Sept. 10
VIRGINIA:
Va. prosecutor preparing to retry man whose death penalty conviction was
overturned
A Prince William County prosecutor says his office is preparing to retry a
former death row inmate whose conviction was overturned on accusations of
government misconduct.
Justin Wolfe was recently released from Virginia's death row and transferred to
the Manassas jail. He had been sentenced to death for a drug-related slaying in
2001.
Earlier this year, though, a federal judge tossed out his conviction and death
sentence. A federal appeals court said prosecutors wrongly withheld information
from Wolfe's lawyers that would have helped him at trial.
At a status hearing Monday in Manassas, a judge set a Friday bail hearing for
Wolfe. After the hearing, senior Prince William prosecutor Rick Conway told
reporters that preparations are under way for a retrial.
Wolfe's parents want the case dropped entirely.
(source: Associated Press)
OHIO:
Death penalty sought for 'piece of human garbage'
A man whose brother called him a "piece of human garbage" for allegedly killing
an East Price Hill man was indicted Monday for murder and could be executed.
Hamilton County prosecutors announced Monday the capital murder indictment of
Daniel Davis, 47, accused of killing John "Jack" Lauck in an Aug. 18 incident.
Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.
Lauck, 79, took pity on the former convict - Davis has a 1986 rape conviction
and 2 other convictions that earned him prison time - and gave him odd jobs to
do at his Purcell Avenue home. Prosecutors said Davis rewarded Lauck by robbing
him Aug. 18 to support his heroin addiction, killing Lauck in the process.
Lauck was stabbed in the neck and chest, strangled, repeatedly beaten and
stomped. Lauck's blood was found on Davis' shoe after the killing. Lauck,
knowing Davis was a former convict and in need of money, hired him to paint the
outside of Lauck's house.
"How sad it is when someone kind like Mr. Lauck tries to help someone like
Davis and then ends up brutally" killed, Prosecutor Joe Deters noted in a press
release.
(source: Cincinnati.com)
FLORIDA:
Car lot murderer asks judge for death penalty
William Davis III, the convicted murderer who told a Seminole County jury last
month that he wanted the death penalty, today took the witness stand and asked
the judge for the same thing.
"I cannot sit here in good conscience and knowing what I've done, what
everybody here is aware of, I can't sit here and ask you with a straight face
to give me life in prison. I can't and I won't. Quite frankly, I think that
it's rather asinine for anybody in this position to actually be given the
alternative of life in prison," he said.
His words were directed to Circuit Judge John Galluzzo, who must now decide
whether to give Davis life in prison or the death penalty.
The judge said he would announce his decision Dec. 3.
Davis, 34, was in court today, taking advantage of his last chance to put on
evidence before sentencing.
He abducted 19-year-old Fabiana Malave from Super Sport Auto, a car lot on U.S.
Highway 17-92 near Longwood, in 2009.
He forced her at knifepoint to drive to his Orlando home, where he raped then
strangled her, according to his confession to a Seminole County deputy. He then
loaded her body into his SUV, covered it with a garbage bag and blanket and was
captured after deputies spotted his vehicle near the dealership where the
violence began.
He pled insanity, but a jury in May convicted him of 1st-degree murder,
kidnapping and armed rape. Last month, the same jury recommended the death
penalty after Davis asked for it.
He told its members he does not want to spend the next 40 to 50 years in
prison.
A psychiatrist and psychologist earlier testified that Davis is bipolar and
suffers from a borderline personality disorder. He takes medication, he told
the jury, and it keeps his symptoms in check.
Most people who now know him, he said today, "are just dumbfounded that I would
be not only involved in something like this, but I would actually do something
like this. However, here again, I know how I am when I'm off my medication. . .
It never fails. Once I get to feeling better, I quit taking it. When I quit
taking it, bad things happen. . . At some point something's going to happen,
and I'm going to go completely off the handle."
After he asked the jury to give him the death penalty, Seminole County jailers
"put me in the suicide cell," he told the judge today. "They told me I was
nuts."
But he feels even more strongly - "110 %," he said - about what sentence he
should get. "I realize it's not an easy thing for you to sit there -- and think
that basically you have my life in your hands. I know that you have to give --
great weight to what the jury says," he said. "However, I do hope that you will
give more than great weight to the jury recommendation."
