Feb. 14 OHIO: Former Prosecutor Says Ohio's Death Penalty System Works Bob Desanto says safeguards are in place to prevent the innocent from making it as far as the death chamber. The former Ashland County Prosecutor says Ohio's death penalty system works. Bob Desanto says safeguards are in place to prevent the innocent from making it as far as the death chamber. Desanto's talk at the Hawkins-Conard Student Center at Ashland University is part of the university's "Dead Man Walking" Project. This discourse on capital punishment will bring nationally known death penalty opponent Sister Helen Prejean to the Ashland campus next week. Ashland University's theatre department is producing the play, "Dead Man Walking" written by actor Tim Robbbins and based on the book by Sister Prejean. She will present a lecture and book signing on Saturday Feb.23 at 3 p.m. (source: WMFD News) TENNESSEE: Christian, Newsom suspect to face death penalty, trials still a year away It will be nearly a year before one of the accused murderers of Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom goes to trial. On Thursday, Judge Richard Baumgartner set Letalvis Cobbins' trial date for January 26th, 2009. Cobbins, Lemaricus Davidson, George Thomas, and Vanessa Coleman are all charged in connection with the young couple's murders. In the court room, the parents of the 2 victims never seemed to take their eyes off of the suspects. Vanessa Coleman was the 1st to be called in, and District Attorney Randy Nichols immediately turned in an intent to seek the death penalty against her. Colemans trial date has not yet been set for her yet, but she'll be back in court March 3rd to take up scheduling issues. Letalvis Cobbins, 25, will also face the death penalty in his trial, which Judge Baumgartner moved from May 12th to January 26th, 2009. Because Cobbins is the 1st of the 4 separate trials, the other 3 suspects also will not likely face trial until 2009. Judge Baumgartner said while the trial seems a long ways away, a capitol punishment case is not something you can rush, and it's typical for some trials to take up to 4 years to prepare. He went on to say the trial will take place in Knox County, but he won't decide on where the jury will come from until April 24th. Eric Boyd will go to trial in federal court on April 7th. He is accused of sheltering Lemaricus Davidson in a North Knoxville home right after last January's deadly carjacking. Davidson and George Thomas were not in court on Thursday, but have a hearing scheduled for March 3rd. (source: WVLT News) ****************** Prosecutors want death penalty for female defendant in carjacking murders ---- Murder trials move closer for 2 suspects accused of killing a young Knox County couple. Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom were carjacked and murdered in January 2007. Vanessa Coleman and Letalvis Cobbins are 2 of the 4 that face a number of charges, including murder. Both Coleman and Cobbins had a motions hearing Thursday morning. District Attorney Randy Nichols dropped a bombshell at the beginning of Venessa Coleman's hearing. Nichols told the judge that the state will seek the death penalty for Coleman. After that development, her motions hearing was reset for March. Judge Richard Baumgartner ruled on more than 80 different motions in Latalvis Cobbins's hearing. One decision not made is whether there should be a change of venue. "There have been demonstrations in this case, rallies and so forth. We expect that there will be more," Kimberly Parton, Cobbins's attorney told the judge. "How can we say that the people in this jurisdiction can't be fair to a defendant without even asking them, judge?" asked District Attorney Randy Nichols. "How do we do that?" Judge Baumgartner plans to rule on the change of venue in an upcoming hearing. Cobbins's attorney also accused law enforcement officials of raiding her client's jail cell, taking legal documents. The judge ruled that any handwritten letters from Cobbins to his attorney not be taken. The Knox County Sheriff's Department said the cell was raided prior to a court appearance, which is policy. They also said no legal documents were taken. Cobbins's trial is set for January 2009. He is also facing the death penalty. (source: WBIR News) IDAHO: Former Idaho Death Row Inmate Convicted in Retrial of Murdering Texas Couple A jury has convicted former death row inmate Mark Lankford of killing a Texas couple in 1983 in north Idaho. Lankford was granted a new trial after the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled he must be retried or released because of a jury instruction error in his 1st trial. Jurors in Wallace, Idaho, deliberated not quite 4 hours before finding Lankford guilty of 2 counts of 1st-degree murder in the beating deaths of 27-year-old U.S. Marine Capt. Robert Bravence, and his 24-year-old wife, Cheryl Bravence. Lankford and his younger brother, Bryan Lankford, were convicted of the deaths in 1984. Mark Lankford was sentenced to death; Bryan Lankford is serving a life sentence. (source: Fox News) PENNSYLVANIA: Journalist on Death Row----Interview with Mumia Abu-Jamal Mumia Abu-Jamal, a journalist and black activist who exposed corruption in the Philadelphia police department, is among the best known of America's 3,500 death row inmates. For years, lawyers have been fighting to overturn his 1982 murder conviction. They argue that Abu-Jamal was condemned due to his skin colour and undue influence from the powerful Fraternal Order of Police. Abu-Jamal and his chief lawyer, Robert Bryan, are currently awaiting a decision from the U.S. Court of Appeals in Philadelphia on their request for a new trial. If a re-trial is ordered, many believe it will be one of the most sensational in U.S. legal history. In this rare interview from Pennsylvania's death row, Abu-Jamal talks about being a journalist on death row with IPS correspondent Adrianne Appel and radio journalist John Grebe. "Writing from a radical and populist, black liberation point of view, never left me," he says, "We do truly live in amazing