals court in 2007 overturned his 1st
conviction, ruling that statements from the children's mother, Angela Camacho,
were wrongly allowed as evidence during the 1st trial. Camacho pleaded guilty
and is serving a life sentence for her role in the slayings.
Records show Rubio's brother and his girlfriend stopped by the apartment,
spotted the slain infant, ran outside screaming and flagged down a police
officer. The officer testified that after he saw decapitated body of a child in
a back bedroom, Rubio held his wrists out and said, "arrest me."
At his 2nd trial, Rubio pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, a defense
rejected by a jury.
Defense experts testified his childhood - filled with violence at home, "toxic"
parents, drug use and prostitution - damaged him developmentally.
Rubio told authorities the children were possessed. Defense experts diagnosed
him as suffering from paranoid schizophrenia, a determination disputed by
prosecution experts.
(source: Associated Press)
PENNSYLVANIA:
Southern York County death penalty trial: Man found guilty of 1st-degree murder
For the rest of his natural life, Paul Henry III will be in the care and
custody of the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections.
Now, a jury in York County will weigh whether his last moments should be at the
State Correctional Institution at Rockview - in the execution chamber.
Following less than 1 1/2 hours of deliberation, Henry, 41, of East Manchester
Township, was found guilty on Tuesday of 2 counts of 1st-degree murder and 1
count of robbery. He burst into a home in southern York County with his wife,
Veronique, and fatally shot Foday Cheeks, 31, of Fawn Township, and Danielle
Taylor, 26, of Spring Grove, on Sept. 13, 2016.
When the foreman announced the verdict at 4:32 p.m., Henry did not react. The
clerk then asked the other 11 jurors, one by one, to answer the same 3
questions:
"Do you find the defendant guilty, not guilty, murder of the 1st degree,
Danielle Taylor?"
"Do you find the defendant guilty, not guilty, murder of the 1st degree, Foday
Cheeks?"
"Do you find the defendant guilty, not guilty, of robbery?"
Amy Eller, Coren Clymer, James Gregoire and Devon Fisher all testified that
they saw Henry shoot and kill Cheeks, who was a heroin and crack dealer.
Their stories slightly varied. But the substance of their testimony was
consistent.
They heard a knock at the back door, and then, a bang that sounded like a
firecracker.
Henry demanded to know where the money and drugs were at gunpoint and searched
through the house. The husband and wife took their cellphones and other
belongings and told the group to wait 20 minutes before leaving out the front
door.
Veronique Henry, meanwhile, whispered to them that they'd be OK.
Police apprehended the Henrys after a pursuit. Law enforcement found 4 guns - a
.45-caliber handgun, .44 magnum, .38-caliber revolver and 12-gauge shotgun -
inside the 2003 Nissan Altima in addition to items including knives, ammunition
and duct tape.
Cheeks' wallet was in the car. It even contained his Maryland driver's license.
Several of the victims' cellphones were also in the vehicle.
2 of the weapons had Cheeks' DNA on them. Bullets and casings at the crime
scene matched the murder weapon: the .45 Colt Combat Commander.
Farley Holt and Suzanne Smith, Paul Henry's attorneys, argued those stories
changed over time and that witnesses were not in a position to see what
happened.
In his 2-hour closing argument, Holt told the jury that many facts weren't in
dispute. The case, he said, boiled down to credibility.
He went through the witness statements - and how they varied and changed - at
length. Holt also castigated the Pennsylvania State Police, calling the
investigation "pretty shoddy, less than stellar."
At trial, Paul Henry testified in his own defense.
Paul Henry said he accompanied his wife - he brought along the .44 magnum and
the .38-caliber revolver - and acted as a lookout outside as she bought a
bundle, or 10 bags, of heroin.
He testified that he ran inside after hearing a gunshot. Veronique Henry, he
said, shot and killed Cheeks and Taylor.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my client didn't commit this act. He didn't know this
whole thing was going to go down," Holt said. "Desperate acts by desperate
people. My client wasn't a desperate drug addict."
But, District Attorney Dave Sunday said the witnesses are humans who've been
through a traumatic event.
Sunday said it would be concerning if they testified in a "robotic manner." The
witnesses, he said, faced more than 7 hours of cross-examination from
experienced defense attorneys.