Despite his request, defense attorney Tim Caudill asked the jury for a life
sentence.
The only other witness at today's hearing was the defendant's brother, Andrew
Davis, a North Carolina lawyer, who testified by phone.
He said their father was a harsh disciplinarian who would punish his sons far
beyond reason.
Andrew Davis said that one winter morning, when he was a child, he forgot to
put on mittens and his father "gave me the spanking of my life."
His father commonly displayed anger that seemed to come out of nowhere, he
said. It was often triggered by a small ordeal.
That is a trait the defendant also has, he said.
The victim's mother and sister sat through the hearing.
What Davis has to say, said mother Gioconda Rodriguez, does not matter.
(source: Orlando Sentinel)
ARIZONA:
Phoenix serial killer waives death sentence appeals
On July 12, the Arizona Supreme Court upheld the death sentence of convicted
Phoenix serial killer Dale Hausner. Following the high court's ruling, Hausner
sent a hand-written letter to the Supreme Court asking that all future appeals
regarding his death sentence be waived and the warrant for his execution be
issued. A copy of the letter was posted by azcentral.com.
Dubbed the "Serial Shooters" by the local media, Hausner and his roommate
Samuel J. Dieteman prowled the streets of Phoenix and several surrounding
cities from May 2005 to August 2006 shooting animals, pedestrians and
bicyclists. The stealth attacks generally took place under the cover of
darkness between 10:00 p.m. and 3:00 a.m. The pair was arrested at their Mesa
apartment by a Phoenix Police task force just before midnight on August 2,
2006.
Dieteman pled guilty on April 4, 2008 to two of the murders and testified
against Hausner during the trial. In exchange for his cooperation with
authorities Dieteman, 37, was sentenced to life in prison.
Following a series of 5 grand jury indictments, Hausner was tried in Maricopa
County Superior Court on eight counts of 1st Degree Murder and 80 other
offenses including Conspiracy to Commit Murder, Aggravated Assault, Drive-by
Shootings, Animal Cruelty and Arson.
Hausner's jury trial began on Sep. 3, 2008 before Judge Roland Steinle and
lasted more than 6 months. On March 13, 2009 the jury found Dale Hausner guilty
on 6 of the murder charges. 2 weeks later the same jury imposed the death
penalty on Hausner for his part in the murders. The jury also found Hausner
guilty on 74 other crimes including the shooting-related charges that wounded
18 people, several dogs and a horse. Judge Steinle also sentenced Hausner to 2
life sentences and more than 900 years in prison.
The pair's string of violence escalated from shooting animals to people between
May-June 2005. Hausner's earliest confirmed victim was David Estrada, 20, who
was shot to death in Tolleson on June 29, 2005. Hausner and Dieteman???s final
victim was Robin Blasnek, 22, who was fatally shot as she walked down the
street near Gilbert and Brown in Mesa around 11:15 p.m. on July 30, 2006.
By spring 2006, police homicide investigators and the Phoenix Police Crime Lab
forensically linked the series of shootings through evidence collected at the
different crime scenes. While the shooters' identities remained unknown at the
time, police concluded they were dealing with a serial killer - or killers as
they would eventually learn.
According to Phoenix police reports, an informant told investigators that
Hausner and Dieteman self-described their random, yet deliberate, shootings as
"RRV" or "random recreational violence." Other police reports indicate that
ballistic tests confirmed that Hausner and Dieteman initially used a .22 cal
rifle in their shooting spree, but later switched to .410 and 12 gauge
shotguns.
Phoenix Police reports show that investigators forensically linked Hausner and
Dieteman to 2 earlier Phoenix shootings, but the jury acquitted them on those
charges. Tony Mendez, 38, was shot to death on May 17, 2005 while riding his
bike in west Phoenix, and Reginald Remillard, 56, was fatally wounded on May
24, 2005 as he slept on a bus bench near 700 W. Camelback Rd.
In his letter to the Arizona Supreme Court dated July 12, 2012, Hausner wrote
that he did not want any further appeals filed on his behalf by his team of
defense lawyers. Hausner's letter indicates he had already been evaluated by 2
psychologists who both found him to be of sound mind and capable of making
decisions for himself. In the letter Hausner wrote, "I want to be served with
my death warrant and to be executed as soon as possible."
