[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TENN., USA, CALIF., ARK.

[Rick Halperin]

Dec. 5




TENNESSEE:

Costs of Defending Indigent Tennessee Death Penalty Cases


Lawmakers and others studying the death penalty in Tennessee are analyzing
how much money is spent defending indigent cases.

Libby Sykes, director of Tennessee's Administrative Office of the Courts,
says the state spent more than $20 million defending indigent cases last
year. Those costs included fees for investigations, attorneys and expert
witnesses.

Democratic state Sen. Doug Jackson says he's concerned that the office
arbitrarily bases its decisions on whether to approve or deny funding on
its budget without considering the legal needs of defendants.

Sykes says the office does not have the money to increase the rates they
pay attorneys to take on indigent cases.

(source: Associated Press)

*************************

Final death-row appeal of Christa Gail Pike delayed again


Prosecutors: Former DA Dossett's death 'suspicious,' want to exhume body

A years-long legal fight over whether convicted killer Christa Gail Pike's
trial was fair just got longer.

Knox County Criminal Court Judge Mary Beth Leibowitz was forced to grant
another delay in a hearing to determine whether Pike received a fair trial
when she was convicted and sentenced to death in March 1996 for the
January 1995 torture slaying of fellow Job Corps student and romantic
rival Colleen Slemmer.

A final round of post-conviction appeals is aimed at convincing Leibowitz
that her defense team at the time was so derelict as to violate her
rights.

Today's delay was prompted by the withdrawal from Pike's defense team of
attorney Catherine Brockenborough, who cited problems with her law
practice as the reason.

The announcement appeared to upset Pike, who cried and attempted to hug
Brockenborough. The move was blocked by guards because of prison security
rules.

Leibowitz has rescheduled the hearing, which will last 4 to 5 days, to
begin April 7, 2008.

Pike was 18 when she grew jealous of Slemmer over Tadaryl Shipp, 17.

The three and another participant in the killing, Shadolla Peterson, 18,
all were students at the now-defunct Job Corps training program for
troubled youth.

Court testimony showed that Pike hatched a plan to attack Slemmer,
enlisting Shipp and Peterson.

Slemmer, who was 19, was beaten, sliced with a box cutter and meat
cleaver, and then bludgeoned to death. A pentagram was carved in her
chest.

In July of this year, however, Pike's new taxpayer-funded attorneys sought
to show that her prior defenders failed to put on proof that Pike suffered
bi-polar disorder and was under the sway of a manipulative, violent Shipp.

Shipp, a defense witness, himself sought to portray Pike as an "edgy"
woman who would sometimes "black out" with attacks of rage for which she
always was remorseful. He also sought through his testimony to minimize
her role in the slaying.

"I carved every last bit of it," Shipp testified of the pentagram.

He also testified that he was the one who brought the meat cleaver and box
cutter.

Because of his age, Shipp could not be sentenced to death. He is serving a
life sentence.

Peterson, a key witness in the case, walked away with probation.


USA:

Huckabee muses on reviewing death sentences as governor and
president-----Conversation veers from abortion ban to role of president as
chief executioner.


Every candidate, and every observer, learns on the run. I was reminded of
that in a conversation with Mike Huckabee that swerved from his support
for a ban on abortion to his belief in reviewing cases that culminate in
state-imposed executions.

Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor seeking the Republican nod for
president, sees an abortion ban as secondary to valuing life. "The bigger
issue is that nobody has his or her life devalued for any reason, whether
it's your IQ, your status of health, your gender, your socioeconomic
standing (or) your disabilities," he said.

I asked if he views convicts on death row the same way.

Not quite, Huckabee said, because such individuals have committed heinous
acts  and a sentence to death is "not the result of the capricious action
of one person; it's the culmination of many actions of a legal system that
has given that person every opportunity to show why he or she should not
be executed."

Huckabee, governor from 1996 to 2007, signed off on 16 executions. During
that period, Texas put 275 convicts to death.

In each case, Huckabee said, "I took the entire case files, which
sometimes, and most times, amounted to several boxes of file folders. I
read every single page of that case, every page, before I would take that
case to the point of execution."