"They did their damnedest," Sunday said. "But what slip up never happened with
Amy Eller? What slip up never happened with Coren? Or Devon? Or James? They
never said 'she.'"
Later, Sunday focused on how Paul Henry had military experience, while his wife
was addicted to heroin and looking for a fix.
Toward the end, Sunday stressed how Paul Henry posted on Facebook 1 1/2 months
before the killings about Cheeks, whom he described as his wife's "pimp/drug
dealer."
Paul Henry used his wife as a key to get in the home. He shot Cheeks one final
time in the head - postmortem - out of "nothing but satisfaction," Sunday said.
"That last round is the epitome of pure, visceral hatred that only 1 man in
that house, only 1 man in this courtroom, ever possessed. And he's sitting
right there," said Sunday, who raised his voice and pointed at Paul Henry. "It
is finally time to hold him accountable for what he did."
(source: York Daily Record)
NORTH CAROLINA:
Prosecutors can seek death penalty in Enfield quadruple homicide
A Superior Court judge ruled Wednesday that prosecutors can seek the death
penalty against 3 of 4 men charged with killing 4 people in an Enfield home
last summer.
Matthew Lewis Simms, 25, of Enfield, Keyon Quarice West, 23, and James Edward
Powell, 25, both of Roanoke Rapids, and Dontayvious Devonte "Moochie" Cotton,
24, of Weldon, all face 4 counts of 1st-degree murder.
Janice Harris, James Harris, Peggy Whitley and James Whitley were shot on Aug.
21 while sitting at the Harrises' kitchen table playing cards, authorities
said.
Authorities said a family member went to check on the residents of the home at
980 Fishing Creek Road, in the Glenview community west of Enfield, and found
the bodies. Some items were missing from the home, but there were no apparent
signs of a struggle, authorities said at the time.
Halifax County Sheriff Wes Tripp said last fall that the home might have been
targeted and the killings might have been gang-related.
Jim Harris, 88, was a gunsmith and had a federally licensed firearm business
that he ran out of his home.
James Whitley, 76, was a farmer and his 67-year-old wife a former hairstylist.
Janice Harris, 72, was an administrative assistant for a local builder.
While Judge Alma Hinton agreed that there was enough evidence against Simms,
Powell and Cotton to declare them capital cases, she postponed a hearing for
West because he has had little contact with an attorney since his January
arrest.
(source: WRAL news)
SOUTH CAROLINA:
Mother of murdered deputy: 'You'll never get justice with the death penalty'
Myra McCants, 74, lost her son on Dave Lyle Boulevard in Rock Hill almost 26
years ago but it feels like yesterday to her because Mar-Reece Hughes, the man
on death row for the murder, is still alive.
"It's horrible. It breaks my heart," McCants said.
York County sheriff Deputy Brent McCants stopped a car because it had a light
out. He didn't know the car was stolen in Charlotte in a carjacking. He didn't
know the 2 men in the car had a gun. McCants was shot 7 times and left to die
in the street.
"My child was 23. 23 years old. He'd be 49 now," McCants said.
She knows her community still cares. She lives on a street in Lancaster named
for her son. His name also appears in Rock Hill where he gave his life, and he
shares a memorial wall at the sheriff's office with Detective Mike Doty.
She doesn't have any faith left in the system that promised swift justice and
has left her suffering.
"Do something when you say you're going to do it. Do it," she said.
Solicitor Kevin Brackett helped prosecute that case and on Tuesday, he agreed
to a deal that put the man who killed Doty in prison for life. He wanted to
seek the death penalty but Doty's parents couldn't endure years of appeals and
seeing their son's killer again and again.
The Dotys were very familiar with the death of Deputy McCants. Brackett was
clear when talking to them about the case against Christian McCall and what a
death penalty trial might mean for them.
"They need to understand this is how the system works. It doesn't," Brackett
said.
"They either need to do away with (the death penalty) and say, 'We don't want
it,' or find a way to make it work," he said.
Brackett said it's shocking that the state can't get the drugs for lethal
injection. He believes the state isn't doing enough to carry out death
sentences.
"I've sent people to death row in my career and none of them have been
executed. They're not even close to being executed," Brackett said.
McCants has given up on the system. She said the Doty family made the right
call.
"Don't go for the death penalty. You'll never get justice," she said.
She believes she'll pass away before Hughes gets the punishment he was
sentenced to for killing her son.