A hearing has been scheduled for Oct. 8 in Maricopa County Superior Court to
determine whether Hausner is competent to waive his appeal rights. Judge
Steinle is scheduled to preside over the competency hearing and Hausner will be
represented by Tucson lawyer Julie Hall.
(source: The Examiner)
CALIFORNIA:
The Bee's past stands on the death penalty
"Some of the advocates of the abolition of capital punishment declare hanging
has not checked murders in California. Hanging has not been given a fair trial
in this state." - Sept. 23, 1912
"Gov. Edmund G. Brown has made a dispassionate and sincere appeal to the
Legislature for a moratorium on capital punishment in California. But as
dispassionate and sincere as his message may be, it makes an unconvincing case
for suspending or repealing the death penalty." - Feb. 4, 1963
"The voters were clearly of the opinion, in voting last November, the death
penalty is a necessary deterrent of last resort. No one really relishes the
thought of capital punishment. But in an era of increasing violence and
terrorism it is wrong to rule out the death penalty entirely as a deterrent and
to make it unavailable in extreme cases." - Aug. 27, 1973
"Hardly any nation on earth executes the young or the retarded. We preach our
constitutional protections to the rest of the world. Those protections are
badly flawed if they allow the state to execute a person who cannot possibly
understand the full consequences of his acts." - June 28, 1989
"There can be little argument that if any crime demands the death penalty, this
one does. (Timothy) McVeigh's workday bombing was calculated to inflict maximum
loss of life. With long premeditation and coldblooded deliberation, he brought
horrible death and the gravest damage to children and adults alike - innocents
caught in the terrible distortions of his mind." - June 14, 1997
"In declaring execution of the retarded 'cruel and unusual punishment' and
therefore unconstitutional, the U.S. Supreme Court has strengthened the moral
underpinnings of capital punishment and reconnected the United States to the
civilized nations of the world." - June 25, 2002
"A narrow majority of the U.S. Supreme Court has wisely and compassionately
ruled that the execution of defendants who were 17 and younger when they
committed capital crimes is a violation of the Constitution's Eighth Amendment
prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment ...The decision continues a
recent high court trend that has properly narrowed who can be sentenced to
death in this country." - March 4, 2005
"In California, the death penalty is conceptual. There simply are too many
smart attorneys who can mount too many arguments that will persuade too many
judges to place executions on hold. So long as we retain this broken system,
taxpayers will be condemned to pay the price - in this instance, about $500
million for a new death row." - Aug. 15, 2010
(source: Sacramento Bee)
NORTH CAROLINA:
Death row inmate re-sentenced for 1993 Food Lion murders
A man serving on North Carolina's death row for his role in the shooting deaths
of 2 Food Lion employees nearly 19 years ago was resentenced to life in prison
Monday after prosecutors said they will no longer pursue the case to get his
execution carried out.
Elmer Ray McNeill Jr., 42, was convicted in 1996 of 1st-degree murder in the
deaths of Michael Truelove, 20, and John Ray, 27, who were closing the north
Raleigh grocery store when they were each shot in the back of the head during a
robbery on the night of Sept. 19, 1993.
McNeill was sentenced to death but a federal court, in 2009, reversed the
sentence, finding that his defense was constitutionally inadequate because it
failed to uncover and present evidence at trial that McNeill suffered from
depression and physical and childhood sexual abuse.
The state initially announced it wanted a new sentencing hearing, but Wake
County District Attorney Colon Willoughby recently said he would be satisfied
with a life sentence, according to the American Civil Liberties Union, which
represents McNeill.
"Given the circumstances of this case, life is certainly the appropriate
sentence," said Jonathan Broun of the Center for Death Penalty Litigation, who
also represented McNeill. "We applaud the district attorney for recognizing
that truth and for upholding justice."
McNeill was 1 of 2 men convicted in the case.
His older brother, Robert Anthony McNeill, 44, was sentenced to life in prison
for the crimes after a jury failed to reach a unanimous decision on whether he
should have been put to death for the crimes.
Prosecutors argued that Elmer McNeill shot Truelove and that Robert McNeill,
who worked at the store, at the intersection of Six Forks and Strickland roads,
plotted the killings and robbery.
(source: WRAL News)
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