Every page? Death penalty cases generate reams of documents including
judicial rulings, legal briefs and trial transcripts. In Texas, governors
review every death penalty case, though Govs. George W. Bush and Rick
Perry haven't been known to plumb the files during their reviews. The
practice is for legal advisers to deliver memos running 10 pages or so
with the governor following up with questions.

I asked Huckabee whether presidents should apply page-by-page scrutiny
though I wasn't sure what role the president plays in death sentences and
I didn't know whether he knew, either. Huckabee said he'd expect taut
reviews.

"You bet," he said. "It's the only decision you make, in my case as a
governor and in this case as a president, that's irrevocable. Every other
decision you make, you can always undo it. You know, you can vote a tax
in, you can vote it out. You can put standards in an educational program,
you can change them and do something else next year. Once you've carried
out a death penalty, you can't undo it."

I did what reporters often do when they sense something new. I asked my
question a different way: If you're president, what's going to change in
the way that people on death row are handled?

Huckabee said: "There would be a thorough review of each case, but I would
respect the court's decision; it would not be my job to, as an individual,
to try to find a way to overturn what the court has decided. It would be
simply to review and to make sure that that person's basic due process had
been carried out."

Huckabee's press secretary said the candidate didn't intend to suggest
that the Bush administration has been lax in its reviews of death
sentences.

The president has constitutional authority to give reprieves and pardons
to prisoners. 3 people (including Timothy McVeigh) have been executed in
the federal system since 1963, all on President George W. Bush's watch.
McVeigh did not apply for clemency, and the president denied clemency to
the other 2. 46 inmates await execution.

Richard Dieter, director of the Death Penalty Information Center, credited
Huckabee's approach to reviews, though he said presidents probably lack
time to paw through piles of files.

"To literally read every word would be a Herculean task," he said.

Like, say, running for president.

(source: The Statesman)






CALIFORNIA:

Witness says Fregia would benefit prison system if spared execution


Lawyers for Mark Fregia sought Wednesday to paint him as a stellar inmate
who would better serve the prison system if he is not condemned.

In reviewing Fregia's extensive prison and jail record and after
interviewing him, former state corrections official Jim Esten testified
that he found Fregia to be "just an unusually different and quite honestly
special kind of an inmate," based on his work record and ability to
sidestep racial factionalism.

"I characterize his performance as, he's a lousy citizen but he's a good
inmate," Esten said.

That testimony came a day after family members and Fregia's former
girlfriend tearfully recalled 2-year-old Daelen Fregia and 6-year-old
Devlin Weaver, whom Fregia was convicted of murdering by fire in a car on
Interstate 80 a week before Christmas, 2003.

The same jury that convicted him Monday of 1st-degree murder with special
circumstances, arson, aggravated mayhem and other charges will soon choose
either a death sentence or life without the possibility of parole.

Fregia poured gasoline on the ex-girlfriend, Erin Weaver, and set her on
fire, scorching more than 85 % of her body with 2nd- and 3rd-degree burns
that left her hospitalized for nine months, more than 2 of them in a coma.

The children died when the car burst into flames. The jury also convicted
Fregia on a count of attempted voluntary manslaughter for igniting Weaver.

Prosecutor Paul Graves on Tuesday elicited testimony from a prior
girlfriend of Fregia, her father and police officers who recounted threats
and harassment in 1989, including a broken window.

"I never left the house alone," recalled Linda Johnson, the former
girlfriend. "He said nothing will happen to him for breaking the window.
He said if he gets arrested it will be for murder."

Solano County prosecutors had filed several felony charges against Fregia
in September 2002 for a pair of domestic violence assaults against Weaver,
with whom he shared a son, Daelen.

Police say Fregia lit Weaver inside the car just before 3 p.m. on Dec. 18,
2003 in a Dodge Colt on westbound I-80 near Appian Way.

Four years later, Weaver said she still most undergo more surgery on her
scarred neck. As she sat on the witness stand, Graves projected several
pictures of her 2 smiling children on a screen. Weaver, her face mottled
from burns, wept in describing the pain of losing them.

She said she knew her children were dead the moment she arose from the
coma.