(source: WSOC TV news)
LOUISIANA:
Hearing that could free convicted murderer from death row nears end
Attorneys for convicted quadruple murderer Darrell James Robinson are wrapping
up their arguments in the Rapides Parish courthouse on the 7th day of a hearing
that could lead to Robinson having his conviction and death penalty sentence
vacated.
Robinson was convicted in 2001 of the 1996 shooting deaths of Billy Lambert,
50, Carol Hooper, 54, Maureen Kelley, 37, and Kelley's 10-month-old son,
Nicholas. Robinson was staying with Lambert at the time and working for him.
Robinson, who has failed in prior appeal attempts, is now trying to have his
conviction and sentence vacated based on claims by post-conviction attorneys
that the original prosecutor on trial, Mike Shannon, may have withheld evidence
from Robinson's attorney at the time, Mike Small. It's a claim the Rapides
Parish District Attorney's Office and Shannon himself have repeatedly denied.
In turn, Mike Small, who was Robinson's original defense attorney is also under
the microscope for possibly providing ineffective counsel.
In the final stretch, Robinson's team called Rapides Parish Assistant District
Attorney Greg Wampler, who enrolled for the state on the case when talks about
possible Brady violations came up in 2015.
In October 2015, some of Robinson's lawyers met with Wampler and District
Attorney Phillip Terrell. They were joined by other assistant district
attorneys including Greg Gravel, Brian Cespiva and Johnny Giordano.
Robinson's attorneys presented to the DA's Office at that meeting evidence they
felt showed that Brady violations were committed.
Wampler said an investigation began, "I discussed those matters with a number
of assistant district attorneys...we contacted to see if we could discover. I
did not specifically investigate Mark Moras (a man who the post-conviction
attorneys believe could have been the real killer)."
The following year, a joint stipulation of facts was drafted between Robinson's
attorneys and the state.
"We worked on it for quite some time," said Wampler, later adding, "I would not
intentionally misrepresent anything."
Robinson's team introduced an email chain to the court which gave the
impression that the parties were working toward a resolution.
"This was a collaborative effort," said Wampler.
In May 2016, a hearing was held about those stipulations and he said they were
amended with the help of former prosecutor Shannon.
"We met with Mr. Shannon," he said. "Mr. Shannon had an intimate knowledge."
When asked about the changes requested by Shannon, Wampler said he "can't
recall."
There was also talk about Mark Moras coming up as a potential alternate
suspect, but Wampler said, "We were never able to verify." He chalked it up to
"wild tales."
Later on in the day, James Boren, a well known defense attorney in Baton Rouge
testified as an expert on the defense of capital cases. This is where testimony
changed focus to possible ineffective prosecution by Small.
Boren went over a series of guidelines that help capital defense attorneys
navigate the process.
"Counsel should conduct an independent investigation," he said. "It should
begin immediately."
One of the key guidelines, Boren said, was addressing the issue of potential
co-defendants or alternate suspects. The name of Mark Moras came up at the
original investigation, but he was removed from the list of potential suspects
when an investigator found he had an alibi.
"They had clues that Mark Moras was an alternate suspect," Boren said.
He also talked about blood found on a wall that was never tested from the crime
scene.
"They were not aware of what portions of the blood had been swabbed or not
swabbed," he said, referencing testimony a few days earlier that showed that
photos of that spot were not provided to Small back in the '90s.
"He (Moras) should have been on their radar screen, but wasn't," said Boren.
Whether it was an issue of a Brady violation or ineffective counsel, Boren
said, was yet to be seen, but, "the result is the same," when talking about the
verdict.
(source: KALB news)
KENTUCKY:
Judge: Lawyer can't represent man in death penalty case
A Kentucky judge says a lawyer must stop representing a defendant in a death
penalty case after the client's money ran out and the lawyer sought state help
paying for expert examinations and testimony.
The Bowling Green Daily News reports Allen County Circuit Judge Janet Crocker
on Tuesday cited a Kentucky Supreme Court decision that says indigent
defendants can get state funds for trial preparation, but must accept a public
defender.
Timothy Madden is charged with murder, kidnapping and 1st-degree rape and
sodomy in the November 2015 death of 7-year-old Gabriella "Gabbi" Doolin.
Madden's relatives had retained Travis Lock, but the money ran out. Lock has
said he would continue to represent Madden for free, but needed state funds for
experts.