times, times that are challenging, times that are dangerous -- but also times that are inspiring." IPS: Through your radio broadcasts and columns about politics, race, black liberation and the death penalty, you have continued to be a leader for those on the left, and I suspect an inspiration to those in prison and on death row. Do you hear from others on death row? MUMIA ABU-JAMAL: I do actually receive letters from guys literally all around the country and -- truth be told -- around the world. Some express solidarity, many request to correspond, some just ask questions on history because they've heard of my history with the black liberation movement. I know that many people on death row are projected as monsters and really evil people. The fact of the matter is, most of the people I've met, I've heard about, or know about on death row are on death row because of their poverty. If they were men or women of means and could have afforded a decent defence at their trials, many wouldn't be in jail. And if they were not in jail, they wouldn't be on death row. IPS: You have great support in Europe but not here in the U.S. What accounts for this difference? MAJ: The [U.S.] media has really been an adversary and not an aide. The struggle waxes and wanes, ebbs and flows. IPS: Public sentiment here seems to be shifting away from the death penalty, especially in light of the 126 people who have so far been exonerated -- 6 in Pennsylvania. Have you and your legal team sensed any change in attitude towards your case -- more openness to the idea that you did not receive a fair trial? MAJ: I can't say that I have. How do you gauge such a thing? There are many people who -- because of what they read in the paper -- firmly believe I am no longer on death row. I have read articles to that effect. Unfortunately, those articles are misleading. I have never left death row for one day. I am on death row. IPS: Are you confident you will receive a fair trial this time? MAJ: I've learned not to be in the business of prediction. That's a risky business. We're certainly working toward that end and I'm certainly hopeful. But I'm not in the prediction game. IPS: Of the 35 states with a death penalty, conditions on Pennsylvania's death row are among the most inhumane. The 228 death row inmates are kept in solitary confinement 23 hours a day in small cells. You are kept shackled when not in your cell, even in the shower. You are not allowed physical contact with visitors, with no one at all. How does this affect you? MAJ: It affects how you interact with family and friends, staff people, females. It affects everything. Years ago in Huntington [another prison], I was taken to a dentist. As I was coming back and crossing the central portion of the prison, there were several hundred men walking toward their dining area. Because it had been so many years that I had been away from a large mass of people I froze, I just froze. The guard with me pushed my back and said, "C'mon Jamal", but I couldn't move. I was so stunned to be in the presence of hundreds of guys. I hadn't been around a group for so many years. I didn't know how to interact with that situation. For years I had lived in a cell or in a cage by myself. John Grebe: As a young, working reporter what inspired you? MAJ: My life as a writer on the staff of the Black Panther newspaper. Just learning from people in the ministry of information of the [Black Panther] Party, that really did inspire me -- even when I left the party, when it fell apart in disarray -- that part of my life, writing from a radical and populist, black liberation point of view. It never left me. I learned some important lessons. When I talk to people in the biz I say I'm glad I never went to journalism school. IPS: You've written 5 books from death row and produce weekly radio commentaries. Why do you still speak out? MAJ: It's still interesting. We do truly live in amazing times, times that are challenging, times that are dangerous -- but also times that are inspiring. We have a government that for all intents and purposes now says that torture is cool. We have secret prisons, so-called black sites, where people from all around the world are held in the name of the United States of America -- whose names you cannot know. People who are tortured. I feel compelled to write because they move me. I'm still a writer, an author, a journalist. They touch me. I would be remiss if I did not write about those things. If you recall, after 9/11 quite a few of the journalistic mainstays in this country did not write about those things. They endorsed the war, they supported the war. They came with what some people would call a mimeograph service for the state. I chose not to take that role. IPS: Pennsylvania death row has twice as many black people on it as white people, something that does not reflect the makeup of the population in Pennsylvania. What does this say about the courts in Pennsylvania? MAJ: It says much about the courts in Philadelphia as opposed to Pennsylvania. Philly [Philadelphia] is a national leader in the death penalty business. Many cases that would be considered third degree or even volunteer manslaughter, or not guilty in other counties, become 1st degree [murder] or death [penalty] cases in Philly. That's because the political system in Philly has been formed around the death penalty. Anyone who doesn't believe in the death penalty is automatically excluded from the jury. Well that's a different kind of jury. It's profoundly unfair at its very foundation. If you pick a jury that is fundamentally unfair, you can only get a fundamentally unfair result. JG: Do you currently have communication with people in the black liberation movement? MAJ: There are many elders who I do hear from. They're wonderful brothers and sisters. Many are no longer with us. But some of them are. I delight in having contact with many of those people. (source: IPS News)
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----OHIO, TENN., IDAHO, PENN.
Rick Halperin Thu, 14 Feb 2008 22:01:33 -0600 (Central Standard Time)