"I woke up knowing. I didn't have to be reminded," she said. "I feel like
I'm no longer a mother. All I had was my kids and they made me so proud. I
feel like I have nothing. He took it all away from me."

During trial, his lawyer, David Headley, depicted Fregia as a man who
loved Weaver, who struggled to control his rage and face down a crack
cocaine addiction, and who suffered from parental neglect that affected
his brain development.

Despite write-ups for being late or lackadaisical in his prison work, as
well as a few scuffles, Fregia's prison performance is laudable, said
Esten, the retired corrections official.

He also noted that Fregia was hired in March as a module worker at County
Jail in Martinez, preparing and serving meals for inmates.

"I would agree with you he doesn't respond well on parole. But that is a
moot issue. He's never going to be on parole," Esten said.

Testimony continues this afternoon.

(source: San Jose Mercury News)






ARKANSAS:

Death penalty sought for Lacy, Laswell


Prosecutors will seek the death penalty for 2 men accused of robbing and
killing Randall Walker.

Benton County Prosecutor Van Stone announced the decision Monday during
court appearances for Brandon Eugene Lacy and Broderick Lloyd Laswell.

Lacy, 28, of Rogers, and Laswell, 19, of Farmington, are charged with
capital murder and aggravated robbery, both class Y felonies. If convicted
of capital murder, the men face possible death sentences or life in
prison. The punishment for aggravated robbery is a sentence ranging from
10 to 40 years or life in prison.

Walker's burned body was found Aug. 30 in his residence at 18425 Beaver
Hollow Road. Firefighters responded to a call and found the body in a
bedroom, where the fire began.

A medical examiner's preliminary findings show Walker died from
blunt-force trauma, including blows to the head and torso, as well as from
stab wounds to the chest and neck. The medical examiner found Walker was
dead at the time of the fire.

Stone cited three aggravating factors for seeking the death penalty in the
case - monetary gain, an especially cruel and depraved manner of death and
a crime committed to prevent arrests.

Circuit Judge Tom Keith scheduled an omnibus hearing for the men for Jan.
14.

Also Monday, Keith appointed Doug Norwood to assist Brad Karren with
Laswell's legal representation. Benton County Chief Public Defender Jay
Saxton represents Lacy.

Lacy contacted Rogers police and claimed he had committed a murder and
that Walker was the victim, according to court documents. Lacy was
arrested Sept. 3 for public intoxication at a Rogers restaurant. While
being taken to the county jail, Lacy again claimed he had murdered Walker,
court documents state.

BCSO investigator Greg Hines interviewed Lacy, who said he was taking
medications for depression. He also claimed he was drunk at the time of
the incident, an affidavit in the case states.

Lacy admitted to hitting Walker over the head with a fireplace poker and
telling him to go into the bedroom and open a safe, according to court
documents. Lacy initially refused to identify a friend he claimed hit
Walker twice in the head with a metal bar from a weightlifting set, the
affidavit states.

Lacy retrieved a gasoline container from a detached garage and dumped the
gasoline on the bed before setting the fire, court documents state.

Lacy later identified his friend as Laswell.

Laswell said the 2 men went to Walker's house late Aug. 29 or in the early
morning of Aug. 30. Lacy went to the kitchen area and returned with the
poker and struck Walker over the head, court documents state. Laswell said
Lacy got the keys to the safe from Walker and went into the bedroom and
returned, asking Walker where some guns were, according to the affidavit.

Lacy, while holding a gun in his right hand and the poker in his left
hand, followed Walker into the bedroom, where Lacy and Walker began
struggling over the gun, court documents state. Laswell admitted to then
hitting Walker over the head twice with a weight-set bar, the affidavit
states.

Laswell claims Lacy then stabbed Walker in the chest with the fireplace
poker several times, according to the affidavit.

Laswell said he was waiting in the car when Lacy came out of the residence
and told him he set the house on fire, court documents state.

The 2 men went to Beaver Lake, where they cleaned off in the water and
threw the fireplace poker and shovel into the lake. They also burned their
clothes and Walker's wallet after taking $ 20 from it, the affidavit
states.

Lacy and Laswell are being held without bond in the Benton County Jail.

(source: Northwest Arkansas News)