The trial set for July 23 has been delayed.
(source: Herald Courier)
NEBRASKA:
3-judge panel sets date to announce death penalty decision in Schroeder's case
A 3-judge panel has set a June 1 hearing to announce its decision on whether
Patrick Schroeder will be sentenced to death for killing his prison cellmate
last year.
District Judges Vicky Johnson of Wilber, Robert Otte of Lincoln and John Marsh
of Kearney heard evidence last month on aggravators.
Prosecutors alleged just one aggravator was needed to make the case eligible
for the death penalty - and Schroeder, who represented himself, chose not to
fight the death penalty and made no argument or case for why the judges
shouldn't give it to him.
He admitted to strangling inmate Terry Berry at the Tecumseh State Correctional
Institution on April 15, 2017, because he wouldn't stop talking.
Berry had been moved into Schroeder's cell almost a week earlier. Schroeder
said he knew it wasn't going to work, but he said prison staff just laughed
when he asked for the cellmates to be separated.
Schroeder was in prison on a life sentence for beating a 75-year-old Pawnee
City farmer to death and dumping his body in a well.
(source: Lincoln Journal Star)
CALIFORNIA:
Andrew Urdiales found guilty of 5 counts of first degree murder, special
circumstance----He could face the death penalty when sentenced
A former Marine already serving time for 3 killings in Chicago was convicted
today of murdering 5 women in Southern California, including victims in Palm
Springs and Cathedral City.
Andrew Urdiales, 53, faces a possible death sentence for his Southern
California killing spree, which stretched from 1986 to 1995 and also left women
dead in Mission Viejo and San Diego.
Urdiales was originally sentenced to death in Illinois for the murders of 3
prostitutes there, but he was re-sentenced to life in prison after capital
punishment was outlawed in Illinois.
His trial in Santa Ana will now move to a penalty phase, when jurors will
recommend if he should be sentenced to life in prison or death. Jurors found
true the special circumstance allegation of lying in wait, making Urdiales
eligible for the death penalty.
Urdiales' attorneys claimed that childhood trauma and fetal alcohol spectrum
disorder left him incapable of controlling his anger, meaning that Urdiales did
not plan the murders before committing them. Instead, they argued for implied
malice, which would lead to a 2nd-degree murder conviction, which would make
him ineligible for the death penalty.
Jurors began deliberating about 4 p.m. Thursday, but then got off to a late
start Monday when a panelist had to be replaced. The jury began again at 11
a.m. Monday and reached verdicts about 3:30 Tuesday afternoon.
The former U.S. Marine was convicted of killing:
23-year-old Robbin Brandley as she walked to her car following a concert on
Jan. 18, 1986, at Saddleback College in Mission Viejo;
29-year-old Julie McGhee on July 17, 1988, in Cathedral City;
31-year-old Maryann Wells on Sept. 25, 1988, in San Diego;
20-year-old Tammie Erwin on April 16, 1989, in Palm Springs; and
32-year-old Denise Maney on March 11, 1995, in Palm Springs.
(source: KESQ news)
*******************
When did Dianne Feinstein start opposing the death penalty?
U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein built her very long and successful political career
staking out the Democratic party's moderate turf: For gun control, for the
environment, for Obamacare, for the death penalty.
Well, not so much that last bit anymore. Feinstein revealed Wednesday that
she's shed her support for the death penalty "as it exists today."
"Several years ago I changed my view of the death penalty," Feinstein said in
an emailed statement. "It became crystal clear to me that the risk of unequal
application is high and its effect on deterrence is low."
Feinstein - now facing a primary challenge to her re-election from more liberal
Democrats - never trumpeted her flip on the death penalty, which was hotly
debated in California just two years ago with dueling ballot initiatives to end
executions or hurry them up. Voters in 2016 decisively rejected the initiative
to repeal the death penalty and narrowly approved the measure limiting time for
appeals to speed the path from death row to the execution chamber.
It was unclear when Feinstein came to her change of heart on capital
punishment. Her campaign said she shared her evolved viewpoint with California
party delegates in a Feb. 19 phone call, and also provided an undated letter
she had sent "earlier" to constituents who asked her position.
Her new position didn't surface publicly until Wednesday when she confirmed it
for a Los Angeles Times article.
Feinstein's leading Democratic re-election challengers like state Sen. Kevin de
Leon, who opposes the death penalty, haven't made capital punishment an issue
in the race. Most polls give her a comfortable lead, with de Leon as the
runner-up who would compete head to head with her in November.
But de Leon campaign spokesman Jonathan Underland said Wednesday that
Feinstein's "latest flip on the death penalty is yet another appeal to
California voters who have outgrown her centrist bent."
"That being said, we are glad her views are coming more in line with California
voters," Underland said. "But the timeline here makes us wonder how long this
change of heart will last."
De Leon and other party critics to Feinstein's left have mostly argued she's
not bare-knuckled enough in fighting President Trump on pretty much everything.
Political analysts said Feinstein's change of heart had an aura of sincerity,
given that she didn't advertise it.
"If it was a craven attempt at popularity it's a misfire," said Thad Kousser, a
UC San Diego political science professor who has followed the Senate race.
"It's entirely reasonable for someone to change position on an issue when
they're presented with changing information," said political analyst Dan
Schnur. But he added that reflects de Leon's effect of pulling her leftward on
issues.
"It probably ends up helping her," Schnur said, "if only because it deprives de
Leon of the ideological oxygen he needs to make inroads against her."
Feinstein's former support for capital punishment helped launch her career in
statewide politics in the 1990s, at a time when California overall was far less
liberal. In 1990, liberal activists at the Democratic state party convention
booed the former San Francisco supervisor and mayor for supporting the death
penalty and denied her the endorsement for governor. But she defeated the more
liberal state Attorney General John Van de Kamp in the primary before losing
the general election to Republican Pete Wilson.
In the Senate, Feinstein voted in 1994 to reject using racial statistics in
death penalty appeals and in 1996 to limit death penalty appeals.
In 2004, Feinstein publicly split with Kamala Harris, then San Francisco's
district attorney and now her Democratic partner in the Senate, over the death
penalty for a cop killer. Harris had declined to seek the death penalty, and at
the officer's funeral, Feinstein said that the cop???s death was "the special
circumstance called for by the death penalty law" and remarked that she might
not have supported Harris as D.A. had she known of her opposition to capital
punishment.
But in her letter to constituents, Feinstein explained that the growing number
of inmates found through DNA evidence to have been innocent has made her
increasingly uncomfortable with the death penalty.
"No one in America should be falsely executed," Feinstein wrote, "and I believe
our criminal justice system must do more to prevent false convictions,
especially where the defendant is subject to the death penalty."
(source: Mercury News)
USA:
U.S. veteran pleads guilty to airport killings to avoid death penalty
A U.S. veteran of the war in Iraq on Wednesday pleaded guilty to fatally
shooting 5 people to death at Fort Lauderdale International Airport in January
2017, in a deal approved by a federal judge that spared him the death penalty.
Esteban Santiago, 28, agreed in U.S. District Court in Miami to a plea deal
that calls for him to serve 5 consecutive life sentences followed by 120 years
in prison without a right to appeal. He is due to be sentenced on Aug. 17.
Santiago flew from his home in Anchorage, Alaska, to Fort Lauderdale, retrieved
a Walther 9mm pistol and 2 clips of ammunition that he had checked on the
flight and opened fire near a baggage carousel.
6 people were wounded in addition to the 5 he killed, according to court
papers.
After running out of bullets, he placed his weapon on the ground and
surrendered to police. At the end of Wednesday's court hearing, U.S. District
Judge Beth Bloom asked Santiago why he committed the violent act.
"I don't know. I wasn't thinking about it at the time," said Santiago, shackled
in a beige jumpsuit. "There were a lot of things going on in my mind,
messages."
Santiago, who served in the Puerto Rico and Alaska National Guard, was deployed
to Iraq from 2010 to 2011.
Prosecutors said Santiago told law enforcement agents he chose Florida to carry
out an attack. Shortly after his arrest, Santiago told federal officials he
participated in online jihadi chatrooms, but federal investigators said there
was no evidence of that, the Miami Herald reported.
A psychologist who would meet with Santiago periodically was present at
Wednesday's hearing and told the judge that he was diagnosed with
schizophrenia.
Though he had been taking psychiatric medicine, a federal judge in March 2017
said Santiago was mentally fit to stand trial. While in custody Santiago had
refused for a short time to take his medicine.
(source: Reuters)
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